Chapter 398

Haruto activated his flight magic and rapidly approached one of the Megalodons swimming through the sky.

The enormous sharklike monster had barely noticed his approach when he appeared directly above its head.

Haruto raised his hand and struck it with his palm.

Before the creature could react, he immediately transferred its entire body into the Gourmet Restaurant.

That was one ingredient secured.

Meanwhile, Kagura had already selected her own target.

She raised her wind fan and swung it sharply.

A concentrated wind blade tore through the air, piercing straight through a Megalodon’s head and killing it instantly.

However, Kagura didn’t allow the enormous creature to plummet toward the ground.

Currents of wind immediately wrapped around its body, supporting its weight and preventing the valuable meat from being damaged by the fall.

Not far away, Kanna was dealing with another Megalodon.

She raised her head and fixed her gaze upon the monster.

The creature’s enormous silhouette appeared reflected within her eyes.

Then Kanna activated her ability.

The Megalodon’s soul was drawn directly into her eyes, and the enormous monster immediately lost all signs of life.

Gardevoir reacted without hesitation.

Using Psychic, she caught the lifeless Megalodon in midair and carefully lowered it to the ground.

Their methods were completely different, but all three had one thing in common: they were remarkably effective at preserving the quality of their prey.

After all, Haruto had specifically instructed them not to ruin the meat.

The battle against the Megalodons ended surprisingly quickly.

Before long, all thirteen flying sharks had been killed.

Haruto and his three companions managed to secure six of them, while Benimaru and the others eliminated the remaining seven.

That wasn’t particularly surprising.

Rimuru’s forces had considerably more fighters than Haruto’s small group, so their overall efficiency was naturally higher.

Still, six Megalodons were a very respectable harvest.

With the accompanying monsters eliminated, only Charybdis remained in the sky.

Haruto looked up at the enormous creature, his eyes filled with anticipation.

"All right. Time to deal with the main course."

He stretched his arms and legs briefly before turning toward Rimuru, who was standing a short distance away.

"Rimuru, if possible, I’d like you to hold off on attacking for a little while."

Although Rimuru couldn’t currently kill Charybdis outright, he was certainly capable of injuring it.

Unfortunately, those injuries might interfere with what Haruto intended to accomplish.

The others weren’t much of a concern.

Charybdis possessed Mana Jamming, which severely interfered with magical attacks. Most of the other fighters would have difficulty inflicting meaningful damage on it.

Rimuru blinked at Haruto’s request.

Then, after considering it briefly, he nodded.

"All right. But there’s one condition."

He glanced toward the town behind them.

"If the village is threatened, I’ll intervene immediately. I can’t risk everyone’s safety."

"No problem."

Haruto smiled.

"Thanks. I appreciate it."

With that settled, he drew his kitchen knife, Myriad Worlds, and flew toward Charybdis.

The enormous monster immediately reacted to his approach.

Its body shifted slightly, and a barrage of deadly scales shot toward him.

Haruto calmly adjusted his flight path, weaving between the projectiles with remarkable ease.

None of them managed to touch him.

Within moments, he had closed the distance and reached Charybdis’s enormous body.

Then he began to cook it.

Swish! Swish! Swish!

Myriad Worlds flashed repeatedly through the air.

Each movement left a carefully positioned cut across Charybdis’s body.

The wounds weren’t particularly small by ordinary standards, but compared with the creature’s immense size, they were practically insignificant.

None penetrated deeply enough to cause serious damage.

In fact, the attacks were so superficial relative to Charybdis’s enormous body that the monster barely seemed to notice them.

Haruto continued flying around it, his knife moving with extraordinary precision.

From the ground, however, the entire process looked rather strange.

Rimuru watched for a while before finally voicing his confusion.

"Uh... What’s he doing?"

He tilted his head.

"I mean, he’s definitely cutting Charybdis, but those wounds hardly count as injuries, do they?"

More importantly, Haruto’s movements didn’t resemble those of someone engaged in a conventional battle.

He wasn’t attempting to overpower Charybdis or strike a vital point.

Instead, he seemed to be making deliberate, carefully measured cuts across different sections of its body.

"Let me have a look!"

Milim, who had been watching nearby, was equally curious.

She activated her Milim Eye, the extraordinary draconic vision that allowed her to perceive things ordinary eyes could never detect.

"Hmm?"

A moment later, her eyes widened in surprise.

Through her enhanced vision, Milim could clearly observe the magicules circulating within Charybdis’s enormous body.

Ordinarily, those magicules moved in a chaotic, disordered fashion.

Their currents constantly collided and shifted, following no particularly stable pattern.

However, something unusual was happening around the areas Haruto had cut.

The direction of the magicule flow was changing.

Whenever the chaotic currents passed through one of his carefully positioned wounds, they were redirected along a particular route.

At first, the changes were subtle.

But as Haruto continued moving and making additional cuts, the altered currents gradually connected.

The magicules that had previously been circulating in disorder began following an increasingly organized pattern.

Instead of spreading throughout Charybdis’s body, they started converging toward a single location.

The base of its left wing.

More and more magical energy accumulated there.

The concentration continued rising as Haruto made further adjustments.

"Wait... He can actually do that?!"

Milim stared at Haruto in amazement.

He was deliberately changing the flow of magicules inside Charybdis’s body!

And he was accomplishing it through nothing more than a series of precise cuts.

What kind of strange technique was this?

Even Milim had never seen anyone manipulate another creature’s internal magicule circulation in such a manner.

Of course, there was a particular reason Haruto could accomplish something so unusual.

Charybdis’s consciousness was unstable and confused.

As a result, it couldn’t properly regulate the flow of magicules within its own body.

That weakness allowed Haruto to interfere with its internal circulation far more easily than he otherwise could have.

If he had attempted the same technique against an opponent with a clear mind and precise control over their magical energy, manipulating their magicule flow would have been vastly more difficult.

He certainly wouldn’t have been able to accomplish it so casually.

Nevertheless, the result was impressive.

Milim continued watching as Haruto’s figure flashed around the enormous monster, her eyes growing brighter with interest.

’This guy really is fascinating!’

Meanwhile, Haruto was approaching the final stage of his preparations.

He continued moving across Charybdis’s immense body, making one carefully calculated cut after another.

Gradually, a faint blue glow began appearing at the base of its left wing.

Initially, the light was barely noticeable.

However, as more magicules flowed into the area, it grew steadily brighter.

The soft blue radiance became increasingly concentrated, eventually forming a brilliant, deep-blue mass of light.

From a distance, it resembled an enormous sapphire embedded in the base of Charybdis’s wing.

Haruto finally stopped moving.

"Preparation complete."

He exhaled slowly.

A fine layer of sweat had appeared across his forehead.

Although the process might have looked effortless from a distance, redirecting such an enormous quantity of magicules had required tremendous concentration.

In fact, this technique was something Haruto had developed by building upon the cooking methods he’d previously used when processing the Air Fruit.

Since Charybdis’s flesh lacked sufficient nutritional value, he’d decided to concentrate the magicules within its body into a single area.

By doing so, he could transform one portion of its otherwise disappointing flesh into an exceptionally valuable ingredient.

Unfortunately, Charybdis was nothing like an Air Tree.

Its magicules were not only violent and chaotic, but also spread throughout an extraordinarily enormous body.

Guiding even a portion of that energy into one location had proven difficult.

Haruto himself felt that a little luck had been involved in successfully completing the process.

Fortunately, his efforts hadn’t been wasted.

He looked toward the brilliant blue mass at the base of Charybdis’s left wing, satisfaction appearing in his eyes.

An enormous concentration of magicules had gathered within that particular section of flesh.

At this point, it could reasonably be considered the very essence of Charybdis’s body.

’Now that’s an ingredient worth harvesting.’

The next instant, Haruto accelerated toward its left wing.

He approached the glowing section, raised Myriad Worlds, and swung.

Swish!

The blade traced a clean path around the edge of the deep-blue mass.

With a series of precise cuts, Haruto separated the concentrated section of flesh from the surrounding tissue.

A moment later, the piece containing an enormous quantity of Charybdis’s magicules came free.

However, the instant it was removed, Charybdis suddenly released a horrifying scream.

"ROOOOOAAAAARGH!"

The sound was piercing and distorted, reverberating throughout the surrounding sky.

Charybdis’s gigantic body began trembling violently.

Although the removed portion was relatively small compared with its overall size, the loss of such a concentrated mass of magicules had inflicted an extraordinarily severe injury.

Haruto could clearly sense that the creature’s aura had weakened considerably.

Unfortunately, his successful harvest had also thoroughly enraged it.

Charybdis’s enormous eye locked onto him.

A blazing beam of energy erupted from its gaze, shooting directly toward Haruto.

However, he had already anticipated that reaction.

Holding the glowing piece of flesh in one hand, Haruto swiftly shifted his position.

The beam passed harmlessly by as he descended away from Charybdis’s wing.

"Rimuru! I’ll leave the rest to you!"

He called down toward the ground before retreating to a safe distance.

Then, seemingly unconcerned by the raging monster behind him, Haruto began carefully examining the ingredient he’d just harvested.

He’d gone to considerable trouble to obtain this piece of meat.

Naturally, he intended to give it the attention it deserved when the time came to cook it.

"Seriously..."

Rimuru looked toward Haruto with a thoroughly helpless expression.

Then he glanced back at Charybdis.

The enormous monster was now visibly more furious than before, its movements increasingly violent.

’So he takes the best part and leaves me to deal with the angry monster?’

Rimuru couldn’t help sighing.

’Talk about dumping the whole mess on someone else!’

Still, complaining wouldn’t accomplish anything.

He quickly focused his attention on the enemy.

His blue slime body began changing shape, transforming into his humanoid form.

A pair of wings emerged from his back.

Then Rimuru took to the air and flew toward Charybdis.

He raised one hand.

A mass of black lightning erupted from his palm and shot toward the enormous monster.

BOOOOM!

The attack struck Charybdis directly.

Violent electrical energy tore into its flesh, opening an enormous wound across its body.

"It worked!"

Rimuru’s eyes brightened.

However, his excitement lasted only a moment.

Before he could celebrate, the wound began closing.

The damaged flesh rapidly regenerated at a speed visible to the naked eye.

Within only a few seconds, the enormous injury had completely disappeared.

Ultraspeed Regeneration!

Rimuru’s mouth twitched.

’Of course. I knew it wasn’t going to be that easy.’

He immediately prepared another attack.

"Fine, then let’s try again!"

Black lightning flashed through the sky once more.

Unfortunately, no matter how much damage Rimuru inflicted, Charybdis recovered almost immediately.

Its regenerative abilities were simply too powerful.

The situation was made even worse by its enormous size.

Rimuru could injure it, but the wounds he created were nowhere near sufficient to kill it.

Even sustained attacks seemed incapable of overcoming the monster’s extraordinary recovery.

’This isn’t going to work...’

Rimuru frowned as he dodged another incoming attack.

He desperately searched for a better strategy.

There had to be some way to deal with Charybdis without wasting all his energy on injuries that healed almost as quickly as he could inflict them.

However, while he was considering his options, something unexpected happened.

"M-Milim..."

A faint voice suddenly emerged from deep within Charybdis’s enormous body.

It was hoarse and distorted, filled with unmistakable resentment.

Although barely audible, the words reached Rimuru clearly.

"Miliiiim..."

Rimuru froze.

"...Huh?"

’Milim?’

’Did that thing just say Milim’s name?’

What was going on?

Why would Charybdis be calling for her?

Rimuru immediately instructed Great Sage to investigate.

The analysis soon revealed something surprising.

There was another life-form residing within Charybdis.

And that creature possessed an extraordinarily intense hatred and anger directed specifically toward Milim.

Rimuru was stunned.

Until now, he’d assumed that Charybdis had come after him because of Veldora.

After all, the Storm Dragon was inside his body, and Charybdis had originally been born from Veldora’s magicules.

It seemed perfectly reasonable to assume that the monster had been drawn toward him.

That was also why he’d agreed when Shion and the others insisted that Milim shouldn’t intervene.

They believed this was a problem their own settlement needed to resolve.

But now...

’Wait a second!’

’Charybdis wasn’t coming after me at all?!’

Rimuru suddenly felt as though he’d been worrying about the wrong thing from the very beginning.

He’d spent all this time fighting a terrifying monster under the assumption that he was its target.

And apparently, he’d been completely mistaken.

’So I’ve been fighting this thing for nothing?!’

After confirming Great Sage’s findings, Rimuru turned toward the distance.

Milim was standing beside Haruto.

However, she wasn’t paying the slightest attention to the ongoing battle.

Instead, her eyes were fixed on the glowing blue piece of meat Haruto had harvested from Charybdis.

Her gaze followed the ingredient with extraordinary concentration.

She was practically drooling.

Rimuru stared at the pair in silence.

"..."

He took a deep breath.

Then he shouted across the battlefield.

"Hey, Milim! I think this thing is actually looking for you!"

"Hmm?"

Milim finally tore her attention away from the delicious-looking ingredient.

She raised her head and looked toward Charybdis.

For a moment, she appeared confused.

Then she activated her Milim Eye once again.

Her enhanced vision penetrated Charybdis’s enormous body, revealing the life-form hidden within.

It was Phobio.

"Ohhh! So it’s that guy!"

Milim immediately understood.

She still remembered Phobio, the subordinate of Demon Lord Carrion whom she’d previously punched.

Apparently, he hadn’t forgotten the humiliation.

And now he’d become the host of Charybdis.

With that realization, Milim finally understood why the enormous monster had come here.

It really was looking for her.

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