He sensed something was wrong when the grotesque voice of the Watcher—the boss monster guarding the floor’s orb—rang out.
- □□□.
It was a trivial sense of incongruity.
Abyss monsters were creatures of another world.
Since their sounds did not belong here, wasn’t it only natural for them to feel out of place?
He had heard the sounds of Abyss monsters many times.
Most were not much different from other monsters, screeching kieek, kyaaaak.
That was the sound of lower-floor Abyss monsters, and he had never heard the cry of a midsection boss monster on the level of the “Watcher” before.
It was not a simple howl. It was something utterly unfamiliar, like an incomprehensible language.
He had simply thought, once they were midsection bosses, they could even speak the language of another world… and let it pass.
But within the sound that repeated several times.
- □□□ga.
When he somehow felt its tone changing little by little.
「Mental attack detected.」
「Trait - ‘Can’t Live Without Style!’ has been activated.」
The sense of incongruity swelled in the blink of an eye and came crashing down upon him.
It did not disappear even after Daphne instantly dealt with the Watcher using a wave of glaciers.
Rather, it grew even stronger.
- □□inga.
The Watcher was certainly dead, and yet the sound coming from it alone had not vanished.
Because that uncanny voice was gradually changing into something familiar.
With rising tension, he lifted his staff.
「‘Staff of the Authority of Darkness’ skill - ‘Dark Insight’ has been activated.」
What his black-dyed eyes saw was—
“Daphne. Stop.”
An eye of the abyss, floating high above.
“Come to my side.”
The instant he perceived it, this place was already the abyss.
* * *
How could he assert that it was the abyss? If asked that, he had no particular answer.
One could say there was simply nothing else to call it.
Against a backdrop of darkness, the space formed of darkness was bizarre beyond measure.
It felt as though he could be swallowed at any moment, as though he could fall infinitely at any moment. That was the kind of space it was.
A vague fear slipped through the mental barrier that had been firmly erected.
It could not be resisted. For any living, breathing creature, it was a space where one had no choice but to feel fear.
「Trait - ‘Can’t Live Without Style!’ is active.」
It was not a phenomenon occurring intentionally. It was simply the natural phenomenon given by the abyss itself, born from this very space.
[Hidden Trait: Violence Is Not Allowed! (Endurance: 940 / 1000)]
And yet he had to endure it.
He had to endure the vague fear with no known reason, the vague terror that he might lose himself at any moment, and come to his senses.
“Keep your mind firm, Daphne.”
That was all he could say to Daphne.
There was nothing else he could do, so he could only hope she would hold on to her mind properly and withstand this bizarre space.
Perhaps those words had some small effect.
A blue cluster of light gathered in Daphne’s right hand, and Laphlysia, the legendary armament of Pieria, revealed itself.
Even so, Daphne’s trembling did not stop.
She had summoned a weapon that was like her other self, but the fear given by the abyss far surpassed even that.
- □□□, □□ □□, Hio Pavlenko.
Once again, the uncanny tone rang out.
It was certainly unfamiliar, yet only those last words were clearly understood and distinctly heard, making the hair on the back of his neck stand on end.
But he could not reveal the fear that came from it.
Even if he showed it, what would return would only be fear grown even greater.
What he had to do now was struggle.
A desperate struggle so as not to sink deeper into the abyss.
- □□□, Supreme Heavenly Demon, Hio Pavlenko.
Again, language rang out from within the abyss.
This time, he could understand more than half of it.
- Lee Hyeonseung, Supreme Heavenly Demon, Hio Pavlenko.
And only on the third reverberation did those words become entirely of this world and resound.
They were perfectly understood, reaching the ears of Daphne and Hio.
The eye of the abyss was looking down at Hio and calling him.
At that, Hio calmly raised his staff.
He had tried not to let it show, but without realizing it, the hand gripping it was filled with strength.
「Skill - ‘Blue Flame’ has been activated.」
Blue flames that annihilated everything they touched burst forth.
The flames containing emotion and will were afraid, just like their master. But they did not express it.
Because the will their master intended to carry out was not that.
“Burn. Blue Flame.”
It was a space unfathomably vast, yet also far too narrow. This was the uncanniness of the abyss.
Hio sought to annihilate that sense of contradiction. He intended to burn away first the fear that came from not knowing the space.
Blue Flame, containing that will in its entirety, rapidly expanded in size.
It pushed back the darkness thick on all sides, illuminated the unfathomable depths beneath his feet, and wherever those blue flames touched, the space was pushed away.
Though the places those flames could not reach were still the abyss and still only darkness, that alone let him breathe a little easier.
[Hidden Trait: Violence Is Not Allowed! (Endurance: 942 / 1000)]
The enormous eye floating in the abyss merely watched Hio’s actions.
If one were to guess the reason, perhaps it was because it knew this was a pitiful struggle.
Was it not because it knew Hio’s abilities could not let him escape this place?
And soon, that uncanny tone was transmitted from the eye of the abyss.
- You hid well until now, but I have found you at last.
At the same time, the space began to move. The abyss was moving.
The pressure of the massive darkness pushing in from above his head, from both sides, and from beneath his feet was beyond imagination.
Within the abyss that seemed ready to swallow him, if not for the blue-glowing Blue Flame, there was a fear that he might lose himself at any moment.
Because the terror was that great, it was only natural that Daphne, driven into a corner, could not bear it and stepped forward.
Her mind, pushed to the edge of a cliff by endless fear, screamed and gave an order.
Get rid of that thing.
Her body reacted, and she lifted Laphlysia.
She aimed it at the uncanny eye gazing down from the high sky.
“…Die!”
Her body trembled violently, but it did not matter.
The target was utterly enormous, and Daphne’s skills—Laphlysia—had never missed even once.
「Skill - ‘Breath of the Glacier’ has been activated.」
「Skill - ‘Thousandfold’ has been activated.」
「‘Laphlysia’ skill - ‘Freezing Point’ has been activated.」
The sure-kill combination that had never once disappointed was completed in an instant, and the bowstring was drawn taut.
A thousand layers of arrows shot toward the eye floating in the darkness, the eye that seemed to be darkness itself. Immense cold was contained within them.
They shot forth faster than ever before and pierced through the eye of the abyss in an instant.
“…….”
No, he had to correct himself.
They had not pierced it; they had simply passed through.
Like a meteor shower passing through a mirage.
The arrows of cold passed through the enormous eye and vanished into the unfathomable abyss.
Watching them grow endlessly distant and finally be swallowed by the abyss made her mind go blank.
It felt as though that would soon be her own fate as well.
And so.
“Die! Die! Please, die……!”
「Skill - ‘Thousandfold’ has been activated.」
「‘Laphlysia’ skill - ‘Blue Sea’ has been activated.」
Daphne, nearly out of her mind, began firing off skills at random.
Of course, not a single one among them dealt any damage.
They merely passed through in vain.
- Rifyue’s hope ends here as well.
Even at Daphne’s struggles, even at her terrified cries, the eye of the abyss did not so much as glance at her.
It only gazed down steadily at Hio and manipulated the darkness. It was gradually pressuring the frightened Blue Flame, which was expanding its body while securing space.
Blue Flame swelled desperately like a frightened puppy, but it was useless.
Because this place was already the abyss.
The reason was that no matter how much it burned, and burned, and burned again, before the infinite abyss, it could only tire in the end.
In the end, even the space Blue Flame had barely managed to secure gradually shrank.
The moment one stepped into it, this abyssal space gnawed away at the mind.
It was so powerful that even a top-tier ranker like Daphne was helplessly brought down.
On top of that, when one watched the darkness closing in every moment and surging forward, one’s mentality could not hold out.
“Don’t come! Don’t come! Don’t come!”
That was the abyss.
A place where even Daphne—always cool-headed, possessing a firm mentality as one at the pinnacle of the Awakened and as the head of a massive guild—collapsed so easily.
「‘Laphlysia’ skill - ‘Blue Sea’ has been activated.」
「Skill - ‘Breath of the Glacier’ has been activated.」
「Skill - ‘Swift’ has been activated.」
She fired off skills indiscriminately. Because of that, Daphne’s mana was rapidly consumed.
A terrified struggle. With it, the cracks in her mind opened even wider.
Fear and terror flooded into the place where cold reason had been.
「‘Laphlysia’ skill - ‘Freezing Point’ has been activated.」
The skills inherent in the legendary armament Laphlysia consumed extreme amounts of mana, commensurate with their powerful effects.
Even if they were not quite top-tier skills, if she spammed them like that, then no matter how Daphne had raised her mana stat to 500, her mana would soon hit bottom.
But she did not notice. She was too busy struggling.
And then, in the end, one went mad. For creatures of another world, this was a space where merely looking at it was enough to shatter the mind.
It was the abyss.
“I said, don’t come…….”
Even those pitiful struggles began to show their end.
With no mana, the arrows she fired no longer carried power.
Her mind grew hazy, and the strength drained from her overly tense body. Wouldn’t it be far more comfortable to simply lose consciousness like this?
If she let go of her strength like this, wouldn’t she lose consciousness and soon become at ease?
And so Daphne’s body collapsed helplessly.
She sat on the ground and stared blankly up at the sky.
No, she could no longer tell whether what she sat on was the ground, or whether what she was looking up at was the sky. Her head was becoming a tangled mess.
All around them, everything was sinking into darkness by the moment, and the space where Daphne and Hio stood was rapidly shrinking. Yet even amid that darkening, the enormous eye floating overhead remained clearly visible and distinctly felt—truly an uncanny thing.
Standing against something so far beyond common sense was itself an absurdity.
It would be easier to simply give up and let go of even the last remaining thread of reason.
Just as Daphne made up her mind to do so.
“I think I understand now.”
Hio, who had remained silent ever since drawing out Blue Flame, stepped forward.
[Hidden Trait: Violence Is Not Allowed! (Endurance: 999 / 1000)]
The hidden trait that had been rising steeply within the abyssal space that endlessly shook his mind finally revealed its true worth.
It was at the very moment she had been about to give up everything.
[Hidden Trait: Violence Is Not Allowed! (Endurance: 1000 / 1000)]
「Congratulations! You have achieved the target value for the hidden trait ‘Violence Is Not Allowed!’ The hidden reward of the hidden trait will be granted.」
「Patience Is Bitter, but Its Fruit Is Sweet!: A skill’s effect becomes not false, but real. The skill’s grade will be readjusted accordingly, and the skill name will be changed.」
「Skills evolved as a reward will not be deleted.」
「Please choose one skill you possess.」
Without hesitation, he chose one skill.
「You have selected the skill - ‘Shield.’」
「Analyzing the effect of the skill - ‘Shield,’ linked to the trait.」
「Analysis complete.」
「The hidden trait reward - ‘Patience Is Bitter, but Its Fruit Is Sweet!’ has been applied to the skill - ‘Shield.’」
「The grade of the skill - ‘Shield’ has been raised to top-tier.」
「The skill name of the skill - ‘Shield’ has been changed to skill - ‘Heaven.’」
Hio took one step forward, and his staff stretched toward the sky.
“Heaven.”
Light poured down.
The abyss split apart.
The eye of the abyss, which had not budged until now, moved its enormous pupil.
Not downward.
- …….
Toward heaven.