The Game of a Legendary Genius Dark Mage - Chapter 74

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Episode 74
Episode 74
A scorching wave of heat swept through the chamber.
The crystal pillars surrounding me could not withstand the intense temperature and began to melt as they reached their critical point.
Every crystal pillar in the majestic and grand Raid Field suffered the same fate.
Half-melted crystalline liquid, brimming with searing heat, overflowed across the floor, and the relentless warmth refused to dissipate, slowly melting even the surrounding crystals.
Even the crystal walls succumbed to the heat and began to dissolve.
The right arm of the Ancient Royal Guardian Golem, positioned at the center of the explosion, had lost all function and melted away immobile, while my right leg and torso were equally damaged.
Yet compared to my arm, the situation was more manageable—my form remained intact.
My right arm, dripping like melted taffy, scattered thick crystalline liquid across the floor as I steadied my stance.
I had already known that an intruder had entered.
After all, intruders had come before, long ago.
They had fled at the mere sight of my form from a distance, so I assumed this one would be of the same ilk.
Yet time had passed and they never came.
But this time was different.
-To think they dared sneak into the Treasure Vault like a mere rat.
To launch a surprise attack from behind through the very Treasure Vault I had guarded so vigilantly.
It was unimaginable.
Being an Ancient Royal Guardian Golem created with the capacity for independent thought, I could only be astounded.
I had never anticipated such a possibility.
Would things have been different had I been more capable?
Perhaps if my body and functions had not grown worn and deteriorated over these endless ages?
Many regrets lingered.
Yet regret changes nothing—the water has already spilled.
If it cannot be gathered again.
-Then one must simply clean up the mess oneself.
Recalling that maxim my master had once taught me.
The Ancient Royal Guardian Golem, whose body was composed of crystal, blazed with brilliant white light in my eyes.
I had lost my right arm, but it mattered not.
My two sturdy legs and left arm remained.
The Ancient Royal Guardian Golem drew my exclusive weapon—a crystal longsword—and pointed it toward the Treasure Vault where the intruder lurked.
Just as the crystals throughout the Raid Field had melted, the Treasure Vault’s door was half-dissolved.
Toward that melted opening, I walked with measured steps.
The Ancient Royal Guardian Golem’s eyes blazed as I beheld the intruder emerging leisurely—Yoo Sung-hyun.
An intruder I could never forgive.
The sole blemish upon my existence.
I would erase that blemish from this world.
Whoosh! Whoooosh!
The Ancient Royal Guardian Golem is an ego golem that moves according to chivalry.
Yet I have no chivalry to display toward a being so petty and treacherous.
Yoo Sung-hyun was equally astonished, observing the Ancient Royal Guardian Golem—aside from its right arm—appeared remarkably intact.
‘That was supposed to be my ultimate strike.’
The most formidable collection of skills I could currently muster.
Yet it had absorbed the blow without sustaining a fatal wound, and hadn’t even progressed to phase two.
This was genuinely shocking.
Though not entirely without effect.
[Hidden Raid Boss ‘Crescent – Ancient Royal Guardian Golem’ has appeared.]
[The Hidden Raid will commence shortly.]
[You have delivered a devastating preemptive strike to Hidden Raid Boss ‘Crescent – Ancient Royal Guardian Golem’!]
[The raid against the Hidden Raid Boss ‘Crescent – Ancient Royal Guardian Golem’, which has sustained considerable damage, now begins.]
Considerable damage had been inflicted.
As the system suggested, the harm dealt was undeniably substantial.
The physical destruction alone allowed me to roughly estimate the magnitude of that damage.
‘At least twenty percent?’
Physical destruction effects only occur when a single strike deals over twenty percent of maximum health in damage.
Which meant Crescent had taken damage exceeding twenty percent from my attack.
This difference was certainly significant.
Yet it still appeared incomparably stronger than Anemor.
So this is what separates a Hidden Raid Boss from the rest.
Yoo Sung-hyun didn’t simply stand idle with that assessment.
Behind him, a colossal portal of teal light blossomed into existence.
From it, his legion advanced.
*Crash! Slash—!*
The sounds that rang out as they marched possessed an overwhelming pressure that even caused Crescent to adjust its grip on its sword.
At the vanguard stood Baltar, the blood-crimson knight, and Fiora, who inhabited the body of Spirit Barfur, with Anemor and Kalisha holding the rear positions.
Faced with a force numbering well over a hundred soldiers, Crescent calmly gripped its sword, pointed the blade toward the heavens, and drew its hand back to its chest.
*Crash!*
Each movement in the sequence was infused with precision, and the sword’s tip permitted not the slightest tremor, even in the briefest instant.
At that resolute display, Baltar threw back his head in laughter and muttered.
-Gahahaha! At last, a foe worthy of my steel has appeared!
Fiora, by contrast, regarded Baltar with considerable concern and remonstrated.
-P-please, we m-must fight together….
At Fiora’s words, Baltar appeared visibly displeased.
Yet he nodded, acquiescing to her words.
There was not a shred of falsehood in them.
-Hmph! I understand, Fiora. Should I fight alone now, defeat would be certain. I cannot bring shame upon our Lord!
Nothing—not pride, not desire—took precedence over the Lord.
Nothing whatsoever.
All must be burned for the Lord alone.
Even the soul itself.
Baltar burst forward first, his eyes blazing with fierce intensity.
As if responding to a prearranged signal, Fiora launched herself into action as well.
Crescent—Ancient Royal Guardian Golem blocked Baltar’s greatsword, which came slicing through space like folding the very air itself, its blade sheathed in crimson light. She twisted her wrist to deflect his strike.
Whoooosh——!
Baltar, his sword cutting through empty air, quickly pivoted to recover his blade.
Fiora seized the opening, exploiting Crescent’s twisted wrist. The arms that had once pierced through anything during the Anemor battle transformed into massive hammers, which she drove toward Crescent with devastating force.
The fist-shaped hammer shot forward in a straight line like a cannon blast, and Crescent felt a chill run through her. With her right arm unavailable, she raised her right leg instead, blocking Fiora’s fist with her shin.
Boom——!
A shockwave erupted, pushing Crescent back momentarily, but her stance remained upright.
Without falling, Crescent infused her crystal greatsword with light, gripped it firmly with her left hand, and swung it downward in a perfect vertical arc as if drawing a line from heaven to earth toward Fiora.
The overhead downward slash, empowered by the luminous crystal blade, achieved a speed that defied comprehension.
It was an attack from an angle and timing that seemed utterly inescapable.
Only Baltar possessed the strength to block this assault completely.
Yet Crescent observed that Baltar, as if he had already decided to sacrifice Fiora, was swinging his crimson-light-infused greatsword horizontally toward her instead.
She would take considerable damage, but that was acceptable.
Sacrifice the flesh to gain the bone.
As Crescent made this judgment and thrust her blade forward—
The light vanished from her crystal greatsword in an instant.
The attack, now devoid of light, passed uselessly through Fiora’s body and struck the floor.
Crash——!
Despite losing its luminescence, the blade’s sharpness remained, leaving a long gash across the crystal floor upon impact.
But that was not the concern.
Her skill had been canceled and dispelled.
Before she could even comprehend what had happened, a brilliant flash erupted from afar—a pure white flash of a slash hurtling toward her.
A flash-like slash that perfectly mirrored her own skill.
Screech——!
The sharp flash struck Crescent’s chest, and the slash shattered the crystal where it made contact, carving through it mercilessly.
A chilling sound echoed through the space.
Only then could Crescent perceive the cause of her blade’s lost light.
Yoo Sung-hyun, extending his hand toward her, activating some skill.
And she also detected the teal-colored spear hurtling toward her.
She could evade only one—either Baltar’s crimson-light-infused greatsword or that teal spear.
Crescent made her rapid judgment and dodged the teal spear, accepting Baltar’s attack instead.
Screech——!
Baltar’s slash, while not as devastating as the luminous flash, still carved a long wound into her.
Yet Crescent could sense it.
Had she been struck by that spear Yoo Sung-hyun had just hurled, the damage would have been far worse than this.
She couldn’t fully comprehend it, but that was her instinct.
And she quickly assessed the battlefield situation.
Initially, she had observed a force numbering nearly a hundred, but now that was no longer the case.
The soldiers remaining under Yoo Sung-hyun’s command were Fiora and Baltar, two identical-looking Kalisha and Anemor, and Spirit Barfur—five in total.
Yoo Sung-hyun judged that having more would only waste mana without meaningful benefit, so he sent the rest back to the Underworld.
This opponent was no pushover.
I had dismissed them as crude and contemptible.
Yet they were an enemy who clearly understood strategy and tactics, displaying exceptional skill as well.
Crescent, unlike before, acknowledged Yoo Sung-hyun and exhaled with eyes gleaming with light.
-Whoooosh.
Then scorching steam erupted from every corner of Crescent’s body, as if draining away all its heat.
Shhhhhhh!
As that heat gradually subsided.
Crystals floated up one by one around Crescent’s body, and I could feel its footsteps had become noticeably lighter than before.
Crescent, sword gripped in its left hand, moved and kicked off the ground.
That scorching heat erupted from the soles of its feet, and with the recoil from the kick combined with the propulsive force of the heat, it achieved tremendous acceleration and charged first toward Baltar.
Whoooosh!
It had definitely become faster.
No, calling it merely “faster” hardly does it justice.
As Crescent rushed at Baltar like it was flying, Baltar raised his sword to block.
But what struck first was not Crescent’s sword.
Crescent’s long, sleek right leg drove precisely into Baltar’s abdomen.
Thud——!
The moment the leg struck his abdomen, using the recoil from raising the sword and the repulsive force of being pushed back from the kick, Crescent spun rapidly through the air and unleashed a blood-red sword aura infused with that rotational force.
Boom——!
A sound erupted from his abdomen as he flew toward the wall and crashed into it.
The blood-red sword aura came flying clearly and was about to strike Crescent just the same when Crescent’s sword moved to parry the blood-red aura.
Truly a terrifyingly powerful creature.
Yet as Crescent parried that blood-red sword aura, it reacted upon seeing the massive fist-shaped body of the spirit entity.
The sword strike was already blocking the blood-red aura.
The right leg had just struck Baltar hard, leaving its stance unstable.
Only the left leg remained, but since it served as the pivot, it could not be withdrawn carelessly.
An observer might have thought Crescent would be crushed by that giant fist.
But before the massive hammer fist could strike, Crescent had already completely collapsed its unstable stance and fired brilliant light from its own two eyes.
Fwooosh——!
The flash fired from both eyes left the unstable stance completely shattered, on the verge of falling, but that was fine.
An eerie flash came flying and struck the spirit entity’s chest hard, and like Baltar, it too flew toward the distant wall and crashed into it.
Crash——!
With Fiora dealt with, the remaining creatures weren’t even worth engaging.
The moment Crescent made that judgment.
An ominous presence was felt from behind.
Wondering if it was Yoo Sung-hyun again, I turned my head only to see Fiora there, having transformed both arms into massive axes.
What about the spirit entity that just flew away?
Crescent sensed something amiss and recalled it.
It was Spirit Barphor, wearing Fiora’s body.
The moment my mind went blank with shock.
Fiora’s attack swung down to tear open his chest.
The axe arm appeared to move slowly, as if time itself had decelerated.
The sudden form transformation meant he couldn’t keep pace with his original speed.
Yet no matter how slow it was, my stance had completely fallen apart.
I couldn’t block or evade.
I had no choice but to expose my chest to the blow.
Crash!
With a violent impact, another long wound carved across my chest.
Still, I could endure this much.
I rose from where I’d fallen and assessed who was pressing the attack.
Baltar emerged from the wall he’d been embedded in, spitting blood, and Spirit Barphor did the same.
Anemor and Kalisha circled overhead, and whenever they found an opening, they hurled ash clouds with scorching heat—an infuriating nuisance.
Yet in that moment, I sensed something strange.
—…?
Spirit Barphor, Baltar, and even Fiora were all at considerable distance from me.
I grasped it quickly.
The one I’d forgotten.
The instant I looked toward Yoo Sung-hyun.
The world erupted in crimson.
Whoooooosh——!
[Hidden Raid Boss 『Crescent – Ancient Royal Guardian Golem』 is transforming.]
[Hidden Raid Boss 『Crescent – Ancient Royal Guardian Golem』 is entering Phase 2.]
*Warning*
-Upon entering Phase 2, the Raid Boss becomes far more powerful.
-Exercise caution.
Phase 2 had finally begun.
As the crimson tempest dissipated, a teal-blue spear materialized and plunged deep into my chest.
[Dark damage is applied.]
[The target partially resists.]
[For 3 seconds, all sight and senses are compromised.]

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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