Battle with the Great Warrior (2)
"Now!"
Jinwoo didn't miss the fleeting opening as the Great Warrior faltered in agony for a split second. From behind the warrior's back, he summoned dozens more crimson-black mana bullets and unleashed them straight at the armor plating.
Boom! Boom! Boom!
This time was different. The mana bullets didn't get absorbed by the armor—they detonated on impact, shattering several thousand of the metal fragments that formed its surface and leaving scorch marks behind. But that was all. The armor writhed like a living thing, instantly regenerating the damaged sections.
Enduring the pain, the Great Warrior spun around and charged once more at Jinwoo, the persistent nuisance. Jinwoo summoned tentacles of darkness again, binding the warrior's legs. In that instant, Chiharu corrected her midair stance and loosed another arrow. This one pierced one of the small remaining eyeballs on his face with perfect precision.
The second wave of pain. But this time, the Great Warrior didn't scream. Swallowing the torment, he channeled his rage into raw power, snapping Jinwoo's bindings and closing in relentlessly.
As the distance shrank to mere inches.
Cawwww!
Corax, having recovered from slamming into the warrior's torso, lunged again like a massive beast, crashing into the Great Warrior's body.
Determined to end it this time, the Great Warrior hurled his massive double-bladed axe at Corax. But Corax was no longer the inexperienced fledgling. Twisting midair, it narrowly dodged the flying axe—then unleashed Mind Shock at point-blank range right into the axe's body as it whistled past.
Clang!
The faint spiritual link between the axe and its wielder shattered under the impact.
For the first time, genuine shock rippled through the Great Warrior as he watched his axe—meant to return to his hand—lodged motionless in the distant ruins.
Chiharu seized the opening. Landing on the ground, she slid between the warrior's massive legs like a baseball player stealing a base. As she emerged on the other side, she swung the sturdy body of her magic bow with all her might at his ankle's Achilles tendon.
Crack!
With that sound, the giant body lost balance and dropped to one knee. Without even turning, she loosed another arrow straight at the last remaining eyeball.
The third agony. Now most of the eyeballs on his face had burst. The Great Warrior was nearly blind. Enraged, he swung a fist at the blurry foe, but Chiharu had already vanished from the spot.
Deprived of nearly all senses, the Great Warrior locked onto the nearest, strongest presence—Jinwoo—and charged desperately. At last, a massive hand seized Jinwoo's body, clamping around his neck and shoulders.
He hoisted Jinwoo up, intent on crushing him. But something was off. The 'mage' in his grip resisted far more fiercely than expected. For a mage, the physical strength felt nearly equal to his own. Almost like... that giant bird from earlier.
Realization dawned. The giant bird was gone.
Peering down at the 'mage's' face in his grasp, the plague doctor's mask began to glitch and warp like low-res game graphics. As it peeled away, it revealed not Jinwoo's face—but Corax's fiercely burning red eyes.
Transformation. It had been Corax in human guise from the start, not Jinwoo.
Before the word could finish.
Thwip! Thwip! Thwip! Thwip!
From behind the captured Corax—at a safe distance—Chiharu's arrows rained madly into the now-defenseless empty sockets of the warrior's face.
As he howled in torment and released Corax.
"Did you really think... I hadn't prepared for close combat?"
From behind came the cold voice of the real Jinwoo—who had never revealed his true form from the beginning.
Boom! Boom!
Two crimson-black flashes erupted from the barrel of the massive shotgun in his hands. These weren't ordinary slugs. They were cursed rounds, alchemy-forged with mana and blood specifically to pierce and destroy armor.
The two slugs slammed precisely into the thinnest joint in the warrior's back armor—his spine.
For the first time, the Great Warrior's colossal body fully collapsed.
Blood and meaningless groans spilled from the fallen Great Warrior's mouth. The two cursed slugs embedded in his spine paralyzed his nervous system, nullified the armor's regeneration, and ignited crimson-black flames from within. The living metal fragments of the armor screamed as they melted. From the dozens of now-empty eye sockets on his face oozed foul fluids mixed with black blood.
For the first time in thousands of years, he tasted the utter humiliation of perfect defeat. Deceived by insignificant vermin, blinded, and slammed into the dirt.
But what welled up from his soul was not rage. It was the pure thrill of a warrior.
Coughing blood, he lifted his head, 'sensing' the three figures before him—the plague-masked mage, the fox-masked hunter, and the jet-black beast—with eyes that could no longer see.
But Jinwoo offered no reply to the final praise. He wasn't foolish enough to indulge in sentiment. He had no idea what this formidable foe might attempt in a last-ditch frenzy. Without hesitation, he reloaded the shotgun.
Click.
The metallic sound echoed coldly across the ruined airport. He aimed the barrel squarely at the warrior's head—now utterly defenseless.
The moment he prepared the killing blow.
The entire nightmare sky shuddered. The fury, disappointment, and desperation of the Infinitely Many crushed down on the whole space.
The ground beneath the Great Warrior abruptly turned into a pitch-black abyss. Hundreds of black tentacles erupted, wrapping around his massive form and dragging him forcibly into the depths.
The warrior's voice held no more warrior's pride—only the abject terror of a failed servant.
He knew. How his capricious, cruel master treated failed toys. Torments worse than death, eternal and unending, awaited him.
But his pleas went unanswered. The massive body was swallowed whole into the abyss without a chance to resist. The rift sealed, and an eerie silence returned to the ruined airport.
Emily had watched the mythic battle from behind the terminal wreckage, holding her breath the entire time. Her body trembled. Not from fear. From excitement.
She had witnessed perfect strategy, flawless teamwork, and brutally efficient deception striking the enemy's weaknesses. That was true war.
And she had seen the crow mage's overwhelming power and ruthless resolve force even an apostle of the gods to its knees.
The world of Whirly Peter inside her chest crumbled completely. Magic was no longer romantic play with wands and incantations. Magic was a desperate, beautiful struggle—blood, intellect, and overwhelming violence pressing a blade to a god's throat.
Her heart pounded wildly—not with fear, but with scorching awe. And beneath that awe, a strange, hot sensation she couldn't comprehend welled up from her lower belly.
Unconsciously, she crossed her legs. The space between her thighs grew slick and wet. Instinctively, as a female, she was responding to the crow mage's—the overwhelming male's—strength and dominance.
I want... to be by that man's side too...
She picked up the useless alchemy grimoire beside her.
...by his side.
The abyss sealed, and an eerie silence returned to the ruined airport. Jinwoo slung the shotgun over his shoulder and slowly approached the two trophies left amid the battlefield.
One was the massive double-bladed axe the Great Warrior had lost. Even without its master, it pulsed faintly under the red sky, exuding ominous energy.
The other was the black arrow—piercing the warrior's largest central eyeball—embedded in the ground where Chiharu had shot it.
"That was no easy fight."
Jinwoo murmured lowly.
[Now I see.]
From beside him, the Magic Grimoire spoke in a voice colder and more contemptuous than ever.
[The identity of that repulsive thing that dogged your heels so persistently. The 'Infinitely Many.' Quite the grandiose name. A low-grade wretch splintered into billions of minds, lacking even a unified will. It took an interest in you, Master. Like a cruel child finding a toy. It wants to break you... yet possess you too. That whimsy nearly killed you today—and saved you in the same breath.]
The Grimoire paused, then emanated greedy hunger toward the two trophies.
[But... thanks to that fool's whimsy, we've claimed the finest tribute.]
[Behold that axe. Within it sleeps the condensed 'Essence of Death' from thousands of years of slain lives. And that eyeball. No mere organ of sight. It holds intact the ancient warrior's 'Essence of Wisdom and Battle'—accumulated through countless wars.]
The Grimoire's voice trembled with ecstasy.
[At last... the time has come, my Master. The final material to complete your imperfect plague doctor mask into its true face has been gathered!]
No sooner had the words ended than a massive shadow descended from the sky. Corax. It gripped the human-torso-sized double-bladed axe in its beak. With a heavy thud, it laid the first 'true tribute' at its master's feet.
Chiharu followed. She yanked the eyeball-pierced arrow from the ground. Kneeling beside Corax, she offered the gruesome yet glorious trophy to her master with both hands in solemn reverence.
A grand ritual: two hunting hounds presenting their finest kills to their lord, each in their own way.
Emily watched it all from behind the terminal wreckage, breath held. Her body shook even more violently than before.
That... that woman...!
Her gaze fixed not on Jinwoo, but on Chiharu prostrated at his feet. A woman who might once have been an ordinary human like her. But now, she hunted mythic monsters and offered their horrific body parts to her 'master' without a second thought.
That sight presented Emily with an irresistible possibility.
Could I... become like that too?
Saint Germain's voice echoed in her mind, bitter with resignation.
[She... is different from you from the start, my lady. That bitch offered everything to that tyrant willingly. Body, mind, and soul. Could you... truly do the same?]
Emily had no answer to Saint Germain's question. She merely alternated her gaze between the useless alchemy grimoire in her hands and the glorious 'hunting hound' offering tribute to her master in the distance.
The world of Whirly Peter in her heart died completely. And in its place, the brutal, beautiful new myth of the crow mage began to take root.