The Flower of Ice Bloomed
The flower of ice had bloomed.
It was summer.
The kind of weather where everyone lounged around in short sleeves and thin clothes — which meant this was no natural phenomenon. This was the work of mana.
And at the same time, a girl could be seen holding back a raging tidal wave.
A streamer was filming the whole scene. Haps, the streamer, thought instinctively: this is gold.
His mind spun into action. The figures wore school uniforms — and not just any uniforms, but the uniforms of Korea Hero Academy, instantly recognizable to anyone living in Korea.
The Emperor, Seo Yebin, hated letting her students appear on broadcasts. But if it was already a live stream, even she would be powerless to stop it.
And he was live right now.
His mind raced.
He was himself a hero of the Transcendent tier — by the association's dusty old ranking system, a B-rank hero.
Streaming had started as a hobby, but somewhere along the way it had become a source of income. He had over a million personal subscribers now.
I should join the fight myself.
⭐ CutestGirlInTheUniverse has donated! ⭐
CutestGirlInTheUniverse. An absurd name, but one of the admins of Haps's channel — someone whose money apparently rotted if left unspent, judging by the millions of won she threw at him every single stream.
"Ohhhh! Madam Admin!"
Before he could even finish thanking her, a message popped up.
The corner of his mouth twitched.
Well, look at that.
He had built his million-strong subscriber base on the image of a Transcendent-tier hero. Put another way, if he weren't a Transcendent-tier hero — a B-rank — his talent alone would never have pulled in a million subscribers.
The viewers wanted it too.
Haps pretended to mull it over for a moment, then gave a resolute nod.
"Well, can't be helped. For the sake of my juniors, this body has no choice but to take the field."
As he said it, he pulled a suit of plate armor out of his bag and put it on. A low vmmmm hummed from the plate as it spread across his entire body.
Amid the viewers' reactions, Haps stepped forward with his spear in hand — then froze.
KWAAAAAAANG!
A thunderous roar accompanied the sight. The black-haired boy with the mission was fighting an opponent who looked visibly stronger than himself.
Reading that chat, Haps could not say a single word.
Tsssrrk.
The flower of winter bloomed, and then it was snuffed out. Even by conservative count, that last strike had killed dozens.
And yet the numbers still remaining were considerable. Over three hundred, perhaps.
Just then, a massive surge of mana was shaking the area up ahead.
Seems he's angry.
The merman with the spear was glaring at me, his face flushed red — a face dyed in fury.
Huh. So merfolk can blush too.
After that idle thought, I leaped forward.
At the same instant, the merman moved the hand gripping his spear — a simple thrust. The minimal motion flowed into the next as naturally as water running downstream.
It was an action of utter simplicity, but in the hands of a spearman, the situation transformed entirely.
BANG!
The air burst with a crack, and a shockwave rolled out with it. Masters of the spear were a nuisance for exactly this reason.
Against monsters it hardly mattered, but against human opponents, the spear was an overwhelmingly powerful weapon.
Annoying.
I slipped away with the Black Flash Step and drew Heukcheon. The Winter Sword was sheathed within Baekhong.
Vmmm!
The energy of Reverse Heaven poured into Heukcheon. A black, malignant force scattered the shockwaves and shaped itself into a faint blade-edge.
Simultaneously, black swords formed from the jet-black bracelets. I seized them with intent and hurled them as they were.
I slammed into the ground, carrying the subtle mechanics of the Black Flash Step. My body sprang upward in a single instant — a leap.
Water was coalescing around the merman's spear. An enormous volume of seawater, the size of a decent apartment building, was dragged up from the ocean and compressed into the spear's blade.
Qi Becomes Blade.
He had poured his own will into the tool called a spear and forged it into an edge.
I gripped Heukcheon and swung it in a single arc.
CRAAAAAANG!
The swung Heukcheon met the spear. Shockwaves burst outward in every direction. I swallowed back the blood rising in my throat and fell back.
So a head-on clash is still beyond me.
I moved swiftly with the Black Flash Step, observing my own body through the Black Divine Dance. Blood surged faster through my veins; muscle after muscle drew taut. I spat the blood onto the ground.
"You... child of man."
The merman spat the words. Once a being reached the Transcendent tier, it could carry its own will within speech.
By species classification they were counted as monsters, but they too were a gathering of heterogeneous races, so there was nothing strange about one of them speaking.
"A monstrous warrior."
Pronouncing this extravagant praise, the merman drew his spear back. Insanely compressed water qi shimmered along its length as it dragged the surrounding sea into a single mass — and that mass took on a shape.
The shape of a dragon.
"This is the secret spear art of the Naga clan, purchased with my very life. Receive it."
He shifted from defense to offense. The water qi the spear had drunk in rose up, and a colossal dragon settled upon its shaft.
BANG!
The spear thrust forward. The water dragon lunged out ahead of it.
I regarded it calmly through the Sacred Star Eye. Its destructive power was catastrophic, but the structure composing it was laughably flimsy.
Shrrk.
Heukcheon cleaved the water dragon in two. The energy of Reverse Heaven denied it. The bisected dragon evaporated on the spot.
"What...?"
Watching the merman falter, I drove my legs forward. In that instant the world drained to black, and every structure composing it resolved into lines of white.
Heukcheonilbo — the Black Heaven Step.
My body felt as if it were not my own. Some vast, brimming force filled my flesh to bursting and spilled out again. With the sensation of leaping across space in a single heartbeat, I extended Heukcheon.
PAAANG!
The merman was fast. Faltering or not, he was a being who had stacked layer upon layer of martial achievement onto sheer physical power to reach the Transcendent tier. He reversed the flow of battle and swung his spear-blade down at me.
I gritted my teeth and swung Heukcheon.
"You seek mutual destruction?!"
The merman hurled the accusation at me through his will. I answered by curling one corner of my mouth upward.
Wincing, he wreathed his spear in water qi and lashed out at me again.
Shrrk.
Something sliced through the air, and I claimed the merman's left arm. His spear-blade hammered into me.
KWAAAAAANG!
"Ghk."
The impact was monstrous, but I could hold. The body tempered by the Black Divine Dance, and the Guardian's Armor (S-) I'd obtained only days ago, made it possible.
The power of Blade Ward — the ability to halve the force of any sword-qi attack.
Hurts like hell, though.
Gritting my teeth, I slipped my left arm into subspace. The truth within illusion. I drew out three daggers that wove delusions around their targets — and threw them.
A throw from point-blank range caught the merman off guard. Even flustered, he was Transcendent-tier: he evaded two of the daggers.
Thup.
One slipped past his guard — and I laughed inside. Truth within illusion. A dagger that imposed a far deeper delusion upon its victim.
I gripped Heukcheon and set my jaw. I swung it. I wanted to bring the Winter Sword out alongside it, but I hadn't yet mastered dual-wielding.
Shrrk — the sound of a clean cut, and Heukcheon opened the merman's chest.
Blue blood gushed out. The difference in our heights had made the wound a little shallow.
KUOOOH!
A violent pulse of mana rose from all around. My sword-spirit sense caught hold of spells and curses streaking in toward me.
I gave up on killing the merman and drew out the Black Wings.
The black wings bursting from my shoulder blades coiled around me. Splitting apart, they cut down the incoming spells, batted them aside, and denied them outright.
"You! Youuuuu!"
The merman was wailing at me as I fled. For someone running away, he certainly had a lot to say.
I bolted with the Black Flash Step. The moment I rose into the air, every manner of spell came flying at me. The students were hurling magic of their own, though with limited effect...
Wait a second.
An overwhelming heat swept over me. A crimson sphere of light, the size of a person's head, hung in the air.
Beneath it stood Hong Yuhwa, the Crown of the Crimson Lotus fixed upon her hair. She extended her hand.
Giga Flare.
FWOOOOOOOSH!
Carrying a savage heat, crimson death descended upon the ground. The heat-laden flash of light boiled away even the sea itself.
Countless merfolk died in the process. Feeling the pressure lift off me, I rode the Black Wings straight back toward the merman.
Gritting his teeth, he swung his spear.
BANG!
It pierced the air trailing a shockwave — clearly weaker than before. I curled my lips upward and struck with Heukcheon.
My hand went numb. The merman swung again, and I hurled Heukcheon straight through his hand.
Then I seized his head, my fingers shielded by the energy of Reverse Heaven.
"You... if you kill me—!"
"If you were prepared to take others' lives, then you should have been prepared to die quietly yourself."
Crunch.
With a sickening sensation, blue blood sprayed in every direction.
I let out a long breath and turned my head. My eyes found the student council president — collapsed where she stood, drained from holding back the annihilation.
I pulled a few Leap Elixirs out of subspace and sprinted toward her.