Chapter 341: 179. The Frost Giant -2 (Part One)
Translated by A Passing Wanderer
Edited by RED
The muscles around the eyes of the Frost Giant Hrímr twitched silently. The creature grabbed the golden bone sword impaling its chest with both of its hands.
-How dare a rotten bag of bones…!-
The soul-chilling coldness permeated into the huge sword, freezing it instantly.
The Frost Giant forcibly yanked the huge golden weapon out of its chest. Both Hrímr and the Skeleton King were shoved back, their arms trembling unsteadily, as if they were suffering from convulsions.
The golden bone sword was pulled out, and snow and water exploded out through the open wound on the Frost Giant’s chest like a powerful waterfall.
That scene left me quite speechless.
My Skeleton King lost out in physical strength?
Hrímr suddenly vomited out a mouthful of melted water, bits of frost mixed within. Its face distorted into an expression of pain, indicating that it had suffered a considerable amount of damage.
“Donn,” I called out, and the Skeleton King looked down at me there on the ground.
I placed my hand on the massive undead’s spine still immersed in the lake of holy water, then injected my divinity. The archangel’s tool around my wrist amplified my divinity greatly.
“Get rid of that thing.”
-As you command, master.-
The Skeleton King’s hands, still holding onto Hrímr’s ankles, released their grip, and grabbed the golden bone sword instead. A great amount of divinity travelled along its four arms to enter the huge weapon.
Hrímr flinched grandly in shock and screamed out loudly, -You monstrous bastard!-
The Skeleton King pulled the sword back before viciously swinging it out diagonally. The Frost Giant leapt up in the nick of time.
The huge creature went airborne, a dozen-plus metres in the air, creating well over a hundred metres of distance between itself and its opponent as it did. In the process, the city centre was utterly demolished.
-Fuu-woo…-
Hrímr heavily exhaled thick breaths laden with frost, and stared at its severed fingers. Then it began grinding its icy teeth in rage. -You accursed bastard!- it roared out, only to come to a faltering pause after realising that the Skeleton King hadn’t moved yet.
When the gigantic undead continued to remain in the same spot, the Frost Giant snapped out of its dazed state rather quickly and stared at the lake of holy water, a sneer spreading on its lips.
-Aha, so you can’t even move from that spot? Yet you wish to fight against me?!-
Hrímr didn’t need long to figure out that the Skeleton King could not move outside of the lake of holy water.
The gigantic undead looked below and while staring at the lake containing its body, its bony jaw clattered open.
-You shouldn’t worry about me, oh King of Ice!- The Skeleton King dipped its hands under the holy water lake’s surface. -Because this body of mine can travel anywhere I wish!-
The undead swung its arms around and began splashing the holy water all around its vicinity. It was like tsunamis of holy water were sweeping through the surrounding cityscape.
Once the lake of holy water had spread all around the city, the Skeleton King dove beneath under the surface, disappearing from view.
And then…
Hrímr urgently turned around and swung its arm powerfully. Its frozen arm smacked away the golden bone sword shooting out of the holy water’s surface.
-…!!!-
Hrímr cautiously scanned his vicinity. The holy water’s surface continued to ripple, circling all around the Frost Giant.
The golden bone sword shot out from the surface once more, stabbing at the giant made out of ice and snow.
The huge blade clattered against the frozen arm, scattering fragments of ice all over the place.
The two ‘kaijus’ were now engaged in a proper fight over there. I figured that it’d be fine to let the Skeleton King handle Hrímr for the time being.
I sucked in a deep breath and looked up at the collapsed citadel. I leapt up and ran up the structure’s wall. I landed on one of the wrecked corridors and finally located King Zayner and Runan.
“Y-Your Imperial Majesty?! J-just what on earth is happening outside…?”
He seemed to be too dazed at the moment, unable to process anything. I stomped on the floor, causing bones to sprout out of the wrecked corridor’s chasm, creating an impromptu bridge. “Hurry and escape.”
“…”
For a moment there he seemed to be hesitating over something, but soon, a determined expression formed on his face. He grabbed Runan’s hand and dashed along on the bridge. Before he disappeared from the view, he said, “We pray that the fortunes of war be with you.”
“Same to you.”
He seemed to know that neither he nor Runan would be much of a help here and hurriedly evacuated this place. Butler Klare also bowed his head to me and chased after the fleeing duo.
I picked up my musket and breathed into it. My target was obviously Hrímr. I had to hit that bastard in the head again.
But, just as I took aim at the Frost Giant…
This creepy chill suddenly ran down my backside and I hurriedly turned my head to my left. A huge boulder was flying my way.
“Oh, sh…!”
Sh*t!
I jerked the muzzle away and pulled the trigger. The holy bullet struck the boulder cleanly, shattering it to bits. Even then, the debris still carried the rock’s momentum, and that of the explosion was added on top. The shrapnel spread out over a wide area, directly slamming into the rest of the citadel.
The already-damaged castle collapsed and crumbled even more. Dangerous-looking fissures ran through the floor I stood on, making me lose my balance. I nearly fell headlong to the distant ground below, but managed to grab the broken wall nearby in time.
When I looked around me…
-Kill that insect, now!-
Other Jötnar were joining the fray now, their sizes ranging from eight to fifteen metres. There were around fifty of them, too.
All of them had humanoid bodies. Maybe they were influenced by the Frost Giant or something, because these suckers were all clad in the ice armour too.
If there was one crucial difference between them and Hrímr, then it should be the fact that they were actual living entities with blood flowing through their veins. They were similar to how humans would be if they were forcibly enlarged to such sizes.
“…Man, you don’t want to make it easy, huh!”
Here was the moment that I really began missing the peaceful days of the past five years.
-Ku-ooooooh!- The Jötnar roared out and began rushing to my location. They didn’t forget to chuck all those boulders my way, either.
I hurriedly jumped up and rushed atop the walls of the citadel as a flood of cold sweat dribbled down my face.
I ran up and up and up towards the top of the citadel, since my life depended on it. Everywhere my feet rushed past was accurately struck by a boulder flying in. The debris of the citadel danced and fell in my direction, and I just barely managed to evade it.
I would have loved to summon a large number of holy undead and hit those giant bastards with them, but that would make maintaining the Skeleton King’s summoning quite difficult. Besides, regular holy undead wouldn’t be able to fight against the Jötnar, anyway.
If it were Rahamma, Kasim, or Nasus, then it might be doable…
“But the biggest issue here is the burden of summoning them will be too great.”
Right, if only Alice was here to provide me with her Resonance. That would’ve been great…
BOOM-!
The citadel shook unsteadily. I looked down and saw those damn giants were beginning to climb up the sides of the collapsing structure.
I took aim at the bastards and pulled the trigger.
A Jötunn, its head pierced clean through, tumbled off the side of the castle and dropped to the ground.
“…Now isn’t the time to sweat the small details, I guess!”
I would definitely love to decline the opportunity to become finely-squashed meat paste courtesy of a giant’s massaging attempt. I finally reached the top of the citadel, then unhesitantly summoned the three undead existences.
“Rahamma.”
First, Aslan’s former undisputed king.
“Kasim.”
Next up, the former successor of the Sword King title.
“Nasus.”
And finally, Aslan’s former grim reaper.
Rahamma, clad in his pitch-black armour, was summoned into the open clutching his huge mace, while Kasim in his gleaming golden armour bore his greatsword and held his head proudly.
Nasus, hidden under his robe and hood, appeared last while raising his musket, glaring down at the Jötnar below.
The giants were startled silly and stopped climbing just then, their expressions hardening.
That wasn’t all that surprising, since even I used to be sh*t scared of this trio back when they were not on my side. I figured that the story wouldn’t be too different with the Jötnar, either.
-Oh, my master.-
-Give us your…-
-Command, for we shall carry it out.-
The three undead asked me in unison, so I duly replied to them, “Hunt these Jötnar down. With the least amount of damage to their bodies, too.”
My three undead leapt off the top of the citadel towards the Jötnar below.
At the same time…
[Your Majesty.]
I momentarily came to a stop. Those words being directly transmitted to my brain made me turn my head, and my eyes gradually opened wider.
[Under your command, we have finally reached our destination, Your Majesty.]
I chuckled hollowly at that report. “Really now, she’s one heck of a diligent kid, alright.”
Then I activated the Aztal Rune.
**
(TL: In 3rd person POV.)
Hrímr grunted in pain.
Bang-!
The ice armour on its back split apart.
BANG-!
A deep sword gash opened up on its great arm made out of ice.
BAAANG-!
Eventually, Hrímr faltered and fell to its knees, its body full of wounds. It used its large hands to shield its head and curled up on the ground.
The creature was surrounded on all sides by swirling currents of holy water. The Skeleton King was somewhere below the water’s surface, choosing to thrust and stab its golden bone sword into the giant from the safety of its hiding place.
It was like Hrímr had become trapped inside a tornado of blades right now.
‘At this rate, I’ll be killed for sure!’
Just what was the identity of its opponent, really?
Was it a Jötunn? No, that couldn’t be, it was definitely a different type of existence.
Maybe it was a creature from the Spirit Realm? If not, then perhaps Purgatory?
Hrímr had no way of knowing. But then again, there was no need to find out, either.
There was no doubting it at this point. The opponents that the undead, that Vampire King or whatever he called himself, had begged the giants to kill, the targets of that man’s revenge… this giant bone creature had to be one of them!
Without a doubt, the Vampire King was strong. Even though he was fighting against three kings of the giants at the same time, he had still managed to inflict a variety of small and large wounds on the giants.
Also without a doubt, it made sense for a mere Vampire to lose against this sort of bone creature.
‘However, that doesn’t mean I’ll lose like this!’
If Hrímr tasted defeat today and ran away with its tail between its legs, then it would surely end up a laughing stock to the other kings.
Hrímr took another look at the rippling surface of the holy water. That bone giant moved around using that. Since that was the case, it’d be a good idea to get rid of the bone giant’s travelling route!
-Oraaa!- Hrímr let out a spirited roar, and thrust both of its arms into the holy water before pouring out its bone-chilling cold aura. The swirling, rippling surface of the holy water all around the creature instantly froze up.
At the same time, the hands of the Skeleton King shooting out of the water’s surface also came to a grinding halt.
‘It’s now!’
Hrímr quickly created some distance. It opened its mouth and shoved its right hand inside its throat. It pulled out an ice spear from within, but then, it also shoved its left hand in and yanked out another identical spear!
After grabbing the two spears securely, Hrímr leapt up into the air.
-Ahaha! Try to block this, dear Skeleton King!-
