Kaijin Fighter: So I Have to Make Monsters, So What?-Chapter 1370: Fighting in the Fire Room

SKRAW!

"BAH!"

Before Zhen Liu could fire off an attack and interrupt Delictum, the owl Kaijin proved himself to be a touch faster.

Delictum released a pair of [Chaos]-infused projectiles from his arm cannons and impacted Zhen Liu right in the gut.

While his [Regalia]-[Stigma] combination was strong enough to prevent penetration and insides becoming outsides, Zhen Liu still felt as if he just gotten kicked in the stomach by an angry mule as he got knocked to the ground and was forced to make a sliding entrance into the smelter room cavern.

While Dante and his horde of kaijin were on the hunt for Zhen Liu’s wild imaginary goose, the kaijin left at the mines had made sure to keep the fires going and that all of the harvested [Malevolent Gold] ore was properly smelted down into gold bars.

As such, Zhen Liu found himself sliding into a burning hot room that was absolutely lousy with malicious energy.

Zhen Liu didn’t let this sudden change in environment and atmosphere keep him down for long, though.

Mid-slide, Zhen Liu released a jet of flames that pushed him off of the ground and gave him the chance to get back on his feet.

[Magam Ram!]

Instead of sliding to a complete stop on his feet, though, Zhen Liu immediately released another jet of flames from his feet in order to charge at Delictum.

At the same time, he began to concentrate [Chaos] and aether around his shoulder, arms, and head in order to create a thick layer of magma around his armored form.

Delictum didn’t even have time to fully register that Zhen Liu had reoriented himself before he found himself getting tackled by a walking ball of magma.

[GRK!]

[Eat it!]

Unfortunately, Delictum was angled in such a way that when he got tackled he wasn’t embedded into a wall. Instead, the lucky fuck was simply sent higher into the air and given a chance to recover.

The owl-like kaijin wiped the blood dripping from the side of his mouth, surprised at the injury.

[A pity. I wanted to crush your wings when I tackled you so that you wouldn’t be able to escape,] Zhen Liu growled with a disguised voice. [Looks like your bones are tougher than anticipated.]

[Feelings mutual,] Delictum growled as he finished wiping away the blood. [I thought I could do the boss a favor by piercing through your guts and giving him an easy target to jam one of his weird rat rockets into. I know that tougher skinned bastards like you have rather soft insides.]

[Do I look like a turtle?]

[No, you sound like a bitch, though,] Delictum retorted.

...

[Okay, that was clever,] Blazejudicator admitted.

’Don’t praise the enemy.’

[You could threaten to pluck him?] Nepherage suggested.

...

[That said, you’re not my objective anyways so I’m cool with leaving whiny bitches where they lie,] Delictum continued, [with that said, here’s ember in your eyes!]

With a hearty flap of his wings, Delictum released a gust of wind that kicked up very loose bit of dust, ash, ember, and soot that filled the room and into Zhen Liu’s eyes.

This attack did physically less than nothing to Zhen Liu, thanks to the fact that he was wearing a fully formed helmet around his head. However, the attack did cause Zhen Liu to instinctively flinch in order to protect his eyes.

This momentarily flinch was all Delictum needed to finish his task.

Under the cover of his own cloud, Delictum darted about the room and scooped several golden orbs that had just been formed that day and proceeded to dart out of the room.

But not before launching yet another flurry of feathers in Zhen Liu’s direction, prompting him to unleash a burst of flames to burn away the attack.

[Wait a minute-Hey!]

By the time Zhen Liu realized what had just occurred, it was too late.

Delictum was already out of the cave and flying back towards Dante.

Zhen Liu was about to fly after the owl-like kaijin, the heat of battle making him temporarily forget his original objective.

However, the moment he stepped on the threshold of the cave, Zhen Liu immediately turned around and ran back inside while cursing like a sailor.

Why?

Because before he could place himself in the line of fire, Corpse Doll and Porcelain Doll delivered to him one hell of a warning.

[Incoming missile barrage!]

[Take cover, Caretaker!]

’OF FUCKING-wait...is he seriously burying his source of power?!’

...What happened?!...

[I got the cores, boss!]

[Same here!]

[Excellent.]

After being issued their orders, Delictum and Gumba had only been gone for less than a minute to acquire the [Cores] from the smelting room and the storage room, respectively.

In their arms were several dozen golden spheres that radiated with incredibly evil auras.

[Oh hey, boss, you’re not gonna believe this, but I found the enemy lord,] Delictum reported to Dante. [He’s in the smelting room as we speak.]

[Oh? In that case...] Dante trailed off as he leveled his [Apostasy] in the direction Delictum just flew in from, priming several rockets at the same time. [Why don’t we give him some time to appreciate my old source of power?]

...Uh oh...

Evidently, Zhen Liu’s decision to retreat to the back of the smelting cavern was a prudent one.

No sooner that he rushed to the back of the cave, a volley of short-range rockets hammered the entrance to the smelter room and collapsed it into rubble.

Had Zhen decided to rush out, he would’ve been peppered with a barrage of missiles laced with enough [Chaos] and aether than he would’ve been the one rendered into rubble.

"Ugh..."

Thankfully, all he had to deal with was a slightly shaken dome and maybe a bruise or two.

At least, that was his initial problem.

"Alright, a cave-in isn’t the worst thing in the world," Zhen Liu grumbled as he got back to his feet. "Nepherage and I can simply use an aether art to smash the rubble after I get over to the —"

CRACK!

"Oh, balls."

Thanks to the faint illumination provided by the burning probe behind him, Zhen Liu could see that the ground beneath his feet was starting to crack like it was an adventure movie.

"Nepherage. Blazejudicator. You guys traveled through the little tunnels that criss cross the mines. Do you know if there’s anything directly beneath this cavern?"

[Unfortunately, yes,] Nepherage answered. [You know how you wanted us to find someplace safe to keep the civilian slaves and braindead ones?]

"Yes..."

[We figured that the old mines, which are directly beneath us, would be safe enough,] Blazejudicator elaborated. [Except we didn’t factor in the possibility of Dante packing explosive abilities.]

’Oh no...’

Understanding what was going to come next, Zhen Liu stopped worrying about himself, since he could take a hit, and swung his attention towards the burning Voyager-1 Probe.

"What are the chances that whatever magical force prevented this thing from burning up in Valresta’s atmosphere is still present?" Zhen Liu asked Nepherage and Blazejudicator while fully expecting the answer.

[Low.]

[Very.]

"Figured—FUCK!"

Immediately after this observation was made, the ground finally gave way and Zhen Liu found himself lunging towards the Voyager-1 Probe as they both fell into a dark abyss.

...Now back to the bad guys...

Dante, Gumba, and Delictum didn’t immediately jump back into the fray once the latter received the [Cores].

Instead, Dante had instructed the duo to follow him as they flew over to where they buried their dead slaves.

Well,where they dumped their bodies at least.

[Wait, boss,] Gumba piped up once his single brain cell managed to notice something odd. [Why do we need these cores? We don’t have any beasts to uplift, and the prison cavern isn’t in this direction. Don’t you need either of those to make more of us?]

[You’re asking that now?] Delictum chided his stupid kindred. [How are you not the embodiment of Ignorance?]

[I don’t know.]

[Yes, that’s normally correct,] Dante replied in a weirdly condescending tone. [I have been using nothing but aether beasts all this time in order to our ranks, but they’re starting to get harder and harder to find around here. Well, ones worth a damn anyways. As for the humans, that was a viable path but...I have come to realize that doing so would be rather wasteful.]

[Wasteful?] Delictum and Gumba releated in a confused tone.

[I mean, we need mortal slaves to mine out all of our precious metals,] Dante explained. [And if we turn them into Kaijin, they won’t want to work.]

Eventually, the trio arrived to the corpse pit’s entrance, the scent fo rot tickling their nostrils.

The smell invigorated something in Dante, so much so that his voice noticeably changed once more.

[But what if we could work them to death and then use their bodies as Kaijin instead? After all, If I can make zakos from corpses, what’s stopping me from making Kaijin from those exact same sources?]