Lord: Sequence Master

"Activate Void Eye Technique..."

Rosen's left eye turned silver-white, scanning the crypt tunnels.

Though the underground dungeons were constructed under the World Government's guidance, they weren't entirely made of spiritual materials. If they had been, adventurers would have torn the place apart, scavenging everything in sight.

In the Trap Lair, only the traps crafted by the Crypt Demons were imbued with spirituality.

However, the Void Eye Technique didn't detect objects imbued with spiritual energy directly. Instead, it revealed areas that couldn't be scanned, indicating the likely presence of traps.

At the front of the group, the Frost Naga had already reached a section of the tunnels frozen by seawater.

Their mastery of ice elements wasn't just limited to freezing water. Under their control, the traps encased in ice remained dormant, while the frozen seawater outside the traps shattered into ice dust, reforming into ice shields to block the path ahead.

Soon, they reached a part of the tunnel that couldn't be scanned by the Void Eye Technique.

Rosen immediately activated its second ability.

Both he and his pets had their life forces digitized, displaying health bars visible only to him.

Under the power of the Void Eye Technique, they were immune to fatal blows—so long as their health bars weren't depleted, they could continue fighting at full strength.

The first trap was triggered. A Frost Naga at the front was sliced clean in half by a hidden spatial rift.

For a regular Frost Naga, even with a health bar, such a wound would have been catastrophic.

However, since they were slimes in disguise, the Frost Naga could simply reform as long as their spiritual core remained intact. Its two halves rejoined seamlessly, like putty pressed back together.

Having identified the trap, the rest of the group lowered their heads and slid across the ice, safely passing through the rift.

The next trap soon appeared. A pillar of flame erupted beneath one of the Frost Naga, reducing its health bar to nearly zero, though the others quickly cast Ice Shield to block the magical flames.

Rosen, confident in their digitized health bars, decided to push forward aggressively.

As long as the traps couldn't kill the pets in one hit, his summoned Angel Beast restored their health bars instantly.

Though this strategy consumed a significant amount of spiritual energy, Rosen's reserves were virtually limitless.

Hovering beside him, the Gluttony Beast was constantly digesting life potions and spiritual crystals, converting them into a steady supply of spiritual energy.

Wizards' life potions usually had limited uses due to tolerance, but the Gluttony Beast could digest them indefinitely, ensuring Rosen's energy never ran out.

The Sequence 9 traps and Crypt Demons had long since perished, alongside the plague-ridden sea elementals.

Rosen didn't even need to stop as his Void Scavenging absorbed the spoils into his scavenging space in an instant.

After half an hour of charging through the dungeon, the Frost Naga finally halted.

Ahead lay Sequence 7-level traps, powerful enough to wipe out their health bars in one blow.

Rosen sent Nightmare Slime and Gray Mouse to the front.

With Panic Escape, Gray Mouse could trigger traps without suffering harm, while Nightmare Slime devoured any trap's damage, whether it was flames, lightning, or poison.

Combined with the Void Eye Technique, Nightmare Slime's Gluttony ability became even more formidable, consuming all damage that approached.

Guided by the Void Eye, Gray Mouse triggered the traps while Nightmare Slime neutralized them. Progress slowed, but the dungeon was steadily cleared.

Soon, Sequence 7 Crypt Demons began converging from all directions, moving through the earth.

Rather than sending Gray Mouse to hunt them down, Rosen expanded the Void Gallery.

The Void Gallery, in its Flaming Skeleton form, was now wrapped in a layer of spatial mist generated by the magical altar.

The Crypt Demons didn't surface for direct combat, instead choosing to attack from a distance by manipulating the earth. They unleashed spikes, gravity fields, sandstorms, and elemental attacks like fire and lightning, causing the crypt tunnel to collapse around the Void Gallery.

At this critical moment, Rosen unleashed the full power of Void Scavenging.

Normally, Void Scavenging could only collect unclaimed or unresisting objects.

But with Greed, Rosen's spiritual energy overpowered the indirect spiritual energy in the collapsing debris.

Although he couldn't seize the Crypt Demons' direct spiritual constructs, the dirt and stones infused with their energy were easily dominated. Void Scavenging began absorbing the collapsing debris into his scavenging space.

Instead of being buried, the surrounding space expanded.

The Crypt Demons that had been hiding underground tumbled out, disoriented by the spatial mist.

Some mistakenly impaled their comrades with earth spikes, while others stumbled blindly into the flaming skeleton's maw. Those devoured were transported to the Gallery Maze.

Inside the maze, which had been flooded with seawater in advance, the Lightning Element Furnace discharged high-voltage currents. Most of the Crypt Demons drowned, though a few, specializing in lightning traps, grew stronger from the shocks.

Rosen quickly moved these lightning-affinity demons to a dry part of the maze, where Chrollo and the others ambushed them. While Chrollo's team couldn't directly kill the Sequence 7 Crypt Demons, they created openings for Gray Mouse and Nightmare Slime to strike.

Dozens of Sequence 7 Crypt Demons were swiftly eliminated without inflicting any significant damage.

Rosen remained within the safety of the Void Gallery, sending out a Self-Portrait Clone to carry it forward.

Whenever an area couldn't be scanned by the Void Eye, he fired God-Slaying Crossbow Bolts tipped with explosive arrows.

The bolts, charged with Enhancement-Type Nen, blasted deep craters, easily dismantling traps.

Traps were dangerous only when hidden—once exposed, their threat was reduced by 90%.

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This is why the Trap Lair is always in high demand, while the Deception Lair sits neglected, with few willing to venture inside."

After another half hour, Rosen destroyed the final Sequence 7 trap.

The last Sequence 7 Crypt Demon charged out, only to be instantly pierced by Rosen's Death Strike, shattering its earth-element shield. The crossbow bolt struck the demon's head, detonating with spiritual energy, and blew it to pieces.

Without pausing to rest, Rosen summoned Chrollo and the others to prepare for the final battle.

Among his 49 retainers, only five had reached Sequence 8, while the rest were still Sequence 9. They weren't equipped to handle a Sequence 6 Crypt Demon and hadn't even qualified to fight the Sequence 7 Crypt Demons.

However, they were useful for grunt work. They grabbed pickaxes and, along with the Frost Naga, began excavating the soil and rock around them.

The crypt tunnels were barely ten meters in diameter—far too cramped to contain the Sequence 6 Crypt Demon's massive body. In such tight quarters, Rosen couldn't unleash his full power.

Soon, a spherical space over 100 meters in diameter had been excavated, with the dirt and rock stored in Rosen's Scavenging Space. As his instincts sensed imminent danger, he immediately recalled all his troops.

He then unleashed Spatial Fog, spreading it over the entire 100-meter radius, and began using the Divine Pen to activate Draw a Prison.

As long as the Divine Pen drew a sufficiently large circle, once the Crypt Demon Leader stepped into it, it would be like walking into a painting—entering the Void Gallery.

Rosen had been using Spatial Fog to send ordinary Crypt Demons into the Void Gallery, saving the Divine Pen's power for this moment against the Crypt Demon Leader.

The entire dungeon was within the awareness of the boss monster, and from the moment Rosen entered, the leader had tracked him.

However, the dungeon's core authority remained in human hands, enforcing rules the monsters couldn't easily violate. For instance, the Crypt Demons couldn't launch a full-scale attack until all their traps were destroyed. Similarly, the Crypt Demon Leader couldn't emerge until every other Crypt Demon was dead.

But these rules weren't absolute. Fate Playwrights like Count Fritz could manipulate events, bending the dungeon's rules with mind control or fate manipulation.

Under the influence of Fate Editing, even Rosen's Actor's Mask couldn't fully prevent the Crypt Demon Leader from emerging.

With a deafening crash, the Crypt Demon Leader burst from the ground—a towering, 20-meter-long creature resembling a giant armadillo, its body covered in thick, armor-like plates. As it appeared, it unleashed spikes that covered the entire 100-meter area.

These spikes weren't ordinary; they were ten times harder than steel.

Rosen activated Shadow Escape, teleporting onto the Crypt Demon Leader's back. However, the spikes, after missing their target, disintegrated into dust, which then transformed into elemental bombs.

Each speck of dust became a tiny bomb, and with thousands of specks, an overwhelming explosion followed.

The Crypt Demon Leader curled into a ball and detonated the bombs simultaneously.

The entire dungeon shook violently, expanding the chamber from 100 meters to several hundred meters wide.

Had Rosen not retreated into the Void Gallery at the last second, he would have been seriously injured, if not killed.

The Void Gallery, now reduced to the size of a fist, slipped into the spatial layer, escaping the Crypt Demon Leader's onslaught.

Realizing it hadn't killed the invader, the Crypt Demon Leader expanded its crypt-space and unleashed stored traps.

Crypt-space was a special power possessed only by Sequence 6 Crypt Demons. Similar to a scavenging space, it was used to store traps instead of objects.

A spatial vortex appeared before the Void Gallery, locking onto it and spinning at high speed.

Rosen had encountered many spatial vortices, but this one was more chaotic than anything he'd seen before. If the Void Gallery got caught in it, it would sustain significant damage.

Rosen could have easily dodged using Gray Mouse's Panic Escape, which would allow the Void Gallery to burst forward at ten times its normal speed.

However, he didn't hesitate and allowed the Void Gallery to be caught in the vortex.

Seeing its enemy trapped, the Crypt Demon Leader moved in for the kill.

But as it approached, it stepped into the Divine Pen's trap—the Drawn Prison.

The Crypt Demon Leader was forcibly teleported into the Gallery Maze, now inside one of Rosen's paintings.

Though the Sequence 8 painting couldn't fully contain a Sequence 6 Crypt Demon Leader, it managed to trap it momentarily before the leader tore through the painting and escaped into the maze.

Rosen hadn't filled the maze with seawater, knowing it would create a swamp that suited the Crypt Demon Leader. Instead, he lay in wait within another painting, ready for the next phase.

The moment the demon emerged from the destroyed painting, Rosen aimed and fired.

Nine Space-Piercing Bullets shot through the canvas, striking the Crypt Demon Leader.

Ordinary Space-Piercing Bullets, being Sequence 9 projectiles, wouldn't normally threaten a Sequence 6 monster.

However, these bullets had been enhanced with Death Strike's ash-piercing effect. Their hollow tips contained miniature spiritual paintings imbued with Spatial Holy Flames from the magical altar.

The Crypt Demon Leader's armored shell was reinforced by layers of rock.

The ash-piercing bullets broke through the outer rock, shattering upon hitting the hard carapace.

As the bullets ruptured, the Spatial Holy Flames escaped from the painted spaces, latching onto the carapace and beginning to dissolve it.

Sensing mortal danger, the Crypt Demon Leader curled into a ball and rolled through the maze, trying to escape.

But it couldn't extinguish the Spatial Holy Flames—they weren't flames in the traditional sense. These flames devoured space itself, growing stronger with each new material consumed.

The only way to stop them was to sever the affected body parts.

(End of Chapter)