The Usurper

The only light in the dark was the glow of the status window that had just appeared. The boss room was a pitch-black cavern whose width, height, and volume defied all estimate.

"..."

"..."

Lee Seon-woo and I held our breath as if by silent agreement. Instinct was screaming. Whatever was hiding its body in that darkness was dangerous.

It felt as though every one of my five senses had gone numb. A Sword Saint's perception was never mere decoration — and yet something unknown was scrambling our senses.

Even when I spread my awareness, it was like peering through murky fog. Not that I felt nothing at all... but neither was it a landscape I could read with any certainty.

On top of that, there was no description of the boss.

I spread my thumb and index finger and opened the status window, but not a single scrap of information on the boss could be confirmed.

"This doesn't seem like a normal situation, does it?"

"It does not appear so. A place this completely sealed off..."

"Watch out!"

What kicked in when the five senses failed was that sixth sense people so often talk about — pure instinct. I ripped my sword free and cut down through the dark.

A vivid blue ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠arc of steel knocked aside the blade that had been reaching for Lee Seon-woo's throat. Orange sparks scattered, and the purposeless edge spun lazily through empty air.

A half-beat late, Lee Seon-woo drew his own sword as well. With our five senses sealed, all we had left were instinct and steel.

"Launch sound, six o'clock, five paces!"

"Confirmed!"

Clang—!

The greatsword batted the blade back toward its owner. Sparks flared once in the darkness, and for a fleeting moment the enemy's silhouette swam faintly into view.

And I was not soft enough to let that opening go.

I loosed a sickle-shaped cutting arc without hesitation. The jet-black knight's throat, already melting back into the dark, caught on the scythe of my strike, and for an instant its movement froze.

That roughly one second of hesitation. For the next Sword Saint, it was more than enough ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠time.

"Lower your head!"

BOOM-BOOM-BOOM—!

A slash wreathed in the power of the earth detonated. Gold light tore through the dark and lit the cavern in a spray of countless star-fragments.

In the breath we tried to catch, Lee Seon-woo shouted.

"The impact felt shallow!"

"Ugh — you could have said that a little sooner!"

A hair-raising sensation skimmed past my neck. The moment the thought I'm going to die hit, I gathered every scrap of mana I could into my palm.

THWOOM—!

Sword met hand, and a colossal explosion rocked the cavern. The knight's keen blade stopped dead, unable to punch through the massive wind packed into my palm.

Lee Seon-woo did not miss the opening. He slammed his greatsword down. Gold mana raced along the blade into the earth, and the ground began to heave.

The startled thing tried to wrench its sword free, but it was already too late. Hexagonal slabs of earth erupted beneath the knight's feet and hurled it into the air.

"Nice work!"

A creature without flight had no real way to evade midair. As it hurriedly raised its longsword into a guard, I unfurled my blade.

Crimson flashes tore through the dark. A lattice of slashes cast like a net was more than even the boss of an S-rank dungeon could fully block.

Armor cracked and shattered. Iron shards flew in every direction, and a foul, unpleasant mana began to scatter wildly. Watching it, I accelerated again. This ground, studded with rising pillars, was my domain for aerial combat.

In the span of a heartbeat, countless slashes raked the empty air. In the five seconds before the thing hit the ground, more than a hundred cuts carved through the void.

"Haa... haa... haa..."

Tap. I touched down lightly, sheathed my sword, and dragged in air. A half-beat later, the butchered armor crashed down with a clatter of metal.

"Huu... are you all right?"

"Yeah. I can still hold on."

I ran a quick check of ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠my own body. Arms, legs — fine. Remaining mana about half. Synchronization still hadn't climbed past thirty percent.

And my mental strength... was still holding. This was a brutal drug that would kill an ordinary person on injection. A fight of this level I could manage without much trouble.

Status check finished, I turned my gaze to the fallen knight.

"All right, time to finish this... huh?"

But where the shredded armor should have been, there was nothing at all. The sense that something was badly wrong hit hard.

Even Lee Seon-woo had been half-dead after taking that technique once. Taking it twice and surviving? That meant this was no ordinary opponent.

In the real world it might have been impossible — but this was a virtual world. A place where anything could be made real, and anything at all could happen.

So I could no longer hold out without the Eye.

The moment the thought landed, I shouted without hesitation.

"Explosion sound, ahead! Twenty-seven paces! Watch out!"

A chilling slash skimmed past my ear. Instinct told me that if I tried to block it, I would die.

So I gathered mana in a rush. Somehow I had to light this room. To use the Eye, at least one of the five senses had to function properly.

But kindling a light in this place was no easy thing.

FWOOM—!

A wall crumbled and a blood-dark sphere of wind rose — only to be swallowed by the darkness almost at once. The brief flash of light did nothing but pinpoint my location.

From far off, a second slash came flying. I rolled hard and kept thinking.

As I was now, wielding the Human-Slaying Style, I had no real way to light the dark. A sword ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠art steeped in the sticky will to kill people was an attribute utterly opposed to light.

Fortunately, though, I was not alone.

"Do you require light?"

"Yes. If I can just see, this is a fight I can handle."

"Then I shall illuminate it for you."

Clack. The sound of him resetting his grip on the greatsword reached me. Vast earth mana gathered, and the ground began to tremble.

Lee Seon-woo pointed the tip of his blade at the floor. Enormous mana from beneath the earth climbed the sword, and the edge drank in the light of dawn.

Crack—!

Darkness shattered from the tip of the blade. Driving the sword still deeper into the fracture, he gripped the greatsword in both hands and began to walk forward.

With every step Lee Seon-woo took, the cracks multiplied. Beyond the lengthening fractures, the soft light of dawn poured in.

Warm sunlight flooded the dark cavern. Darkness that had rushed greedily to devour the light melted away and vanished before it.

And thanks to that, the enemy that had been hiding in the dark came into view.

The fallen Knight King, wounded from head to toe, barely upright in shattered armor.

I activated the Eye without a moment's hesitation.

Only then did information on the boss begin to appear. Having wanted even a scrap of knowledge about the Northern Supernatural Research Institute gate incident, I started reading it without thinking.

"...?"

That was the moment the information began to erode. Black squares overwrote the fields where data should have been, and my eyes burned as if on fire.

The cascading status window began to thrash as though it were trying to say something.

I tried to tear my eyes away from the thing in a panic, but my body would not obey. A burning agony rang through my skull.

"Ugh?!"

Along with the malice-laden words rising on the status window, my consciousness sank into the dark.

"Uugh..."

When I opened my eyes again, I was in a pure white room.

A white bed, a white desk, and a single white chair. A room so white it had not even a window.

The only thing in that space that was not white was the slogan written on the calendar.

"...Ah?"

With that, recognizing the nature of the space was not difficult.

The Northern Supernatural Research Institute of Russia, located in a secret city somewhere in Krasnoyarsk.

And December 25th, 2034, was...

The day I had gained this Eye.