With its new sword in its hands, and its body strengthened and bulked considerably, the draconid began to walk forward. The frost was still affecting it, so it wasn't moving quite as fast, but it probably didn't need to rely on speed anyway.

  The 'strength' provided by Shimia was a physical muscle strength, not just the vague concept of power that could present in ambiguous ways. The increase in muscle would decrease the flexibility. Plus, though the draconid was able to push off the frost that had grown on its body, this spell was continuous and would soon continue freezing the monster.

  But this time, it was cold enough that even Ashton was considerably affected by it. If he wasn't fast enough, he'd get frostbite. Luckily, even if it went to a serious degree that couldn't be saved on earth just a week ago, with a bit of the rapid healing potion, he would be fine. He just had to finish this as fast as he could. Not that he really had the leisure to do that.

  Ashton ran toward the monster and swung his staff directly at it. It returned with a slash of its sword, though it didn't aim at the staff to block it, and instead just tried to hit Ashton directly. He pulled his staff back and deflected the attack. Ashton thought the draconid would be able to save the attack and move on directly, but the frost had affected it much more than expected.

  It took a while for it to recover from the attack. Well, technically it was just a brief moment, but compared to the pace of the fight thus far, it was taking a while.

  Ashton didn't hesitate to take advantage of that moment and slammed his staff into the side of the monster's jaw. He put his entire weight into it, and even pushed a force of mana out the front to try and increase the impact. It wasn't a technique, but just basic mana manipulation. But something like that wouldn't be enough to do a lot of damage.

  One of the draconid's teeth was chipped, nothing more. The monster returned an attack, and its blade cut into the wood of Ashton's staff. He could feel the bone-sword digging into it, and quickly used that to redirect the attack. The draconid was pushing against Ashton's staff and was trying to destroy it. Surely, without a weapon, Ashton would be helpless. Which wasn't actually completely wrong, either.

  But even so, the fact that the draconid was pushing against the staff instead of just slashing at it, allowed Ashton to pull on his staff and made the draconid subconsciously change its stance in a way that helped Ashton out.

  The moment the draconid's leg moved forward, Ashton let go of his staff with one of his hands. The staff flipped down, helped by the explosive momentum created by the draconid's push. Ashton pushed the staff under the monster's leg and kicked it back up with his own foot.

  Losing its balance, the draconid fell forward. The stump on its lower back, that its tail was once connected to, began to tense up. Tails, especially for bipedal creatures that have them, are absolutely crucial for balance.

  The moment Ashton saw even a tiny, momentous gap, he slammed his staff down onto the lizardman's face. He hit the exact same spot that he hit earlier, but this time, he didn't just cause a tooth to chip, but managed to dislodge the draconid's jaw.

  And at that exact moment, the Backpacker appeared and threw a bottle of water at Ashton, before disappearing again. He smashed the bottle with his staff and controlled the water by channelling the undine, making it press onto the draconid's jaw.

  Ashton was trying to damage and weaken this as much as he possibly could. By the time the draconid stood back up, the water had pushed itself between the gaps in the monster's jaw. As the water was frozen by the persistent spell on this area and began to expand, the monster's jaw was pulled apart even further.

  The draconid tried to scrape the ice away with its claws, while swinging its sword around to keep Ashton away.

  "Finally starting to panic, huh?" he grinned, building some distance. He cleared his throat, and with a shivering lip, said something in the language of the lizardmen. Once again... it was mostly an insult. Those were the majority of the phrases of monster-languages he knew. "Shimia riod ogbariasdi maligosh, oligam!"

  Directly, it translated to 'Shimia is the god of weaklings and cowards'. A meagre insult, one that most people might not even react to. But draconids were too proud for that. Even if it was just a regular believer, it would make this monster furious, but this one was a cleric of this god.

  It snapped its head at Ashton and stared at him angrily. Its lower jaw wasn't moving properly, so even though it tried to say something, all the sounds came out garbled and inaudible. Not that Ashton would have really understood what it was trying to say anyway.

  Instead of focusing on its jaw any longer, it ran straight at Ashton, attacking him with a flurry of slashes that were either blocked, deflected, or dodged. Ashton was getting used to the way this guy was moving. Its movements actually became a lot simpler compared to before. It was freezing, angry, and wasn't as flexible due to its muscles.

  And though Ashton was exhausted, and injured, poisoned, and freezing, he was still slowly getting the upper hand. At least, in regard to mobility. None of the attacks that he was getting in were really doing much to draconid. Plus, it was starting to protect its jaw a lot, to the point where Ashton was unable to get another good hit in on it.

  But there was still more he could do. He directed the shrunken wisp toward his hand, and quickly altered the spell placed into it. Instead of being a focused 'force', it was going to create a blast in every direction again.

  It just took a moment, so the wisp shot away just as quickly as it came, and the fight continued. Ashton kept aiming at the draconid's face to get at its jaw, so that it would turn its head away, even just slightly, while keeping its attention on Ashton. Right then, he directed the wisp, in its full air form, into the draconid's mouth.

  It didn't seem to realise what happened at first, when Ashton made the wisp turn back into its solid form and had it become as large as possible. This was exactly what he did with the first boss monster he fought here on earth, just with a slightly different twist.

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  The draconid's jaw was barely hanging on, being pushed open the way it was. With a trigger of the 'force' spell, the monster's jaw was blown off and slammed onto the ground.

  The monster yelled out in pain as blood soon began to cover its body, freezing in the cold. Its golden scales were slowly being covered up by a dark red. But right then, Ashton could feel something. A flood of mana was welling up inside of the draconid.

  He ran forward and began to attack the monster as fast as he could, hitting it with as many high-powered strikes as possible. But as the mana grew in the monster's body, its muscles seemed to pump up just once more.

  It slashed at Ashton, and he quickly held his staff in front of him, unable to dodge.

  But the wooden stick that had accompanied Ashton for almost the entire journey so far, was slashed in half. The draconid's blade cut along Ashton's body, from his right shoulder to his left hip. It was a shallow wound, created just with the tip of the sword, but that was all that was needed.

  Almost immediately, Ashton could feel the injury fester and gradually begin to rot. That was a pain that he would never forget, and instantly recognised.

  "Fucking-" Ashton ground his teeth while holding his chest.

  Even with its lower jaw missing, the monster began to cackle. It walked over to the jaw on the ground. Once it was torn off, the flesh began to melt away the same way it did with the tail, and now just the bone was left.

  The monster grabbed it, and attacked it back onto its face. Strands of muscle almost immediately began to stretch out to hold the jaw in place, though the regeneration stopped there.

  "You've got to be kidding me..." Ashton let out a laugh. He couldn't believe this. It really was the incarnation of all of Shimia's domains.

  It was normal for a priest to deeply represent one domain, maybe two if they were a particularly high-level believer. But what this draconid was showing was a extremely proficient use of every part of its god.

  "How many sacrifices did you make before I even got here?" Ashton stared at the monster. "If you were doing these rituals already, why were you keeping so many people alive? Why the fuck would you-"

  Ashton stopped himself. Why was he even asking? Why didn't he see it earlier?

  He connected the dots. The seemingly random setup of the shelves, the labyrinth that was created for absolutely no reason. The separate 'walled-off' areas, each with its own specific purpose.

  They hadn't just taken over this store, they had turned it into a single massive ritual.

  "What, are you trying to call your god here? How do you even know if that thing is real or not?" Ashton asked, though he knew the draconid wasn't listening. No, he had to calm down. These guys didn't have the means for summoning magic. All of the rituals by lizardman tribes were boosts that helped them in a particular field that their 'god' represented. They weren't summoners.

  They were preparing something else. Either, it was meant to strengthen the entire tribe, or a single, already powerful individual.

  Ashton practically snarled. "You're preparing to strengthen the Wyvern, aren't you?"

  He tried to recall every single word of the lizardman language that he could recollect, sprinting through the past when he had tried to learn it. There was really just one word that he needed.

  "O-Odi... Odimirash?" He stuttered out, uncertain if it was the right word. If he remembered right, the lizardmen were familiar with wyverns from their own world, and that was the word for it.

  The draconid's eyes widened, surprised. "Odimirash?" it laughed. "Odimirash ogbariasdi logir."

  "Ogbari...? Wait that one means... you believe that the wyvern is connected to your god?"

  This was bad. This was really, really bad. The wyvern was already overwhelmingly powerful, but if it was strengthened by the lizardmen in any way, it would be catastrophic. Not just for Drakewood, but for the entire country, maybe even the world if it continued to grow stronger even after that.

  Ashton couldn't hold back. He had felt his vessel quiver earlier when defeating the crocodilian, and was afraid to use any more of that pre-core technique, but there was no way that he could allow this monster to continue on living.

  He clutched both halves of his staff tightly and held them together. He used the undine's water magic to have them freeze into one piece again. It was too weak for an extended fight, but maybe it was enough for a few moves.

  Ashton took a deep breath and pulled in the extensive mana from the well. He let as much of it flow into his staff as he could, circling in pulses of particular mana, just a step before that moment of mock-awakening.

  And then, he started to run. Not at the draconid itself, but at the centre of the mana well.

  At that 'hole' in the centre of this space. The boss monster seemed to realise that Ashton was planning something. Maybe it was its instincts, or its god really existed and conveyed a warning, but it began to run after Ashton.

  He spun his staff around, collecting the mana that he needed right at the tip, and forced it into a state of awakening.

  With a single stab forward, Ashton forced all of the mana into that hole at the centre of the well. This was the same technique Ashton had used to destroy the crocodilian's magic stone, just a lot stronger. His vessel vibrated so loudly it began to reverberate through his body and ears.

  "Sorry, guys, I'm doing my best to keep you all protected," Ashton spat out. He encased and strengthened his vessel with the rest of his mana, every drop that he wasn't using for this attack already.

  The forcefully-awakened mana hit that hole, that bottomless, tiny nothingness, and it shattered into pieces.

  As Ashton felt the draconid's sword stab through him, the mana well collapsed in on itself. The frost spell that had been continuously active, feeding on the well's mana, collapsed with it and went into overdrive.

  The pulse of mana went far beyond this small space, though Ashton had no way of knowing how far exactly.

  All he knew was that the lizardman behind him had stopped moving. It fell over backward, dead.

  [You have killed a [Hidden Boss]. You have offered a portion of its life to the [Daughter of the Scarlet Heart], but they have rejected to receive all of it and so, for your extraordinary effort, you are awarded 1000 Coins and a [Rare Random Magic Item Box]!]

  [Due to your special achievement, the [Daughter of the Scarlet Heart] has counted your quest as fulfilled]

  [You have completed the [Bonus Quest - The Daughter's Trial]!]

  [You have earned the right to form a Lowest-Grade summoner's contract with the [Daughter of the Scarlet Heart]]

  [A large number of constellations is shocked at your feat]

  [[Daughter of the Scarlet Heart] tells you to hurry and drink that potion]

  [[Observer in the Veil] stares at you, uncertain what to do]

  [[Executor of the End] wonders whether it is your time to go]

  "Hah... Hahaa..." Ashton laughed out slightly. There were a few more messages, but Ashton couldn't pay much attention to them right now. He ripped off part of his clothes, using them as fuel for the salamander, so that he could warm himself a little. But warming himself wouldn't be enough.

  Ashton looked at the mark on his arm.

  "Sp-Spawn... of Akrazoth" he said, the sword sticking out of his chest. "I know that... you're greedy... and want to take whatever you can..."

  The demon crawled out of the mark, climbing down Ashton's arm as he collapsed onto his knees. "This one time, I'll let you... What do you want... to save my life?"

  Excited, the demon began to clutter around, unbothered by the freezing cold, though even the salamander seemed to want to shiver. But in the end, it seemed like it already knew what it wanted, and was just letting Ashton grow more desperate.

  It sat there on the ground, and Ashton ground his teeth. When it came to this, Ashton could understand what exactly this demon wanted.

  "... Fine... Take them, but not... do not even take a little bit more," Ashton whispered, before collapsing on the ground.

  And so, the demon got to work.