NOVEL NEXT Chapter 21
Chapter 22
The martial arts of the Ice Palace consisted of movements that were both a technique and not a technique. This was because the martial arts of the Ice Palace took the form of dance. In other words, every single movement was interconnected, rendering the need to categorize them as techniques unnecessary.
Beneath her, the stage of ice unfolded. Even standing on the ice, Baek In-hwa danced gracefully, freer than anyone else.
She glided through the clumsy monsters that struggled to navigate the icy surface with a chill that seemed to beckon.
Her movements, which could easily be seen as seductive, were, when flipped inside out, not sweet temptations but the scythe of death hanging perilously close.
Goblins, wolves, and a variety of lower monsters suddenly froze in their places. Their toes began to turn white and made unsettling crunching sounds as they froze. Within mere seconds, the monsters mutating into countless ice statues was nothing short of a transformation.
Baek In-hwa could naturally massacre monsters that struggled to use their mana effectively.
Could this view represent the island where the mythological Medusa lived, filled with statues? Amidst the burgeoning ice statues, Baek In-hwa signaled the end of the performance by tapping the ground lightly with her toes.
Clink, clink…
The sound of breaking glass echoed repeatedly. Soon, all that remained on the ice was Baek In-hwa, and no one else.
Finding joy in extinguishing lives was always awkward.
However, if what stood at the end of the sword was a monster…
Just like that day when she had torn apart the monster that devoured her brother, she could swing her hands without hesitation.
*
I felt utterly bewildered.
Of course, I could easily defeat a mere puppet. Yeon-woo’s calculations and decisions to dive in were all too real. The plan was to align the puppets and the doppleganger in a straight line to minimize the doppleganger’s interference while dealing with the puppets in the process… that was the significance behind my earlier charge.
Yet somehow, my sword, when cutting through the puppet, felt as though I were slicing through tofu, effortlessly severing both sword and shield. The puppet had been fully armored.
‘Was there… a way to increase destructive power by swinging a sword while on a light step?’
No, there hadn’t been… Centrifugal force can increase impact, but the phenomena caused by light steps had not included the enhancement of destructive power.
As Yeon-woo pondered, Shar, still half-asleep, spoke up. Considering that we’d gathered by 9 AM, and even with the time that had passed, it was nearly noon; for Shar, who had been sleeping more lately due to preparations for hatching, it must have been an early wake-up call.
[Yawwwn… Dad, have you eaten alone again….]
‘What the heck can I eat in this situation?’
Seriously, what a brat.
[But it tasted strange, you know…. Yawwwn.]
I had done nothing other than slice that puppet, so what was she talking about tasting something? It felt utterly unfair. But what kind of strange flavor had she experienced?
[It was something musty and dark…. There was a flavor like this in Dad’s old memories too.]
I see, it seems I remembered such a flavor…
Yeon-woo felt a bit melancholic as she continued to glance around, while Shar carefully spoke.
[…I’m not exactly sure what happened, but I can faintly feel a bit of dark elemental mana from the Dragon Heart. Given the circumstances, I suspect it was absorbed from that puppet. It seems to have entered through the sword…].
What…?
Yeon-woo couldn’t contain her shock at those words. Absorb, absorb? Specifically absorbing the opponent’s elemental mana was something completely out of the ordinary. Such abilities had never existed even in previous lives.
‘Could I be an owner of absorption elemental mana??’
[That doesn’t seem to be the case… You should be internally aware of it, but could you please gather as much dark elemental mana as you can? It likely won’t take much to cut with the sword wrapped in mana….]
Of course, I’d help with that. There was no downside to me.
Yeon-woo lifted her gaze to where the swirling darkness was fidgeting. The doppleganger. It was the one responsible for granting the dark elemental mana to the puppet. Naturally, the being with the highest concentration of darkness in this place had to be it.
Given the circumstances, adjustments to the plan were inevitable.
Originally, the plan was to wait for Baek In-hwa to join, but once the side quest of absorbing darkness arose, there was no longer any reason to wait for her.
In fact, Baek In-hwa’s joining was nothing less than a hindrance to growth.
Yeon-woo cast a brief glance at Baek In-hwa. With an expression sharper than usual, she danced among the monsters, seemingly engrossed in the situation. Not a bad sight.
During the moment Yeon-woo let her guard down, it seemed the doppleganger sensed danger. The mass that had been swirling around began to constrict and transformed into the form of a child, about 130 cm tall.
The dark appearance remained unchanged. However, it lacked human-like features, floating eyes, and facial attributes entirely failed to evoke any sense of pity.
The coiled mana surged. The feeling was distinctly different from before. But to be honest, I had expected it.
『Kiyii-!!』
The sharp roar triggered darkness to rise violently around us. The internal pressure of the cavern intensified in an instant. This was only natural. Even though endless lights had been poured out to contain the area, this cave was its territory.
I kept my focus sharp. It was good to gain a means of attacking it, like absorption. Yet, one couldn’t forget that by pure ability, it was stronger than Yeon-woo.
Zing, my instincts warned me. Without realizing it, Yeon-woo threw her body to the side. The direction of the oncoming attack was evident. The sky was sealed off by the lights.
‘Underfoot……!!’
A shadow spear erupted from the ground right where it stood. If I had remained still, it would have been quite a painful situation. With a roll, I collected myself and swung my sword at the emerging spear. Crack, the broken shadow melted away into the air.
‘It’s definitely absorbing….’
At that sight, it seemed the doppleganger recognized the anomaly; the clusters of eyes sprouting from its body all frowned.
It swung its hand forward. Thorns, rippling from the floating shadows, shot towards Yeon-woo. While it’s nearly impossible to predict each attack pattern, there were tendencies.
The specialty of the doppleganger was the attacks that could emerge from anywhere. Nonetheless, the fact that it had launched from its own feet indicated—
‘It’s guided!!’
Wow, when mages strive for just one guiding attribute, they’d tear apart spells and lose their minds over mana control, while monsters can crudely replicate it within their territories.
The speed of those movements was nothing exceptional. They were actually a bit slow. But like in many games, the issue with guided shots lay in the fact that they moved independently from the caster’s attacks.
Dodging the sprouting attacks, Yeon-woo fell back on sheer instinct to lure them to her limit.
As the name dark element mana suggests, it experiences less physical restriction, yet it still couldn’t unapologetically manipulate physical phenomena.
Yeon-woo narrowly avoided the needles approaching her and dashed forward. The wave raced to follow her in a straight line, gaining speed as it did, but it also had to twist itself to follow, already bound by inertia.
Just like an asteroid barely grazing the Earth, bending its trajectory, the darkness thorns similarly had to veer.
It would be simple to just submerge them in darkness and pull them back but recovering what generated physical phenomena would inflict physical trauma on the doppleganger itself.
Yeon-woo shot herself forward towards the doppleganger. Light steps. Her leg, radiating silver mana light, fulfilled her master’s desires.
She tore through the fleeting moment and halted before the doppleganger, leaving skid marks behind due to the speed.
It extended its sharpened arm. The surrounding darkness responded to that strike, shooting sharp objects directly at Yeon-woo.
Swoosh.
Taking a deep breath, she drew in the air. Wrapping mana around her arm, she imbued her eyes with mana to focus to the max. The battlefield seemed to be seen from above.
In what felt like slow motion, the sharp advances created by hundreds of armor pieces pierced toward Yeon-woo. If struck, she’d turn into a pincushion. The only option left was to cleave them all.
With the sword grasped at her waist, she lifted it and swung. Swoosh, without resistance, her blade dug into the doppleganger’s right arm, severing it off.
With that, she loosened her grip, turned the sword backward, and thrust it upward. The incoming spear shattered.
Grabbing the handle that jutted outward with her left hand, she thrust it behind her. The thorns pierced through.
Moments later, she spun her body, cutting as if wrapping around herself. Countless attacks were severed and absorbed.
After that, there was no thought, only instinct as she acted on what was necessary. It was the proof she had entered the realm of domains and intervals.
“───Huff.”
Yeon-woo exhaled deeply. How many times had she swung her sword in the mere seconds gone by? Her arms, pushed to their limits, were a mess of torn muscles and burst veins.
Even with the enhancement of mana, such a state was almost disheartening. Closing in on the front, she plunged the sword in one last time.
“Now die.”
The doppleganger, simply staring dumbfounded at the blade piercing its chest, let out a sharp, mournful scream like a beast facing death.
Crying would earn no sympathy. It only added to the noise.
Yeon-woo silently watched the sight, consumed by an overwhelming fatigue.
[It’s being absorbed, Dad. Please endure it a little longer, even if it’s tough.]
‘Got it.’
I felt slightly revitalized. It was similar to drinking a liquid elixir. For the doppleganger that absorbed the identities of others to be absorbed itself; I wondered what it must feel like.
It began to condense its body as though it were making a final struggle. Dark explosion. I couldn’t tell how many had died from this in the past, but it wouldn’t happen this time.
Once it had transformed into a black sphere, Yeon-woo raised her sword and cut horizontally through it.
A smell like meat grilling pervaded the air. It was as if I had dipped my hand into flames, feeling the hot heat through my entire arm. Pain pierced through her entire arm. It likely melted and shredded. However, it was only natural that bare skin had a higher absorption rate than a sword. She had to endure.
In fact, the doppleganger, which had been concentrated for an explosion, was rapidly diminishing, allowing Yeon-woo to hold on for a little longer.
“Why would I save you?”
Die, write my name with that elemental mana.
(To be continued in the next episode)