Dark Fantasy’s Extra Chapter 185

First, we decided to wait until Ozwald recovered somewhat.

Though he was swallowed by Thumbelina, she didn’t try to digest him but rather kept him as a ‘tool’ to use, so unlike Chris’s case, there wasn’t major damage to his body and soul.

What little damage there was had mostly been treated by Maia when she returned, so Ozwald’s recovery didn’t take very long.

As a bonus, we decided to keep the whole Noah thing a secret for now.

They wouldn’t believe it anyway… right?

Somehow I feel more scared that Hilde and Gerda might actually believe it a little.

“By the way, you said Vile had changed quite a bit – how exactly was he different?”

“Well, first his whole body was in tatters. Looked like he’d suffered tremendous injuries.”

“And Vile still came out personally despite being that injured?”

“Yes. It’s just a feeling, but they didn’t seem like wounds that would heal easily. I don’t know what he did, but still.”

“But how did you end up losing to him, Sir Ozwald? You escaped last time, right?”

“Indeed I did. But this time he brought a behemoth with him. I heard something similar happened in Offenbach too… just how many behemoths does that guy control?”

“What did it look like?”

“Like a mix between a wolf and a lizard. It had an extremely long snout and neck, and its body was gray.”

I see, must be the Raging Bandersnatch.

The last of the three behemoths controlled by Vile.

While Biting Jabberwock and Snatching Jubjub Bird each have two fights – one with gimmicks and one direct combat – Raging Bandersnatch only has a single direct battle.

Though smaller than the other behemoths, it’s much more agile and has many threatening patterns, making it actually the most difficult boss fight in the game.

If the first two were like missiles, Bandersnatch was more like a blade or gun.

“It was quite a formidable opponent. Against two behemoths, I just couldn’t protect Oscar…”

Ozwald became dejected.

“Moreover, Oscar’s homeland of Vale territory was completely destroyed. Everyone was massacred – the Baron and Baroness Vale, and all the residents without exception.”

“…What about Oscar?”

“…”

Ozwald hung his head even more dejectedly.

It seems Oscar showed no particular reaction even watching his homeland be destroyed…

“But Oscar is still Oscar! We’ll save him together somehow!”

Hilde said while grasping Ozwald’s hand.

“Yes. Thank you…”

“Who’s Oscar?”

Gerda asked.

“My companion.”

“What does he look like?”

“Ah…”

I was suddenly at a loss for words.

“Um… he has long black hair and blue eyes.”

“Just like Sister Hilde.”

“They are… similar.”

“What’s wrong? But Oscar? Sounds like a man’s name.”

“He is a man.”

“…?”

After finishing that somewhat difficult explanation to Gerda, we packed our things.

“So now we just need to go find Oscar? And this Vile guy has him?”

Maia said.

“Yeah. I’m counting on you. You’re the only one we can rely on.”

“Ugh… alright. Just leave it to me…”

Maia squirmed slightly like someone being tickled.

“I think I know where that Vile fellow might be.”

“Oh! As expected of Ms. Maia!”

Ozwald exclaimed in admiration.

Maia’s gaze briefly flicked toward me.

Before the others woke up, I had already told Maia the location of Vile’s base.

Unlike with others, I felt I didn’t need to hide my past life knowledge from Maia.

Of course, while we had clues about Vile’s base from the start, we couldn’t find it on our own.

Vile’s base would be one of three locations each guarded by one of the three behemoths he controls, with the last place you tackle becoming his base.

No matter which order you tackle them in, the bosses always appear in the fixed sequence of Biting Jabberwock, Snatching Jubjub Bird, then Raging Bandersnatch.

…If Blue Paper Moon was actually a simulation predicting what would happen in reality, would that sequence limitation apply in reality too?

Or was it just game mechanics?

No… probably no point thinking about such trivial things.

“We’ll check three places. At least one of those three should be Vile’s base.”

And so we set off toward Vile’s base following Maia’s guidance, who had received my information in advance.

None of the others questioned how Maia knew.

They seem to just accept it since Maia is no ordinary sorcerer.

Which works out well for me.

We crossed the border again and headed first to Turtle Beach, the closest location.

Normally it would take two days of walking, but thanks to Maia’s sorcery-summoned carriage, it only took half a day.

In the original game, Maia’s carriage was the ultimate transportation method combining fast travel and saves for any previously visited location, though you normally had to pay quite a lot of Order Silver coins to use it, but she let us ride for free.

After half a day of traveling at incredible speed, we arrived at Turtle Beach.

It used to be a shore where countless sea turtles lived and could be called the birthplace of turtle soup, but they went extinct from overharvesting.

By Blue Paper Moon’s timeline it had become infested with unique newborn Beasts called fake turtles – strange creatures that walked on two legs with cow heads on turtle bodies.

Since there was lore about Vile trying to restore the area’s sea turtles in his own way, there was an easter egg where using devour-type skills on the fake turtles would give you a slight buff.

“Hmm… there’s nothing here?”

But there wasn’t a single fake turtle to be found, when there should have been swarms of them.

The Biting Jabberwock was missing too.

Originally it should be circling the field as a gimmick boss periodically breathing fire at the player for the first battle, but the sky was empty.

Were the wounds from the witches at Offenbach that severe?

Could it be dead?

Could that be why the fake turtles aren’t appearing either?

The newborn Beasts created by Vile had no physical form and would disappear without an energy source nearby.

It wouldn’t be strange if all the fake turtles in this shore vanished with the massive energy source that was Jabberwock gone.

“Let’s search a bit more and move on to the next place if we find nothing.”

We spread out to search Turtle Beach but found not just no newborn Beasts, but no Beasts at all.

“Then on to the next location.”

After another two hours in Maia’s carriage, we arrived at Griffin Plateau.

Griffins are mythical creatures said to have an eagle’s upper body and a lion’s lower body, and like the fake turtles, there was lore about Vile recreating these ancient imaginary beasts.

Though they had wings, they couldn’t truly fly but rather made massive jumps close to flight while striking down with eagle talons as their main pattern.

And like Jabberwock, the Snatching Jubjub Bird would circle the field sky before irregularly swooping down to snatch players and drop them from the air, with fall damage so severe it was guaranteed instant death even at max level.

Even using items that negated fall damage, the damage was still so huge you’d die anyway unless extremely high level.

However, when it swooped down to grab players, a shadow would appear on the ground as a tell, so you could dodge easily if paying attention.

“…”

A vast plain on high mountains.

A frigid, expansive grassland revealed under moonlight.

A plateau with tales of someone seeing griffins here long ago.

But this place was empty too.

Nothing was here.

Not just the griffins Vile supposedly created, but not even Jubjub Bird’s shadow.

We searched the plateau feeling somewhat disappointed but still found nothing.

“The next one has to be it…”

Maia glanced at me.

Honestly, I’m getting anxious too at this point.

Am I remembering correctly?

Or has the story changed somehow?

We left the plateau and headed toward the final location.

We rode the carriage for a good half day.

At this point it feels like we’ve almost circled the entire country.

“We’re almost there.”

A large island came into view in the distance.

Called Snark Island, it was uninhabited with dense forest beyond the beach.

Originally it was just a nameless deserted island, but in Blue Paper Moon it was named after a dangerous Beast created by Vile.

Though there were less than 10 Beasts that could be found on Snark Island’s surface, in terms of danger level it was incomparable to the other two locations.

All snarks were at least high-tier Beast level, with random ‘mutations’ occurring.

And these mutations had the troublesome ability to delete health bars themselves, similar to the tag players at Vile’s old laboratory.

At least with the tag players, your health bar would return after leaving their sight for a while, but health bars deleted by mutations wouldn’t return unless you defeated them.

Of course, such debuffs would disappear upon returning to headquarters, but I wasn’t sure if that was just game mechanics or not.

At least in-game, the health bar would never return no matter how long you waited.

And unlike tag players who could only delete a fixed amount at once, mutations had no limit and would erase it completely, causing death when it hit zero.

Though they weren’t instant like tag players, they had tells and you could interrupt their skills by attacking to break their stance.

“Is it that island? There are no ships around…”

Gerda said.

“We don’t need those. What do you take me for?”

Along with Maia’s words, the carriage drove smoothly across the sea surface like flat ground and safely reached Snark Island.

“Could there really be nothing here too? I can’t sense anything…”

Hilde said.

“Vile’s Beasts can’t be sensed, so we can’t say for sure.”

Though Ozwald said that, his voice also sounded slightly anxious about coming up empty again.

“No, there’s something here this time.”

Maia said.

“I can feel it. Something’s here. The number is roughly… 8? And one of them has a dangerous smell.”

“That’s quite specific. Can you sense Vile’s Beasts?”

Until now no one had been able to detect Vile’s Beasts.

Even Sephira said she couldn’t sense them even right in front of her.

“Yeah. Not their presence exactly but hmm… it’s hard to explain. I’ve never felt anything like this before either. Vibrations? Colors?”

“Wavelengths?”

“Ah, yes! That’s it! That’s exactly the right word!”

Maia clapped her hands.

“There are 8 creatures with unique wavelengths on this island. And like I said earlier, one feels particularly dangerous. Ah, one is coming this way.”

That dangerous one must be a mutation.

“…I hear something.”

Ozwald pointed his staff toward the forest.

Everyone got into ready stances and looked where Ozwald was pointing.

Soon after, a large, massive hand crawled out from the darkness of the forest.