* * *

“H-… Ah… Ahihi… I’m… at my limit…”

Now, one of the Three Great Jailers, who had been running for their lives… the angel with red hair… perhaps having reached his physical limit, gradually slowed down… and finally fell to his knees.

In front of my cell.

“D-Don’t be foolish! L-Let’s escape!”

The blue ogre, who had been running beside him, concerned about the angel, reached out his hand.

But… the angel slapped his hand away, refusing, and shouted!

“Escape!? Where are we supposed to escape to, Kaizan!? The entrance of this Great Prison is already blocked by that monster!?”

And then, with his face twitching… he started laughing creepily…!

“Ahihihihi… It’s over! It’s all over! Even the Prison God’s avatar couldn’t defeat that monster… We’re all going to be eaten by that monster, and die! AHIHIHIHI!”

“Netsuzou…!!”

The blue ogre… Kaizan, seeing the angel… Netsuzou like that, sadly furrowed his eyebrows, and bit his lip in frustration.

“Hiiiiiiiiin! I-If you want to die so badly, then die alone! You’re in the way! Move aside! I can’t get through, I’m going to die, hiiiiiiiiin!”

Meanwhile, the giant behind them, repeatedly glancing behind him, stamped his feet impatiently!

This giant… who must be Enzai, judging by the process of elimination… is so big that he can’t move forward in the corridor if there’s even one person crouching in front of him!

He can’t get around them!

Or rather, this guy reeks of scum!

“Ummm…”

Now, about me.

I’m sorry to interrupt your desperate situation, but I don’t understand what’s going on at all.

“Did something happen?”

So, since the Three Great Jailers have started their mysterious drama right before my eyes, I decided to ask them.

<We don’t understand anything at all, do we? We need to gather information.>

“““Wh-Who’s there!?”””

It seems they finally noticed my presence when I spoke to them.

They all turned towards me at once.

That’s how desperate they are.

“Wh-Why is there a girl in this Enemy of the Gods cell!?”

“If I recall correctly, the only Enemy of the Gods currently imprisoned here is that busty woman!?”

“Hiiiiiiiin! I don’t care, let’s hurry up and escape, you idiots!”

Although the Three Great Jailers were panicking, the first to move was the blue ogre swordsman, Kaizan.

“You… who are you?”

He asked, pointing his sword at me.

“I am…”

<Wait, Emi. To you, they’re enemies. There’s no need to properly introduce yourself, and give them information.>

“…I am… the spirit… of Myogomyogoshugo…”

<That’s a nostalgic reference.>

Don’t call it a reference.

““The spirit of Myogomyogoshugo!?””

<They’re surprised.>

Yeah.

“H-Hey, Netsuzou, did you hear that!? A Myogomyogoshugo spirit!?”

“Yes, Kaizan…! I can’t believe they actually exist…!”

<They believed you.>

Even though I said it myself… why would they believe that!?

“Hiiiiiiiin!! What are you idiots doing, IDIOOOTS!!”

But Enzai, at the back, didn’t join the conversation.

He’s stomping his feet, furious, his face red!

“Who is this brat? I DON’T CARE! If you want to know, find out yourselves! Let me through! Hurry up and let me escape, hiiiiiiiin!”

And those words—

—Were Enzai’s last “meaningful” words.

Because the next moment!

“Hih!?”

—Shurushuru—something brown wrapped around Enzai’s legs.

“Ubuh!?”

And started dragging him backwards with all its might!

“Aguu, h-hiiiiiin!? GYAAAAAAAAAAH!?”

ZURURURURURU!

Enzai, his face slamming into the stone floor, scattering blood from his nose, was dragged down the corridor at high speed!

And then!

—DOPON!—

With that sound.

He was completely swallowed… by “something” at the end of the corridor.

That “something”—

—Is “sludge”.

Filthy, brown sludge.

Bubbling, as if something is being crushed with tremendous force…

Wriggling and squirming.

Emitting a terrible stench…

That sludge extended a part of itself like a tentacle, grabbed Enzai, dragged him… and sunk him into itself.

Enzai’s screams are no longer audible.

Only the sound of bubbles popping—BUKU, BUKU—and a squelching, crushing sound—GOKI, MESHA—echoed through the corridor.

“YOU MONSTER, HOW DARE YOU… HOW DARE YOU, HOW DARE YOOOOOU!!”

Seeing that, Kaizan shed tears, and became enraged!

“Even if he was scum! He was my comrade… who shared joys and sorrows with me for many years…!”

Shouting that, he raised his long sword above his head.

And then, Kaizan swung it… at a speed invisible even to my eyes, towards the sludge!

“【Sea Splitter】!!”

A slash flew from his sword!

The sludge, without any resistance, was split in two by the slash.

But that sludge is sludge.

It’s like a swamp… covering the entire corridor ahead.

Would a swamp be damaged by a sword?

Of course not.

Sludge immediately flowed in from the sides, filling the gap where it was cut.

It had no effect.

“UWAAAAAAAAAAH!!”

Kaizan, screaming hysterically, continued to unleash slashes.

But all his slashes, although deeply cutting the sludge, are meaningless.

The sludge slowly approached Kaizan… and—

“A—”

It was instantaneous.

A tentacle shot out—Pyun—wrapped around Kaizan’s torso.

And dragged him into the sludge.

Goki, mesha, baki…

That unpleasant sound echoed through the corridor, which had become quiet again…

“Ahihi! Ahihihihi!”

Netsuzou, the last of the Three Great Jailers, perhaps no longer sane… just kept laughing, sitting on the corridor floor, not even trying to escape.

But his laughter suddenly stopped.

“A sweet… scent…?”

And Netsuzou, with a puzzled look, started saying that.

A sweet scent…?

There’s no such thing.

<It just… stinks.>

But Netsuzou isn’t paying attention to me, tilting my head.

He slowly stood up.

And then, the next moment!

A part of the sludge, which had just been spreading across the corridor, formed a sphere-like shape, and then!

The sphere squirmed… and transformed into a human shape!

A mud man was born!

And the shape of that mud man… is identical to Kaizan, who was just swallowed by the sludge!

“Kaizan! You’re safe, aren’t you!?”

Netsuzou, uttering those strange words, started walking unsteadily towards the sludge.

“No, no matter how you look at it, it’s a fake!?”

I couldn’t just leave it at that, so I shouted from inside my cell, but… it seems that my voice didn’t reach him.

“A-Ahihi! E-Everyone else too! You were there!”

Netsuzou, chuckling happily, continued to approach the sludge.

Before I knew it, on the sludge… besides Kaizan, there were other mud men, shaped like humans.

Are those his subordinates, wearing the same uniform as Netsuzou?

And those wearing tattered clothes, with chains around their wrists… are perhaps the prisoners who were imprisoned here.

There are also some wearing armor with designs I’ve never seen before, and some dressed like ordinary villagers…

Various mud men were standing there.

And they’re all smiling.

Beckoning Netsuzou—Come, come.

“Happiness…? Ah, I see… So that’s… happiness…!”

And then, after happily saying those incomprehensible words—

“I too… will become… one…”

He muttered that, and—

Netsuzou jumped into the sludge himself.

What happened after that is the same as with Kaizan.

Only the squelching, crushing sound echoed through the corridor.

<And so, the Three Great Jailers are gone! Thanks to that, Emi was able to escape from the Great Prison of Delenezo! The end!>

Extra-sama, sounding slightly resigned, joked.

“Haha.”

I couldn’t help but laugh too.

Although my expression didn’t change.

…I can only laugh, really.

I looked towards the direction from which the Three Great Jailers came.

It’s already completely covered in sludge.

That unidentified, man-eating sludge.

Like a swamp.

And they said, just now.

That the entrance is blocked by a monster.

There’s no escape route… isn’t there?

And to make matters worse, this sludge… doesn’t seem to be full, even after “eating” the Three Great Jailers.

It’s slowly approaching me.

And it touches the iron bars, which hurt when touched.

It gets repelled with a snap—BACHI.

But it keeps coming back.

…Repeating that.

It seems that it can’t do dexterous things like thinning its body and slipping through the gaps in the bars… which is the only saving grace right now.

Haa…

What is this thing?

Cold sweat trickled down my forehead, and a small drop landed on the floor, forming a tiny circle.

It stinks, it’s creepy… and dangerous.

Honestly, I can’t imagine myself winning against it.

First, is this sludge even alive?

I can’t win unless it’s something that dies when killed.

Fighting… how am I supposed to fight a swamp?

I couldn’t help but hold my head in my hands.

<Emi… listen carefully.>

Here.

Extra-sama spoke to me.

What?

Do you know what this sludge is?

<As expected of Emi, you noticed.>

We’ve been together for a long time.

So?

What is this thing?

<It’s one of the Calamities, which should have been sealed in Forast, the ‘Continent of War’ Normally, it’s not something that can exist in the Great Prison of Delenezo. However, for whatever reason, it’s here now.>

After saying that—

<Squirming, swallowing everything, spreading endlessly. And interfering with the minds of the living, whispering happiness… This Calamity is—>

Extra-sama told me its name.

<‘The Blissful Sludge’, Kolmallya.>

The Three Great Jailers, eliminated at high speed!

And a new Calamity appears, ‘The Blissful Sludge’, Kolmallya!

Most Calamities are opponents that even Emi, in her current state, has no chance of defeating.

Considering that the self-proclaimed ‘weakest’ Calamity, ‘The Great Evil Spirit Engee Albitt’, was the final boss of Arc 1, you can imagine how troublesome they are.

Incidentally, the name Forast, the Continent of War, already appeared at the beginning of Arc 16.

Hamejika, the ‘The Golden Continent’.

Nijial, the ‘The Fantasy Continent’.

Sardisann, the ‘The Dark Continent’.

Forast, the ‘The War Continent’.

These four are the names of the main continents in this story.

There’s one more continent whose name has been revealed…

But Emi won’t go there, so it doesn’t matter…