𝐂𝐡𝐚𝐩𝐭𝐞𝐫 𝟐𝟏𝟕
[The barrier imbued with Beluin’s power activates.]
‘As expected, a barrier?’
The barrier activated as soon as the light returned to all the red stones.
With the barrier activated, those who left this place could never return.
However, I wasn’t too worried, believing there was a way to break the barrier somewhere within the abandoned castle. I headed towards Aizen, and soon I could hear the Apostle who was in the midst of a battle with him.
━The barrier has finally activated.
His tone implied he had been waiting for the barrier.
[Beluin, the God of Deep Darkness, has detected multiple life forms within the barrier.]
[Beluin, the God of Deep Darkness, uses Sacrifice Devouring.]
[All players within the barrier will lose 300 HP per second.]
[Upon death within the barrier, the soul will belong to Beluin and resurrection spells will not work.]
“This is……”
━Quietly become a sacrifice to Beluin-nim.
Momentarily flustered by the sudden message window, the First Apostle began to wield his sword in earnest, as if the fight so far had been a mere game.
[Beluin’s First Apostle uses Spatial Swordsmanship.]
Swoosh!
Suddenly, the blade swung by the Apostle disappeared and reappeared in a completely unexpected location, cutting off Aizen’s arm.
It didn’t end with just one or two strikes. Every time he swung, the sword would appear in a different unexpected spot, cutting Aizen. It was such a cheat-like skill that Aizen hurriedly retreated without even attempting to counterattack.
“Move!”
I blocked the Apostle in Aizen’s place.
With HP decreasing by 300 per second due to Sacrifice Devouring, it was difficult to rely on the unlimited healing of the guild members.
‘I have to hit him no matter what.’
Jayer’s Guardian Shield only recovers 90 HP per second.
Ultimately, it meant a loss of 210 HP per second. To compensate for this, the only option was to attack the Apostle with Thunder Strike.
Thunder Strike’s attack power would replenish at least a few thousand HP.
“Thunder Strike!”
Kwaaang!!
[Skill Damage! 21,727.]
[HP recovered by 2,107……]
Somehow, the attack was successful, but only because the Apostle’s blade had disappeared, leaving him unable to block my attack.
Conversely, the vanished Apostle’s sword cut my back, and I could feel a slight shock, along with an absurd amount of damage.
[Damage received! -4,691.]
‘Damn it.’
It seemed like the Spatial Swordsmanship itself had a damage-boosting effect, as I received more damage than before.
‘One thing’s for sure, it’s not an attack that can be dodged.’
Dodging was impossible since there was no way to predict where the sword would appear.
Even if I tried to dodge by jumping, he could simply swing his sword again.
‘Plus, surprise attacks won’t work either.’
Kwaaang!!
[Skill Damage! 39,494.]
[HP recovered by 3,830……]
Anyway, I landed all three hits of Thunder Strike, but the situation hadn’t improved at all.
The HP recovered by Thunder Strike was less than the HP being drained, and the guild members’ healing wasn’t keeping up either.
I could guess the reason without even looking.
‘They must be busy healing themselves.’
If things went wrong, we could be wiped out in a few minutes.
Healing skills can’t be used indefinitely.
We were somehow managing to heal now, but once our stamina ran out, we would die one after another.
‘I have no choice but to trust Heron.’
Fortunately, my prediction that he would have something up his sleeve was correct. Heron, along with a few executives and guild members, had been sent outside the barrier, so there was still a chance he could resolve this situation.
[Damage received……]
Anyway.
“Title Change, Summon.”
[Summoning Ust, Swallowing the Bitter Cold.]
[Summoned creature’s level increased by 16……]
With the thought that it was absurd for me to endure when I could neither block nor dodge the Apostle’s attacks, I summoned Ust and decided to entrust this battle to him.
“Eliminate that guy!”
━As if a summoned creature could stop me……
Kuwaawak!!
The summoned Ust fired a Dark Ray before the Apostle could even finish his sentence.
He then summoned dozens of Withered Roots to pressure the Apostle, but the Apostle simply stood in place and cut down all the roots with his sword.
‘How long can Ust hold out?’
Of course, the situation wouldn’t improve just because Ust was holding out.
Heron had to do something, and Ust would have done his part just by holding off the Apostle until then.
“Rudin-nim.”
Suddenly, I turned my head and saw Aizen approaching, having finished his recovery.
“Recovery?”
“It’s not enough to fight with ease like before.”
“He’s fighting better than before.”
Wait, were we fighting with ease before?
“Anyway, we need to disable this barrier first. Do you have any good ideas?”
“Remember when Ukron attacked and the barrier broke? I think it’ll be difficult unless we go towards the part of the abandoned castle where Ukron attacked.”
One way or another, we had no choice but to trust Heron and wait.
Even if we attacked the Apostle now, we couldn’t block his Spatial Swordsmanship, so we’d have to rely on the guild members’ healing skills. However, they were busy healing themselves.
“A barrier……”
Then, Aizen, after hearing my words, looked around and said,
“Perhaps there’s a device to disable the barrier here as well.”
“You want to look for it?”
“I’ll tell the guild members.”
‘Well, with so many people, we should be able to find it quickly if we look for it.’
Of course, this was assuming there was a device to disable the barrier here.
If there wasn’t, it would be a wasted effort, but we had no other options, so it might be better to try.
‘By the way, Ust won’t be able to hold out much longer.’
Even now, Ust was constantly being cut by the Apostle’s sword.
Moreover, the Apostle was simply standing still and swinging his sword, yet he was cutting Ust all over. Ust was counterattacking with various skills, but it felt far from sufficient compared to the Apostle’s attacks.
“Ah, by any chance, do you know the Apostle’s remaining HP?”
“Around 1.5 million left.”
“……1.5 million?”
Is it really 1.5 million?
I don’t think even the raid bosses I’ve faced so far had that much HP.
Not even the Demon King.
“How much was it originally?”
“It was 2 million.”
Well, at least we managed to shave off 500,000 in this short amount of time, so that was a relief.
If it was only 100,000-200,000 less, I would have suggested we run away as soon as the barrier was lifted.
Running away might earn us the resentment of the viewers watching the broadcast, but it was still better than dying.
Pat━
‘Huh?’
[The barrier imbued with Beluin’s power has been deactivated.]
[The applied Sacrifice Devouring disappears.]
‘Heron did it.’
I didn’t know how he managed it since I was unaware of the situation outside, but it was clear that Heron had deactivated the barrier.
And as the barrier deactivated, the guild members murmured amongst themselves and then sat down to recover their stamina. The rest began to search for a device that could deactivate the barrier here, as Aizen had suggested.
‘Anyway, since Heron deactivated the barrier, it shouldn’t activate again.’
I didn’t know why the barrier had returned to its original state, but even if it reactivated, Heron could simply deactivate it again.
━……You broke the barrier.
Now, while Ust was holding off the Apostle, I was about to attack the Apostle with the guild members who had finished recovering their stamina. However, before I could do so, the enraged voice of the Apostle rang out.
━I was going to offer you as sacrifices to Beluin-nim, but I’ll just kill you instead.
As soon as he finished speaking, the Apostle abandoned Ust and charged towards where the guild members were.
“Uh, uh?”
“Damn it, he’s coming this way!”
“Everyone, get up quickly!”
Originally, executives were on standby to prevent this kind of situation, but they had disappeared with Heron to deactivate the barrier, so there was no one to stop him.
“Elsyke’s Phantom Shift!”
If the guild members in charge of healing died, the raid would become even more difficult. I quickly used Phantom Shift to move and blocked the Apostle without hesitation.
━You again.
“Dynamics.”
Kwaaang!
[Skill Damage! 3,393.]
If I could restrain his movements with Earth’s Dynamics, it wouldn’t be difficult to not only block but also counter him.
However, as expected, the Apostle swung his sword without any problems.
“Ugh!”
At the same time, I could hear the sounds of guild members collapsing behind me.
‘Blocking him from the front is pointless.’
Spatial Swordsmanship seemed to be a skill that could cut through obstacles.
Anyway, if blocking and restraining his movements didn’t work, I might as well attack. With that thought, I used Thunder Strike to hit the Apostle and saw him reach out towards me.
━You’re probably the strongest among them, right?
Isn’t Aizen, with his legendary weapon, the strongest?
That thought briefly crossed my mind, and in that instant, the Apostle did something that caused a message window to appear.
[Beluin’s First Apostle uses Mark of Death.]
‘Power?’
At the same time, I confirmed a dark red mark engraved on my chest and hurriedly retreated.
[Mark of Death is engraved for 30 seconds.]
[Receive 3 times the damage from all attacks by Beluin’s First Apostle.]
It was a power, but it was slightly different from the one used by the 26th Apostle.
The power used by the 26th Apostle marked all members and had no time limit.
However, in order to use that power, he had to eliminate a certain number of guild members or sacrifice a portion of his own HP. The power used now had no such limitations.
‘Is it possible to control and use power like this?’
But I didn’t even have time to think about that. I used Phantom Shift to escape from the spot.
Earlier, the Apostle’s attack had dealt 4,000-5,000 damage, so tripled, it would be over 10,000. If I got hit just 3-4 times, I might die, so I had to escape.
‘For now, I’ll use Phantom Shift’s stealth to…… Huh?’
Helplessly, I tried to endure for 30 seconds in stealth mode, but I felt like I made eye contact with the Apostle who had turned his head.
‘Ah, right.’
Stealth is detected when marked with Mark of Death.
As soon as I remembered that fact, I prepared to use Phantom Shift again, but the Apostle didn’t come this way and instead began to massacre the guild members.
“……”
I was speechless at the Apostle’s actions.
‘Should I say he’s smart?’
While I couldn’t even approach due to the Mark of Death, the Apostle was diligently cutting down the guild members.
‘Tsk, we’re doomed.’
Of course, the guild members weren’t just taking it lying down.
They were counterattacking and trying to run away, but all of it was futile against the Apostle’s attacks.
It was understandable since the Apostle’s attack power was over 10,000.
‘But since the barrier is deactivated, we can escape.’
Even if we tried to fight to the end, the Apostle’s HP was over 1 million.
Moreover, the guild members were dying one after another, so judging that it was impossible to continue the raid, I thought about retreating for now. However, one person who disagreed with me was moving quickly and cautiously towards the guild members.
‘Aizen?’
What is he planning to do there?
He made a wide detour around the outskirts and didn’t seem to be noticed by the Apostle yet, but I couldn’t understand Aizen’s intention as he went between the guild members.
Kiaak!
Apart from Aizen, I could see Ust’s Trees of Death running towards the Apostle.
Wouldn’t there be about 40 of them?
When we faced the Apostle, the Trees of Death were cut down before they could even be created, but now that he’s massacring the guild members, it felt like he was really determined to make them.
‘Come to think of it, what about a suicide attack?’
The suicide attack is an area-of-effect attack, so I thought it might work if done right, and with that thought, the Trees of Death continued their suicide attacks, and because of the explosions, I felt like the Apostle’s attacks had stopped for a moment.
At that moment.
Chaak!━
A golden light cut through the Apostle’s body through the smoke from the explosions caused by the Trees of Death.
‘Extinction Sword?’
I wondered what he was doing hiding among the guild members, but was it to use Extinction Sword?
Extinction Sword was Aizen’s best skill, but it wasn’t enough to kill the Apostle.
And there’s no way he wouldn’t know that himself.
But Aizen, who used Extinction Sword anyway, swung it two more times, cutting the Apostle three times in total, and as soon as the casting of Extinction Sword ended, a faint light emerged from Aizen’s body.
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