281 – Decisive Battle – 1
I hesitated at the word Phase 2. It was a word that could never come out if you did not know my knowledge. Even in-game, we didn’t officially use the word phase.
“That goddess must have been quite desperate. She created that strange virtual reality based on her experience of fighting me. And that, too, for just one human being.”
“Mere human? What did the guy who once ran away from being beaten by that mere human?”
I was sarcastic, but the World Eater ignored it very neatly. It was as if he hadn’t even heard me from the start.
“I did consider you a peculiar person. She’s that goddess, she protects you to the point where she overdoes it, and you walk around as if you know everything. If your knowledge consists of a kind of foreknowledge, then her petty confidence is understandable.”
“It’s been working well so far to say it’s trivial confidence. That one is the only exception.”
The guy laughed bitterly. The jet-black pupils briefly changed to dragon-specific vertical pupils, then returned to the same shape as mine.
“Let me tell you an interesting fact. She said you are not the first human the goddess has endowed with powers. Because one day, she gave a mission to some human in her world to kill me.”
I was quietly listening to him. It wasn’t that I was particularly interested in those words. I was just trying to decide whether or not to make a surprise attack while he was chattering about.
However, the vaguely long distance caught my ankle. Since he still couldn’t use mana and faith, it was almost impossible to run at a speed that he couldn’t react.
‘Let’s watch for now. I might come closer.’
Also, there is a possibility that something important information will be leaked while talking like that. Anyway, that guy kept opening his mouth, so there was nothing bad about me.
Unless this space itself is a trap, like the red world up there.
“The one who was given that mission was, according to your knowledge, a human called the ‘pope’. She was the first woman in the world created by the Goddess to be crowned Pope.”
It was the story of a creature abandoned by God.
Since I already heard from the goddess, I tried to tell her not to talk nonsense and to close her mouth, but I held back. Because he took one more step.
If you walk just a few more steps, you’ll be within enough distance to surprise. Until then, I was going to let him keep talking. I slightly gripped the handle of the wingless nightmare.
“However, as soon as she gained immense power, the pope woman had a wrong desire for God. What do you think happened next? Of course, as soon as I touched him, he was swallowed up by his own desire and went out of control. And-“
“The concept of monotheism is tainted. It’s a story I’ve already heard from the Goddess, but I don’t want to hear what I’ve already heard again. Bring up another story.”
The first pope, who ran rampant, was easily overpowered and thrown into the abyss without even touching Eclipse, and became a creature abandoned by the gods.
The identity of the abyss that filled the surroundings was the contaminated divine power. It was the divine power of the days when they served the only god. The divine power used now was created by overturning that concept from the root.
All of these were stories told by Eclipse.
‘I didn’t know that this was the reason why I fell into the abyss.’
If there was such an inside story, it was understandable that Eclipse hid the reason why creatures abandoned by the gods were created. Unless I ask, it must have been a past that I didn’t want to reveal first.
“I must have heard it already. Don’t you wonder what the goddess was thinking as she subdued her? I wonder what she must have been thinking when she modeled herself in her own image, and the existence of her, to which she bestowed great power, attacked her with wrong desires?”
“I’m not curious about anything. Why are you talking about such nonsensical things?”
A little more.
If you take one more step now-
“To buy time.”
“What?”
At the same time, he stopped. The vertical pupil, which was lightly exposed between the eyelids, completely disappeared. A perfectly spherical pupil filled the place where the vertical pupil had disappeared.
“I know you’ve been thinking about whether or not to attack me. I also know that I didn’t do it because I thought it was a bit far for me to attack at a speed I couldn’t react to. That’s why you pretended to listen to me and waited for me to come closer.”
“… ….”
All read. As soon as I realized that fact, I immediately aimed at the wingless nightmare. Seeing my appearance like this, the World Eater smiled and shook his head.
“It’s already too late, human. If you’re going to attack me, you should’ve done that a long time ago. If you looked into my eyes, you would have known that the union wasn’t quite finished yet. Didn’t you know that too much prudence can actually be poisonous?”
“Okay. It seems to me that there is still plenty of time.”
I gritted my teeth and replied. He said that what he said was only a trap, but it was really a trap like a ghost.
“Then you are looking at the wrong facts.”
Five fingers gripped empty space. Then, the nearby space twisted and converged into my hand. A long object protruded from the side of the little finger and thumb.
The object held in the hand of the World Eater gradually took on the shape of a sword. A cross guard was formed above the thumb and forefinger, a blade was formed, and the tip became sharp.
I also aimed at the nightmare that lost its wings. I focused on the sword in my right hand. It was probably the size of a wingless nightmare or a little smaller.
‘I can’t give you more time.’
I was the one who made the first move. I kicked under my feet and closed the distance with the maximum speed I could. It stood still in its place, extending the weapon in his right hand wide to the side and swinging it horizontally.
The wingless nightmare collided with the jet-black sword and made a sharp, metallic sound.
“Kuu!”
And then, I was pushed back a few steps.
‘How did the power come back?’
Even though it was clear that swords collided with swords, it felt like hitting some huge steel bar. My hand wielding the knife was all numb.
He grabbed the sword with both hands while I was pushed back. The handle of the sword was pulled up to his stomach, and as soon as he let go of his left hand, he stabbed it forward at high speed.
When I bounced it off, my body was pushed for a while. First of all, I pierced the tip of the knife into what was assumed to be the floor and supported my body. In fact, I doubted whether this was the bottom. I felt like I was losing my sense of space.
As if I had been waiting for that, this time he charged. The weapon in his right hand swayed and began to change its shape.
‘…… Dagger?’
The sword, which was a bit smaller than a wingless nightmare, had shrunk to the size of a small dagger before I knew it.
The World Eater brandished a weapon that turned into a dagger. Let’s bring the wingless nightmare to the trail of the dagger aiming for the neck, Chang! And the whole body was staggered.
At the tingling sensation that flowed through his handle, he bit his lips and hit the next series of attacks. When I deflected the third attack, my body suddenly became heavy. It meant full of battle fatigue.
He smiled faintly, grabbed the dagger with both hands, and sprinted backwards. It was an action that seemed to have been seen somewhere before.
The world eater who retreated back changed the look of his weapon again. It was a huge scythe.
“Your body has slowed down. Wouldn’t that make it impossible to dodge this attack?”
The distance narrowed again, and the scythe he held in his right hand stretched out slightly diagonally and slowly scanned it. It was noticeably slower than normal attacks.
‘…… No way?’
As I tried to deflect the attack by wielding the wingless nightmare, I reflexively kicked off the ground and jumped sideways at the sudden terrifying sensation.
The sickle scratched horizontally where my neck had been. It wasn’t meant to be decapitated, it was a movement that seemed to pull the world toward the Eater.
If I had tried to swing the sword and bounce it back, I would have been caught on the scythe with the weapon itself and dragged right in front of me.
That was an action I had seen before. No way, the thought crossed my mind.
“What was that?”
“There is no reason for me to tell you that.”
His weapon has changed its appearance once again. It was a greatsword much taller than me.
After carefully examining its appearance and confirming that it was from memory, I reviewed all the weapons that the Eater of Worlds had used so far.
The first sword, the second dagger, the third sickle, and the great sword you are holding now. All of them were weapons that appeared in Brussels 4.
ㅡWhoop!
At the sound of the great sword swinging through the wind, I stopped thinking and rolled to avoid the great sword’s trajectory. I could feel the wind blowing behind my back.
If I’m right, we’ll have to roll one more time here. I rolled off to the side, and the greatsword swung in the opposite direction cut through the air again.
After dodging the second attack, the World Eater came right in front of me. The posture of swinging the weapon with the point of the greatsword pointed backward and the center of gravity as low as possible. It looked very familiar.
The moment the greatsword swung upward from the left diagonal position came close to me, I swung the wingless nightmare and countered it.
With a metal sound of an incomparable size, the body was pushed back for a long time. Even as I was pushed back, I watched the World Eater.
He held his greatsword straight up over his head, then twisted his body sideways and straightened himself, passing his blade to the other side.
‘That…… Isn’t that the special skill of a forged supersword?’
There was no time to think leisurely. The World Eater changed his weapon and attacked. A weapon slightly longer than a normal sword, slightly curved in the direction of the cross guard extending from the middle of the blade.
It was a curved sword.
He made one horizontal swipe from right to left, grabbed his weapon with both hands, and spun around his body. A new slash filled the place where the blade had just cut.
If I guessed correctly, I’ll spin my body one more time in that state, and when it’s halfway through, I’ll make a slight leap and slam it down from top to bottom for the last attack.
As expected, I deflected the attack and swung the wingless nightmare, causing it to fall backwards. I just made sure of that. What is that guy doing now?
“Looks like you’re finally convinced.”
As if reading my eyes, the World Eater stopped attacking.
Judging by the fact that he even said that, it seemed like I was right. He said he had acquired my knowledge, but I had no idea how to use it in that way.
He changed the look of the weapon in his hand, as if for show. A large greatsword, a small dagger, a grotesquely twisted curved sword, and a sharp sword-type weapon.
It was all things in my memory.
Weapons from Brightest Darkness 2, weapons from Brightest Darkness 3, and finally weapons from Brightest Darkness 4. Fragments of those countless weapons were visible in that bastard’s right hand.
“To think that the knowledge that has helped you on your journey so far has returned as a blade to choke your neck.”
He said while holding a sword that looked just like the wingless Nightmare.
“How paradoxical isn’t it?”