One hour passed.

I used concealment magic and discreetly left the city through the gate.

The shortsword couldn’t be used through Magic Transfer.

I even tried testing it, but Magic Transfer wouldn’t activate while I was holding it.

In fact, it wasn’t just Magic Transfer. Regardless of my own will, just holding the shortsword would cause all of my magic to be concentrated at the tip.

And so I currently had it sheathed and hanging on my belt.

Because of these reasons, I determined that I would have to fight the dragon directly if I wanted to use the sword.

Of course, the guild would try to stop me if I told them of this.

They wanted to go only after they had assembled a good hunting party.

“…But there really isn’t time.”

The sky over the Delight Forest was already much darker than it was last time.

And from what I could see of the dragon through the slimes, it was also bigger than before.

If this continued, it would be too strong to deal with within two days.

I was sure that the guild would assemble their best possible team of hunters, but what good would that be once the mythological dragon was fully grown?

I had to kill it before that happened.

‘Are there any other monsters near the dragon?’

‘They all ran away!’

‘It’s just us that remain!’

The last time when I came here for the quest, there had been lots of monsters around the dragon.

But now, the only monsters who tried to get close to it were the monsters that I had tamed.

…Perhaps this meant that the time for the dragon to start running wild was close at hand.

I wondered about this as I rushed through the forest at full speed.

Killing so many monsters must have made me stronger because running long distances felt a lot easier now.

While I could only see my HP and MP on my status, perhaps there were other stats that were going up as well.

Though I had no way of seeing them right now.

-And like that, I ran through the forest…

It was when I was just about to reach the area that the dragon was, that the slimes started screaming.

I had never heard their voices like that before. It was full of fear.

‘GAAAHHH!!’

‘Run away!!’

‘Thi-this is bad! Good slimes, please get onto my back!’

The Proud Wolf said as they abandoned their posts and left the dragon in a panic.

I didn’t know what was happening, but it sounded bad. And so I cast some magic on the slimes and Proud Wolf that would help them in their escape.

—And then about a dozen seconds passed.

As the slimes were no longer close to it, I could not see the dragon…but I knew that it was the source of this power.

The slimes probably had a natural instinct for these things, and so they ran away.

-But that wasn’t the only change that occurred.

Along with the explosive sound, the surrounding trees were torn from their roots.

‘Ahhhh!’

‘Oh, no! Proud Wolf! Hurry!’

‘I’m going as fast as I can!’

The slimes were coming towards me as if to escape the blast.

In spite of the tension in their voices, it seemed like none of them had been harmed.

Fifteen seconds later, the sound of the explosion reached my own ears.

Considering the time lag, it was was probably the same sound I had heard from the slimes.

…How big of an explosion was it…

I would have probably died if I was close to it.

A crater had been created by the blast. And a single dragon hovered over it.

—It was the Blue Dragon of Delight.

However, it was at least twice as big compared to when I first saw it.

“Am I too late…?”

The priest had said that we only had 3 days.

And that was 2 hours ago.

I should still have a chance.

I wanted to believe…but that hope started to fade ever since I saw the explosion.

However, it was too late to run away.

If this was the dragon from the myth, it could destroy a continent in 3 days.

If I wanted to outrun it, I would have had to start running on the day I arrived in this world.

Of course, it was impossible.

In the myth, an ‘Emissary’ had defeated the dragon. But there was no such person in this world.

Even if we somehow escaped to another continent, that continent would be the next to be destroyed.

‘Yuji. What are you going to do?’

‘Fight. There is nothing else to do.’

It looked like a futile battle, but there was one hope.

This shortsword that the priest had given me.

Combining this shortsword with Hellfire of Death might just be enough to kill the dragon in one shot.

…That is, if I could somehow pierce this 30 cm blade into the giant dragon that was currently floating up in the air.