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＜ 19. Arpan’s burnt offering (6) ＞
It was an extremely short moment, but Andrea could read countless emotions in Arpan’s gaze. Astonishment and indignation, thick anger and smoky hatred, eyes burning with vengeance .
But there was no sense of desperation .
Right before Arpan was completely engulfed in flames, he spread out his burning left hand and drew a magic circle .
Kwa-ang !
A large explosion occurred in the incinerator .
It happened so quickly that there was no time to react. Andrea cannot overcome the heavy tyranny and falls out. The entire wall where the incinerator was located collapsed, creating a thick cloud of dust .
“ Andrea !”
Startled, Tricia jumped out and helped Andrea. I didn’t even have time to say it was okay. Andrea’s eyes turned to the collapsed incinerator .
KANG, KANG –
The sound of an iron bar hitting the floor .
Beyond the dust, a goat-headed monster walked out .
Andrea swallowed .
‘ They escaped before being completely burned by the repulsive force of the explosion… Damn, that’s ridiculous wits .’
When the body is burned in flames, it burns and the flesh melts. However, the flame of annihilation is not for burning, but for ‘extinguishing’. Because of this, Arpan, burned by the flames of extinction, looked incomplete as if half of his body had been erased with an eraser .
Mimic freaked out and teased her tongue .
“ The head of the beast is still alive, even with only half of it left. Big fist man, what’s that guy’s name …?”
“… Arpan .”
“ Then, it’s Arban Pan from now on …”
Andrea couldn’t help but laugh. Even if half of the plate was blown up, the anger inside it was more swollen than when it was whole .
“ A buggy guy !!!”
Arfan hit the floor with an iron cage with a thunderous roar. With a great vibration, the cracks in the tiles gradually widened, and red energy emanated from them .
After that, a strange sense of expanding space enveloped the entire waiting room. A space that fluctuates as if an earthquake had occurred. Mimic instinctively closed the cover and crouched down, forcing the rest of the party to lie down or kneel on the floor .
The space finally revealed was a world dyed in red. A space where neither the sky nor the ground is dyed red, allowing no other colors .
It was the true appearance of the waiting room that had never been revealed .
On the side where Arpan was, there was an old tree with a strangely twisted shape, and a huge bloodshot eyeball was embedded in the center. That alone was grotesque, but what was truly horrifying were the corpses scattered around .
A corpse with its tongue exposed as it had lost its lower jaw, a corpse with its eye sockets chained, a corpse whose armor and flesh were melted together, and even pieces of flesh that could not be recognized as corpses… The stench of rotting corpses and the smell of blood were everywhere .
The scene of an abyss that is hard to even look at sanely .
“ Ah, Miss Andrea… Ah, no, Andrea. What is this ?”
Emilia’s face turned white like wax. What is this sight? The eyes that ask for an explanation. But Andrea couldn’t possibly give an honest answer .
All those corpses were the words of challengers against the guide .
Instead, Andrea woke the party up so they wouldn’t fall into panic.
“ Tricia, Emilia! Don’t panic and wake up! Even if I couldn’t kill him, the damage to Arpan was not small. If you fight calmly, you can defeat it !”
In preparation for the failure of the plan to deceive with the alter ego, Andrea had already familiarized the party with Arpan’s strategy. Even if the plan worked, I didn’t know that I would fight Arpan, but .
However, the party could not regain their composure. Trisha, who hurriedly fumbled through her deck to draw out a card, was perplexed. An illusion that looks like a padlock was blocking the opening of the deck .
“ Uh, Andrea…? The deck doesn’t open …?”
Andrea looked at the old tree. The eyes of an old tree that radiate pitch-black eyes. Standing next to him, Arpan was sending a look full of anger and contempt with only half of his face remaining .
‘ Damn it, it’s a deck sealing pattern from the beginning ?’
Arpan was not an easy opponent to face, but it was no exaggeration to say that the difficulty increased several times because of that old tree. Because it makes the use of cards extremely difficult, destroys used cards, or even sets patterns that seal the deck .
Still, there has never been a case where the deck was sealed completely from the beginning, but it seemed that Arpan had manipulated something. Andrea bit her lip and gave instructions to the party .
“ If you destroy that old tree, you will be able to use the card again, so don’t panic. If I run over there, Trisha will keep Arpan in check. Emilia and Mimic will soon come back to life and attack, but stop it .”
Leaving their nodding heads behind, Andrea rushed forward. Andrea stretches toward the old tree like a gale .
Arpan, who was standing on the floor with his cane, hit the floor again with it .
“ Insignificant bastard!!! Do you dare to think that you can stand against me !”
The floor around the old tree twisted and spiraled up, creating a red barrier. At the same time, corpses scattered all over the place sputtered and stood up, and dozens of magic circles intricately entangled with runes emerged from Arpan’s back .
Kwaaa – !
Kwaaa – !
A bombardment of red light poured out from the magic circle all at once. Andrea read the trajectory by concentrating her senses as much as possible. It wasn’t easy to find a place to escape from so much light pouring in at once ,
Dig !
I was able to barely avoid it by throwing my body to the side and bending to the floor. A fierce explosion occurred where the bombardment of light hit .
Kwaaang !!!
Kwaaang !!!!
An attack comparable in power to Shadow Bombardment. To use such an attack as a normal hit, Andrea reminded herself of how formidable an enemy the opponent in front of her was .
‘ Damn it, I thought he would have weakened a bit since he was cut in half, but he seems to have gotten stronger because he got pissed off .’
Wedge – Liquid !
Whiik –
Arpan lightly twisted the trajectory of Trisha’s arrow, which had not been strengthened. Still, there was a gap at the moment, and Andrea dug into it, but
jjoong !
Arpan created a shockwave in the air and shook Andrea away at once. A shock that pierced the gauntlet and pierced the bones. Andrea did one lap of somersault and was barely able to avoid rolling on the floor .
Andrea shakes her wrists and thinks for a moment. Things were going badly .
When they tried to cross the barrier and attacked the old tree, Arpan blocked them, and when they tried to attack Arpan, they were in a dilemma. Emilia and Mimic were too busy fighting the corpse and couldn’t afford to help .
‘ At this time, if Marco was present, the situation could be overcome… In order to summon Marco, the situation must be overcome first …’
In a stalemate with no answer in sight, Andrea thought of wasting time .
“ In that situation, using magic to jump out of the incinerator, it was unbelievable quickness .”
“ Shut that mouth !!!”
Instead of calmly engaging in the conversation, Arpan responded by summoning a burning stone and flying it. It was so absurdly fast that Andrea almost got his head blown off .
“ It is not an empty word. Summoning you to the incinerator is what worked in the game. I never imagined that you would escape with explosive magic .”
“…!”
“ Did you develop your quickness through hard work ?”
“ A guy who is not even this trash !!!”
Arpan’s offensive became even more fierce. This time, numerous giant hands were summoned and flew to crush Andrea. Andrea breaks one in front of her nose and ducks to avoid the giant’s hand .
However, since Arpan was also not in good shape, it was not easy for him to use magic. Andrea keenly did not miss that fact .
“ So, if I quietly let them into the hidden room, I wouldn’t have to blow half of my body away, and it would have been good for them… What the hell is there, why are you hiding it ?”
“… I don’t need to know. Now, you’ll never get there .”
“ Is there really a weapon there to defeat the ‘Manager’ ?”
“… He’s not the kind of person you deserve to talk about something as lowly as you !!!”
Andrea thought it was time to increase the number of gamblers. Andrea jumped up holding the giant’s hand and leaped into the air, thrusting out her fist toward Arpan .
jjoong !
Although Arpan created a powerful shockwave and again blocked Andrea’s approach ,
“ No way !”
. . . That was
exactly what Andrea had hoped for .
With the repulsive power of the shockwave, Andrea rose high and jumped over the barrier surrounding the old tree. It was thanks to the purpose of adjusting the direction of the jump so that it would bounce high this way .
“ Thank you. for helping me .”
Wow – billion !
As soon as Andrea stepped inside the barrier, she threw power into the eyes of the old tree. The sticky bodily fluid splashed out, the black light faded, and the shape of the lock next to the deck disappeared .
‘ It’s done. Now, all I have to do is draw a card and defeat Arpan …’
Then, suddenly the barrier collapsed and the world turned upside down .
The bloody red space was transformed into a creepy black space. The figure of a distant colleague was only seen as a pure white dot. The world where the colors were reversed looked like a dreamer’s painting that was bizarre and gloomy .
My whole body stiffened and I couldn’t lift a single finger. Andrea had experienced the same thing before. The boss of the 50th floor, the 2nd phase of the black knight, when the shadow beast reveals itself .
‘ But… Arpan doesn’t have a second phase, right ?’
The half-cut Arpan was nowhere to be found. No matter how hard I tried not to lose my composure, my mind kept wandering. The moment Andrea was swallowed up by a dream …
A white shadow cast behind him. The shadow was so huge that it covered the entire space. Earth-shaking footsteps gradually drew closer .
And Andrea faced a nightmare .
[ I can’t believe I’m revealing my true body .]
A monstrous creature of overwhelming size with goat bones on its head. The skin with bizarrely swollen tendons looked like the bark of a thousand-year-old tree, or the withered upper of an insect. On top of it were written strange characters that could not be interpreted without gaps .
To be called a monster, it resembles a human, and to be called a giant is too distorted. Facing the ominous glow in the eyes, it felt as if the blood in my body cooled off .
Arpan, who saw through Andrea’s fear and suspicion, answered him personally .
[ What you’ve defeated so far is an alter ego that shared a tiny fraction of my power. Without that, would he have been able to reappear even after being killed by you every time ?]
Andrea felt a shock as if her head had been hit hard .
Come to think of it, Arpan reappears even if he dies in the game. I thought it happened because of the game’s permission, but I didn’t expect it to have such a background setting .
[ First of all, you can never beat me. Have you forgotten that a being of a lower level of spirit can never perish a being of a higher level ?
Hearing that, a snippet of an earlier conversation with Khalisis came to mind .
‘ Don’t you know? Even if angels and demons are physically killed, they will soon be resurrected. In order to perish them forever, someone with a higher level of spirit than me would have to come forward .’
In fact, if you think about it a little, you can figure it out. Considering Arpan’s position comparable to ‘God’ and ‘Devil’ in the world, it is natural that the level of the spirit is that high. Enough to be compared to ‘challengers’ .
It was the same with Andrea. For Andrea, who had a low level of spirit, it was impossible to completely kill Arpan no matter what method was used .
··· Except for one way .
However, even that is a method that can be used only if it is revived somehow …
[ It took too long for no reason. Let ‘s put an end to this messy story .]
Arpan’s hand rose high. I doubted whether I could avoid it even if I was fine, but my body still didn’t move anyway. An overwhelming sense of helplessness and desolation filled Andrea’s inner world .
A fist rushing towards the floor like a meteorite. The inevitable death cast a clear shadow .
However, the time when he never closed his eyes and faced his own end ,
aaa !!!!
A hand as big as a mountain rose from the floor and collided with Arpan’s fist. The stone hand was half-shattered by the combination, but the intended purpose of blocking Arpan’s attack was fully achieved. It couldn’t stop the rock debris from being scattered like a landslide, but .
However, soon the wreckage also stopped in the air all at once. Even a single speck of dust .
Then, a challenger walked toward Andrea through a landscape where time seemed to have stopped .
“ It’s a cliché, but I’m glad it’s not too late .”
The platinum-colored hair did not lose its luster even in the reversed world. Her cheeks were the same color as back then, and her eyes, blue like jewels, were still the same .
“ A dramatic appearance like this is, as the saying goes, too clichéd .”
Andrea called her name in a slightly trembling voice .
“… Anna .”
＜ 19. Arpan’s Burnt Offering (6) ＞ End