Retribution
"Hahaha!"
"This lunatic!"
"Has he completely lost his mind?"
No sooner had Jin-soo finished speaking than laughter exploded around him. The Yellow Dragon Guild's acting guild master had not been forcing some empty bluff. He had taken the measure of the field, judged that it could be done, and spoken accordingly.
"A man with his stamina and mana scraped dry, puffing himself up with a show of strength—there's a limit even to bluffing. Did you really think we'd lose our nerve and run?"
They knew perfectly well that Jin-soo was monstrously strong. He commanded powerful summons and wielded the skills of archer, assassin, warrior, and tank as freely as he pleased. But none of that was possible unless stamina and mana were there to support it. On top of that, they held an overwhelming advantage in numbers. Even if Jin-soo had been at his peak, they were certain that beating them was impossible.
"Whether it's a bluff or not, you'll find out once you've felt it for yourselves."
In the next instant Jin-soo launched himself forward and brought Baekcheonsingeom and the Blood-Sucking Sword down in a single sweeping arc.
"Hmph!"
The Yellow Dragon Guild's acting guild master cast a Protection skill and sprang back. He had expected a surprise attack and was already on full alert.
"What?"
Jin-soo's speed was simply too great. Worse, the moment Baekcheonsingeom touched it, the Protection skill—so proud of its formidable defense—vanished like snow in the sun. The acting guild master's left arm sheared away, shield and all.
"Aaaagh!"
He screamed, raw and wretched. The Blood-Sucking Sword came whistling in after the first blow, and he flung himself aside in panic. He managed to dodge—but this time his right arm was taken as well. In a heartbeat he had lost both arms, and his face twisted into something out of a nightmare.
"Kill him! Now!"
The Yellow Dragon guild members charged Jin-soo at once. In that same moment the Shadow Summons and the Army Summons revealed themselves and crashed into them. The clash was one-sided from the first exchange. Yellow Dragon members were swept aside as steel bit, bodies broke, and screams tore through the roar of the fight.
"Aaaagh!"
"Guhk!"
"Haa... For now, all of us will have to pool our strength and put that man down."
"We'll have to."
"We can't just leave him rampaging like that."
The guild masters of the Minamoto Guild and the American Alliance had been watching the slaughter. After a brief exchange with the other guild masters, every one of them drew a weapon, wearing the look of men who had no other choice. Their demands had been unreasonable, and they knew it, but none of them had truly believed it would come to a physical clash. Now that the fighting had started, like it or not, they were in the same boat as the Yellow Dragon Guild. If Jin-soo kept the upper hand, the members of the Daehan Guild, the Ollih Guild, and the Upendo Guild—who had already agreed to hand over the Bone Dragon's spoils—might get swept up in the mood and run wild right alongside him.
They told themselves that only by crushing Jin-soo outright, and making a proper example of him, could they prevent a larger collision. The guild masters led their elites into the battle.
Yeah. I knew it would come to this.
Jin-soo watched the guild masters and their members pour into the fight and summoned the Army Summon he had only just acquired. Pitch-black mist gathered, took shape, and resolved into a massive Bone Dragon that glittered like obsidian.
"W-what is that!"
"Wasn't it destroyed?"
The guild masters who had been about to rush him recoiled in horror. The summoned Bone Dragon opened its maw and breathed. Not Decay Breath—this was a beam of pitch-black light. The blast struck the guild masters and guild members of every guild head-on. The masters survived, more or less, with wounds of varying severity. Their members were not so fortunate.
Among the tanks, those with high durability and sturdy bodies lived. Among the assassins, the quick ones lived. But a considerable number of the rest—those whose defense was lacking, or whose movements were dull—died to a single breath.
"Urgh!"
"How dare you attack us!"
"I'll kill you!"
"That isn't a real Bone Dragon! It's a summon!"
"He must have learned a skill that dropped from killing the Bone Dragon! Attack!"
"That summon is weaker than it looks! We can take it!"
Guild members who had watched their comrades die threw themselves into the fight, given over to rage.
Weak, yes.
Fighting alongside his Shadow Summons, Jin-soo studied the Bone Dragon that had newly become an Army Summon. As a summon it had grown markedly weaker. His Blessing had grown, and with it the Army Summon skill had climbed to level 822—and still, perhaps because the Bone Dragon's caliber was simply too high, he could not even draw out its original strength, let alone strengthen it.
Nothing wrong with that.
Raise the level of Army Summon, and he could keep strengthening the Bone Dragon that served him. In the end it would surpass the power of the original. And even now, diminished as a summon, it was hardly frail.
It is a Bone Dragon, after all.
It was a being on an entirely different level from any monster that had become his summon before.
And it isn't as if I only have the one.
As his Blessing grew, a new Blessing skill had appeared for the first time in a very long while.
Skill Sharing.
It was a Blessing skill that let him share abilities between the holy affinity and the dark affinity, which until now had been cut off from each other. He raised it to level 122 at once. Even so, he could share only two skills from each affinity. From the holy side he chose the Dragon Tooth Soldier summon and Army Summon; from the dark side, the Shadow Summon and Army Summon.
Inventory can wait.
If convenience were all that mattered, the Inventory skill would have come first. Combat power came before convenience.
Dragon Tooth Soldiers. Army Summon.
Through Skill Sharing he cast the holy-affinity skills, and bone cracked and knit across the battlefield. Nine Dragon Tooth Soldiers forged from White Drake teeth took shape, along with twenty-one more, newly made from the teeth of the Bone Dragon. At the same time a mass of brilliant light swept in, and a pure-white Bone Dragon appeared with monsters of every kind at its side.
"Kraaaaa!"
The white Bone Dragon loosed an enraged roar and breathed. A beam of pure white light scythed through the players charging Jin-soo and swept them away in a single stroke.
Stamina and mana are coming back.
A Bone Dragon was undead. It did not bleed. Players were different. They were living things of blood and flesh. The Blood-Sucking Sword and its blood-draining skill drank voraciously of the dead, restoring Jin-soo's stamina and mana, while Essence Drain did its own work and stole their mana outright. The longer the battle went on, the faster his reserves filled. All the while Shin Sua's buffs poured onto the summons in real time.
Dragon Tooth Soldiers.
With mana to spare, Jin-soo scattered Lizardman teeth. The soldiers that rose from them were weaker one by one, but their numbers were nothing to scoff at.
Flame Storm. Twisted Steps.
And with them he spent, at last and without restraint, the mage attack skills and curse skills he had been hoarding his mana to avoid using.
"Aaaagh! My arm!"
Fire roared. Explosions tore through the press.
"Aaaagh!"
"Hot! It's hot!"
The traitors who had rushed him certain of victory died in heaps.
"The enemy is only one man! Kill him! Kill him, I said!"
"If he dies, this is over! Everyone, rush him!"
The guild masters who had worn such easy expressions were shouting their orders now with fear stark on their faces.
Those ones first.
They were skilled, and they fled like rats. Catching them would not be easy. Then the Daehan Guild, the Ollih Guild, and the Upendo Guild—who until this moment had done nothing but watch and wait—drew their weapons as one.
"We're joining in!"
"Fight! We'll fight and keep what's ours!"
"Waaaaah!"
Jin-soo was holding. The three guilds that had submitted because they believed they had no chance of winning drew their blades.
They've been sitting on the fence since the fighting started, and they only jump in once the tide turns. A little grating, I'll admit.
Even so, he understood the choice. The Tower had its rules and its lines, but in the end it was a world where power was everything—survival of the fittest. The old rules and the old lines were nothing more than what the old strong had laid down, or arrangements made so that no one would suffer mutual harm. Preach justification, justice, and morality at a robber with a knife in his hand, and none of it would land. Resist by force when defeat was certain, and all that remained was to swallow it.
Then they saw I might win, so they joined.
Late, but courageous in its own way. He and his summons were wreaking havoc, yes—but the enemy's numbers were still overwhelming.
Thanks to them, I've got a little room.
Jin-soo's gaze, sharp as a hawk's, sought the guild masters. His first target was the Yellow Dragon Guild's acting guild master, already badly wounded and out of the fight.
Change the head, and the Yellow Dragon Guild's nature stays exactly the same.
They had been the first to incite the players. The Minamoto Guild had chimed in and built the mood around them.
There he is.
Jin-soo drew a bow from his inventory, nocked, and loosed.
"Eek! Block it! Block it!"
The acting guild master shrieked at the sight of the arrows. Unfortunately for him, not a single player was willing to stake their life on keeping him alive. Those closest to him scrambled to put distance between them instead. The arrows punched through his head and his heart.
"Guaaagh!"
One down.
Jin-soo turned the bow on his next target, the guild master of the Minamoto Guild.
"Dodge!"
The man raised his voice.
This one's different.
All four limbs were intact, and—assassin that he was—his movement was blindingly fast. Even with the board flipped, he still held clean command of his guild members.
Yellow Dragon's was only acting. This one isn't.
The gap in control was, in a sense, only natural. Jin-soo fired as he closed, and once the distance collapsed he triggered a magic attack skill. Crimson flame detonated in a roaring blast.
He really is fast.
Whether he had used Stealth or not, he vanished in an instant.
But this doesn't end just because you dodge.
Jin-soo changed targets and went for the Minamoto Guild's core officers. An arrow punched through a heart.
"Guhk!"
Flame exploded, and those caught in it died where they stood.
"Aaaagh!"
"Save me!"
Steel rang as Jin-soo drew Baekcheonsingeom and the Blood-Sucking Sword. Pure-white aura clung to one blade, blood-red aura to the other, and he swung both without restraint. The men who had prided themselves on being the top players of Floor 100 died in moments, barely able to resist.
"Guhk!"
"Urgh!"
They were basic skills, yes—but the ability to use the skills of every class was an enormous advantage in itself. On top of that, his skill levels reached as high as 822, and with every base stat at 1,222 he was under a buff that raised them a further 92.2 percent. Skill levels and stats that overwhelming were, by themselves, a calamity that could not be stopped. Added to them were Baekcheonsingeom's Skill Nullification, the Blood-Sucking Sword's restoration of stamina and mana, the formidable defense of the Black Dragon's Cursed Armor Set, superb swordsmanship, and a depth of combat experience that dwarfed the field.
Like a lion that had leapt into a flock of sheep, Jin-soo rampaged without restraint and cut down the top players of Floor 100.