Chapter 1275: Ghost Image
Upon hearing Rhode’s question, the crowd, which was cheering loudly, suddenly fell silent. It felt as though there were an invisible hand at their throats, stifling their voices. Everyone exchanged looks with one another. The atmosphere turned bizarre all of a sudden.
“So? Who is gonna do it?”
“Hurry up, we’re rus.h.i.+ng for time. Anyone except Leader can loot the corpse, since you won’t be as unlucky as the three great G.o.ds of the ‘unlucky looting aura’! The other two sites are still waiting for our reinforcements! Hey, how about… You! Go loot!”
“What the heck!”
Rhode grew furious instantly. No matter what, he was the Void Dragon now and the ruler of the Void Territory!
How dare you guys defame me. Don’t you know the supreme ruler always has good luck? I’m THE chosen one! It’s time for me to show you my drive!
At this thought, Rhode wasted no time and swung his arm abruptly.
“Lapis, loot it!”
“Huh? What, Sir Rhode? What did you say?”
Facing Rhode’s words, Lapis was stunned. Upon seeing her reaction, Rhode was also speechless, but explained to her quickly.
“Sweep the battlefield to find anything useful in that fella’s corpse. Bring them all over.”
“Got it, Sir Rhode.”
Lapis understood what he meant instantly. Back then, she had also been a mercenary. However, she was too weak and spent most of her time providing support around the perimeter of the battlefield and wasn’t given the opportunity to gather loot. Although she didn’t know why Rhode chose her for the job, the obedient young lady didn’t question his decision, but nodded and ran up to the pile of corpse dust to begin her search instead. Everyone watched as she extended her arm and…
“… Sir Rhode, there’s nothing…”
“d.a.m.n it! What a scam!”
“Leader, you’re so unlucky that even your girl is as unlucky as you! How are we supposed to have fun together in the future? If this continues, won’t we be infected by you too? Everyone, take note to stay away from Leader! How are we supposed to get new equipment if we’re with Leader next time?”
“Alright, cut the c.r.a.p and go!”
Rhode’s expression remained unchanged at the sight of the people talking behind him. Currently, Canary and Mirror were facing an emergency. Just like Rhode predicted, when Julia attacked his group, the other two Chaos Lords also realized the situation. However, Canary and Mirror did well to contain the two Chaos Lords. There was one good news and bad news. The good news was that the Chaos Lord that Mirror contained was one that Rhode encountered in a land of Chaos. But the bad news was that on Canary’s side, the Chaos Lord was entirely new to them. At that moment, both sides were confronting and probing each other, but judging from Canary’s tone of voice, it seemed like that Chaos Lord wasn’t easy to deal with.
But even so, Rhode didn’t choose to move off immediately after defeating Julia. After all, his group consumed a lot of strength in that battle. They were also a long distance away from the tower where Canary was. If they were to encounter any Chaos creatures along the way, perhaps they would be exhausted when they arrived at their destination, not to mention putting up a fight. That was why Rhode chose to rest for a few moments after annihilating Julia. Of course… He also gained nothing from looting her corpse.
It was a pity that not only did his ‘unlucky looting aura’ not weaken, but it also became much stronger now…
Dwindling his depressed emotions, Rhode led his well-rested group and hit the road again, heading toward the magical tower.
The magical tower that soared over the Darkness Palace was once a forbidden place in the Country of Darkness, where many historical records and evil, mysterious, ancient spells of death were collected. But now, invaded by Chaos, the magical tower had lost its purpose. Chaos was the manifestation of disorder, and now that the Darkness Capital was completely contaminated by Chaos, the magical data that was kept in the tower also lost their meaning. Even if one were to take a book from the shelf and flip through it, one would only see incomplete and contradictory records.
But now, Rhode didn’t have the time to lament about the recorded history of the Country of Darkness being reduced to sc.r.a.p paper. After entering the tower, Rhode and his group encountered sniping from numerous Chaos creatures. Unlike the steel skeleton guards on the outside, most of the Chaos creatures here were products metamorphosed from ‘books’. For that reason, it was even more impossible to defend against them. There were several times when Rhode and the rest sauntered across the library, and the books that were arranged neatly on the shelves suddenly grew razor-sharp teeth, flapped their pages, and attacked them like flying animals. Although their level was generally low, such a large number of them still caught Rhode off guard. Not only that, but due to the narrow interior of the tower, it was also impossible to let Lapis blast the place indiscriminately like an open s.p.a.ce. They would be done for, not to mention killing some of the Chaos creatures.
For that reason, everyone wielded their weapons and hacked their way through. After almost an hour, the group finally got to ascend the stairs.
“Phew… That’s tiring… Tsk, I never expected those annoying Chaos creatures to be so tough!”
Celestina wiped the beads of sweat on her forehead and grumbled. s.h.i.+ra, Little Five, and Celestina weren’t withdrawn to their card forms by Rhode and had to follow them throughout the journey. After all, the three of them were outstanding in strength, especially after Rhode activated his Taboo Halo, where they jumped straight into the Peak Legendary Stage. Even though they were slightly weaker than players, the trio was still summoned spirits, after all, where their combined attacks were no worse than that of one player’s! As a matter of fact, the reason why they were able to successfully break into the core of the tower was due to s.h.i.+ra. As an Undead Puppet who wors.h.i.+ped destruction and had bizarre tendencies, she didn’t care about traps or getting hurt at all. Because there was nothing in this world more enjoyable for her than pain.
“Hahahaha!”
The bizarre laughter rang out. Celestina instinctively s.h.i.+vered, raised her head, and gazed forward in fear, only to see that right in front of her, s.h.i.+ra lifted the scarlet longsword in her hand and swung it forward with great force! In a loud boom, the bookshelf before her collapsed, followed by screeching, whistling explosions. Hundreds of ‘books’ flew out from the ruins of the bookshelves, fluttering their pages, opening up their enormous ‘mouths’, and biting down on s.h.i.+ra.
However, they didn’t have their way because the scarlet longsword in s.h.i.+ra’s hands metamorphosed into an even larger and more ferocious beastly mouth, sweeping across the air and swirling in a red whirlwind. The Chaos creatures who were swept into the whirlwind were shredded into bits. After the whirlwind came to an end, what displayed before everyone was shredded pages swirling in midair, falling like snowflakes. At a glance, it was indeed a beautiful sight.
“Heh, heh. Not enough! I want more…! More…!”
s.h.i.+ra mumbled under her breath and swept glances to her surroundings. Then, she paused her gaze on Celestina…
“———!”
Upon detecting her meaningful stare, Celestina felt chills running down her spine. But before she reacted, the group heard loud explosions above them.
Boom! Boom! Boom!
Along with the ear-deafening explosions, the entire tower shook. Rhode sulked instantly. He was aware that this was undoubtedly a sign that Canary had gone all-out!
This doesn’t feel right!
Sensing the rippling magical energy above, Rhode turned grim. He tried contacting Canary earlier. Back then, even though Canary was containing the Chaos Lord, she didn’t attack rashly. In any case, Chaos Lords were powerful creatures, and now that Canary only had half her original manpower on her side, it wasn’t enough for her to deal with one. This was still based on the fact that Bubble and the rest had cast the Order Barrier and isolated the palace from the outside world. If they didn’t isolate the outside world from the power of Chaos, the Chaos Lord would turn even stronger. When that happened, perhaps her party would be wiped out by the Chaos Lord in 10 minutes, not to mention containing it! Earlier on, Canary had also specifically stressed to Rhode that this Chaos Lord was rather odd and dangerous. According to her character, it was impossible for her to be as impulsive as Bubble. But now that she launched her attack, it proved that the situation was truly threatening!
“s.h.i.+ra, Little Five! Attack!”
Rhode hesitated no more and gave his command right away. Upon hearing his order, s.h.i.+ra let out an odd laughter. This young lady clad in a tattered gothic dress raised the scarlet longsword, charged through the solid ceiling like a cannonball, and flew toward the top of the tower. The specter young lady also followed closely, pa.s.sing through the ceiling without making a noise. At the same time, Rhode also sprinted ahead in large strides. He knew that something was amiss.
“Haa… Haa…”
Canary gripped the staff in her hand and stared at the enemy before her. Beads of sweat couldn’t help but trickle from her smooth, fair forehead. But at the moment, Canary couldn’t care less about her image. On the contrary, around her were blazing rings of flames that shrouded her densely. Despite that, she didn’t feel any sense of safety at all.
She swept a glance at her three companions who were already ‘dead’ and s.h.i.+fted her gaze away. At that moment, she was located in a s.p.a.cious rotunda in the center of the magical tower. Along the walls of the rotunda were glittering books of magic that once recorded evil and powerful undead spells. But now, there was nothing left. However, this wasn’t Canary’s concern. Instead, it was the terrifying creature floating in front of her right now.
It was a robe hovering in midair. In the hood and limb area, thick, dotted texts could be seen, forming circles of bandage-like presences that coalesced into a head and limbs. Apart from that, this Chaos Lord had no particular form to speak of.
But it wasn’t just about its form.
Canary gripped the staff in her hand. Even though the Chaos Lord before her seemed weak and didn’t look like past Chaos Lords that were gigantic and full of oppression, its abilities were really odd and Canary sensed an ice-cold aura of death from it. It was an evil, dark power that came from death itself. Canary didn’t even see how the other party did it. All she witnessed was a flash of black light and the three players who acted as ‘vanguards’ and ‘main tankers’ lost all their health and collapsed straight to the ground without resisting at all!
What is this power?
Faced with the scene before her, Canary was bewildered. Of course, this wasn’t the first time she encountered a situation where the BOSS instantly killed her party members. But the problem was that there were indications before instant-death spells were cast and this creature before them showed no warning at all, where even when the three players crumbled, Canary didn’t notice any movement from the Chaos Lord. Before she had a chance to ponder, she saw the mysterious figure s.h.i.+ft, throwing its right arm forward and pouncing on her group!
“Everyone, disperse! Attack!”
Looking at this scene, Canary was stunned. Although her original intention was to wait for Rhode to arrive before launching any attacks, this Chaos Lord was simply too peculiar, so much so that Canary had to give an order immediately. Upon hearing her command, the players who followed her scattered instantly, before unleas.h.i.+ng all kinds of arrows and magic spells like a powerful storm that greeted the Chaos Lord.
But shortly after, a scene that left Canary flabbergasted happened.
The magical spells and arrows failed to hit their targets as they simply pa.s.sed right through the Chaos Lord! Moreover, just as the two thieves were speeding up to attack from the back, the Chaos Lord merely stroked its arms and the two thieves fell to the ground lifelessly.
Canary was stunned. The Chaos Lord closed in on them, and she was forced to unleash her proudest chain of nine explosive fireb.a.l.l.s! From her perspective, although she didn’t know what the other party was, since she felt an evil, undead energy from it, perhaps it also possessed similar weaknesses to an undead spirit. As expected, after her attack, the Chaos Lord finally stopped moving and drifted back to its earlier position. Although Canary’s attack worked, she didn’t feel a.s.sured just yet, as she clearly witnessed that even though her fireb.a.l.l.s struck the Chaos Lord, it didn’t inflict too much damage.
What should I do?
If only Bubble were here…
At this thought, Canary couldn’t help but force a smile. Although her flames could restrain undeads, the most powerful thing against the undead was a power of light from Mini Bubble Gum! Unfortunately, she wasn’t here right now, and the clerics in her party mostly specialized in defense and not offense. Among the rest, only three holy knights were able to emanate holy light. However, they weren’t light elemental specialists, after all, so the amount of damage they could deal was also limited…
It seems like I can only stall the battle and wait for Rhode’s arrival.
The moment this thought cropped up in her mind, the Chaos Lord suddenly launched its attack again! Facing Canary and her party, which blocked off its exit, the Chaos Lord widened its mouth, laughed heedlessly, and stretched its arms. With that, the magical books abandoned by the sides of the wall erupted in magical radiance in an instant!
“Oh no!”
Looking at this scene, Canary was taken aback. Although she didn’t know what the Chaos Lord was trying to do, she was certain it was definitely something terrifying! Canary couldn’t delay the battle any longer. Shortly after, a scorching, scarlet pillar of flame took shape in her hands, metamorphosing into a fire serpent that widened its mouth and pounced straight at the Chaos Lord!