Chapter 258
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Translator: 8uhl
Chapter: 258
Chapter Title: What Tremendous Courage.
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Only the red moonlight filtered through.
In the silent jungle shrouded in darkness and stillness, Maia stood alone.
She hadn't hidden any ambushes or special forces.
No close aides.
No clan-level experts.
Not even the clan's strongest strike force.
She had left them all behind to deploy the Great Blood Heaven Poison Formation and come here truly by herself.
It was nothing special.
Acting alone was familiar and natural for Maia.
Especially when facing enemies.
That was why, even standing alone before the Forest Guild's headquarters, she felt no anxiety—not even a hint of tension.
'Crude.'
The original Forest Guild headquarters had been as splendid as Quetzalcoatl's main branch.
Now, gazing at the fortress surrounded merely by tall wooden palisades and swamps, Maia thought absently.
It wasn't a judgment on the buildings.
It was about the guild members who were flustering about even after she'd approached this close, yet hadn't fired a single shot.
'Did they lack the lesson?'
She had already taught them once.
Yet their behavior suggested they hadn't learned a thing from that incident—or had forgotten it all in just a few years.
Well, if they remembered that day, they never would have dared create and distribute Ambrosia or send assassins.
'Then I have no choice but to show them again.'
As always, she curled her lips in a sneer, but her eyes were darker and sharper than usual as she glared at them.
Maia removed her gloves.
Then, following the breathing technique of a certain martial flow, she drew up her psionics.
The Seventy-Two Martial Flows, supreme arts created by the seven dragons to transmit psionics to humanity.
True to their origin, the Seventy-Two Martial Flows were, in principle, shared among all seven clans.
But without grasping the essence of psionics, one could master only a single flow—so each clan specialized in specific ones.
Like the Azure Dragon Clan's Phantom Shift Flow, maximizing innate psionic advantages.
Or the White Dragon Clan's Iron Cannon Palm Flow, compensating for lacking might or weaknesses.
One or the other.
And among them were flows only a princess could learn, or those that shone only in a specific clan's hands.
The flow Maia was unleashing now was one such.
Sss...
The moment immense psionics circulated through her body.
Changes began.
A sweet fragrance wafted from her ungloved hands and entire body, and the underbrush at her feet started withering.
Poison Dragon Blood Formation Flow.
A flow that infused one's own blood with toxicity via psionics and wielded that poison aura.
Using bio-manipulation principles to generate poison made it stronger in Green Dragon Clan hands.
Thus, Green Dragon experts who mastered it became living poisons—poisoning people just by approach.
The higher their psionic reserves and flow attainment, the stronger the toxin.
Here arises a question.
What if a princess, born with psionics mightier than hundreds of experts combined, mastered this flow?
What if that princess inherited the Poison Green Dragon's pure blood, able to poison all with her breath from birth?
How potent would her poison be?
The scene unfolding around Maia right now was the answer.
Chiiiii...
The surrounding underbrush shriveling like it had been doused in defoliant was just the beginning.
Trees rotted and crumbled.
The ground melted away bit by bit.
The swamp turned pitch black.
As if thousands of years had passed in an instant.
The once-vibrant world was dyeing itself one color around Maia.
The color of death.
"Wha... what the hell is that?"
Hober's eyes bulged.
As a high-level player, he'd fought countless monsters and seen all sorts of skills.
But this landscape, like the world itself sickening and dying, was horrific beyond even his wildest imagination.
The others were the same.
At least the guild members guarding the palisades were all frozen in dumbfounded stares.
Except one.
Mateus, instead of spacing out, bellowed desperately in a tearing voice.
"Barrier!"
"What?"
"If you don't wanna die, activate the barrier now!"
"B-but to activate the barrier, we need permission from the lord or an executive..."
"You crazy bastard! Does this look like the time to worry about that?!"
Hober hesitated.
The situation was dire, sure—but activating it without orders could get his head chopped off by Gula.
But his hesitation didn't last.
"Huh? What's this smell...? Gah!"
"Cough, cough cough!"
A sweet scent brushed their noses.
Then guild members suddenly paled, coughing blood or collapsing unconscious.
The death zone hadn't even reached the palisades yet.
Seeing their clear poisoning symptoms and heeding his Crisis Detection warning, Hober freaked and activated the barrier with his gatekeeper authority.
Woooong...
Fortunately, it worked.
The moment the seven-colored hemispherical shield formed.
The fragrance vanished, and the collapsing stopped abruptly.
'W-we're... saved.'
He'd once mocked the massive spending on high-grade barriers like World Isolation for this rundown base.
Now, thanks to that ridiculous investment, Hober wiped cold sweat and sighed in relief.
"...Pathetic."
Maia said coldly.
No disappointment at the poison being blocked.
Her inherited Poison Dragon blood wasn't so easily stopped.
To prove it, she reached for her waist.
Saruk.
"What?"
Hober's eyes widened.
Right after Maia untied her sash.
Her outer garment slipped off like a cicada's shed skin, revealing smooth shoulders.
Why undress?
Flustered by the incomprehensible act, he still instinctively followed that white skin with his eyes.
But his leisure ended quickly.
Chiiiiiik!
"...?!"
As if waiting for her to shed the outer layer.
The death zone swelled double.
The half-eroded swamp turned utterly black, spewing smoke as it touched the barrier. He gaped in horror.
Only then did Hober realize.
Why Mateus had panicked and yelled to stop her removing the gloves.
And one more thing.
Sruk.
...She still had layers of outer garments left.
"Th-this psycho...!"
Another layer fell at her feet, doubling the death zone again.
Not just the range.
The poison aura filling it amplified too—now tainting not just the swamp but the air in sickly hues, corroding the barrier.
The good news: one of the seven barrier colors faded, blocking the poison.
The bad: it was just the start.
Tok.
The third layer dropped.
Poison doubled further.
Three barrier colors melted away.
She'd shed most outerwear, exposing elegant collarbones and slender calves.
But Hober couldn't even peek anymore.
He just trembled and screamed.
"Attack prep! Ranged skill users, stand by— if none, grab guns!"
Guild members obeyed instantly: flames in mouths, bone arrows from hands, guns raised.
They knew World Isolation blocked internal attacks while up.
Yet they prepped without complaint for one reason.
Instinct told them.
The barrier would fall soon.
Death would follow.
Their only survival: kill Maia first.
As hundreds atop the palisades steeled themselves, eyes fierce on her.
Saruk.
Kwaduduk!!!
Another layer slipped.
The flickering barrier, like a candle in a gale, finally shattered.
And the roar erupted.
"Everyone, atta— gah, krrk!"
But Hober couldn't finish.
Before the words ended, sweet fragrance and symptoms overwhelmed him.
Spinning dizziness, throat dry as desert spewing blood, legs giving way with incontinence.
One breath.
No, just contact with the air, no inhale.
That alone left Hober semiconscious, unable to rise.
The majority of guild members too.
"Ugh, kuh..."
"Coughcoughcough."
"Aaaah! My arm, my arm!"
Those who could scream were the lucky ones.
Nine in ten players collapsed without a groan.
Even those screams brief.
Denser poison seeped through the broken barrier, silencing weak moans quickly.
Forest Guild.
Renowned among top ten for ferocity and brutality—their base neutralized in minutes.
By one person. Unbelievably ruthless.
Yet Maia didn't twitch an eyebrow at the sight.
She just stepped forward.
Step, step.
Crossing withered grass and half-melted ground, the pitch-black swamp blocked her.
Overwhelmed by virulent poison, bubbling like lava—a cauldron of death itself.
Splash.
But she didn't stop.
Nor did the swamp swallow her.
No sudden shift to flat ground.
Her pale bare feet felt weightless, walking atop the surface to the palisades.
Thud.
One kick shattered the drawbridge.
Entered the towering palisade interior.
Strolled the Forest Guild base like a park.
That simple act spread her poison aura throughout.
Just walking dyed everything in death. Her form was so horrific it instilled primal fear.
Yet solitary in death, she seemed achingly beautiful.
Lonely, thus nobler.
Hober, weeping blood tears, could only gaze in rapt, terrified awe.
'Strange.'
But Maia ignored Hober and all her fallen foes.
Instead, suspicion flickered in her somber eyes.
'Is this... all they've got?'
Destroying the base before had taken her half a day of battle.
Now? Minutes, not half a day.
No proper counterattack. Suspicious.
Even accounting for losing elites last time.
Wrong base?
Forces elsewhere?
If neither...
"Ha, you rotten bitch."
Right then.
A gruff voice from somewhere quelled her doubts.
Maia turned.
To the mansion at the fortress center.
On its roof stood an elephantine bulk, suddenly there. She sneered.
"Showing yourself before me again. What tremendous courage."
"You think I'm scared of you?"
"Naturally."
Poison so virulent even high-level players were down—yet this man moved fine within it.
Precisely: his blackened left hand and half-melted, grotesque face. Maia twisted her lips.
"I acknowledge your tenacity, but this time, no chance to flee with half your head gone. Gula."