Nathaniel pushed himself back as the creature fell down.
"Ughh! I guess my leg is broken."
He had saved his whole body from being crushed under the large head of the five-meter-tall creature, but he couldn't act early enough to save his legs.
After crashing his bulky body to the skeletal creature, Ulfred had grabbed the creature from its left leg, which was his best option at that moment.
As soon as the creature fell, the old man let go of its shinbone which was almost up to his own height and sprang above the creature with a fierce, skaldic expression on his face.
The creature's large head had a weight that Nathaniel couldn't handle, even though the dry bones could be deemed to have light enough weight. From where he fell and stuck, he hastily threw his Bonesword to Ulfred.
Without a word, Ulfred caught the sword in the air. They didn't need words to have a good rhythm in this fight, because they had talked briefly about possible scenarios before they acted.
Then, Nathaniel did the smartest thing he could do in his situation.
He held the lower jaw of the creature with both hands and pressed it firmly against its upper jaw. He wasn't sure how successful his act would be, his aim was to prevent the potential, guttural roar of the creature, that would be capable of ending the fight in one move.
"I don't want to experience that feeling ever again!" Nathaniel hissed through his creaking teeth. How much power he was exerting at the moment, was evident in his voice.
Ulfred and Nathaniel had quickly put their small plan into effect. As soon as the deadlock had ended, the old man was almost ready to attack the giant skeletal creature that now appeared to be vulnerable to the eyes.
In order to kill undead creatures, ordinary paths which have been followed in killing other living things could not be followed. The first thing to do was to quickly and most efficiently weaken the undead creature in question.
That's why, the old man's target was the waist part of its spine, the most critical point of a skeleton!
Ulfred grasped the Bonesword with both hands and attempted to thrust it into the spine of the giant skeleton, accompanied by a high-pitch battle-cry of concentration.
*Clank*
The old man pushed his muscles up to the limit and launched a torrent of sword blows on its spine.
*Clank*Clank*...*
With each blow, the broken small bone fragments were falling out and scattering around.
There was no one with any sword technique in their four-people small party. That was why, Ulfred, whose brute strength was the highest, was their best attack force. If he fails to succeed in this short-lived chance...
No! The old man had no other choice. No matter what, he must become successful. Failure meant death.
Somehow, the giant skeleton was again distracted after it had received Dante's kick. In fact, that was what gave Ulfred this short opportunity to strike.
It was obvious that the giant skeleton stripped of its earlier strength. However, it was not as if it would just die without a fight.
The skeleton turned its empty eye sockets toward Ulfred for the second time today, but this time, it had a passionate killing intent in the hollow pits on its head, unlike the first.
The giant skeleton wasn't struggling. On the contrary, it was lying still on the ground. The only person who felt its killing intent was also seemed to be Dante.
"Get down from there, old man! Right now!" Dante cried out with a hectic expression on his face.
Somewhere inside of him, he had been surprised, but the old man's huge body immediately stopped attacking, and as soon as he heard the voice of Dante, he threw himself to the left side of the creature as quickly as he could, without question.
*whoosh*
As Ulfred acted, something shaved his hair off. The old man didn't even know what happened. All he could feel was a strong wind that roughly rubbed her cheek, and all he could see was a few tufts of hair falling to the ground along with him.
The attack Ulfred had evaded by a hair's breadth, was a slap-like blow like the one he had received earlier, but the important point here was the speed and power of the latter.
An ugly expression formed itself on Dante's face. The gray glow covering the bones of the creature had been visibly diminished, but a serious slap from the creature was still strong enough to kill Ulfred before even he realized what had actually happened.
Wait... If the creature had really fallen from power, then why did the creature's present strength seem greater than the strength it used to attack Dante? Was it holding itself back while attacking Dante? If so... why?
'I can't understand anything about this thing anymore!'
Although Dante was thinking such, there was also an absurd possibility in his mind.
The creature immediately started to fight back after it had failed on its attack. Using its right arm, it got support from the ground and attempted to lift off its giant body. Nathaniel who was still attached to its head was nothing but a weight it did not even feel. Its intention seemed to get on its feet, but at this moment a crackling sound came from its waist, and the creature stopped moving.
Ulfred's efforts have not been in vain!
However, the fact that the gray glow began to intensify where the creature's trachea supposed to be, and the fact that it was still able to move its jaw as if there was no Nathaniel who was trying hard to hold it shut, turned the momentary joy of the trio into horror and shudder.
The creature was about to use its strange ability again!
While they were so close to the creature, and while its killing intent was at its highest level, if they were to become subjects to that strange roar, then this would undoubtedly be the end of the trio.
Just when the creature was about to use its ability, Dante did something crazy. After leaping suddenly, he grabbed the creature by two of its horns. Right now, Dante was right in front of the creature's face and was staring at its dark eye sockets.
His aim was not to attack, it was to gather the creature's attention on himself again, and in this way, he could also be sure of the absurd theory in his mind.
As soon as it had seen Dante this close to itself, the movements of the skeletal creature stopped once again. In addition, the creature's killing intent completely disappeared into thin air.
'Then why did you always attack me at that time?' thought Dante. There was a case of special treatment that was directed at himself. Now, he wasn't sure the creature's intent was to kill him.
"Ulfred. I don't care how you do. Just separate the flail from this creature. Immediately!" said Dante with a low but oppressive tone.
Dante knew that the real source of the creature's power was the skull-flail. When the gray glow surrounding its body first appeared, it spread out to the creature's body from the flail, and Dante saw that clearly.
The blood pond was nothing more than a catalyst for the creature to make use of its power more efficiently. In short, if they want to see tomorrow again, they had to separate the creature from both the blood pond and the skull-flail.
Ulfred didn't know how much time they had, so he acted without thinking.
"Don't ever think about touching the flail, Ulfred! This nonsense started with the touch of one of the newcomers. I saw it with my own eyes. Those who touched it shared the same fate as those who heard the roar of the creature!" Nathaniel hurriedly added.
Hearing this, Ulfred paused for a moment. While this was the case, striking with a sword repeatedly to the creature's arm or to its fingers wouldn't work. The skull-flail had to be separated from the creature in a clean way. Otherwise, the creature's attention could focus on Ulfred again while he was doing the deed.
The old man frowned, and interestingly enough, he let go of the Bonesword. Moving rapidly, he put his two legs between the forearm bones of the creature. With both hands, he grasped the forearm that situated above his feet, and with both his feet and hands he used all his strength to break the bones of the creature's forearms.
*Kaa*
One of the forearm bones of the creature instantly broke off from its elbow! Ulfred immediately took an appropriate position and twisted the remaining left forearm bone in the opposite direction with support from his body.
Due to the present deteriorated structure of the elbow, it was much easier to separate this last bone from the elbow, but at this moment, a tremor ran through the creature's body.
"Guuuuugrrrhhh!!!"
Suddenly, there was no trace from power left in the old man's arms, not even in his whole body. The forearm bone that he once firmly grasped slipped through his hands, and Ulfred, with a horrified look on his face, collapsed on his knees.
Nathaniel was still holding up the creature's jaw. He was aware that it wouldn't work, but that was the only option in which he could be slightly useful. However, as soon as he heard the roar of the skeletal creature, he fell down from a height of about three meters with an expression similar to that of Ulfred's on his face. Even though one of his legs was broken, he didn't feel any pain from the fall.
On the other hand, Dante was in front of the creature's face during the entire process of 'roar'.
When its arm was damaged, he saw the creature open his oddly shaped mouth wide. He saw the churning and boiling gray glow in its rib cage. However, he did not feel the air flow that should have been arisen from the roaring.
Because this wasn't a roar! First of all, a skeleton couldn't roar.
There was nothing Dante could do to get out of this situation. Since the creature was just under his nose, he would likely be more affected by this skill, compared to Ulfred and Nathaniel. So he chose to prepare himself for what's about to come.
He closed his eyes for a moment. When he opened them again, there was an expression of steel on his face.
Dante, "…"
The roar came to an end.
Dante, "???"
'What? Is that it? So it actually amounted to this much!' thought Dante.
Somehow, Dante wasn't even affected in the slightest by the creature's ability.
However, after seeing Ulfred and Nathaniel who had already turned into spasming vegetables, he recovered himself and acted immediately. He quickly grasped the remaining left forearm bone of the creature and exerted force in the opposite direction as Ulfred had done before.
The creature was always acting sluggish when it came to Dante. This time too, it was no different. It extended its right hand to Dante at a slow pace.
"Come... on... break..."
Dante was pushing himself enough to cause his face to become completely stained with red and to purple veins to make protrusions from his forehead.
His strength statistic was only half that of Ulfred. However, it didn't seem like enough to do the job.
Just at this moment, a pair of delicate hands appeared on the left forearm bone of the creature. Unexpectedly, Iona had come to help Dante. With a scared, at the same time, a serious expression, with a pair of teardrops that had not yet dropped at the edges of her eyes, she was trying to be the power of Dante as much as she could.
Dante was clearly surprised, but not surprised that she had come to help him. He was surprised that she was still able to move. Somehow, she also wasn't affected by the creature's ability.
However, Dante said nothing. Now it wasn't the time.
The creature's right hand was still slowly approaching Dante.
*Kaa!*
It was at this time that the long-awaited moment came and the creature's left elbow was completely destroyed!
The body of the creature was shaken with a strong tremor. As the gray glow surrounding its bones was rapidly and completely disappearing, it let out a bitter, hoarse howl that spread all over the crater.
The hand that stretched towards Dante was still on its way despite all of these. However, Dante instinctively drew away from the creature with frowns on his face.
A short time later, the gray glow surrounding the bones of the creature disappeared without a trace, and it completely stopped moving. It was dead.
Today, here, in The Lower Catacombs, a lot of things that Dante could not understand happened.
At the end of the day, he was looking at the lifeless body of this strange creature with pity in his heart.