The Last Winter
It was a sword art that compared pure stats alone — nothing more.
The very rank woven into that technique made it so. Its wielder was, in all likelihood, a being of extreme purity.
And yet.
Its strengths are as clear as its weaknesses.
The advantages and drawbacks were unmistakable. The moment that man used the technique, he would likewise forfeit every benefit of his additional stats. Against someone like himself — a user of stacking buffs — it could prove advantageous. Against a weaker throng, however, it was nearly useless.
That was why he had transformed the moment the others appeared, pinning their feet in place.
More than anything, that sword art is still incomplete.
It stood on the road toward completion, and so it was unfinished. And anything unfinished was bound to have a flaw.
He is not perfect either. But he is dangerous — dangerous enough that he must be eliminated here and now.
If he grew any further, he would become unmanageable. Should the technique ever reach completion, the Heaven Destroyer's plans themselves could unravel.
And so the black paladin staked everything he had.
Hooooooong—!
The sunspots swelled and began to split without end, as if on the verge of bursting.
Sunspot Explosion
The greater the overload, the stronger Sunspot Explosion becomes.
Consumes all overload and holy-demonic power to detonate within a designated range.
After use, the caster dies with 100% probability.
A self-sacrifice skill.
What power could be purer than life itself? The black paladin was certain that even that man's sword art could not stop a skill of pure sacrifice.
So long as he was using that unidentified technique, his absolute defenses would only grow weaker!
"Heaven Destroyer! I come to your side at once!"
In the next instant, every sunspot filling the black paladin's body detonated.
KWAAAAAAAAAAAAANG!
There was no stopping it.
That apostle of the Heaven Destroyer had succeeded in reading my abilities to a certain degree. He had attempted self-destruction certain that I could not block it.
Where the hell did a bastard like that come from?
He was the first to ever grasp the root of Wilhelm's sword art. And true to that insight, the attempt had been a success. That self-detonation was precisely the kind of attack Wilhelm's technique could not stop.
Even Darkening would change nothing. It would only hasten death.
But there was still something he had failed to account for.
Sacrifice Skill of Demon Blood Species — Cluster 2 activated.
Blazing Blood Curtain is cast.
The power of the King of the Demon Blood Species.
If he used a sacrifice skill, I simply answered with a sacrifice skill of my own.
Fwoooooosh—!
Cluster 2. Five hundred Demon Blood Species detonated at once, scattering blood in every direction. The ruptured blood then gathered before me, weaving itself into a colossal curtain of blood.
Krrrrrrrrumble—!
The exploding sunspots hammered the blood curtain, and the veil shuddered under the assault. But it did not break. It looked ready to tear open at any second — and yet it held.
Not enough.
This alone would not be enough. The life force of that apostle of the Heaven Destroyer was not the measure of a single man. The lives he had absorbed numbered in the hundreds, the thousands… perhaps more.
—I don't like it, but if it means catching the Heaven Destroyer, I'll help. Use Winter.
Winter spoke again.
The attitude of someone who clearly knew the Heaven Destroyer. How did a sword sealed in the North know of a Heaven Destroyer I myself had never heard of? And more than that — it seemed to regard him as an enemy.
Either way, if it was offering help, I had no reason to refuse.
I raised Winter.
And then—
Last Winter is cast.
Last Winter descends upon every zone of every level.
Hooooook—!
The moment Laktusha exhaled, his breath froze solid.
This is no ordinary blizzard.
A winter that had arrived without warning. The howling snow was not merely cold.
A curse. On the same level as Baal, the one I faced before.
The snow itself was a curse. Something had summoned the curse of winter — a powerful hex that slowed the body, weakened every resistance, and even dulled attacks.
But who? Who in the world could call down a winter of this magnitude?
Baal had laid a potent curse of death upon all who stood near him. The power of that curse, which Laktusha had felt at the Mountain of the Cultivator in Baal's immediate presence, he was now feeling across a vast range.
Even so, it posed no great danger to him. Troublesome, yes — but endurable. That was not the problem.
The range…
This blizzard spanned zones. This winter had not come for this place alone.
Huh.
A large number of low-HP Demon Blood Clan members have died.
Zone exploration rate has exceeded 90%. A Zone Boss has appeared.
It was absurd.
The blizzard was slaughtering Demon Blood Clan members across a wide area — those with low health, or those who had fled wounded. And in doing so, it had even forced a Zone Boss to spawn.
They had not managed to kill the Zone Boss itself, but that hardly mattered.
Contribution points acquired: 30
Party score total: 510
1st-place party score total: 980
Insane.
The first-place party's score was climbing at a terrifying rate — not by tens of points, but by hundreds at a time. Which meant—
Whoever killed the Master and summoned this winter is in the first-place party.
Who could it be? Who was capable of a feat like this? Someone who could open an overwhelming gap that transcended zones themselves.
Don't tell me… the White King?
Could it be the White King? If the White King himself had climbed the Rift Tower, it was a plausible theory. A White King at full power could certainly summon a curse of this magnitude.
And if the White King was somewhere in this tower—
This is the perfect chance to kill him.
A tower with no escape. Nowhere to run — was this not the ideal opportunity to catch that cunning White King? He would be in a higher-level zone, but a curse that spanned zones meant there had to be a way to cross between them.
Laktusha had received yet another blessing, and now wielded power beyond his level. With Sword Gang at his command, he was confident.
1st-place party score total: 1,060
…But was it really the White King?
The score had blown past a thousand in an instant. Even for the White King, a gap this wide was hard to accept. At most he would have climbed with the Four Pillars.
Kill everything in this zone and take the boss.
He could not afford to let them pull further ahead. But a Zone Boss could not simply be hunted the moment it appeared. The wisest course was to slaughter every creature in the zone for points first, then take the boss. That was what the zone was designed for — simply killing the Zone Boss alone had its limits.
Laktusha began to roam the zone.
How long had he been at it?
"Oh-ho. And you are…?"
A colossal earth dragon. One of the White King's principal forces. Laktusha found himself face-to-face with Dae-to-ryong, radiating a fierce green light.
When Valte came to, the world had gone pure white.
What happened…
He remembered being surrounded by monsters. After that, nothing.
I blacked out again.
This weak? Valte berated himself. Losing consciousness at the drop of a hat — there was no way to improve like this.
"Successor…?"
But the self-reproach did not last long. In the middle of that pure-white frozen world stood a familiar figure.
Randolph.
He had raised Winter and stopped the explosion. Beyond the frozen wall of blood, everything on the far side hung motionless, locked in ice. On this side of the wall, where Valte stood, there was even a gentle warmth.
"Ahh…"
"W-what on earth…"
"Did he… save us?"
One by one, people began to regain consciousness.
Winter's power was dominion over contracts. Every contract they had made with the tower's master in the Waiting Room had been rendered null — the curse that ordered them to kill the bug user.
He had voided the contracts and blocked the explosion besides. It was only natural they would assume he had saved them.
Then—
1st-place party's ??? has completely slain Black Paladin Yor, Thunder Summoner Yata, and Clay Tribe Warrior Sar-am.
Additional points acquired: 280
Party member Serengeti made a major contribution to killing the Zone Boss.
Additional points acquired: 100
Party member Rommel delivered the finishing blow to the Zone Boss.
Additional points acquired: 60
1st-place party score total: 1,520
Serengeti and Rommel had contributed to the score as well. And so — 1,520 points. A total in an entirely different league from every other party.
Ziiing—!
Golden warps appeared before every party member.
Mid-standoff with Dae-to-ryong, Laktusha scowled.
"You… you didn't climb the tower with the White King?"
Laktusha had assumed the first-place party was the White King. And if it were the White King, he would certainly have climbed with his principal forces. Yet even as the message The 1st-place party challenges… floated before his eyes, Dae-to-ryong was still locked in combat with him.
"Why should I answer that question?"
Kwa-rung!
Two bolts of lightning slammed down at the speed of a flash. They stood like spears on either side of Dae-to-ryong's massive frame.
Hooooook—!
At the same time the earth heaved, and the two spears began to draw in the surrounding ground as if they were powerful magnets.
A skill of a form he had never seen… no. That was a weapon. A Unique-grade weapon that commanded both thunder and earth, without question. Where had he suddenly acquired something like that?
With that weapon, Dae-to-ryong's rank had risen several tiers. But that hardly mattered. Laktusha himself could now use Sword Gang thanks to the Black Heaven Sword.
What truly bothered him was something else.
The first-place party isn't the White King?
Then who? Who had seized that overwhelming score of 1,520? The Black King had not climbed the tower, so the White King had been the only remaining candidate. Which meant the one who had brought this winter… was some third party he had never even considered.
The Empire? But to cause upheaval on this scale, it would truly have to be the Emperor himself.
The Emperor. That being, who had slept for centuries, was shrouded entirely in mystery. The accepted truth was that the White King and Black King left the Empire untouched solely because of that "Sleeping Emperor." Of course, only those two knew the real reason—
But even to Laktusha's mind, this score made no sense unless the Emperor had awakened. No matter how many renowned powerhouses the Empire held, could any of them truly be stronger than him?
Or is it those bastards?
When the Black King had moved to expand his influence, certain heretics had approached him. The Black King had dismissed them as "mongrels" and refused them. If some unknown force had climbed the tower and posted results like these… the only remaining possibility was those mongrels.
"Laktusha. Is the Death King dead?"
Dae-to-ryong asked abruptly.
Laktusha grinned openly.
"Why should I answer that question?"
Nothing came for free. He was under no obligation to say whether the Death King was dead or still alive.
Jjeojeong!
The two lightning spears circling Dae-to-ryong began to thrash wildly.
"Then I'll just have to force it out of you."
Overflowing confidence. Watching that arrogant bearing, Laktusha shrugged.
"I wonder. Whether a greenhouse flower like you can pry my mouth open."
Kramdel in the North was a comfortable place for its principal forces — a place where one could settle and rest. The South was different. In the territories ruled by the Black King, every day was war. Only the strong survived, and all of them grew like weeds.
How could a flower from a greenhouse ever defeat a weed?