The Final Quest
The frozen wasteland at the northern edge of the Rubel continent had been ruled by a powerful Lich for thirty years.
The greatest wizard of the Magic empire and the most powerful frost mage in history, Frezole.
When he became an Elder Lich and decided to settle in the northern region, the people trembled in terror and despair.
Some requested their kings to eradicate him.
But the people’s pleads were ignored by their kings.
Thousands of armored skeletons armed with weapons made of ice.
The seven Death Knights, surrounded by their darkly menacing aura.
And the Elder Lich who was once the greatest and most talented wizard, Frezole.
Their power was incomparable to the kingdoms who only had a standing army of ten thousand.
Naturally, no humans traveled there. Not even the bravest of adventurers or the most curious travelers would travel to those frozen lands.
It is a place that does not accept the living, for it is the land of the dead.
It had been a long time since a living human has visited.
[Main Quest - Eradicate the Elder Lich Frezole]
[Difficulty - S]
[Reward - Legendary ~ Mythical reward book 1]
Breach Frezole"s lair located at northern region of the Rubel continent, kill his minions and slay their master.
*Level requirement - Lv90(Recommended Lv97 and above)
"Hm... It’s 93 percent now, so I should hit max level at the end right?"
The black haired man mumbled, pulled out his golden knight"s sword and entered the snow covered forest.
***
BANG, BANG!
Suddenly, large explosions cascaded in the silent forest of northern Rubel continent.
The freezing temperature and frost covered lands evaporated, and in its place were h.e.l.lish, burning flames.
The skeletal warriors armed with frozen swords stronger than steel lay on the floor in pieces, alongside the Death Knights as their brooding souls began to dissipate through the fractures of their armor
And the man who was the cause of it all.
Facing him was the demonic Elder Lich, casting his spells.
"Ice Hand, Ice Hand, Ice Hand, Ice Wall, Ice Dragon."
The man"s feet, which were smoldering with heat, froze instantly and a hand made of ice sprouted from the ground and grasped one of his legs.
Two more hands appeared behind him to hold his body still, as solid walls of ice appeared to trap him within.
The only way out was to go up.
But an ice dragon that appeared out of nowhere, was already staring down at the man trapped inside.
He quickly looked around the area but the frozen hail surrounding the dragon made it seem like escaping unscathed would be difficult.
KRAAAAAAAAAK!
As if unable to wait any longer, the ice dragon roared and dove straight down towards the ground.
The man gave up on the thought of escaping through the top and gathered the fiery power in his body.
"Spirit Form."
BAAAAANG!
In an instant, the man transformed into a fire spirit and melted his way through the ice wall. The Ice Dragon slammed into the ground and returned to natural ice.
As the man raised his guard for a counter attack in the frosty mist, he could see hundreds of cone shaped missiles of ice in front of him.
Each of them flew past at dangerous speeds, and getting hit by more than one would endanger his life.
"Quadruple casting and instant cast as well... shouldn"t this be SS, not S?"
Even as he was thinking such a useless thought, he evaded the missiles with swift, clean movements.
The Elder Lich Frezole was getting pushed back, as the man dodged his ice magic with superior agility and even had time to counterattack by releasing lightning from his blade.
"How could a mere human... have such strength. He doesn"t even seem to be in his thirties..."
Frezoles emotion turned from surprise to fear.
In the two hundred years that he had lived, including his life spent as a human, the number of people who had been able to threaten his life could only be counted on one hand.
Ninety nine percent of his enemies lost their lives to the ice missiles, and the remaining one percent could be dealt with the Ice Dragon, Ice Hand combination.
There had been no exception.
But this man was different.
No matter what attack, what spells he used, he could not change the calm look on the man’s face.
Even facing the endless wave of spells, the man was so relaxed and the Lich began to feel he was the one being cornered.
The Lich admitted.
Frezole was feeling fear.
"But... I won"t accept defeat so easily."
Frezole began channeling all of his remaining dark mana in his vessel and began casting.
It was his first time controlling ice missiles and casting two high rank spells, but he had no other option.
He could feel his body beginning to break from using his mana beyond his limit, but the spell finished before it broke apart.
His trump card with everything on the line.
The skeleton dragon appeared behind the man.
A blue flame burned in Frezole"s eye socket.
"If even this doesn"t work... Kuku, I"ll accept it, and pa.s.s on to eternal sleep."
The skeleton dragon charged at the man who was swinging his golden sword.
But the man turned his body naturally as if he was expecting it.
As he was looking at the skull dragon without any tension, Frezole"s second spell activated just in front of him.
BAAAAAAAANG!
The bone explosion spell sent the fragments of the skeleton dragon"s body flying towards the man.
***
[Level up!]
[Congratulations! You have achieved level 99.]
[Limited access - Asgard"s Seal has been released.]
[Main quest - Eradicate the Elder Lich Frezole has been completed!]
[Please choose your reward.]
"Kuuaaah! I’m done!"
At the centre of the smoldering land, Vulcan, armed with a golden knight"s sword and red leather armor shouted out loud.
Normally he wouldn"t hesitate to ignore everything other than the quest reward, or review his battle, but not this time.
"Level 99... max level... I"ve done all the quests and did everything I can. I knew the Seal would release if I hit level 99!"
Vulcan smiled with a sense of accomplishment.
He was teleported into an unknown world called the Rubel continent when he was twenty, and suffered through all kinds of hards.h.i.+p.
Instead of a normal university life, he had been forced to hold a sword and deal with constant messages and voices in his head as if he had gone insane.
The "guide system" which you would only see in a VR game, forced quests upon him which seemed like it was leading him to certain death. Along the way, he even experienced his first life-threatening situation and his first murder...
His lonely, five-year-long adventure flashed through his mind like a slideshow.
In a way the time had gone by in the blink of an eye, but the fact that he could no longer remember his parents or his sister’s face, nor his memories of his home was proof that it was definitely not a short amount of time.
He had endured it all for such a long time.
No matter how hard the adventure was, he hadn’t given up and took his steps one by one. Now only one final step remained.
Right now Vulcan, looked like a hero from the legends.
His entire body was hardened with muscle and the confidence and pressure coming from his body was emanated to his surroundings.
There was no remaining trace of a newbie who once trembled in terror while fighting a single goblin or orc.
Equipped with legendary and mythical armaments on his entire body, the max level hero awaited his ending.
"It"s over. After this last quest... I can go back. Back to the peaceful days, back home."
Vulcan sheathed his blade of pure lightning and looked at his quest window.
There was no need to search through it. All of the completed quests had been removed and the ones on the list were [Main Quest - Eradicate the Elder Lich Frezole] for the reward and [The Final Quest - Enter Asgard] which had just been unsealed.
After this was completed, everything would go back to its original place.
Vulcan closed all of the notification messages in his view and left the quest reward and skill windows open. He focused on the skill list especially.
[Pa.s.sive skill list]
*Combat Mastery - S
*Weapon Mastery - S
*Defense Mastery - S
*Evasion Mastery - A -> S(Rank up)
...
Fire mastery A -> S(Rank up)
Lightning Mastery S
Cold Mastery B
Necromancy Mastery C
Vulcan"s lips turned into a smile when he saw that his "Evasion Mastery" had improved, which had never happened despite all of the previous grindings he did to raise it.
Dodging all of Frezole"s modified ice missiles one by one must have had a large effect on it. He almost allowed Frezole an opportunity due to length of the battle but the reward was worth it.
"Instant cast of Skull Dragon and Bone Explosion combination... He wasn"t a level 99 boss for nothing."
There were other improvements, Fire Mastery had improved from A to S.
"Perhaps it’s because I destroyed the Cold Magic with Fire Magic. Hm."
This was also a great result.
With the difficulty of the last quest in mystery, the S-rank Fire Mastery would prove useful.
After looking through all of his masteries on the chart, he looked at his quest rewards with greed.
It was the first time he had done so, but he had wanted to save the best for last this time, which was difficult.
"Now... What will come out from it."
The last 2 S-difficulty quest rewards hadn"t disappointed him.
The trials he went through at level 80 to receive the mythical weapon, the "Pure Lightning Blade" and the skill "Indestructible" that he received at level 95 for killing the orc great chieftain had increased his stats drastically.
His whole mind was filled with excitement.
"To be honest I don’t need any changes to my equipment. A skill... a Fire or Lightning skill. One with a lot of utility... Please!"
Vulcan looked at his reward.
[Mythical Skill - The Burning h.e.l.l]
[Level Requirement : 99Lv]
Turns the area around the caster into scorched earth. Enemies within the AoE take damage over time, and the caster"s Fire skill damage increases by 20%. When in flame spirit transformation, the spirit may travel to any place within the scorched earth. 60 second duration.
Vulcan smiled.
***
"This is perfect. Perfect condition, perfect equipment, potions fully stacked. There’s nothing more I can do."
At the western end of the Rubel continent, there was a cave on an uninhabited island.
Vulcan stood at its entrance, outfitted with his legendary equipment.
Within the cave was a darkness deeper than an abyss.
A normal man would quake with fear just looking into it, afraid of the unknown threats that could be lurking within.
However, Vulcan"s face seemed as if he had made a decision.
Truth be told, Vulcan had long contemplated about going through with the quest "Enter Asgard".
The term "Final Quest" suggested that the difficulty would be far beyond what he had faced before, and the fact that no details about the quest had been shown made it even more difficult to make a decision.
But he decided not to think about it anymore.
He had done everything he could.
In order to be prepared for everything not only had he leveled up, but he had also invested a lot of time into basic combat mastery and gathered skills that synergized with each other.
His items could not get any better, either. He also prided himself on his vast combat experience.
Vulcan was the undisputed, most powerful man in the world.
Waiting any further would not be caution, but hesitation and cowardice.
Vulcan scratched his head, his hair had been cut short like a mercenary’s. Some of his hair dropped along with his unrest.
"This is the end, b.l.o.o.d.y Rubel continent."
The footsteps that echoed in the cave went farther into the distance, and darkness swallowed him whole. And then, as if nothing had happened, the cave erased its own existence from the world.