Chapter 26

Chapter 26. Gale of Annihilation

Seria's body trembled violently.

Her eyes were stained red.

She looked ready to draw her bow at any moment.

I gripped Seria's shoulder.

"Hold."

A low growl.

"If you act now, you'll die for nothing."

It was a cold assessment.

The soldiers filling the plaza.

A glance told me there were well over a thousand.

Their armament was incomparably sturdier than the Frost Tribe's leather garments.

Armor and spears forged from ice crystal.

On top of that, archers were stationed along the ramparts.

This was the enemy's stronghold.

If a commotion broke out, we'd be turned into pincushions.

Seria bit her lip.

Blood seeped through.

But she bowed her head.

Had my grip not held her in place, she would have bolted.

That was when it happened.

Thud. Thud.

The soldiers' ranks parted.

A knight in silver armor approached.

He appeared to be a commanding officer.

He stepped in front of us.

His gaze was thick with suspicion.

"Halt."

The knight lowered his spear tip.

But his guard remained up.

"This is the northern front line. The God of Frost, Lord Cryos, strictly controls all entry by outsiders."

He glanced at the staff in my hand.

"You claimed to be Lord Heimdal's herald?"

"That's right."

I lifted my chin.

As arrogantly as I could manage.

"I have a question, if I may. Why would the great God of Typhoons send a herald to a remote outpost such as this?"

The knight narrowed his eyes.

"And without any prior notice, at that."

A reasonable suspicion.

But if I faltered here, it was over.

I scowled.

"Insolent."

I loaded mana into my voice.

"A mere mortal dares question His intentions?"

"I did not mean to imply......"

I slammed the staff against the ground.

HUMMMM!

The gem at the staff's tip spewed blue light.

Wind surged.

A razor-sharp gust of pressure grazed the knight's helmet.

CLANG!

The ornament on his helmet was sheared clean off.

The knight's face went white.

He stumbled backward.

It was real.

That power was divine might that could not be faked.

Just as the knight was about to bow his head, cold sweat running down his face.

"F-forgive m......"

CRACK!

A dull, wet burst.

The words never finished.

The knight's head was gone.

No—it had exploded outward.

Blood and brain matter sprayed in every direction.

Splatter.

Hot droplets struck my cheek.

"......!"

Seria flinched and retreated.

The surrounding soldiers screamed and scattered.

The headless knight's body crumpled lifelessly.

THUD.

In that spot, a pitch-black spear stood embedded.

A javelin.

A spear hurled from somewhere had obliterated the knight's head.

I shifted my gaze.

The direction the spear had come from.

The rampart above.

A massive shadow stood there.

A silhouette, backlit into solid black.

It leaped down from the wall.

BOOM!

The ground shuddered as though an earthquake had struck.

From the cloud of dust, it emerged.

A towering frame, easily three meters tall.

A beast-man with a human body and the head of a lion.

A golden mane billowed in the wind.

Veins coiled like worms over muscles swollen to the point of bursting.

"......Pathetic."

The lion beast-man growled.

His voice was rough, like grinding stone.

He walked to the corpse.

With one hand, he wrenched the embedded spear free.

SCHLK.

Flicking the blood from the spear, he spoke.

"Lord Cryos commanded it. Not a single ant gets in."

Yellow eyes flashed.

"And the moment I look away, you let in a peddler."

His gaze locked onto us.

On Seria, specifically.

"And one of them is an elf."

He sniffed the air.

"Reeks. A runaway rat?"

Seria's face went pale.

Killing intent.

An overwhelming killing intent was pressing down on her.

I swallowed hard.

'Why is he here?'

An unexpected variable.

I knew that thing.

The gatekeeper who had guarded the entrance to Floor 50.

If Seria had been the mid-boss, this thing had been the one stationed at the floor's gate.

'Kusan, the Lion King.'

Why was he here?

Kusan should have been in the Tower. Why was he out here on the Asgard mainland?

Kusan leveled his spear at us.

"I am Kusan, gatekeeper sworn to Lord Cryos."

He bared his fangs in a vicious grin.

......He'd seen through us.

The beast looked simple and brutish, but his senses were sharp.

Above all.

"You lot—you stink. The stink of liars."

Kusan was a fanatic.

He obeyed only Cryos's commands.

Even if the real Heimdal had come, as long as his master ordered it, he would have thrown his spear.

He was not someone who could be reasoned with.

The muscles in Kusan's thighs bulged.

"Seria!"

At my shout, Seria snapped back to her senses.

Instinctively, she drew her bowstring.

FWIP!

An arrow tore through the air.

A precise shot aimed squarely at Kusan's forehead.

But.

Kusan didn't dodge.

The arrow bounced off his dense mane and clattered uselessly to the ground.

"That tickles."

Kusan sneered.

Seria was still growing.

She was woefully far from the might that had once earned her the title of Floor 50's nightmare.

"Seize them!"

"Intruders!"

At Kusan's signal, soldiers swarmed in like ants.

Enemies on all sides.

At this rate, we'd be surrounded and bled dry.

I clenched my teeth and slammed my left hand against the ground.

HUMMMM!

Authority—Hellfire-Seething Earth.

CRASH—!

Starting from beneath my feet, dark-red flames erupted.

The ice sheet melted away and the ground boiled.

"AAAGH!"

"It burns!"

The charging soldiers were engulfed in flames and sent tumbling.

A curtain of fire formed.

I'd managed to cut off their approach.

But Kusan was different.

"Oh ho, not bad. That's some real heat."

He casually sidestepped the field of lava.

Even the surging heat, he endured with brute physicality.

It wasn't enough.

I swung the staff.

The Typhoon That Rends Flesh from Bone.

WHOOOOSH!

Blades of wind that could carve through space descended on Kusan.

RRRUMBLE!

Gashes opened across his body.

Blood flew.

But that was all.

"A little breeze is all you've got?!"

Kusan roared and swung his spear.

CRASH!

The wind was torn apart.

'Madman.'

He was on a different level entirely.

Qualitatively different from the Avatars I'd faced on Earth.

If they were players shielded by the System, this thing was the wild itself.

Overwhelming physicality.

Battle instincts honed across centuries of warfare.

A warrior of the orthodox school.

CLANG! CLA-CLANG!

Abriel darted through the air in Holy Sword form, covering Seria.

But.

"Gkh!"

Seria cried out.

Kusan's fist grazed her side.

She flew like a fallen leaf and slammed into a wall.

"Seria!"

"Eyes on me!"

Kusan barreled to point-blank range.

His spear tip drove toward my throat.

I barely managed to block with the staff.

CLAAANG!

My wrist felt like it would snap.

I was being pushed back.

Maintaining Hellfire with my left hand while controlling the typhoon with my right was taxing enough on its own.

'Is there no way out?'

I racked my brain.

One Authority remained.

Extreme Blizzard, gained from devouring Caligo.

But it was useless here.

This was the north.

The territory of the God of Frost, Cryos.

Using ice magic here was like splashing water on a fish.

It would only buff the enemy.

Should I retreat?

'Impossible.'

Kusan was faster than me.

The moment I showed my back, a spear would be planted in it.

Should I have come better prepared?

Regret washed over me, but it was already spilled water.

The monsters bought from the Floor 1 Shop couldn't be brought outside the Tower.

This was the best fighting force I currently had.

"Is that really all you've got, fraud?!"

Kusan pressed the attack.

Spear thrusts rained down.

All I could do was block.

I'd hit my limit.

I panted and looked down at my right hand.

The golden rune etched on my palm.

The power that devours Authorities.

'Maybe......'

I looked at the staff.

The moment I recognized it and gripped it with my right hand.

Hummm.

'......!'

The golden rune reacted.

Golden threads shot from my palm.

Straight into the Divine Armament Heimdal had given me.

'......No way.'

Could I devour it?

Even the Authority dwelling within a Divine Armament?

But even if I did, it would just be the Typhoon That Rends Flesh from Bone.

No different from what I was already using through the staff.

I'd only lose the staff's amplification effect.

At the same time.

A thought flashed through my mind.

Using the staff was 'item usage.'

But if I devoured it, it would become 'my own Authority.'

And if it became my Authority?

'I can combine it.'

The hidden reward sitting in my Inventory.

The Authority Combiner!

There was no time to hesitate.

Kusan's spear was already closing in again.

I tightened my grip on the staff.

'Devour it.'

HUMMMM!

The golden rune spun.

The light from the blue gem at the staff's tip was sucked into my palm.

WHOOOOSH!

The storm energy wrapping the staff vanished.

The Divine Armament lost its radiance in an instant, reduced to an ordinary wooden stick.

At the same time.

Ding!

[You have devoured the power of the Divine Armament, 'The Staff of the Typhoon.']
[You acquire the Authority, 'The Typhoon That Rends Flesh from Bone.']

Done.

I immediately opened the System window.

Authority Combiner: activated.

The list appeared.

[Checking combinable Authorities.]
[1. The Typhoon That Rends Flesh from Bone (Mythic)]
[2. Extreme Blizzard (Legendary)]

The two Authorities were resonating.

Wind and cold.

The most perfect synergy.

I pressed the button without hesitation.

[Disassembling Authority 'The Typhoon That Rends Flesh from Bone.']
[Dissolving Authority 'Extreme Blizzard.']
[Analyzing the affinity between two Disasters.]
[Synergy explodes!]
[Progress: 15%]

The cauldron was boiling over.

But it needed time.

The gauge was filling slowly.

Kusan broke through the flames.

Even the Hellfire couldn't fully burn through his thick hide and mana barrier.

"Seria!"

I shouted.

"Buy me time!"

"......!"

Seria bit her lip.

Terror filled her eyes.

But she didn't back down.

She drew her bowstring.

FWP-FWP-FWIP!

Arrows flew in rapid succession.

"Annoying little fly!"

Kusan swung his spear.

The arrows shattered to pieces in midair.

An overwhelming gap in combat power.

THWACK!

"Hurk!"

The spear shaft slammed into Seria's abdomen.

She tumbled across the ground.

Even as she coughed up blood, she rose again.

A will to hold on no matter what, even if she had to cling to my ankle and drag herself.

[Progress: 85%]

Just a little more.

Kusan grabbed Seria by the throat and lifted her.

"Weak, all of you. I'm bored now."

The instant he began to squeeze.

Ding!

[Combination complete!]
[A new Authority has been born!]
[Authority grade is being recalibrated.]
[Reaching 'Ancient' grade.]

A grade beyond Mythic.

Hummm.

The raging Hellfire guttered out in an instant.

As the dark-red curtain lifted, Kusan looked at me and grinned viciously.

"Giving up? Playtime's over, is it?"

He hurled Seria aside like a sack of cargo.

Then he walked toward me, slow and deliberate.

The composure of a victor.

I extended my hand toward him once more.

Kusan was careless.

Now was the perfect opening to kill him.

I spoke the name of the completed Authority.

"Gale of Annihilation."

CRASH—!