The Final Boss Has Returned — Episode 75
The moment I left the Skeleton Battlefield where the Undead King was, the first thing I did was summon Lich Dice.
"Summon Lich Dice."
[Lich Dice has answered the Apostle's call.]
No sooner had the activation phrase ended than Lich Dice was summoned from thin air alongside black smoke!
Clad in a black robe and holding a skull staff, a fierce blue spectral flame burned within Lich Dice's hollow sockets—though not as intense as that of the Undead King.
Opening his status window, I saw Dice's class was Necromancer, and his race was Undead (Lich)!
Having confirmed that the rest of his skill list was quite useful, I closed the status window and issued Dice his first command.
"Guide me to the Undead King's treasure vault."
[Yes, Apostle.]
No sooner had my order fallen than Dice took the lead!
The Undead King's treasure vault, which I arrived at under Dice's guidance, was a place where gold and silver treasures were piled into mountains, enough to make one's eyes pop out of their head.
Literally, a massive mountain of glittering gold and jewels—the kind you'd only see in a cartoon—stood before my eyes.
"Since we're in the treasure vault, everyone pick one item and let's go."
I spoke to my party members while staring at the mountain of treasure, and as I watched them scatter throughout the vault, I began to move as well.
It was time to collect the quest reward.
The items weren't only in the mountain of treasure.
Based on my game experience, items piled up like that were highly likely to be unremarkable even for warehouse goods.
So where were the 'real' ones?
They were in the display case beside the mountain.
I stared at the weapons and armor neatly arranged in the display case.
Every single piece looked expensive!
Equipment that was clearly at least Legendary-grade emitted a prismatic light, tempting me.
'I was told I could only choose one.'
But among them, only one item was actually available to me!
So I had to choose carefully.
'First, swords and armor are out.'
To make the optimal choice, experience dictated it was best to eliminate broad categories first.
The first broad categories I eliminated were swords and armor.
With the Black God Armor and the Executor of Iron Blood already in my possession, swords and armor weren't of much use to me.
Naturally, what remained were shoes, accessories, and capes.
I carefully examined the items with a focus on shoes, accessories, and capes, and finally found one to my liking.
[Reaper's Cloak]
[Grade: Legendary]
[Classification: Cloak]
[Durability: 50,000/50,000]
[A cloak of legend said to have been worn by the Reaper.]
[An ominous aura of death continuously flows from the cloak.]
[An ordinary person who equips this cloak may go mad.]
[Item Effects]
[Dark Attribute Resistance +70%]
[Dark Attribute Additional Damage +10%]
[Soul Absorption: Absorbs the souls of those killed by the wearer to recover the wearer's mana.]
[Life Drain: Absorbs the life force of the living with each attack by the wearer.]
[Shadow Movement: Allows movement from shadow to shadow. (Cooldown: 3 minutes)]
[Equippable Restrictions]
[Possessor of a Dark-type class, or one who has formed a contract with a Transcendent of the Demon Subjugation Hall.]
Reaper's Cloak!
A Legendary-grade item laden with excellent options was before me, and I had already been thinking of acquiring a cloak.
The moment I laid my hand on the Reaper's Cloak, a notification window popped up before my eyes.
[Do you wish to select 'Reaper's Cloak' as your quest completion reward?]
[Caution! You may only select one item.]
A message asking if I was really going to choose it!
"I select it."
[You have selected the Reaper's Cloak.]
[You have selected all rewards. You will exit the Undead King's treasure vault.]
I smiled as I read the final message.
The undead quest was finally, truly, completely over.
* * *
War Against Death!
A large-scale war event ambitiously prepared by Spear King Rio and the Simseong Milky Way Guild, one that had virtually monopolized Ard Saga's trending topics during its run.
But it ended with a conclusion that no one—not even Spear King Rio, who had hosted the event—could have predicted.
None other than Drakan!
He had suddenly taken the side of the undead and crashed the event.
When Drakan appeared leading an undead army on the snowy plains of the North where blizzards raged, the internet quite literally exploded.
Drakan, blocking the path of Spear King Rio!
Who could have imagined such a thing? It was a situation no one could have foreseen.
But the surprises didn't end there.
Rune of Regression!
Though it was a one-time skill, the overwhelming power of Drakan using that skill to temporarily summon his prime self was broadcast to the entire world through Ard Live and SBC Games.
From the Incarnation of Iron Blood to the Rain of Steel!
The sight of Drakan crushing the Over Ranker Spear King with overwhelming skills and physical prowess and mowing down enemies immediately transformed into countless GIFs and clips, heating up the internet.
On the Ard Forum, posts about the overwhelming performance Drakan had shown rose to popularity by the minute.
[Makes me realize anew, but Drakan was really fucking strong back in the day.]
[Just because he beat an Over Ranker, people are going on about how Drakan is an Over Ranker. It's just because Second hasn't been out for long. Rio was a monster by the first game's standards too, lol.]
[Even by first game standards, Second's basic item spec is way better, so that's not it.]
[Yeah, the stats on endgame gear from the first game and mid-to-high tier gear now are about the same anyway.]
[lol the first-game apologists are out. It's been ages since the devs officially said the calculation formulas are different between the first game and Second, so one-to-one spec comparisons are meaningless, lol.]
[I thought even with his prime transformation he was about the same level. I think Rio just has exceptionally bad mechanics.]
[lololololol]
[Downvote real-name system ON]
[Once both finish their succession quests, Drakan and Yujin will probably have similar specs. But since Yujin has higher levels, maybe he's a bit stronger.]
[Right now the farming period gap with Yujin is widening, so we won't know until they fight.]
[So fucking hyped for the dream match.]
Drakan!
The overwhelming performance he had shown was revealed in the explanation video Drakan himself uploaded to be the effect of the 'Rune of Regression,' but even so, the users' interest in Drakan's performance didn't cool much.
The new generation of users!
New-generation users who had started Ard Saga from Second were one of the two powerful pillars supporting Drakan's fandom, the 'Black Ox,' alongside the Eastern users.
But ironically, the new-generation users who supported Drakan had only heard about his exploits in the first game by word of mouth, never having seen them directly, because they hadn't been playing the game during Drakan's active days.
Yet in that situation, Drakan had shown his prime form, if only temporarily.
So they couldn't help but go wild.
Drakan!
The fact that his name—the Terror of the Battlefield, the Lord of Steel, the Iron-Blooded Tyrant—hadn't been gained through mere luck!
The fact that he possessed more than enough potential to grow far more explosively than the current Over Rankers, and even to threaten the position of Top Ranker Yujin—Drakan had shown this through the Rune of Regression that day.
Yujin!
The ruler who had held dominion over the Ard World for more than six years!
Upon learning that the titan who possessed the qualifications to challenge Yujin's iron-walled reign was none other than Drakan, whom they supported, Drakan's fandom—fundamentally imbued with an anti-Church of Infinite Yujin sentiment—went into a frenzy.
On the other hand, the Church of Infinite Yujin instinctively sensed a crisis.
Drakan!
Because they felt the nightmare of the past reviving in the form of his prime-era performance.
Thus, the Church of Infinite Yujin's public opinion warfare was more active than ever.
The quest itself had little to criticize, but the problem was that winter had come to the North!
The Church of Infinite Yujin persistently dug into that weakness from the early stages.
[Honestly, isn't it broken that Drakan brought winter this time?]
[For real, it's a bit much. What did Northern users do to deserve this? Suddenly it's winter, lolol.]
[Honestly, it's kind of annoying that it suddenly got cold.]
It was none other than Drakan who had brought winter to the North.
Of course, just because winter had come didn't mean it was much colder than a normal winter, but nevertheless, it was true that the weather had suddenly turned cold as the season changed from what should have been summer. So public opinion seemed to be gradually turning negative as the Church of Infinite Yujin intended, but refutations immediately came in.
[Isn't that because of Rio? If Rio hadn't messed with the undead that were just minding their own business~ this wouldn't have happened, lol.]
Spear King Rio!
It was Drakan's Black Ox who first uncovered the fact that this incident had clearly started as a war when Rio struck the undead living quietly within his territory out of a desire for fame.
[Honestly, Rio has no shame. Drakan-nim included regular users and held a fun event, but that bastard Rio selfishly tried to hog it all among his own people and ended up like this. You reap what you sow.]
[For real, Rio made dogshit terrible plays and went down in flames, so why is that Drakan's responsibility?]
[Is it true that some people from Simseong Milky Way got into the event through money and others through connections this time?]
[Yeah, it's true. I heard from someone who paid to join the quest that they got character-deleted at the end because they didn't get escorted and the guild cut and run.]
[That was me, lol. I'm suing that bastard, damn it.]
[Honestly, Drakan-nim is the best, don't you agree?]
Moreover, since Rio had excluded user participation in operating the event, users who had been bitter about being unable to join the War Against Death began to join that public opinion battle.
Of course, it wasn't wrong for Rio to proceed with the quest using only his own forces without sharing it.
But the problem lay in the fact that right before this, Drakan had shared quests with users twice without any conditions.
Drakan, who had shared quests without any price, and Rio, who had shared quests only with the forces around him!
The public opinion, already seething at the glaring contrast, was completely overturned when certain users revealed that some members of the Simseong Milky Way Guild had secretly allowed people into the expeditionary force either for money or through crony connections.
[Can you survive without ass-kissing? Even in games, it's all school ties, blood ties, and hometown ties. For real, Ard World has gone completely to hell, lol.]
Entering the expeditionary force through connections or money!
That was enough to provoke users who had been unable to participate in the quest, and as a result, the final flow of public opinion began to flow backward from Drakan toward Rio, contrary to what the Church of Infinite Yujin had intended.
At that very moment.
Big news that would overshadow all of that public opinion blanketed the entire internet.