The Hand of the Dark Saint
【Hand.】
The Saint of the Dark God.
Roan extended his right hand.
“Your words are few indeed, when paying respects to a lord as lofty as the heavens.”
“You iron-headed fool. He can only speak five characters a minute—he has to save them.”
“Khh. With true loyalty, one can overcome any restriction.”
“That’s exactly why you’re an iron head.”
“You mage!”
Shh.
Both of you, quiet down a little.
A holy spell.
An entirely new field.
I hadn’t learned it from a skill book the way one does magic, nor was it something with a visible form like swordsmanship instruction.
Curious how he would pass it on, I held out my hand. Black haze rose in wisps over our overlapping palms.
An endlessly dark energy.
It felt like stepping into a sealed room without a single light.
Fear would have been the normal reaction, yet the moment I faced that darkness, it was as warm as clasping another person’s hand.
“So this is holy power.”
Nod, nod.
Roan stirred the black haze with his left hand.
【Hatred Liberation.】
Ssssss!
The haze whirled wildly and clung to the back of my hand.
Hatred Liberation spell has been imprinted.
Imprint – 1/5
You may imprint again after 168 hours.
Hatred Liberation
Category: Sacred Art
Grade: A
Type: Active
Whenever you deal damage to an opponent, Hatred energy charges. Consuming fully charged Hatred energy heals the body.
◈ When Hatred stacks charge, stats rise by up to 50%.
◈ When consumed at full stacks, immediately recovers 50% HP and MP and heals injuries.
One click and an A-rank skill just got added? Is this real?
You… you little bastard.
You were a good guy all along!
Who cares if you worship a weird god like the Dark God?
An A-rank skill. An A-rank skill!
“I shall not scold you, so laugh to your heart’s content.”
“Eheheh!! Ehehehehe!”
Even without worshipping the Dark God, I understood what it meant to learn a holy spell.
With the imprint, I could perform miracles by converting mana into holy power.
Melee dealer — Sir Isra.
Ranged dealers — Ingrid and the Witch Coven.
Breakthrough — Tigris.
Tanks — the Armed Zombie Strengthened Soldiers of the Tempest Knight Order.
My undead army covered nearly every position.
The only thing truly lacking had been a supporter.
Healing and buffs.
Unfortunately, the support team had no priest-type members.
“Do undead not grow weaker when they receive blessings?”
“That’s why I had been disappointed.”
“You iron-headed fool. Still don’t get it?”
Ingrid thumped her chest in frustration.
“We Resurrected possess the dual nature of both human and the dead, remember?”
“Ah. That’s right!”
It’s fine.
I understand.
What can you expect from someone who cares about nothing but chivalry?
“Roan. Can you use healing spells too?”
Nod, nod.
Perfect.
I now had a stable means of recovery as well.
The Life Ring–Vampiric Ring combo wasn’t bad, but once the stock ran dry, recovery was sealed off and sustainability became a problem.
Even instant repairs took a fair amount of time.
With holy spells, though, healing would be instantaneous.
“Is there a limit to the imprints?”
【Maximum. A-rank.】
Once a week.
I could receive transmission of A-rank or lower sacred arts or holy spells.
Priest-type skill books almost never dropped, so I couldn’t even begin to guess how valuable this was.
The stained cup had served its purpose.
I should hand it over to Ingrid for research.
Shake, shake.
Roan took my hand.
“Do you need this?”
Nod, nod.
Less than a minute had passed, so he couldn’t speak, but he expressed his will vigorously with hands, feet, and head.
Apparently it had another use.
“Is it all right if I yield it?”
“I must follow my master’s will.”
I was curious what he would use the stained cup for, so I would ask later.
“Khhhhh.”
The one missing piece had clicked perfectly into place.
A little taciturn, and a former cultist—so what?
He was my subordinate now.
【Great Lord. I’m here too, aren’t I?】
“Thief, stay out of this.”
【Hmph. Do you remember who saved whose life last time, Sir Knight?】
“Khhhh.”
Sir Isra clamped her mouth shut.
His talent for hiding had proven useful in many ways.
He had collapsed the Black Sky Society’s trap, and when Chinese hunters ambushed us, we had fully exploited Zaug’s gifts to take out the mages.
The more otherworldly souls I gathered, the greater my power grew and the more versatile my responses became. Pure profit.
Absolutely.
The number of otherworldly souls bound as retainers has increased to 4.
The grade of the Death Space skill rises.
Grade: C → B
The number of corpses that can be stored increases to 80.
Good heavens.
It even upgrades Death Space?
Another reason to take otherworldly souls under my command had just appeared.
Burp.
I feel full even without eating.
【Holy Relic. Purification.】
That, he said, was why he had taken the stained cup.
A holy relic, huh.
Judging by appearance alone, it looked too wretched to use even as a dog bowl back home.
I concluded that the Dark God’s tastes were simply peculiar.
With the new otherworldly soul recruited and the gate report finished, it was time to return to daily life.
“President Baek. Please fill my gate raid schedule to the brim.”
“Are you certain? After all that hardship…”
“Hardship? The kids do all the work.”
Ah.
So comfortable.
The inside of a gate actually feels pleasant now.
For a C-rank gate, I didn’t even need to carefully direct my minions.
【Dark Blessing.】
Dark Blessing
Manifest – Holy Spell: Unholy Mist
Pitch-black smoke blanketed roughly thirty meters.
Confusion Lv 11
Fear Lv 15
Delirium Lv 13
Madness Lv 7
……
Strength Enhancement Lv 16
Reaction Speed Enhancement Lv 13
Great Fortune Lv 8
……
A twisted holy spell that inflicted various debuffs on living creatures of flesh and blood while granting buffs to the dead and demons.
A skill worthy of the Dark God’s Saint.
The mechanism of Dark Blessing was extremely unique in a different sense from Solar Eclipse.
When Roan uttered the words “Dark Blessing,” he could use any desired holy spell or sacred art—limited to B-rank and below.
An all-master of sacred arts and holy spells, one might say.
In exchange, he could speak only five characters once per minute, so skill use carried restrictions.
“Hahahaha! Where do you think you’re looking?”
Within the pitch-black mist, a woman with golden hair raced tirelessly in every direction.
Each time Sir Isra swung her sword—
Slash!
—a monster’s life was severed without fail.
“Iron head! Leave some for me!”
Unique Formula – Solar Eclipse
Lightning × 4
Modified Formula – Shatter
Crackle-zap!
Holes punched clean through the bodies of several monsters lined up in a straight path.
Overlapping and reinforcing lightning to pierce them left no room for resistance.
【Dark Blessing.】
Dark Blessing
Manifest – Holy Spell: Corrupted Light
With Roan joining, the fighting became far easier.
The strength of Dark Blessing lay in its enormous range of applications.
Buffs for allies.
Debuffs or crowd control on enemies.
Skill so refined that the once-per-minute restriction barely registered!
The skill itself was powerful, but Roan’s mastery in wielding that power was outstanding.
“There’s no room for us to step in.”
“I wanted to show off the results of our training, too.”
The support team hunters smacked their lips in regret.
Perhaps because they had trained under Sir Isra and Ingrid, everyone looked far more confident than when we first met.
Heh. Good thing we trained together.
The old sages were right—shared pain is halved.
I wasn’t just sitting around sucking my thumb either.
I pulled a portable forge and anvil from my subspace carrier.
Clang! Claaang!
I repaired the worn weapons and armor on the spot.
The first holy spell I had imprinted—Hatred Liberation—only required an attack action to be recognized; the stacks did not consume themselves otherwise.
I was already accelerating gate clear speeds, so constant fighting simply meant Hatred Liberation stacks kept building.
After two buffs, I had nothing left to do.
So what then?
“Practice. Practice.”
Invisible Hand
I added one more corpse-doll arm.
With four hands now, I hammered away.
A skill-operation method with its pros and cons.
The moment I increased the arms—
Blacksmith’s Soul
—the skill I had received during the C-rank promotion exam activated.
I had thought it only worked when using weapons, but perhaps corpse-doll arms counted as armament as well.
In any case.
Clang! Clang! Clang! Clang!
With the correction from Blacksmith’s Soul, hammering became much easier.
And so.
You have cleared the Cave of Lamentation.
Grade is being assessed.
Cleared at SSS rank.
Reward: 100 C-rank Magic Stones granted.
You have cleared the Desert of Scorching Heat.
Grade is being assessed.
Cleared at SSS rank.
……
I left the fighting entirely to my retainers and honed my bone metallurgy.
“Please take care of me again today.”
“Mister. Another round, yeah?”
I also steadily spent time training with the support team and Yeondu.
Clang!
Claaang!
“Hunter Park. Ease up on the force a little there.”
Whenever I had a spare moment, I stopped by Hanil Blacksmith for guidance.
Day after day.
Every single day spun without rest, like a hamster wheel.
When I lay in bed, exhaustion closed my eyes of its own accord, yet the forced march never felt hard or tedious.
Compared to the past five years, when I had prepared for the D-rank exam I once thought an insurmountable wall, this was far less bleak and difficult.
Now a sense of accomplishment was layered on top, so even rest felt too precious to waste.
In that manner, two weeks flashed by.
Two days before the promotion exam.
I had achieved level 150, the very end of C-rank.
“Congratulations, my lord.”
“The day after tomorrow you’ll rise to B-rank.”
【Great Lord will of course pass, yes he will.】
【Amazing. Master.】
This is my first B-rank exam, you know.
Could you not talk as if it’s already in the bag?
It feels like you’re planting flags.
After finishing a gate clear, I also told President Baek that I had reached level 150.
“Congratulations, Hunter Park!”
“I’m worried I might slip up during the exam.”
“Who is Hunter Park that he would fail? I am not worried in the slightest.”
Meeting those eyes full of boundless trust made my heart warm.
“Then I will cancel tomorrow’s schedule.”
“Why bother? The retainers do all the work, I told you.”
“You must manage your condition.”
“You don’t need to worry.”
How much money does one gate clear bring in?
Even if byproducts or finished items were few, clearing at SSS rank yielded a mountain of magic stones.
“Please do not overdo it.”
“Yes, sir.”
I spent the remaining schedule as usual—clearing gates and practicing bone metallurgy.
At last, the day of the decisive battle arrived.