My Reincarnation as a Chicken

The moment we entered; a giant hologram of Kaleb Zen appeared before us

“Welcome, to the final dungeon in my series! You are honestly pretty impressive. As expected, you completed the <<Yellow Springs>> without a hitch and now you’re here to do the same to this one.”

Yellow Springs? I hadn’t done that one yet. Maybe he assumed it’d be done in a particular order?

“Well, finish this dungeon for a cool surprise.”

With that, the hologram faded, leaving both Julian and I alone in the snow forest. I looked to him for any sort of information, but he simply shrugged, just as unknowledgeable as I.

‘Agent?’

<<… C… n’t… arri…r… skills… shut… down.>>

‘Eh? This hasn’t happened before.’

‘Oi, Akira, Akkun, Hyakkun.’

They didn’t respond to me. Somehow, I couldn’t feel my connection to them anymore, even though they were supposed to be in my head. A bit perplexed, I reached out my hand to use a skill, just as a test. My hand was covered in bits of steel scales, but the scales just fell off before they could completely encase them.

‘Hm? Skills are active but at a weaker level?’

Just as I figured this out, Julian spoke up.

“W-Well… i-it would seem this wasn’t as bright an idea as I believed.”, In his palms, blood that he was summoning just fell to the ground lifelessly.

I looked at him with disbelief and anger, but before I could berate the dumbass, the growling of monsters cut through the air. From behind the trees, a group of giant white-furred creatures with ice blue eyes and fangs about the size of my forearm appeared.

‘Kill! Kill! Kill!’, was the only thing in their minds. Either that, or my telepathy was now at a level where I could only interpret simple thoughts. I highly doubted it was the latter though.

One of the yetis jumped down, swinging a frozen tree branch at me. Easily, I sidestepped to avoid the blow, then used [Spear Stab] to pierce it in the chest. The yeti backed down, falling on its knees, holding its chest and huffing heavily.

I looked at my hand. I was a bit surprised that it wasn’t as easy as a one-hit kill. However, I wasn’t going to waste time thinking about that. Quickly, I used [Spear Slash] to decapitate the yeti. Its body fell lifelessly to the ground.

“Well… at least I know I can kill them without breaking a sweat.”

Julian clapped his hands excitedly.

“That’s the queen of monsters for you.”, He muttered.

To avoid hearing more of his cringe nonsense, I looked back at the yetis. Three more fell to the ground, all charging at me. Avoiding their attacks were no problem for me. Within seconds, they were all on the ground, either missing a head or a limb.

The rest of the yetis that were hiding up on the trees glared at me quietly. Obviously, they were analysing me, using their friends as test dummies to come up with counter measures. After all, even if yetis were savage beasts, they wouldn’t be able to survive in the [Winter Zone] with brawn alone. If I had to give a singular yeti a rank, it’d be B-. At my current level, even with weaker skills, an entire group wouldn’t even make me sweat.

The yetis hiding in the trees started to break off the frozen branches of the trees and started to throw them at me.

Ignoring their silly attacks, I jumped at their trees, hunting them down one by one. And as if to protect them, the trees started to move around, their branches swinging wildly to hit me. Now they were a bit harder to dodge due to the sheer amount, but the moment I grabbed one branch, it was game over.

Using the branch as a rope, I swung the tree I’d caught, clearing all the other trees easily.

“Oi, Julian. This isn’t even a challenge.”

Although I said this, I was starting to get anxious. Sure, I was clearing these guys easily, but this was Kaleb Zen’s final work. If there were more floors beyond this, my inability to use my skills to their full extent could result in my death. And there was also the fact that Julian was watching me closely to make it so I wasn’t able to use anything else.

‘Wait… don’t they need me though? The queen chose me to be the demon lord stand-in while Maou grows up. That means, Julian can’t afford to let me die…’

No. That wasn’t the right way to think. The queen most likely only picked me because I was the most convenient and easiest to control. I doubted she’d put in a lot to ensure that I survived this. I had to think of this like I was extremely disposable if I wanted to survive.

“You’re right. I’m starting to feel underwhelmed-! Huh!?”

There was a whizzing sound in the air and then, half of Julian’s stomach was no more. The boy’s eyes widened, at the sight of his blood spilling everywhere. The impact of whatever it was that effortlessly broke through his defences kicked up a storm of snow behind him, as he fell limply.

Instinctively, I also kicked up another cloud of snow, then covered my body in steel scales and dragon scales. I also used [Mythril Body] to up my defences as best as I could. Just like with Julian, something hit me, right in the forehead, shattering through my scales and knocking me back, quite the distance.

‘Oi, oi, oi! T-That’s overkill! I actually almost died just now!’

It felt like my skull almost split in two.

That was bad. Considering just how weak my skills were compared to when outside, I wondered what sort of effects it would have on my resurrection skill. I highly doubted it’d be functional. And even if it was, there was no telling just how long it would take.

At least, I now had a sense for which direction it came from. I then grabbed one of the frozen branches, then using [Dragon Spear Technique] and [Snipe], I fired off the branch in the direction, at my maximum strength.

The branch connected with the peak, creating an explosion of snow. I quickly ran over to Julian’s side and picked him up from the ground.

“Y-You good?”, I asked.

“N-No… my regeneration is completely off. At this rate, I may die if don’t get blood. If you could oblige me with yours, I would be eternally grateful.”, He said, already baring his fangs and getting ready to dig into my neck.

I pushed him back, then looked at the mountain top.

“If it’s blood you want, you can have the blood of whatever it was that… did… this. To.”, The sound of something charging up entered my ears. “You…?”

I took in a big gulp. There was bright bluish light from the mountain top. The light only grew brighter and bigger and my survival instincts told me that was a blast I didn’t want to receive.

“L-Leave me, monster queen!”, Julian yelled dramatically. “Take my death as a lesson. This is the start of thine divine legend. I am glad to have been thine motivation for world dominance.”

I had to give him props. Even in the face of death, he still found a way to be cringe.

I just had to stop it before it charged up to completion and we were good.

Quickly, I flew up to the top of the mountain, ready to fight whatever it was that was attacking us, but to my surprise, all I found was… a sniper rifle? The bright light that I saw earlier was merely a giant lantern that was getting brighter by the second. However, I could still hear the sound of something charging up.

I looked back to where I originally was, and crouching right next to Julian was what appeared to be a girl. She held a bow and arrow made of pure energy, with its sights set on me.

Before I could react, the arrow was sent flying in my direction.

‘T-This is bad!’

***

“Targets have been identified. Hinotori Hyakkiyako and Julian. Releasing neutralising agent for the vampire, Julian.”

I pulled out the sniper rifle that my master had assigned as my personal weapon and aimed at the duo. Specifically, the vampire.

Without hesitating, I fired off, carving out a chunk of the vampire’s innards. Quickly, I set my sights on the Hinotori and aimed my sights at her head. She was a smart one, however, as she kicked up snow to obstruct my view.

“Switching to infrared vision.”

Her body heat through the snow allowed me to observe her easily. I fired off another round, hitting the target, right on the forehead. Rather than splitting her skull in two, it simply knocked her back a few metres.

I readjusted my sights, ready to fire off at her again, but she had already started her counterattack. An icicle came flying at my neck, just as fast as my bullets moved. No, maybe even faster. I rolled to the side, narrowly avoiding death, then jumped back.

Even with her skills nerfed, she was too strong a target. I’d already prepared myself for this, though.

I placed the rifle down, with it still aiming at her.

“Call Gate: Open Vault 02.”

A silver bow appeared in hand.

According to a manual I’d been given, this bow was one of 12 weapons crafted by a legendary weapons master before the God Wars. They each contained insane power, but this power couldn’t ever be used since the chances of them ever accepting mere mortals as partners were almost non-existent.

Still, this bow had accepted me.

I pulled back on the bow, and a string of yellow light formed. The further back I pulled, I created a spear of light.

In an attempt to end it all with one attack alone, I continued to charge up the attack without regard for the kind of effect it would have on the ground below.

But, as if aware of the sort of destruction this attack would unleash, Hinotori flew towards me. I activated my teleportation ring, choosing to appear right where she’d just abandoned.

“Huh? W-Who are you?”

I chose to ignore the invalid as I let go of the strings, shooting the bow forward. It's size, too big to avoid, and speed too fast to react to. If I was lucky, this would kill her.

“You don’t actually believe that your arrow can kill her, do you?”

Of course, I didn’t. My hope was that, at the very least, this arrow would buy me 5 minutes. Even a god would have a hard time when the fabric of space-time around them was being ripped apart and they were being overloaded with cosmic radiation.

The whole floor started to shake violently. No doubt the effects of her collision with the invisible dome. I took out a knife.

“For now, I’m going to take off your head, the-”

I paused.

A shadow loomed over me, the scent of burning chicken wafting in the air.

<A/N: Looks like this ranger's about to get a fistful of KFC... get it? KFC... cause chickens and burning and... Yeah... I'll stop now.

Anyhow, pray for food vendors. Especially those who give us good fried chicken. In fact, I'll go order myself some KFC rn.

Have a good day!>