Chapter 319

“Sir Carcharocles. We must drive him into the Bottomless Deep under the Ocean King’s Castle,” Natantes said.

“I agree. Casualties will be far too great if we fight here,” Carcharocles replied.

“You know that... yet you were about to go into your Ancient Transformation state earlier?”

“G-gahaha! Let bygones be bygones!”

Natantes and Carcharocles joined forces as they glared at Dopper, an exemplar of Squama.

“We should put aside the faults of our past momentarily and focus on tearing apart that son of a bitch tarnishing Squama’s honor!” Carcharocles shouted.

“Very well. First... I will shove him into the Bottomless Deep.”

Natantes’s blue eyes shone as he drew out his unique caliber from his star, the white foam, Spuma. His grand mana and uniquely heavy Stream Force coursed throughout his entire body, unleashing the power that the merfolk had lost.

“HAAAAAHHH!”

[Activating Race Skill: Ancient Transformation.]

Natantes’s white ganoid scales proliferated endlessly, becoming a giant white whale, easily a hundred meters long and a thousand tonnes heavy. He was literally a white wall—the true form of Natantes, the White Whale. A giant shadow loomed over the battlefield.

“W-what the hell is that?!”

“Holy crap!”

“Whoooaaa! It’s Master Natantes!”

“The Almighty Whale has made his move!”

The nagas were left in shock as they looked up, while the merfolk cheered. The ancient merfolk that had resided in the merfolk dimension, Venilia, were all massive. However, as their habitat grew more crowded and food became scarcer, they grew smaller and smaller, reaching their current size.

Hence, they created a skill called Ancient Transformation to restore their former glory. It was the merfolk’s race skill, using mana and Stream Force to stimulate the ancient genes lying dormant inside them.

“Here I go!” Natantes shouted, raising his giant tail fin and fanning it.

An unfathomably powerful whirlpool appeared over Dopper and engulfed him. Dopper grunted, being forced downward, unable to defy the current that went through the Ocean King’s Castle and anything in its path toward the Bottomless Deep.

“Let’s go tear him apart!” Carcharocles shouted.

“Okay!” replied Natantes, who had already canceled Ancient Transformation.

They rode the current that Natantes had created, following Dopper into the Bottomless Deep.

“Natantes! Where do you think you’re going?!” Rahab shouted, seeing Natantes going elsewhere.

He was about to ride the current as well when forty-five red Wands appeared to surround him and shot flames at him.

“What the hell is this?!” he shouted.

They did not hurt him at all, but the intense heat evaporated the water, creating vapor that restricted his vision.

“Master Elementum! Can you do something similar to what Natantes just did?” Seong-Hwi asked.

“You ask too much of me,” Elementum responded, but she smiled as she extended her pale, thin finger.

A sphere rose above her head. Inside it was a vortex of phenomena such as fire, water, earth, wind, light, darkness, lightning, rainbow, and forest, as well as various emotions such as joy, sorrow, indolence, compassion, envy, rage, conviction, hope, and courage.

This star, resembling the Spirit Stone, was everything to Elementum. It was Aequalitas; in other words, it was her friends.

“Maybe not to that extent, but we were once a water spirit monarch,” Elementum said. The iridescent Aequalitas then filled only with blue water, and she asked, “What do you want me to do?”

“East! Please send him flying toward the east!” Seong-Hwi said.

“Why east?”

Seong-Hwi smiled wickedly under the Myriad Cheoyong Mask and replied, “I have some starving friends waiting for him.”

“You... wouldn’t joke about something like this. Understood.”

[Activating Race Skill: Ellaim’s Spout.]

Elementum drew out her mana, Spirit Force, and her unique caliber to activate the skill. Dozens of waterspouts surged like giant water dragons, all flying toward Rahab trapped inside the vapor.

“Kurghhh!” Rahab grunted, being dragged eastward.

***

“It’s begun,” Lapsus remarked as he stared at the two water currents. One was headed downward, while the other was headed eastward. “Survive. That way, my journey here wouldn’t have been for nothing.”

He recalled Ozenta’s words as he stared at Seong-Hwi, who was riding the current heading eastward.

“Cheon Seong-Hwi possesses our new and only hope.”

“Lapsus! Why would a lone wolf like you help those bastards?!” Vipera asked, flicking her tongue.

Lapsus stared at Vipera and replied, “I’m thinking of putting down my roots again.”

“What?”

“Do you think a dry seed can still bud?” Lapsus said incomprehensibly, smiling faintly. “Since I failed to lumber it, I might as well try sowing a new seed.”

“So... you mean to stand in my way, to the end. Do you seriously believe I am weaker than you just because of our ranks?” Vipera asked, her reptilian eyes shining ominously.

She was sixteenth in the world ranking, while Lapsus was thirteenth. They were three ranks apart.

“Of course not. I only believe in what I see,” Lapsus said as he smiled. “That’s why I am certain that you cannot defeat me.”

“THE INSOLENCE!” Vipera screamed.

[Activating Star Power: Cycle of Ouroboros.]

Vipera’s star, Ouroboros, began to rotate. The rotation of the snake, whose beginning and end were connected, endlessly amplified Vipera’s mana.

“Ohohohoho! Be engulfed by a wave of infinite mana and die!”

[Activating Race Skill: Sea of Snakes.]

A tsunami of trillions of snakes, made with Vipera’s infinite mana, moved to engulf Lapsus. However, Lapsus simply smiled as he stared at the overwhelming number of snakes.

“I was expecting something more than an imitation of Creo’s halo and Regnator’s Dragon Heart. Where’s your self-esteem, you reptilian bitch?”

Golden letters began to be written on Lapsus’s star, Zohar.

[Activating Star Power: Boker Tsahov (Golden Dawn).]

The Golden Dawn shining from Zohar illuminated the entire battlefield. Lapsus grabbed the old bow slung over his shoulder and drew the bowstring without an arrow nocked.

[Activating Unique Skill: Chets Maveth (Arrow of Death).]

A golden arrow was soon nocked on the bowstring, and Lapsus let the arrow loose without hesitation. The ordinary-looking golden arrow flew toward the center of the Sea of Snakes and dyed the entire area around them gold once it made contact.

A radiant sunlight engulfed and annihilated everything it touched without an explosion or impact. However, Vipera activated Sea of Snakes again, using her infinitely amplifying mana pool.

“I told you! It’s infinite!” she shouted.

This time, she surfed the Sea of Snakes, charging at Lapsus like a missile as she activated a skill.

[Activating Unique Skill: Lelek.]

A purple cobra, Lelek, slithered toward her hand and opened its mouth. A sharp, blue longsword sprouted from its mouth.

“DIE—!” Vipera screamed, flying toward Lapsus as she melded with the Sea of Snakes, using all her might so as not to give Lapsus even the time to draw his bowstring.

The sword sprouting from Lelek pierced Lapsus’s chest, and Vipera’s expression filled with joy.

“Ohohoho! I killed him!” she shouted.

Lelek was a snake with venom so powerful that not even Recorders could escape the history of intoxication that it had written. Vipera was certain that not even Lapsus would be free from its history. As she had expected, purple smoke rose from Lapsus’s pierced chest, and his pale skin with a golden sheen was also dyed purple.

“Ohohohoho!”

“How... simple,” Lapsus said.

“What?”

Vipera stared at Lapsus’s face. He did not seem in pain at all despite having his chest pierced by a longsword and venom spreading throughout his body. He was still smirking at her mockingly, basking in the light of Golden Dawn.

[Activating Unique Skill: Netzach Temura (Glorious Exchange).]

A blinding golden light flashed from Lapsus’s entire body, restoring his pierced chest and purple skin from the intoxication to normal. In exchange, a puncture wound formed on the giant tree that Lapsus had summoned, and purple smoke began to rise from the wound.

“All plants will happily sacrifice themselves to keep me shining,” Lapsus remarked, smiling flawlessly at the wide-eyed Vipera as he drew his bowstring. “That is why I was known as Hod—Sefirot’s eternal glory.”

He let the bowstring loose, and the Arrow of Death flew toward Vipera’s chest.

“Hence, I abandoned that name. Because it reeked of rotting fertilizer.”

“YOU BASTARD—!”

Ouroboros rotated rapidly like a halo, and a golden light engulfed the battlefield again.

Lapsus stared at the light, filled with infinite glory, and mumbled, “Now, I am but an error (Lapsus).”

***

[Activating Race Skill: Ellaim’s Spout.]

[Activating Race Skill: Ellaim’s Spout.]

[Activating Race Skill: Ellaim’s Spout.]

...

“You... sons of bitches!!!” shouted Rahab, a red storm raging in his eyes as the endlessly generating spouts pulled him away.

A crown with red gems embedded in it appeared in the sky. It was Crown of Pride, Rahab’s star. He also drew out enormous amounts of mana and Draconic Mana he had been born with, from his Dragon Heart.

[Activating Race Skill: Dragon Tongue.]

“Stop!” he shouted.

The spouts Elementum created lost their strength and dissipated.

“Damn you, creatures!” Rahab said, ripping apart the powerless spouts, as his reptilian eyes with vertical slit pupils flashed.

He glared at the two individuals before him. One was wearing a beautiful tiara of fine craftsmanship, and the other was wearing a sturdy-looking crown, seemingly made of pure gold.

“My, what a violent lizard,” Elementum remarked.

“It’s okay. We are in range,” Seong-Hwi said.

“Impertinent inferior races! How dare you look upon me with crowns over your heads?!” Rahab shouted, annoyed by their crowns. He raised his chin and shouted proudly, “Lower your heads now and move aside!”

He was still a teenager, so he sounded like a chūnibyō. However, he was more than worthy to say such things because he was a royal among royal dragons with the most almighty bloodline in the Mirror World. He was promised the most blinding success from the moment of his birth. He was Rahab, the proud Storm Dragon.

“I shall forgive your disrespect, so make way! I must kill Natantes!” he said, his eyes filled with pride as he mentioned the name of the man he respected the most. “That is the will of my almighty father, Dragon King Regnator!”

Seong-Hwi stared at Rahab with his deep, dark eyes. The dragon before him closely resembled the one who had destroyed his entire life, killed all his comrades, and granted him endless despair using the power of inevitable destiny.

“Dragon King... Regnator,” Seong-Hwi mumbled.

“Ahaha! That is correct. It is the name of the Almighty One who could exterminate your entire race in one day if he so wished!”

Seong-Hwi knew very well that Rahab was not exaggerating. The scenery of the burning Capital was still clear in his mind. Regnator was stronger as an individual than the entire human race. He was the monster who greatly influenced Seong-Hwi’s values. One could say that he was the reason Seong-Hwi was aiming to become one of the Ten Lords and Fiends and believed in the strength of one over many.

He recalled Regnator’s words as he looked up at him like an insect with its limbs severed.

“That is your rightful position as a mere worm. Make sure to remember it.”

That day, Seong-Hwi had made up his mind.

“If my limbs are gone, I’ll use my teeth. If my teeth are gone, I’ll use my gums. If my gums are mangled, I’ll curse you all to death.”

And this was the destiny he had borrowed to actualize his pledge to himself.

[Activating Unique Skill: Borrowing Destiny.]

[Siegfried the Dragon Slayer]

[Activating Unique Skill: Symbol Embodiment.]

[Holy Sword Gram]

A beautiful, silver greatsword over two meters long with a crossguard and a flawless fuller appeared in Seong-Hwi’s hands.

“Ohhhhh! This monster rivals Fafnir!” Siegfried shouted excitedly in Seong-Hwi’s head.

Seong-Hwi erected Gram and said, “He is but an appetizer.”

Just then, the surroundings darkened as if night had come. One would think the sun had set, but it was the millions of Underfish that had the three of them surrounded, rapidly approaching them.

“This is—” Rahab remarked in shock.

“Seong-Hwi?!” Elementum shouted, staring at Seong-Hwi in confusion.

Seong-Hwi, filled with a desire for vengeance, resentment, and ambition, shouted, “Today, I will devour a dragon’s heart!”