◈ Chapter 478. Exploration of the Strange
- Presentation (2)
Instance dungeon.
The dungeon that befell each player was different. Yet the perceived difficulty was the same. Unless there was a difference in “class,” no one would be able to clear their dungeon easily.
Hisagi, a magic spearman, had encountered the worst possible matchup.
“At this rate, there isn’t even a gap for my spearpoint to slip into.”[Lv.650 : Ironclad Slaughter Doll]
There wasn’t even a seam in its iron armor.
But there was no hesitation.
In a dungeon, the moment one was held in place.
One would face even more monsters.
The best course was to take them down one by one, by any means necessary.
Whoosh.
The magic spearman’s skill, Magic Spear Art, activated.
A vortex of flame swirled around the tip of Hisagi’s spear.
Melt the opponent’s iron armor with intense heat and render it powerless.
As expected of Hisagi, known as the Wise Serpent of Tokyo, he had thought of a way to overcome the matchup, but.
Hiss.
The problem was that this place was a dungeon.
And one designed by Raymon Sean.
A dungeon he had designed with impure intentions.
Drip, drip.
Droplets falling from the dungeon’s outer walls cooled the heat.
The moisture prevented the flames from spreading.
Swish.
The flame-attribute Magic Spear Art heated the creature’s iron armor red, but that was all. Hisagi quickly widened the distance. He thought of his next move.
Crackle.
Magic Spear Art, Lightning.
If the dungeon’s humidity was the problem.
Then he would use lightning, which could turn that humidity into a catalyst.
Hisagi’s judgment was the best choice this time as well.
However.[The Ironclad Slaughter Doll resists the status abnormality, ‘Electrocution’.]
The problem was that even that lay within Raymon Sean’s expectations.
Damn it, if it was covered in status-abnormality resistances as well…….
Hisagi spoke in a low voice.
“Magic Spear Art may not have much effect.”
Magic Spear Art was like a game of rock-paper-scissors that could not lose. It meant he could seize the advantage through various attributes. But to think it possessed such a wide variety of status-abnormality resistances.
Hisagi raised the corner of his mouth.
“So it was a trap meant to catch a snake.”
He had expected it.
The fact that the players had been isolated.
Meant the enemy was confident he could coax and cook the isolated players as he pleased.
However, in another sense, it left a rather unpleasant taste.
“This feels as if my struggle is being denied, does it not?”
A dungeon blatantly designed by measuring his limits.
Without taking into account at all.
His struggle to break those limits.
Which meant.
To put it another way.
If he broke through his limits, he could clear it.
“Whew.”
Hisagi prepared to manifest not a skill, but 『magic』.
His manifestation ability was, even if judged generously, not at the level of an apprentice mage.
Regrettable, but it could not be helped.
Search, interference, manifestation.
Far from applying them.
They were concepts he could barely keep up with.‘However.’He could at least add “something” during the process of interference.
Soon, an air current rippled at the tip of Hisagi’s spear.
It was sword aura.
Gooooo.
Add sword aura to the interference process.
The backlash could only be severe.
Perhaps because he had not fully awakened to either magic or sword aura.
Gulp.
This was, as expected, the backlash.
Blood surged up his throat.
But Hisagi did not spit out the blood.
Gulp.
He swallowed it back down.
“Bitter.”
Like a snake swallowing its prey.
At this moment, Hisagi was forcing the impossible.
In order to digest the [『Strange』]
that was larger than his vessel.
Literally.
He resolved to become a snake.
Yes, a boa constrictor capable of swallowing the elephant that was the Strange would do nicely.
Drip.
Soon, blood flowed down from the corner of his lips.
“……
Who am I?”
I am Hisagi Kazuma.
The snake of Tokyo.
Even if only to live up to that name, I must digest it.
Even as Hisagi struggled to digest the Strange.
Time continued to flow.
Clank.
Just as he had feared.
Monsters began to gather from all over the dungeon.
From the perspective of Arcana Continent Chronicle, the raid had failed.
However.
“……
It’s done.”
In the end, Hisagi had digested the Strange.
So with only the narrow perspective of Arcana Continent Chronicle.
It was no longer possible to evaluate what would happen from here on.
As you can see.
Swish.
With nothing more than a thrust of his spear.
Ignoring the matchup entirely.
He sharply sliced the ironclad dolls apart.
Srrk.
Hisagi wiped the blood from his mouth and spoke.
“We are an alliance, after all. Should we not go together, Taemin?”*
The Space-Time Social Hall.
The Child of Lightning.
And the Warrior of Sunrise checked the parchment.
No, they reread the “parchments.”
“Nam Taemin, Hisagi, Leoni…….”
The Space-Time Social Hall had granted qualification reviews to no fewer than three people.
And all of them were adventurers.
The Warrior of Sunrise twitched his thick eyebrows and asked the boy.
“Has there ever been a case like this before?”
“As if there has. Even one sheet arriving is enough to cause a fuss!”
“Three at the same time.”
Even if heroes were born in chaotic times.
This made no sense.
Because the qualification of a Transcendent was not something one could seize merely by being strong.‘Moreover, they are adventurers.’They should have been utterly lacking in the accumulation required to qualify as Transcendents.
But the question did not linger long.
The Child of Lightning, who had been staring sullenly at the review request.
Suddenly jumped in shock.
“……
Wait! Th-this, this long name is?!”
A long name?
The names of the three adventurers were not long.
The achievements they had built were not particularly long either.
“No. Here at the end, at the very end!!”
At those words, the Warrior looked at the review request in his hand.
And there truly was a long name.
A name he could never forget.──────Reviewed by : Grandfell Claudi Arpheus Romeo──────“Grandfell……!”
The man who had entered the Space-Time Social Hall by the first unanimous vote.
And at the same time, not long ago.
The man who had dissolved their Transcendent Alliance.
“Why, why is he written here?!”
The Child of Lightning trembled the moment he saw that name.Because he had yet to shake off the humiliation he had felt from Retel.
The head of Akamond, one of the four families.
To the point that.
“……
Wait, he’s not listening from above, is he?”
He even stammered while glaring at the innocent chandelier on the ceiling.
“Not ‘he’—why is Grandfell here……!”
Of course, the Warrior was puzzled as well.
Among the Transcendents, he had only entered the Social Hall relatively recently. He had not seen many review requests. He could not even guess why that man’s name was written together on a Transcendent qualification review request.
Even so, he carefully tried to grasp the intent.
“Reviewed by…….”
Fortunately, the conjecture was not difficult.
Had they not been harboring doubts already?
Adventurers.
How had they.
Managed to rise to the ranks of Transcendents in such a short time?
“……
No way.”
“No way what? Did you figure something out, tacky hyung?”
“So that was it.”
“No, don’t act like you’re the only one who knows. Tell me!”
Clench.
Before he realized it, the Warrior’s hands were sweating.
“Grandfell Claudi Arpheus Romeo. That man led Nam Taemin, Hisagi, and Leoni. He led those three adventurers to the ranks of Transcendents. That is the conclusion I have reached.”
“Wh-what kind of nonsense is that?”
The Child of Lightning was dumbfounded.
“Do you seriously think something like that is possible, hyung? Ever since that day, you’ve become so listless……. You’ve changed way too much, you know? There’s a limit to overestimating someone……!”
“It does not lie.”
Flutter. The Warrior of Sunrise shook the parchment.
“You know as well as I do that what is written on the parchment is the truth, without a single falsehood. That is why, even during Grandfell’s Transcendent qualification review, you cast a vote in favor.”
“……
W-well, that’s true!”
“And that very parchment clearly states the man’s existence.”
Then what that meant was simple.
“This is a tremendous relief…….”
By the mere fact of his existence.
Grandfell was someone who could guide others to the ranks of Transcendents.
If he had not shown them mercy…….‘By now, we would be trembling in fear.’In that sense, his thoughts reached Oxidin.
Just what scheme was that bastard hiding?
He had been impossible to read from the moment they first met.
But now, it was even harder to guess.‘To be precise, ever since the moment he was reborn as a monarch.’After pondering, the Warrior rose from his seat.
The three Transcendent qualification review requests.
He left all of them on the table.
“This is not something I can evaluate.”
“What? Why? I’m definitely voting against them!”
The Child of Lightning, like a child his age.
Insisted stubbornly beyond reason.
He intended to take out on the adventurers the anger he had suffered from Retel.
The Warrior of Sunrise spoke childishly, as though handling a child of that age.
“You’d better keep in mind that the name stated on that review request is not just one. If you stubbornly insist for no reason and end up tarnishing Grandfell’s face…….”
“……
Agh!”
In the end, the Child of Lightning also sprang to his feet after the Warrior.
“Then I’ll abstain for the time being too, like you, hyung! So where are you going? Did something make you curious? Or is it because you don’t want to play with me?”
The Warrior nodded.
“Both.”
“Both?”
“Because I cannot learn news of the continent from here.”
Time in the Social Hall flowed so slowly that it would not be wrong to say its flow had stopped. Which meant he could not know what was happening on the Arcana Continent.
“Shouldn’t I watch?”
Oxidin.
What that bastard was doing.
Thus, the Warrior of Sunrise left the Space-Time Social Hall.
“……!”
Soon, he opened his eyes in reality.
And felt a sense of incongruity.
Why.
Rattle.‘Am I riding in a carriage?’
He had definitely been traveling with Pocom the General Merchant, who was also a Transcendent……. Around that point, the Warrior of Sunrise realized that his memories were not intact.
“……
Wait.”
The Warrior looked beyond the carriage window.
He saw Pocom riding a pony and the merchant caravan following him.
Now that he had closed up shop for the time being, there was no reason for him to be leading a caravan.
Just where were they headed?
No sooner had the question formed.
Than a majestic sight entered his vision.
“Is that……?”
A city wall.
On the Arcana Continent at present, city walls of that scale were rare.
Thanks to that, he realized it immediately.
Pocom’s caravan was heading toward Antonium, the capital of the Empire.‘There was no reason to stop by Antonium.’The Warrior’s pondering ended there.
In the instant in reality while he had stayed in the Space-Time Social Hall.
He did not know what had happened.
But he had no intention of being dragged into Pocom’s affairs without knowing why.
Tap.
In preparation for any unforeseen situation.
The moment the Warrior of Sunrise reached toward the Sunrise Blade.
His hand twitched.
“!”
It was sticky.
Because sticky blood was smeared all over the handle of the Sunrise Blade.
At that moment, he intuited it.‘Oxidin……!!’The tyrant’s brainwashing had not been completely undone.*
The colossal beast, Ptera.
Oxidin observed the battle situation from atop the ancient pterosaur.
“I expected nothing from beasts to begin with.”
The colossal beast was, in any case, nothing more than a deception.
The real pieces were, at this moment, concealing their identities.
The Transcendents entering Antonium.
“Do not blame yourself. You were splendid, Lee Hoyeol.”
Oxidin thought of Hoyeol, who had undone the brainwashing of the Transcendents.
It was an ad-lib worthy of high praise.
However, you were unlucky, and I was lucky.
Oxidin recited.
“Because not even death could break my desire.”
The moment he wore the crown upside down, things changed drastically.
Oxidin’s name was updated in the player rankings.
His level rose.
Why such a result had appeared.
The cause was revealed here.
Oxidin.
No, the thought engraved upon the Tyrant’s Crown.
Liuojunchun’s thought opened its mouth.[Tyrant’s Succession (Master) : A true tyrant does not allow anyone to steal his throne. Even if his life comes to an end, the tyrant’s will toward power shall not be severed. Current subject of succession : Oxidin]
“Find him. And execute him.”
The tyrant gave the order.
“Begin with Long Chengluo, the traitor of Tianxia Tongyi.”...
Slice.
Sunrise.
Before the speed of the rising sun.
He could not even dare utter a death cry.
“F……?”
Spurt.
Long Chengluo’s body and head separated. Blood surged up in the tavern. The man who had cut off Long Chengluo’s head, the Warrior of Sunrise, left the tavern without saying or doing anything further.
As if, with that, his purpose had been achieved.
“Kyaaaaaak!”
“C-catch that bastard right now!”
“You crazy son of a bitch, stop right there!”
The man who had been sitting across from Long Chengluo was drenched in blood.
But he was not shocked.
Because even at this moment, his mind was spinning rapidly.
This was a murder born of a grudge.
Long Chengluo had earned someone’s resentment.
Long Chengluo, who had turned over a new leaf.
There was only one person.
Who might hold such a grudge against him.
“……
Liuojunchun.”
A former Five Star of Tianxia Tongyi.
Bai Chenglun.
He wiped the blood away and gritted his teeth.
“I will repay the debt I owe him with your life.”
Shing!