Chapter 105 - Battle at the Top (1)

Lattice reflexively turned around.

'Was there anyone else here?'

Whir-

The red light mixed with the blue light of the magic circle, which made it look more mysterious.

Both soon gathered in the air, and they took a concrete form.

Lattice narrowed his eyes while looking at them.

Two people…

Two girls with similar physical builds to his were standing at the top of the tower.

One was wearing white robes and the other one black.

The girl with white robes had a serious expression on her face, and the other one was looking around, confused.

Lattice's eyes wide-opened after looking at the girl with black clothes.

She had become so famous that it was impossible not to recognize her.

「Hyun, the scenery changed again.」

「Look carefully, this is the temple you were staying in!」

Hyun immediately noticed where they were.

Rutia was right. They had successfully moved to another space without using Teleport.

But she’d ended up staying in the Symmetrical World.

"Hmm? There's someone here," Ain mumbled after noticing Lattice.

Hyun and Lattice had finally encountered each other.

The moment Hyun saw the man with the blue longsword, he knew who it was.

—The number one ranking player of Asrian.

He had numerous nicknames.

His job, level, and the side he belonged to were already known.

Hyun bit his lips.

'I never thought I'd meet him here!'

In that short period of time, Hyun noticed a few things about Lattice.

The first thing was that he was currently doing a quest, and the goal of Lattice's quest was probably to destroy all of the magic circles on Iluna.

If it weren't that, there was no reason for him to be there.

'Damn, we don't have a lot of time. Why now…?!'

Hyun quickly started to think.

After thinking for a while in the Symmetrical World, Hyun had come up with a way.

There was only one way to save Louise…

That was to get the help of Radiette.

If he used the ego of a Transcendent, maybe he would be able to warp Louise to Asra.

But for this plan to be successful, two conditions had to be met:

—The first one was to receive the approval of Radiette.

—The second one was meeting Radiette before the sun covered Iluna.

Of course, the hardest requirement was the second one.

If the magic circle was destroyed before he could meet Radiette, Iluna would move out of its normal orbit, and that would make all places the sun couldn't reach to disappear!

The reason why he had asked Rutia to send them there was to protect the last magic circle.

「Ain, I'll leave it to you.」

Hyun whispered to Ain while feeling sorry.

「I don't mind. After all, I wanted to fight against that guy.」

After noticing Lattice's presence, Ain was smiling.

Her teeth were showing.

「I'm sorry, I can't use «Assimilation» on you right now.」

「It's better that way.」

After looking at each other, they nodded.

Then Hyun, in Louise’s body, jumped off the tower.

Lattice didn't even glance at Louise and was looking firmly at Ain.

"Now that I think about it, you also belong to the Heavens."

It was Lattice who spoke first.

Swish. He immediately pulled out his sword.

He pointed it toward Ain's heart.

"You used to be second?"

It seemed like Lattice was talking about Ain's previous ranking.

Ain laughed.

Who had he heard that from?

Lattice wasn't wrong but wasn't completely right either.

Of course, Ain recognized how good Hyun was.

Hyun was better than her in numerous aspects, which was why she’d started to be interested in him.

But there was something in which she had no intention of letting go.

"No."

Ain shook her head.

While looking at Lattice's doubtful eyes, she spoke.

"When it comes to dueling, I'm number one."

Even though there was a snowstorm at the top of the tower, Lattice clearly heard Ain's words.

"You better concentrate."

Paf-!

After saying that, Ain's figure suddenly disappeared.

* * *

"The Heavens are taking care of us!"

After Maria's sacrifice, the atmosphere among the Heavens’ forces changed completely.

Hope started to fill the camp of the Heavens that, up until then, was full of fear.

The commanders led the way and pushed the monsters from the walls. Several front-line soldiers went back to their position.

"Shoot!"

Whoosh-!

Attacks of light began falling into the middle of the Abyss's army.

The wide-range attacks of high-ranking Priests began incinerating the undead monsters.

Although the leech tried to defend the monsters again, the results were different that time.

In the battle of magical power, the Heavens were winning.

The monsters surrounded by the light were annihilated with screams of pain.

Maria's buffs were applied to NPCs, too.

"Good, this place is going to be my graveyard."

The Holy Knight looked down while grabbing his sword tightly.

No matter how many of them he killed, there seemed to be no end to the number of monsters.

Even with Maria's sacrifice, they probably wouldn't be able to change the result of the battle.

Among the Abyss's Forces, there were some monsters that couldn't be defeated with an average level.

—Reapers!

They were monsters that only answered to the commands of Great Demons, and they looked like dolls carrying giant scythes.

Strong, dark energy leaked from their creaking bodies.

The monsters that were touched by the dark energy became more aggressive.

Reapers were monsters that couldn't be defeated with the current level of users.

Three high-ranking Priests had to work together in order to tie their feet.

"Catch it!"

Whip!

A ring of light tied a Reaper up.

It was «Bind», the evolved version of «Restraint», the skill Jini had learned previously.

But the moment it was touched by the Reaper's dark energy, the binding began getting weaker and finally broke.

Vroom-!

A dark scythe cut all opponents that were within 5 meters.

The moment a dark light flashed, all the high Priest’s defense barriers were destroyed.

If it weren't for a Holy Knight that jumped into the middle, both high Priests would've been killed.

"Ugh!"

The Holy Knight, who successfully defended against the Reaper's attack, lost his arm.

His sword was destroyed the moment it clashed with the scythe.

Judging by the fact that he'd lost an arm, it wouldn't have been weird if he'd died instantly.

A high-ranking Priest that was around there used a recovery skill.

Fwoosh-!

Light began gathering around the Holy Knight, and his arm was soon reconstructed.

But the Holy Knight didn't have enough time to say thanks.

The Reaper in front of him was smiling with a creepy expression.

Flash! The Reaper swung its scythe, intending to cut the Holy Knight's neck.

The moment he closed his eyes, a lantern passed in front of his eyes.

Just at that moment, Radiette appeared in front of them.

Crack!

The arm of the Reaper wielding the scythe froze.

Part of the body of the doll that was covered by dark energy turned into dust and scattered away.

The Reaper that had lost its arm let out a sorrowful cry.

The faces of the Priests brightened after noticing Radiette’s presence.

"Mr. Radiette!"

"Back off. It still hasn't died."

—It was just like Radiette said.

The black doll that had lost its arm looked even creepier than before.

Radiette used another magic on it before dark energy could restore its body.

As its head froze, darkness covered the whole area.

The people of Heavens closed their eyes upon hearing a horrible scream.

After making a Reaper disappear, Radiette sighed.

'Oof…'

Because of his supersense, in that short time frame, Radiette was able to scan the battlefield.

Thanks to Maria's sacrifice, they were able to resist, but it was temporary.

The only ones who could face the Reapers save for him were the commander-ranking Holy Knights.

The city would've probably already been invaded if it weren't for him.

“There's too many,” He murmured to himself.

The Heavens had lost when they’d failed to summon an Angel.

Even for a Heavenly Being, it was too much to fight against hundreds of Reapers.

Could he change the result if he used his ego?

Radiette didn't think so.

He had already used some of his ego while fighting against the Reapers.

If he overdid himself, he could end up with the same fate as Maria.

'Maria, it seems like neither you nor I can go against fate.'

Radiette smiled bitterly.

Maria had chosen to sacrifice herself, but he had no intentions of doing that.

If he hadn't met a certain user, he would've been watching Iluna from the Giant's Forest.

Ain…

He suddenly remembered her face.

He suddenly felt that he would've liked seeing her one more time before returning.

'I guess I'll see her once more if I'm lucky.'

Radiette saw the entire city once more.

The souls of many humans and monsters were falling.

There was only one thing he could do…

Extend the lives of those that Maria had tried to protect as much as possible.

'Okay… I'll kill as many of these guys as possible,' Radiette vowed to himself while cutting the head of a Reaper.

He would do everything possible to get revenge for Maria to the best of his abilities, and he would eliminate the things that’d made it difficult for her.

—Though such a resolution would never reach her.

* * *

Iluna's Quest was about NPCs and users working together to defend the city.

Of course, an NPC’s influence was bigger than the influence of a user.

Even though there were more users, some NPCs were over level 200 or even 300.

Most users were fighting under the guidance of an NPC and were accumulating contribution rate.

But even in that situation, there was a user who stood out.

“Yes!”

Salon shouted excitedly after surpassing a thousand combo rating.

He felt something burning inside him after seeing the message that he'd surpassed a thousand combos for the first time since he’d changed his ultimate attack to «Trance».

'Finally, a thousand!'

Those past few days, Salon hadn't been able to do much.

After changing his ultimate attack, his control couldn't match the time frame in which combos were counted.

The «Sword of Despair» skill had 1.5 seconds.

But Trance only counted attacks as combos that were faster than one second.

After learning Trance, Salon had surpassed 500 combos only three times.

There were some times when he regretted changing his ultimate attack and even blamed his lack of talent.

Salon had decided to participate in Iluna's Quest because it was obvious that a large-scale battle would occur there.

He shouldn't have to worry about the combos being cut off if there were opponents everywhere, right?

But reality wasn't that easy.

As the number of opponents increased, another problem arose:

He was almost swept away by large-scale magic; he cursed after barely dodging it.

'Damn it! How am I supposed to stack combos in such an environment…?!'

After struggling so much, Salon started to admire TarrTarr.

Looking at something and actually trying to do it yourself were two completely different things. He felt that pain and doubted his skills when Maria's buff activated.

'What's this light…?'

Salon suddenly felt his body becoming lighter.

Everyone within the city suddenly had their abilities increased.

The effects of the buff didn't stop at a stats increase…

One of the phrases in the messages caught Salon's attention.

[One of your skills has been strengthened!]

[The level of your awakening skill has increased by 1 level!]

[Your skill has evolved! Select one of two effects!]

1. Your combo is reset after a certain point, and you'll recover HP and Mana.

2. Combo time is increased by 0.5 seconds.

Salon was lucky.

The chances of the random skill being strengthened being the ultimate attack were very slim.

Salon's pupils dilated.

There was no need to think about which effect to choose.

'If the time frame increases by 0.5 seconds, that means there's no difference compared to the time frame of the «Sword of Despair»!'

Salon chose the second option.

And then, without making any mistakes, he reached a thousand combos.

It was a known fact that, the higher the number of combos got, the faster you became, and the faster you became, the easier it was to stack combos.

As Salon's sword became faster, the undead started rapidly scattering away into light.

'How did that guy do it?'

He tried to remember TarrTarr's movements.

He was clumsy at times, but that 0.5 seconds naturally connected each movement.

The results of all the image training he’d done started to show results.

The adrenaline of his first success increased his concentration to a limit.

'I mustn't lose the flow!'

Salon was at the forefront of the battle.

Thanks to «Trance» and Maria's buffs, his sword shone brightly!

The moment his light-covered sword hit the monsters, they scattered away.

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