335. Bloody Rose
335. Bloody Rose
***
As a beautiful flower etched itself over the jet-black suit and stained it red, her pitch-black hair slowly shifted color as well, until it took on a completely crimson hue.
Serin, seeing Yujeong's Awakening Skill for the first time, showed interest at the complete transformation, and even Sua gave her a surprised look.
'Is it a Body Enhancement type?'
Watching Yujeong in her Awakening Skill state, that was Serin's first thought.
A dramatic change in outward appearance. That made it look like a body-enhancing Awakening Skill. But with the deep blood-red aura rippling ominously around her, it seemed there was something more to it.
Perhaps because of that, when Yujeong, whose appearance had originally been all jet-black, was now completely dyed red, her impression looked entirely different.
Her appearance, which had always held an alluring quality, was now colored in even more brilliant hues, and rather than feeling sensual, it didn't feel that way at all now.
Rather, it felt like a single elegant, dazzling, yet noble flower blooming its beauty to the fullest.
It was a mysterious and beautiful appearance.
A beautiful flower bearing thorns. If one were to express beauty so maximized that even the thorns couldn't be perceived, this might be exactly how she looked now.
My gaze, which had been watching Yujeong use her Awakening Skill, soon turned away.
The Harpy Queen, revealed as the blood-red mist dispersed. A different red from Yujeong's.
Unlike her previously leisurely demeanor, the Harpy Queen, steeped in darkness, was looking down with emotionless eyes.
Before she had opened her Demonic Energy, a transparent force had rippled across her entire body. Now, an energy of perfect, deep darkness was raging violently over her whole form.
"..."
"..."
The moment I felt my eyes meet the Harpy Queen's for an instant, she began to move.
And for a moment, I couldn't understand why the Harpy Queen's hand gesture looked so slow.
Even though there was clearly still distance between us, her hand seemed to approach right before my eyes, an illusion so vivid that it looked strangely enormous.
The direction that hand was heading was unmistakably the space where my neck was. Her hand was slowly reaching out to seize my throat.
'How can I see it this vividly?'
Even as I thought that, my body was already moving unconsciously.
Swish.
As the harpy's hand, wreathed in dense Demonic Energy, clutched at empty air, I—who had been throwing my body backward—only then felt like I could suddenly breathe again.
"...Dodged?"
Afterward, the sight of the Harpy Queen tilting her head as if puzzled was clear in my vision, and I could see a massive wave of fresh blood rising to crash over her. But I had to feel confusion at that strange sensation from just now.
An instant of less than a second had felt like an eternity. Because the Harpy Queen had come at me in a single breath, as if she'd used magic.
I was surprised that my body had reacted first to an instinctive sense of danger I hadn't felt in a long time. But I also felt a strangeness, as if my thoughts couldn't keep up with my body.
Wondering if my body had reacted first because my stats had changed, I unconsciously tightened my grip on the Crescent-Moon Weight.
'This won't do.'
I immediately changed my mind and released the Moon Princess state.
The Harpy Queen's speed just now was nearly impossible to react to by sight. To keep up with those movements, I needed another method.
Pure speed rather than Moon Princess's destructive power. That belonged to the Dancer.
And that thought immediately led to action.
—Swift.
Serin had narrowly avoided the Harpy Queen's attack. The light armor she wore soon shifted to red, as if recovering its original color, and then a bleak blood-red aura began to ripple over her entire body.
***
A rapier dyed in gold light surged toward the Harpy Queen's wing like a beam of light, but the Harpy Queen deflected it with a casual flick of her hand, frowning.
The moment she dodged the attack, a massive wave of blood came crashing in. Watching it—like a surge of fresh blood—the Harpy Queen quickly swung her hand as if striking it away.
Slaaash!
A black-stained wind rose violently and erased the fresh blood in an instant, but the Harpy Queen was displeased.
After the human who had been dyed in jet-black turned red, her presence had changed beyond comprehension.
'Is it possible to become this much stronger?'
The human had clearly been attacking by surprise like a wildcat, slashing with those claws. She had smelled strongly of blood, so she'd thought she was no ordinary human. But the sight before her now was such a dramatic change that it seemed as if she'd been hiding her strength all along.
Swoosh!
She tilted her head back to avoid the golden trajectory shooting toward her again, and when the fresh blood surged in, she raised a massive wind to cancel it out.
Beyond the two humans continuing to attack, her gaze drifted to the other side.
The human who had been pure white had suddenly changed appearance, and the power she felt from her was weaker than before.
Compared to before, her speed had increased, and she had to be wary of that peculiar weapon being swung from blind spots and similar spaces.
Just moments ago, she had been driven into a lethal situation in a completely unexpected turn of events. She didn't know what trick she might use.
Swoosh!
Just as she raised another great wind to erase the fresh blood surging up once more—
"...!"
The Harpy Queen's eyes suddenly flew open. The sensation was completely different from what she had been canceling out before.
At the end of the fresh blood bursting apart in the wind she had raised.
She saw a hand, impossibly white, reaching out toward her.
***
Yujeong had experienced quite a few raids, but no matter what raid she did, it wasn't easy to encounter a monster that had reached level 85. Even in large-scale raids of over ten people, level 85 entities rarely appeared.
Typically, depending on the party's level, monsters in the early 80s—or at most level 83 to 84—would appear and be handled by dividing up the work.
That was how special and powerful an entity that reached level 85 was.
She hadn't worried about that at all for this 3-person raid.
...
Even using her Awakening Skill, she hadn't thought it would be easy at all.
The Harpy Queen. Level 85. Flashy owned traits. She'd thought it would be difficult, and when Rin had performed so well, she'd thought it was impressive.
Even so, Yujeong was flustered by the situation unfolding right now.
'Why is she targeting Rin and not me...?'
The Harpy Queen, having awakened her Demonic Energy, attacked immediately. Naturally, I assumed the attack was aimed at me because I'd used my Awakening Skill. But in the end, its path passed completely by me.
In that moment, I felt a strange emotion I couldn't put into words.
Since this was a special entity that had reached level 85, its standards might differ from ordinary monsters. But normally, it should have targeted the existence it perceived as strongest.
But...
The Harpy Queen had targeted Rin.
Was it because she felt Rin was the most threatening? Or was it something like retaliation for what Rin had done just moments ago?
I couldn't be certain which explanation was right, but I couldn't shake the complicated feeling.
Because I could feel it from that alone.
Even with my Awakening Skill active... I felt as if I was inferior to Rin, who hadn't even used hers.
That was why I'd been slow to react to the Harpy Queen's attack.
The Harpy Queen had suddenly appeared nearby, as if she'd teleported through space.
When the attack looked like it would land directly on Rin, belated regret surged through me.
'It's my mistake.'
I'd been the one to suggest using Awakening Skills first, precisely so we could prepare for a situation like this. And yet I hadn't managed to block the Harpy Queen's attack properly.
But when Rin miraculously dodged the Harpy Queen's attack at the last moment, I found myself staring blankly at her.
...
As the black wind blew and the fresh blood kept getting blocked, Yujeong's eyes were growing colder and harder.
'The Harpy Queen is letting her guard down.'
The Harpy Queen, having awakened her Demonic Energy, was certainly displaying the strength of a special entity, but her attitude was still strange.
She should clearly have been focusing her attacks on me, yet the Harpy Queen's gaze was still wandering.
I knew where her gaze kept turning.
'Rin.'
As if bothered by that, the Harpy Queen wasn't even making use of aerial combat—her greatest advantage—and was fighting in melee on the ground.
And for me, that was an unparalleled opportunity—the conditions I needed to unleash 100% of my Awakening Skill's power had effectively been met.
WHIZZ!
I swung my hand wide as usual, launching fresh blood at the Harpy Queen, and saw her raise wind almost reflexively to burst it apart.
Immediately after, she threw her body forward.
She thrust her hand out swiftly into the fresh blood bursting apart.
—Rose Madness.
Yujeong's hand, extended like that, showed no outward change whatsoever.
Her nails didn't lengthen, and her entire hand didn't take on any kind of energy.
Rather, as that too-ordinary yet beautiful hand surged straight through the fresh blood, the Harpy Queen stayed on guard but didn't evade.
Instead, she met Yujeong's hand head-on with her own Demonic Energy-infused hand, putting force into it.
...
As the Harpy Queen's hand, stained with jet-black energy, surged forward as if to burst Yujeong's hand apart in one blow, Yujeong coldly twisted the corner of her lips.
Crunch!
Yujeong's white hand, as if working some kind of magic, lightly seized the Demonic Energy-stained hand.
"...!"
The startled Harpy Queen tried to shake the hand off in a panic. But Yujeong's next action was faster.
As Yujeong, gripping the Harpy Queen's hand, pulled hard, the Harpy Queen's body was dragged toward her with absurd ease, and the Harpy Queen soon found herself face-to-face with Yujeong at a distance where their breaths nearly touched.
When her eyes met Yujeong's—hair dyed crimson as if soaked in blood, and eyes bearing an even deeper blood-red than that—she felt that something had gone terribly wrong.
——!!
Immediately after, a massive blood-red flower bloomed around the two of them, as if bursting into full blossom.
Whoosh-whoosh-whoosh!
Blood-red stems surged up into the air, countless—reaching into the hundreds, the thousands—and immediately bound the Harpy Queen's entire body, while something shaped like flowers began to bloom beautifully all along the blood-red stems.
"Now!"
As soon as the skill fully succeeded, Yujeong shouted, and Sua and Serin didn't miss the opportunity.