Chapter 47
Chapter 47
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 47
Chapter Title: Showdown with the Elf Master
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“Sangheon, take Nayeong and Paul and fall back.”
No matter how much their levels had risen or what items they’d equipped, those two were still just D-Rankers. They wouldn’t be any help right now. Truth be told, I wasn’t even sure if I could take on this elf who called herself a master. But retreating wasn’t an option.
Sangheon bit his lip in frustration. He hoisted Paul over his shoulder and dragged Nayeong back. She knew she couldn’t help too, shedding tears as she withdrew.
“You’re not escaping this place alive anyway. Once I deal with you, I’ll bring an even larger force—not just this small group—and slaughter everyone interfering with the bridge creation.”
“You’re saying you’ll destroy us to save your world?”
“Why should I worry about a primitive civilization that can’t even use magic properly? It might be impossible for you, but give us enough time, and even we can take down the Destruction God.”
“Don’t think we’ll just roll over because of your circumstances.”
Confirming that Nayeong and Sangheon had fallen back, I charged at Helen.
Helen swept her hand through the air, and dozens of invisible spatial distortions targeted me. Their power, number, and reaction speed were several times greater than Paul’s.
But I could tell where the attacks were coming from based on Helen’s hand movements, gaze, and my sharpened senses.
Even as I darted at high speed through the gaps in the onslaught, Helen never lost sight of me, scattering dozens more spatial distortions along my path.
Dust kicked up in my wake as I zigzagged to evade them.
Finally reaching Helen, I swung a fist cloaked in aura straight at her face.
Something felt off. Helen was staring straight at my incoming fist, unflinching. She didn’t seem surprised—why wasn’t she dodging?
In that instant, my body jerked backward as if yanked by an invisible force, and my fist sliced through empty air.
Pain shot through me. Looking down, my right foot was mangled beyond recognition.
“Not bad speed. But it’s not enough to touch me.”
Helen raised her hand again to finish me off.
I wrenched my trapped right foot free with raw strength, regenerating my severed right arm in an instant and swinging it.
Even Helen was startled this time—her eyes widened. A spherical barrier formed around her. Just like with Paul, I channeled aura into my fist and launched it.
The hurled aura smashed into the barrier and exploded, but unlike with Paul, the blast only rippled outward, leaving Helen unscathed. As expected, her skills were on a whole different level.
“Such tenacious vitality. Regenerating that fast—you’re like a lizard.”
Helen gazed down at me imperiously, floating within her barrier.
“Damn it…”
“Don’t worry. Every human on Earth will follow you soon enough.”
Helen swung her hand, and spatial distortions gripped my arms and legs, crushing my body.
I couldn’t die like this. I had to think of something. Fortunately, she was toying with me and hadn’t twisted my neck outright. My mind raced.
‘Wait… that’s…’
Then I spotted an opening.
Drawing a deep breath with the lung capacity honed in the deep sea, I turned the blood in my mouth into a mist and sprayed it at Helen.
“What filthy—!”
But as expected, it was blocked by the spatial barrier, raining down around her.
“I was going to let you vent a little, but that’s enough. Die.”
Helen pulled her hand back for the final strike.
“Cough…”
Helen vomited blood.
“What… is this…?”
The spatial distortions squeezing my limbs released.
“What else? Poison.”
I hit the ground and channeled strength into my limbs, regenerating them to normal.
“I… should’ve blocked it…”
“There was dust on your pants.”
“Dust…?”
Her expression said I was spouting nonsense.
“When my attack hit your barrier earlier, some must’ve slipped through in the backlash. I figured it wasn’t fully sealed off. If it were, you couldn’t breathe or talk to me. Sneaking in that fine mist of lethal blood droplets was a gamble, but it worked.”
“You vermin…”
“Yeah. You’d have killed me if you’d gone all-out from the start instead of calling me vermin. Now I’ve used every trick I’ve got.”
Helen collapsed to the ground.
“Stay down, and I’ll spare your life.”
Her knowledge could be valuable.
“You think… I’ll die… like this?!”
She screamed through the blood, her body and mind enduring far beyond normal after inhaling poison I’d maxed out to its limits. She should’ve dropped dead or passed out instantly.
Just in case she regenerated, I reached out to restrain her.
“I’d rather… die than be captured.”
Helen gripped the large yellow gem embedded in her necklace’s brooch. In that moment, light poured from the bridge gate, bathing her body.
I leaped back from the unknown phenomenon.
Helen rose slowly into the air.
“Because of you… everything’s ruined. A little more time, and we could’ve gained the power to fight the Destruction God.”
Her skin cracked like parched earth in a drought, light bursting from the fissures. It looked like her body was overflowing with light and about to shatter.
“Why make us buy your time with our lives? Just charge the Destruction God now.”
“You foolish human. Don’t you get it? If we win, Earth survives too.”
“And we all die in the meantime?”
“That can’t be helped. But now it’s all over. Still, I’ll take you with me at least.”
“Forgot what happened earlier?”
“Can’t you see this light? With infinite mana from Tellus, I’m invincible.”
“You look like you’re about to die.”
“Yeah. I am. After centuries of life, to fall to the likes of you… But killing you first will be easy.”
Helen raised her hand.
I turned and bolted at full speed.
“Huh…?”
Helen stared blankly as I fled.
“You… coward! Don’t run!”
No reason to heed a dying woman’s ravings, especially when she’d monologued it all.
Helen’s attacks rained down from behind.
I dodged at top speed, widening the gap.
Suddenly, a spatial ripple appeared ahead. I slammed on the brakes, skidding across the ground to halt.
Helen emerged from that space. Paul could only manage a few meters; she’d crossed hundreds.
I spun and ran the opposite way.
“You rat!”
Helen halted the distortions and unleashed massive energy blasts from both hands, like uncontrolled aura bolts. They twisted out like dozens of lightning bolts.
Unlike the refined beauty of Hunter Jeong Mingi’s strikes, these lightning-like blasts dwarfed real lightning in power. Where they struck, rocks shattered and earth upheaved—far beyond the A-Rank mage’s wide-area spell from the troll hunt.
Focusing my mind, I scanned the barrage from all sides. Time seemed to slow. I searched for gaps, zigzagging at a sprint.
I evaded the big ones, but couldn’t dodge everything. A branch from a major bolt grazed me, shredding flesh from my shoulder and back.
Abnormal destructive power. Helen was absorbing that infinite energy into her body—she couldn’t last long.
Just a bit longer… With that thought, I pushed muscles that had evolved beyond human limits to the tearing point. Even with Resilient Mind active, pain wracked my body, but it wasn’t as bad as the submarine ordeal.
I regenerated the damaged parts, but fresh strikes hit before they finished, tattering my arm. A direct hit would’ve vaporized it.
Gritting my teeth to the breaking point, I poured power into my legs. Forgetting to breathe, I evaded at maximum speed with desperate resolve, fleeing from Helen.
[Agility has increased by 1.]
[Agility has increased by 1.]
[Agility has increased by 1.]
[Vitality has increased by 1.]
Sweet stat gains. I ramped up my speed further.
“Arrrghhh!!”
Helen, furious at my evasions, screamed.
Lightning erupted on a scale dwarfing before—a spectacle filling the sky. If it weren’t aimed at me, I’d have stopped to admire it.
Until now, I’d found narrow paths to dodge, but this barrage enveloped everything around me.
No openings.
I curled into a ball and shielded with aura. Eyes squeezed shut, I braced for impact. Praying I’d survive.
“Kya啊啊啊!!!!”
No impact on me—instead, Helen’s scream rang out. I snapped my head up.
Nayeong and Sangheon had returned. Nayeong held her wand. Helen’s skin sloughed off as her attacks scattered, openings appearing.
Dodging, I saw Helen’s eyes clouded—blinded. Her blasts fired wildly. Double-casting Blind and Corruption? When did she learn that?
Even as her skin peeled, Helen sprayed attacks everywhere. A mage of her caliber could resist mental assaults, but her crumbling mind couldn’t fend off Nayeong’s Blind.
“Die, all of you!”
Problem was, her blind frenzy hit everywhere.
Energy beams lanced outward. Density toward me dropped, but they threatened Nayeong and Sangheon too.
Sangheon trembled, sword raised to shield Nayeong. A thin lightning strand arced at him. He blocked with his sword, but splinters bent around, striking his armor. He writhed in pain but survived. Without Jaen’s armor, a graze would’ve killed him.
No time. I kicked off the ground, charging Helen. No openings when she focused on me—but now?
Running full tilt, I blasted aura from my soles for propulsion, launching straight at her. No holding back life force—this was all or nothing. Failure meant death.
The random lightning shredded parts of me.
Gathering all remaining life force into my right fist as aura, I plunged it into Helen’s chest center. That instant, Nayeong’s Blind and Corruption broke.
Oblivious to my approach, Helen only looked down after my fist pierced her heart, seeing my arm impaling her.
I was a mess from the lightning—half my face burned, no inch of me intact.
Crack.
A massive vertical fissure split Helen’s right forehead, through her eye to her jaw, spilling glowing liquid and light. From there, cracks spiderwebbed her body, oozing the luminous fluid.
“I… will protect… the Empire…”
The light from the gate to Helen cut off.
[Your level has increased.]
[Your level has increased.]
[Your level has increased.]
The glowing liquid from Helen’s body lost its shine, turning red as it soaked the ground. It was her blood. No trace of her former beauty remained in the blood-soaked corpse.
A fitting end for an elf who’d tried mass slaughter to save her own kind.