Chapter 85: Bird with Rabbits vs. Chorus Skull
[NPC Name: Bilac] [LV: 98] [JOB: Master Craftsman] [SJOB: Archaeologist] [Vorpal Bunny Master Smith]
[HP (Health): 175] [MP (Magic): 530] [STM (Stamina): 120] [STR (Strength): 130] [DEX (Dexterity): 120] [AGI (Agility): 30] [TEC (Technique): 130] [VIT (Vitality): 169] [LUC (Luck): 130]
[Skills] [· Best Step] [· Quake Stamp] [· Gigaton Swing] [· Titan Blast] [· Fortress Breaker] [· Material Destroy] [· Critical Focus] [· Analyze: Legacy Lv.4]
[Magic] [· Damage Repair Lv.MAX] [· Break Repair Lv.8] [· Quick Forge Lv.4] [· Stack Grind Lv.7] [· Drain Enhance Lv.7] [· Breakerize Lv.1] [· Forgerize Lv.MAX] [· Strengthrise Lv.MAX] [· Evolverize Lv.8] [· Fusionize Lv.6] [· True-Rise Lv.4] [· Random Encounter Lv.3] [· Enchant: High Robust] [· Miracle Mining] [· Legacy Sense Lv.3]
[Equipment] [Weapon: Ogre King's War Hammer: Sledge Ouga] [Head: Flame-Seeing Wrapped Cloth] [Body: Rabbit-Style Smithing Garb] [Waist: Rabbit-Style Smithing Garb] [Feet: Rabbit-Style Smithing Garb] [Accessory: Flame Spirit Gloves: Ifrit Gloves]
Sunraku: "Damn, she's strong."
After we'd taken down the remaining headless horse, I pulled up Bilac's stats — and, well... this feeling is giving me intense déjà vu. If I try to remember it any harder, something's going to burst out of the ground at my feet... ugh, my head.
Bilac: "I got this strength from hammerin' iron, not real fightin'. I'm way behind ya on combat experience."
Sunraku: "I'm realizing all over again that just one smack to the head from you could snap either my neck or Emul's."
Bilac: "Just what d'ya take me for?!"
I exchanged a look with Emul — wordlessly, we both arrived at the same thought, then turned back toward Bilac in unison.
Sunraku: "Some things are better left unsaid..."
Emul: "...As they say...wa."
Bilac: "Emul... yer startin' to act like him."
Emul: "H-HWAAAH?!"
Emul looked absolutely horrified, but I have no idea what Bilac — or Emul, for that matter — actually meant by that. Eh, whatever. Worrying about this kind of thing is just a waste of playtime.
Sunraku: "Anyway, let's collect the Dullahan materials and... honestly, let's just get to the boss already."
If we drag our feet here, it's going to take even longer. By which I mean, I'm going to keep getting sidetracked.
[· General Dullahan's Decapitator] [A longsword wielded by the General Dullahan, one that must once have possessed great power. Now rotted away, it can do nothing but sever flesh by brute force alone.] [Attacks against a target's neck receive a damage modifier.] [The skeleton forgot its memories, its pride, even its love, and lost even its own head. That is why the abandoned body now seeks not only the heads of the living, but even those of the dead.]
Sunraku: "Talk about taking it out on everyone else."
So basically: "I lost my head, so now you all lose yours too," right? That's straight-up misplaced rage. Although... if he was wandering around decapitating fellow undead, you could argue his kill score was actually helping out the player base. At the end of the day, the edge looks pretty dull anyway — I'll probably just sell it off eventually.
Just as I was about to shove this thing — which honestly looked less like a sword and more like a vaguely-sword-shaped piece of rust and dried-blood-caked scrap metal — into my inventory, Bilac stopped me.
Bilac: "Oi, lemme see that a sec?"
Sunraku: "Hm? Here."
I handed the General Dullahan's Decapitator over. Bilac examined the sword with intense scrutiny, gave it two or three swings, then nodded as if everything had clicked into place. She raised the rusted, decayed blade high.
Bilac: "I knew it. This sword ain't dead yet. Lend it to me later — I'll bring back its true form."
Sunraku: "Huh."
I probably won't use it, but once you hear something has a "true form," you can't help wanting to see it. That's just how gamers are wired. Let's rush through this area and get a look at that so-called true form.
Sunraku: "Still, compared to the other areas so far, this map is incredibly simple."
Emul: "All things considered, you just need to head straight forward...wa."
Rather than crossing a canyon from cliff to cliff, this map has you travel lengthwise through a canyon that cuts between the cliffs; the shortest route is simply straight ahead. Normally, miasma and undead would block your path while you struggled through status effects and debuffs, but... I'm basically a human air purifier who also repels the weak. At this point, it feels like nothing more than a leisurely stroll.
Sunraku: "Seriously, though, you two could at least walk a little on your own..."
Emul: "Walking is a bother...wa."
Bilac: "Stayin' stuck to ya saves on holy water. Just accept it."
Well, we don't know how much holy water the area boss will burn through, so the reasoning is sound, but... a half-naked bird-head with a white rabbit on his head giving a black rabbit a piggyback ride, advancing through a corpse-and-miasma-choked canyon — what kind of visual is that? It feels like it's straying from the fantasy I had in mind... but on the other hand, from the perspective of "something you could never experience in real life," maybe it passes as fantasy after all?
Sunraku: "Hmm... a god-tier game is as deep as a secluded mountain valley..."
God-tier games, trash games, no — what even is a game...? As I pondered these philosophical time-wasters, I suddenly realized we'd arrived at an open space wrapped in a dome-shaped black fog.
Sunraku: "Well, that's probably the area boss."
I touched it lightly — there wasn't any previous party inside blocking the way or anything. Apparently, this is just how it is by default.
Emul: "We go through this...wa?"
Bilac: "We're countin' on ya, bird person."
Sunraku: "Is that just my default name now...? All right, let's go."
I switched my weapons to Togetsu — Moonblades: Waxing & Waning and stepped into the haze. For several seconds, I felt a discomfort like being wrapped in smoke, but once I pushed through the black miasma that licked at my skin, the final gatekeeper of the Canyon of the Ancient Souls — the area boss — revealed itself at the center.
A black skull — not carbonized, not coated in paint, but something closer to having been stained dark by something seeping out from within. From it extended a similarly pitch-black spinal column and a few ribs, along with a grotesquely oversized right arm — only its bones remained, while a murky miasma cloaked its missing parts like a robe. In its right hand, it gripped a staff of truly terrible taste: a spine that clearly wasn't human, decorated with human jawbones arranged like flower petals.
Sunraku: "Now there's a skeleton freak that certain types would absolutely love."
Bilac: "Be careful now. That's a Humming Lich... It feeds on the grudges and deaths around here to make the miasma spreadin' through this whole canyon!"
Emul: "Eeeek, I don't wanna get anywhere near it...wa!"
Hahaha. At the very least, this is a game that didn't get slapped with an R-18G rating. If I just write it off as a tacky skeleton with bad taste, it's not scary. Not scary at all. I mean, we live in an age where genuinely gory games with hardcore splatter that bar minors can get banned thirty percent of the time. A tacky skeleton monster like this? Piece of cake.
Bilac: "If yer gonna fight it, don't forget to add holy attribute. Plain physical attacks won't work on that thing."
Sunraku: "...Wait. It's immune to physical attacks?"
Emul and Bilac apparently understood both what I'd just said and what it implied—that I had no way to imbue a holy attribute—because they froze in shock too. The Humming Lich did not let that opening pass; it blasted a torrent of miasma straight into my defenseless back.
Sunraku: "Whoa, what the—?!"
I wheeled around, cursing my own carelessness at the sensation of something roughly brushing my spine like a coarse broom. The expressionless black skull's jaw had dropped open so wide it looked ready to clatter right off. A hypothesis suddenly flickered through my mind, and I pulled up my status screen. Yeah, a little HP shaved off, but no status effects.
Sunraku: "Ah... so basically..."
I have no way to attack the Humming Lich. And meanwhile — given the overwhelmingly pure-magic-job aura this thing is radiating — its miasma-based curse can't affect me because I already bear the "Marking" curse. A strange stalemate. What you'd call an endless deadlock... but that only applies if I were trying to solo this.
Sunraku: "Heh heh heh... Emul, looks like it's time for the Rabbit Gun [Palm Turret] to make another appearance."
Emul: "AGAIN...wa?!"
That said, the "Marking" curse only nullifies buffs and debuffs aimed at me — ordinary offensive magic and curses still deal damage. And with my VIT having regressed from cardboard box right back to toilet paper, a direct hit — even with the HP I've stockpiled — would be like throwing a cup of water on a blazing fire. Death would be unavoidable.
Like a character in an event scene who somehow weaves through a hail of bullets without a scratch, I dodged the Humming Lich's attacks through sheer manual effort while lining up the timing to shove the Rabbit Gun — that is, Emul — at the tacky skeleton.
Sunraku: "Right now, you're a single-shot revolver! Hahaha, BANG!"
Emul: "Pyaaah, I have no idea what that means...wa! Magic Edge!"
I slipped through the gaps in the miasma, closing in on the Humming Lich, and a blade of magical energy fired from Emul — thrust forward in my grip. It wasn't massive damage, but it was definitely hurting it; the Humming Lich visibly recoiled from Emul's attack. I tried slashing at it a few times during those openings, but sure enough, even the bone parts were immune to physical attacks. I stowed Togetsu [Waxing]—which phased right through—into my inventory and decided to focus purely on Emul's attacks.
Sunraku: "Bilac! How's the progress?!"
Bilac: "Aaargh! Ya think it's that easy?!"
I called out to her, and Bilac — chugging yet another holy water — shouted back, already half-furious. In her hands was the General Dullahan's Decapitator, the sword I'd thought I'd never use, and she was working her magic on it.
The reason being: when the AI apparently decided to show us some mercy after the complete lack of effective attacks, Bilac had proposed this:
Bilac: "It's a slapdash job, but I'll forge a weapon right here that can hurt the Humming Lich."
Trusting Bilac's words when she asked me to hand over the General Dullahan's Decapitator, I'd been running an aggro-gathering decoy play — I'd lost count of how many times now.
Sunraku: "Miasma attacks come in three types: torrent, orb, and encirclement. Plus dark hands that burst out of the ground, adds, a staff bash... Movement options include short-range teleport and swapping places with a miasma clone..."
Emul: "Pyaaah, we're surrounded...wa!!"
Sunraku: "Compared to Ash Blizzard, this is very easy...!"
I activated Moon Jumper and leaped over the miasma closing in to crush me and Emul, then danced back a few steps while mentally cataloging all the motion data I'd collected.
Sunraku: "Overall, a downgraded Wethermon — but that instant teleport is a pain. Is it random? Or does it follow some positional rule?"
Unlike Wethermon, where you'd die if you didn't move almost entirely on reflex, the Humming Lich's overall motions were slow, making them easy to handle. But this isn't an endurance fight — it's an extermination fight. Running away alone means slowly losing. And that occasional teleport and clone-swap is honestly pretty tricky. Are the warp coordinates random, or is there some kind of pattern? I need to test this. I'll need to whittle down its HP with Emul while provoking more teleports.
Bilac: "Done!"
Bilac's triumphant shout and the Humming Lich making some kind of suspicious move happened almost at the exact same moment.
[Now that is what you call “leave your head behind”... just kidding.]
[Blacksmithing magic is actually very useful, so quite a few players have learned it. However, its effectiveness differs between players who take a smithing job as their main job and players who only take it as a sub-job.]