Tide of Blood
Do-yun suppressed the bewilderment rising in his chest and swept his gaze rapidly over the surroundings.
An abnormal phenomenon like this always had some precipitating incident behind it.
"Doyun-nim! Over there!"
Following the direction of Ciel's pointing finger, he spotted a milky-white sphere that glowed faintly even while submerged in the blood-soaked waters.
A perfect orb sliding serenely across the crest of a blood-formed wave, as if surfing it.
Do-yun had already encountered a barrier of such flawless construction once before.
"Lunia."
The person inside that sphere had to be her.
As if to prove him right, the figure that emerged beyond the blood wave was none other than the vampire.
I definitely took that one down, didn't I?
A question mark floated through Do-yun's mind as he stared at the vampire standing perfectly unharmed.
The vampire's reappearance itself was not strange. Other Nightmares would have been near where Lunia had fallen.
What threw Do-yun so badly was the sheer volume of blood churning around the creature.
"Where the hell did it scrape together that much blood?"
Gazing at a quantity of blood vast enough to swallow the horizon, Do-yun swallowed dryly.
The vampire he had faced earlier had drawn its blood from itself—pouring out various forms of attack from a wound that looked self-inflicted on its wrist.
And Lunia had dumped heals on it so the blood never ran dry.
Even a vampire had limits to how much blood its body could hold. Yet by using her recovery skills, Lunia had continuously replenished the vampire's supply. That was how it had been able to control an endless flow of blood and wield power beyond its limits.
Though you'd think a recovery skill would just seal the wrist wound first…
He had assumed a healer of Lunia's caliber could selectively heal only the parts she wanted. But the scene before him defied even that explanation.
Kwa-gwa-gwa-gwa-gwa.
An unimaginable torrent of blood rolled in like a tidal wave. No matter how peerless Lunia was with recovery skills, this far exceeded anything healing could cover.
"What, did they gut dozens of vampires or something?"
"Even that might not be enough, don't you think?"
Ciel took his muttered joke completely seriously.
He was right. Even lining up dozens of vampires and pouring heals into them would take forever to produce this much blood.
"I believe you should look to the side rather than straight ahead."
Elysee supplied the final missing piece of the puzzle.
Do-yun, whose attention had been seized by the crimson wave charging from the front, turned his gaze sideways at her words. There he found a giant—smaller than the wave, yet still enormous.
That's the giant I saw at the very beginning.
The blood-weeping giant he had glimpsed only vaguely when the challengers first entered the tenth floor and the Nightmares all transformed at once.
"Don't tell me…"
A vampire that could control blood, and a giant that bled without end. The moment Do-yun grasped the connection, a bitter smile tugged at his lips.
"It wasn't a home run. It was a foul."
He had been so focused on launching Lunia far away that he hadn't paid attention to the direction. Of all places, she had landed right next to a giant that made the perfect blood reservoir for the vampire. It was his own mistake for failing to account for the characteristics of Nightmares shaped by other challengers.
Does that thing just not die?
The giant's body was already a wreck. Dark-crimson wounds split open across its flesh, blood fountaining from them. The spilled blood ran along the ground like a red river and flowed straight into the wave the vampire had created. By sheer volume of blood loss it should have collapsed long ago, yet the giant still stood firm.
"So that's the kind of fear it embodies."
A plausible hypothesis formed in Do-yun's mind. An enemy that refused to fall no matter how many wounds you carved into it, even when the blood ran thick enough to form rivers. The giant was likely the amplified form of some challenger's terror of exactly that kind of foe.
"What do you intend to do, young friend?"
Lost in solitary thought, Do-yun flinched at the question. The very idea of needing to discuss strategy with others felt deeply unfamiliar. Ciel was less a comrade than a fellow traveler bound by fate; no consultation had ever been required.
"I rather think there's no need to confront it head-on."
But the two standing beside him now were different. They were independent individuals cooperating only after weighing their own interests. To lead them according to his will, he would have to go through the process of persuasion.
Technically I could just abandon them and head for the Sanctuary Room…
The last shred of conscience Do-yun possessed would not allow that choice. If they had exchanged nothing it might have been different, but he had already accepted their reward on the eighth floor. In that moment, memories of Earth surfaced—the shelter that had fawned over him when it needed him, only to cast him out the instant his value dropped.
…I don't want to become like those people.
Repaying what one had received was the bare minimum of decency. Until he saw Elysee and Seo Hwi satisfy the clear conditions of the tenth floor, he had no intention of returning.
Do-yun opened his mouth for the two who were staring at him, waiting for his opinion.
"Seo Hwi-nim, what exactly do you wish to do?"
The foundation of persuasion was properly grasping what the other person wanted. Rather than rushing to stake out a position, Do-yun first sought to understand Seo Hwi's desire. The man had been burning with intensity in his eyes ever since they first spotted the blood wave.
"The Way is like flowing water. When blocked it stagnates and rots; only when it flows does it become clear. That abomination denies this truth and spreads poison upon the world as a turbid current."
Seo Hwi launched into a grand speech as though he had been waiting for the chance.
"Therefore I shall carve that blood monster to pieces and scatter it. That is the path that accords with the principle of the Way."
Strip away the needlessly long-winded philosophy and the conclusion was simple: he wanted to charge straight into the oncoming torrent of blood.
"And you, Elysee-nim?"
"I have no intention of avoiding the fight. If it is necessary, we must stand against it."
Elysee had earlier voiced the opinion that there was no need to confront it, yet Seo Hwi's unyielding stance seemed to have changed her mind.
"Very well. Then let us all break through in that direction."
In the end Do-yun decided to face the blood wave as Seo Hwi wished. There was no time to break the stubborn will of one of their party members, and behind them a slaughter machine that carved people apart with its claws was still running wild.
"Nya-ha-ha-hat!"
Kaya's manic laughter still rang out. One of the two threats would have to be faced either way. Even without Seo Hwi's insistence, Do-yun would have chosen the side where the blood wave was coming. Better to go swimming in blood than face Kaya, who had recovered even a fraction of her prime strength.
"You've both noticed the vampire faintly visible over there, correct? We have to kill that thing to stop this wave."
Watching the blood current draw ever closer, Do-yun rapidly formulated a plan. In broad strokes it was the same as the one he had first devised: while someone else fixed the Nightmare's form in place, Elysee or Seo Hwi would snipe it from range. The only differences were that they would be facing the vampire instead of Do-yun's own Nightmare—and that the vampire's power had already transcended ordinary Nightmare levels.
"Please stay as far away as possible and attack from a distance."
If they approached the vampire closer than Lunia currently was, the Nightmare's form would shift into something else. It would lose its control over blood, but then achieving the original goal of clearing the tenth floor would become far more difficult.
The best outcome is still taking its head while it's still a vampire.
And for that, they needed to match the vampire's eye level. From down here, no attack would even reach that high.
"Seo Hwi-nim. You can fly on your clouds, correct?"
"My cloud can lift only two people, myself included."
"Perfect timing, then."
Do-yun lightly tapped the hilt of the sword at his waist and continued.
"I was planning to draw its attention from below anyway."
It was not only the vampire they had to deal with. Lunia, hidden inside the barrier that bobbed amid the crimson waves, was another variable. If they launched an obviously powerful attack, she would likely dart out and intercept it in the vampire's place. Someone needed to keep her attention pinned down below so she would have no room to spare for anything else.
"Will you be all right?"
Worry colored Seo Hwi's question. Do-yun's declaration amounted to volunteering for the most dangerous role.
"Why worry about me? You both saw me on the eighth floor, didn't you?"
Do-yun referenced the first time he had used Dawn. The two of them had been present when he first unleashed his SS-Rank skill to cut down the worm; no one knew better that his firepower was beyond question.
"My thanks."
Seo Hwi formed a cloud and soared upward with Elysee. Left alone, Do-yun cracked his wrists and did a light warm-up.
"Doyun-nim! Will you really be okay?"
"Why so sudden?"
Kwaak.
Do-yun gripped his sword as he watched the approaching blood wave.
"Even if I'm not, I'll just have to make it okay."
As he walked forward, white light gathered at the tip of his blade.