The Heavenly Demon Tries Again (5)

"How would Dekay know that?"

"Because I tried it."

During the week they spent raiding, Dekay's party had tried everything imaginable. At first they challenged it with standard methods. But once the failures piled up into the thousands, Dekay's party completely lost their minds.

They scoured every possible dirty trick to take down the Outer God. One suggestion was to deal massive damage the moment the instant death skill appeared and cancel the pattern entirely.

"You know Android A-17 has a self-destruct function, right?"

"That's just a meme skill."

A-17 was one of the few sci-fi characters in Apis, a game filled with every kind of fantasy archetype. The character was designed around nuclear fusion for overwhelming firepower, but most of its skills leaned heavily into entertainment value. Self-destruct was one of them.

Because it detonated the fusion reactor, both its range and power were impressive. It looked perfect for a suicidal strike, but the skill had one fatal flaw. After entering the command, the user was completely helpless for a full minute.

Who would simply watch someone blow themselves up? They would either run or kill the user first. A skill that could never be used in real combat, whether in team battles or solo. That was self-destruct.

Yet when it came to the Outer God, the skill suddenly looked valuable.

Someone had said it: since someone had to die every time the instant death skill went off anyway, they might as well have A-17 self-destruct and deal at least some damage. Dekay's party, driven mad by endless failure, immediately decided to try it.

"The execution went smoothly. The moment the Outer God began casting instant death, we hit A-17's self-destruct command and managed to deliver the android right beside it."

After several failures and countless attempts, they finally succeeded. A-17 erupted in a colossal explosion directly in front of the Outer God. The blast was powerful enough to rip off the temple ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠ceiling and let sunlight pour inside. Some of Dekay's own party members who failed to escape in time had died, so they were certain the Outer God had taken heavy damage as well.

Reality disagreed.

"The Outer God stood there completely fine and fired off the instant death anyway."

That raid attempt failed, of course. Later experiments revealed that when the Outer God used its instant death skill, it was protected by black fog and took almost no damage. Physical damage reduction reached roughly ninety-nine percent.

"So damage doesn't go through at all."

"Exactly."

Therefore it could be said with certainty: if Hwaryeong believed canceling the pattern was her breakthrough, she was only going to lose again.

"I see."

"Looks like I'll need to prepare room eight again."

They might even have to change the content entirely. If that was all Hwaryeong had prepared, the situation was bleak.

Dekay watched with a heavy heart as Hwaryeong dashed forward. She reached the Outer God, stepped on empty air to rise upward, and drove her fist straight into the center of its body.

It was merely a human throwing a punch, yet the aftermath was anything but light. A storm exploded outward from Hwaryeong's fist. The temple shook violently. Fragments rained from the ceiling. The decorative statues on the walls crumbled. Dust filled the entire sanctuary.

Cough. Cough.

Dekay, who had inhaled the dust and coughed repeatedly, finally drew a deep breath and muttered in disbelief.

"You really don't seem human at all."

But it was still a failure. No matter how much damage she forced in, it was meaningless. Look. The black mass that had filled the ceiling was being sucked back into the Outer God, revealing the ceiling patterns again.

Huh?

"Why..."

Why was it still there? The black fog that should have been drawn toward the Outer God was still covering the ceiling. What on earth was happening?

Dekay forgot he was supposed to be commentating and simply stared at where Hwaryeong stood. Soon the dust settled, revealing both the Outer God and Hwaryeong clearly.

Dekay was speechless at the scene before him.

The one standing was Hwaryeong. The Outer God was on its knees, unable to rise. The amorphous entities that formed its body could no longer maintain their shape and were melting down onto the floor.

"You put it in a groggy state?!"

How? Wait, did the Outer God even have a groggy state?

"Dekay! What do you mean it can't be done? Look! Hwaryeong-ssi just succeeded right in front of us!"

"This is impossible."

That. Why did that work?

Dekay could no longer speak. The cheers flooding the chat. Enri's passionate support. Everything felt distant. He simply stood there, eyes fixed on only one thing.

Hwaryeong.

Coming up with the idea that it would work if the creature couldn't breathe was fine, but one problem remained. How exactly to stop it from breathing.

The first plan that came to mind was to unleash a relentless barrage of attacks so it never had the chance to use the skill and simply beat it down. That idea was quickly discarded. If this were my real body, perhaps. But with this body inside Apis, I could not generate that level of firepower. My internal energy would run dry and I would collapse long before the black thing went down.

Dodge it? No. I would only get caught in the aftermath for nothing.

Attack the mouth so it could not open? That thing only mimicked human shape. Destroy one mouth and another would simply appear elsewhere.

I searched for another method. Yet another method. I found it. I devised it. ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠I pondered it.

At the end of that process, I discovered one answer.

Instead of delivering ordinary shocks, I would accumulate damage inside the black thing itself. Then, the moment it tried to breathe, I would detonate all the stored damage at once and knock it down.

The moment the plan formed, I pictured the scene in my mind. The previous battle had already proven that impacts could be engraved onto the black thing's body. Forcing my way through the tentacles that tried to block me when it fired its breath was possible if I ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠pushed myself a little.

Each and every punch would need to carry the principle of martial arts, so internal energy consumption would be extreme. But that was something I could manage.

A path to victory had appeared. And now the result stood before me.

The black thing, which had not even realized damage was accumulating inside its own body, was now on its knees. The tentacles that had constantly tormented me hung limp. The amorphous masses that maintained its form could no longer hold their shape, repeatedly melting and clumping together.

To be honest, I was surprised to see the floating black mists gathering near the Outer God. That was an impenetrable shield meant to protect the defenseless creature. Had I not planned to burst it from the inside from the very beginning, I would have suffered greatly.

However, what I targeted this time was not the Outer God's exterior but its interior. Mere defense like that held no meaning whatsoever.

The Outer God's movements had stopped, but I could not attack either. I had expended every last bit of my internal energy to detonate the accumulated shock. I was recovering rapidly, but I had no intention of moving until I returned to peak condition.

There was no need to rush. Since my plan had unfolded exactly as I envisioned, the scales of victory already tipped in my favor.

The black thing staggered back to its feet, but its form had changed drastically from before. The constant dripping of black fog made it look extremely unstable, more like a black slime than a god.

The instant I severed the black thing's neck, Enri came running and leaped straight at me.

"Enri. That is dangerous."

"Ah... Hwaryeong-ssi! That was absolutely incredible!"

Did you not just say my real name? How excited are you?

When I silently scolded her with my eyes, Enri quickly looked away. After carefully setting her down, I checked the chat window.

It seemed no one was speaking in proper human language anymore. I could tell they were happy for me, but that was as far as it went. I had no desire to understand their thoughts any further.

"That was truly amazing."

At Dekay's voice I finally looked away from the chat. For some reason his expression looked utterly confused.

"How did you cancel the instant death skill?"

So that was what he wanted to know. Explaining it was not difficult.

"Have you ever seen two people fighting where one keeps getting hit in the abdomen until, at some point, they collapse as if a string inside them snapped?"

"Yes. That's because damage accumulated in their internal organs, right?"

"Similar principle."

I had simply used martial arts to accumulate damage inside the Outer God's body, then detonated it the moment its breath attack fired. The method itself was extremely simple. The difficult part was actually executing it.

"Huh?"

However, Dekay seemed unable to understand and asked again. Hah. Are you not supposed to be someone well-versed in martial arts? If you cannot understand even this much, what are we to do?

I frowned, and Dekay hurriedly spoke up.

"I understood what you said. But how did you pierce the Outer God's energy? Damage shouldn't go through at all, right?"

"No matter how hard armor may be, what lies beneath is not necessarily steel."

Dekay blinked. It seemed he truly did not understand this time. Since he was conveniently wearing armor, I might as well demonstrate with his own body.

"Dekay. Right now you are protected by your armor."

I struck the armor normally, without imbuing it with any principle. A human fist meeting steel naturally meant my hand took the pain. Dekay remained completely fine.

"A normal strike ends up like this. However..."

This time I infused the blow with principle.

"Ugh!"

The shock transmitted through my fist passed straight through the armor and into Dekay's abdomen. A groan escaped his lips from the unexpected impact.

"This renders the armor meaningless."

When I had struck the Outer God with my fist, only the scale had been different. The basic principle was no different from what I had just shown.

"Do you understand now?"

"...Yes. You really don't seem human at all, Hwaryeong-nim."

Haha. I will take that as a compliment.

<Photo of her walking forward with the collapsing body of the Outer God behind her>