Climbing up turned out to be easier than I thought.
We seemed to cover about twenty meters with each jump, and after jumping roughly 200 times, we finally reached our target’s altitude.
> [For a mortal to…!]
A simple calculation determined that we were now approximately 4,000 meters in the air.
Considering that Mt. Everest’s summit was around 8,800 meters above sea level, this height alone wasn’t lethal.
“W-We finally made it…! I’ll expand our foothold now!”
> [You dare ascend to the skies with your petty tricks?!]
Of course, we were still dealing with strong winds, altitude sickness from lack of oxygen, and bone-chilling cold.
However, the Inquisitor could ward off most of it using Divine Power, while I just fitted my teeth and endured.
Altitude sickness was essentially just a problem with air pressure, so I thought wrapping myself in Arcane Power might act as a sort of shield. It seemed to be having some effect, at least.As for keeping warm, I managed to avoid completely freezing by taking the medicine the Archmage had given me.
“Wahaha! Finally, I get to see that overblown face up close!”
Bers… Honestly, I didn’t quite know what to make of her. Was she the literal definition of ‘Don’t worry! I bounced them off!’? No, was she even mortal to begin with?
T/N: This may be a reference to Azumanga Daioh
Air pressure aside, it was freezing up here, so how was she enduring it with just one layer of clothing?
Even though she took the same medicine as me, it was still a bit crazy. I wanted to shake my head at the sight of her defying the basic rules of the universe like that, but I kept myself from doing so.
Instead, I stepped onto the Divine platform that had expanded from approximately three square meters to several dozen.
Beneath the faint golden barrier, I could see the ground thousands of meters below us, but it just looked so surreal, as if it were CGI.
And right before us was a whale draped in clouds like silk robes.
Its white belly was like that of an ordinary whale, but its upper part looked to be made of waves filled with specks of sparkling light, making it seem like a starry night sky or the deep sea.
Had I not known it was a Great Demon, I would’ve mistaken it for a mythical being worshiped by many.
> [I’ll drop you back to the ground!]
Buooooh!
At that moment, Moby Dick cried out again. Its gaping maw, in stark contrast to its innocent appearance, was pitch black, as if it had bitten off a chunk of the void or something. It was the final proof that it was indeed an evil creature.
“It’s coming!”
Even now, the creature didn’t try to flee. Judging by its sluggish actions, perhaps due to its massive size or something else, it seemed escape had never been an option.
“Haha! Now that we’re on the same ground, there’s nothing holding me back!”
“I’ll create a few more footholds every meter or so, just in case!”
But there was no longer any need to block it by force.
Bers jumped to dodge the water-elemental beam crashing down on us as if intending to wipe away the entire horizontal plane.
Meanwhile, I grabbed the back of the Inquisitor’s neck with my left hand as she raised her shield.
Due to the thickness of the waterspout, the topmost barrier—which I was currently standing on—would definitely shatter. However, another platform was just one meter below us, with additional platforms two and three meters further down.
Crash!
I felt my body fall as the platform gave way beneath me.
As soon as my feet touched the second barrier, I deliberately stomped down to break it.
“Why…?”
My body fell even lower. By crouching down just a little, I could now avoid the stream of water altogether.
Boom!
“Wow…!”
I could feel the waterspout barely grazing over my head as I released my grip on the Inquisitor.
Since she wasn’t Bers, I trusted our kimchi dumpling wouldn’t get the stupid idea of raising her head in this situation.
As expected, the Inquisitor lived up to that trust, allowing us to dodge the attack with ease. This trick could only be performed in this world where, unlike most games, space wasn’t strictly confined.
Craaaash!
The stream fanning across the area finally passed over us. It was now our turn to deal damage.
As soon as I landed on another platform, I lunged forward, charging ahead. I could see that Bers had also avoided the waterspout and was now rushing toward the whale from the other side.
“Die.”
I swung my sword, careful not to strike the platform beneath me.
In games, you usually didn’t have to worry about destroying the platform you were standing on, even if you couldn’t use the trick of dodging by leaning backward. It was just a little annoying.
Slash!
Still, a hit was a hit. I felt satisfied when I saw what should have been a single slash mark on the enemy had multiplied into three.
It was thanks to the skill [Triple Claw Strike], which I hadn’t used much—mainly because it was usually unnecessary—but since this was a raid and raid bosses often had enormous HP pools, it was worth using.
Buoooooh!
Triple the attacks meant triple the damage! And Bers’s damage could also be added to that.
Moby Dick writhed and cried out. Water droplets quickly gathered in the air and instantly froze into ice before shooting out at us. Some didn’t turn into ice but instead took on the shape of serpents, homing in on me.
Clang, Claclang!
Because of that, I had to abandon my plan to try jumping onto the whale.
Instead, I shattered the ice shards flying toward me and disintegrated the water serpents giving chase.
Even throughout all this, the platforms beneath our feet grew increasingly solid, with multiple layers appearing below them thanks to the Inquisitor’s power.
Still, it wouldn’t be good if our footholds received any unnecessary damage.
After destroying all the incoming attacks, I swung my sword again. I tried to move in as close as possible, since the nearer I was, the less Arcane Power I needed to use, and the more powerful my strikes became.
Babam!
However, whenever the DPS and Tank got too close, the boss would often start attacking, so as we got closer, Moby Dick began thrashing around violently as if it was trying to crush us under its massive bulk.
The platform we were standing on, which had been accidentally hit—or perhaps deliberately, since we’d fall to our deaths if our footholds were destroyed—began to crack and seemed about to break, but the Inquisitor held on.
Bers and I did the same. We avoided Moby Dick's thrashing, continuing to slash at its white flesh and hack off its fins on either side.
Unfortunately, it showed no sign of falling. It seemed something other than its fins was keeping it afloat.
> [Mere mortals!]
By the way, how come all immortal bosses always have lines like ‘Mere mortals’, ‘How could a mere mortal?!’ or ‘How dare you mortals?!’
Ah, then again, considering my character setting made me look down on Demons and call them pathetic worms while arrogantly certain of my victory, perhaps I wasn't one to talk?
‘Pathetic, worthless trash.’
I cleared my mind of all distracting thoughts, stepped back, and then swung my sword just as the bastard paused.
I slashed upward. As I left a deep cut from its mouth to its eyes, the whale recoiled, its dark Demonic Energy briefly lingering before disappearing into the air.
* * *
> [This is as far as I let you go!]
But of course, being a Great Demon and all, even if it was going to die soon—not necessarily, I guess—it wasn't just going to let itself get hit. Instead, it showed off a new attack pattern.
Beneath its cover of clouds, the watery scales making up its body began to surge outward.
Craaaash!
A three-meter-tall wave crashed against the barriers of light, sweeping everything away in its path.
There was no room to dodge, no place to jump or run to. In most games, one usually dealt with this gimmick using invincibility frames or by hiding behind the tank.
“Uwargh!”
Bers, who’d been relentlessly slashing at the whale at the forefront while ignoring its patterns, was the first to get swept away.
“Idiot.”
In contrast, thanks to my gamer instincts, I avoided getting caught up in the wave, falling back as I watched the flow of its attack.
However, if I kept retreating like this, I would eventually land myself in a dead end. I furrowed my brows while heading backward, seeing no obvious escape route.
“Gather up!”
Fortunately, the solution came from the Inquisitor, who was behind me. At the sight of the raging waves, the kimchi dumpling formed a dome-shaped barrier to protect us.
I couldn’t tell whether she truly had enough leeway to do this, given that she’d created several layers of barriers to serve as our platform, or if she was straining herself just to provide us with a place to retreat.
But in the end, it didn’t matter. What mattered was that I now had a place to take cover behind.
I slid behind the Inquisitor’s shield, the waves following behind me like a tail.
Watching my HP keep dropping, I wasn’t entirely sure whether I’d actually entered the safe zone or was still getting attacked, but since standing here did hurt a bit less, I probably succeeded.
Crash!
As the waves collided with the barrier, something like steam began rising. Looking closely, one could see that the shield’s surface was continuously cracking and repairing itself.
The Inquisitor’s face grew evermore determined as she continued to pray.
Ruuuuumble.
“Stop acting like a fool.”
During all that, I could see that Bers was still alive, even after getting swept away.
I couldn’t help but be impressed as she managed to turn around, even while caught in the current, and head toward the hand I’d extended outside the barrier.
I immediately grabbed Bers by the collar and dragged her inside the temporary shelter.
“Phew! That was close!”
This wasn’t just a simple wave. The brief moment my hand was outside the barrier was enough to tear up my sleeve and leave a small cut on my skin. Bers fared no better, her skin pocked with tiny white and red wounds.
A mix of blood and water splattered onto the golden shield.
“Wahaha! I almost fell off!”
However, she was alive, and that was enough. The Inquisitor, who’d been kneeling and praying, surrounded by an intense light, smiled faintly.
She was maintaining both the barrier we were standing on and the protective dome around us. Was it because she was carrying all these burdens that we could continue fighting? Beads of sweat formed across her forehead, only to evaporate almost instantly.
> [Go!]
But even after the massive raging waves passed us by, we had no time to relax.
While the Inquisitor was repairing the barrier beneath us, which the Demon’s attacks had nearly shattered, and we prepared to close in on the whale again, Moby Dick made his next move.
Bubblebubblebubble.
The whale’s surface, which resembled the deep ocean, began to boil before spewing something out.
Things that seemed like both stars and shadows. Pure evil.
Grrrrr.
The white eyes I’d mistaken for stars began to glare at us fiercely.
“Hah, just a bunch of small fry!”
“I’ll never allow you to break through…!”
“Vermin.”
Ah, shit. A minion wave?
I tightened my grip on my sword as I watched monsters rise from behind the sky whale.
They all appeared to be based on some sort of marine life.
They were twisted versions of octopi, serpents, merfolk, crocodiles, crabs, seals, and other such creatures.
However, their nightmarish appearance wasn’t the only problem.
I watched as more and more monsters emerged, wondering whether this wave would have an end or would continue until the battle concluded.
If it were the former, I could simply wipe them all out once, but if it were the latter, I would have to fight while managing my Arcane Power and stamina even more carefully.
> [Kill them all!]
“Small fry are no fun! Get lost before I wipe you all out!”
However, I needed to wait a bit longer before deciding.
“…! They’re trying to break the footholds!”
What was clear, though, was that they had to be killed.
“You, can you hold them off?”
“…Yes!”
Those things seemed to be trying to break our platform, but the Inquisitor was confident she could hold out, so I decided to conserve my Arcane Power for now. There was no telling how this battle might change, after all.
So, instead of unleashing a [Slash] flurry to cleave those things, I chose to firmly grip my Zweihänder.
Then, I beheaded the serpent that lunged at me first, its blood spraying across my body as I stomped down on its now headless corpse and leaped over it.
I then twisted my body to avoid a merman swimming through the air.
Using the momentum from slashing the serpent's neck, I raised my legs and lowered my head, reducing my surface area to perfectly evade the merman’s spear.
Whoosh.
After dodging its attack, I landed behind the merman.
Promptly stomping down on the merman’s fish tail, I stabbed it in the back before it could fully turn around. I drove the long blade of my Zweihänder into its back, exiting through its chest.
Next, I poured some Arcane Power into the sword to increase its sharpness.
Instead of pulling out the blade, I simply cut through the merman’s flesh in a circular motion. The blade came out with a squelch, splattering flesh and blood everywhere, before slicing another monster about to attack me.
Crack!
A crab-like monster’s exoskeleton shattered, scattering its flesh and internal organs.
I wiped away some of the blood with the back of my hand and pulled out my sword before running forward again.
This time, an octopus-like monster stood in my way, swinging its eight appendages in all directions.
Predicting the attack paths of those eight legs was a bit tedious, so I activated [Survival Instinct] for the first time in a while to find the most efficient path through this chaos.
[Stinger]. With a swift, lance-like stab, combined with [Survival Instinct] to avoid its eight legs, I pierced the octopus’s forehead.
Before I could catch my breath, one of the massive crocodiles lunged at me. I quickly tossed aside my Zweihänder before stomping onto its lower jaw with my foot while grabbing the upper jaw with my hand. Then, I quickly drew my longsword and cut through the upper jaw horizontally, severing part of its snout.
Now missing a significant part of its maw, the crocodile instinctively tried to snap its jaws shut, its eyes immediately widening when it realized something was off.
Stab.
However, it was too late. My longsword had already pierced its brain and sent the monster flying in one smooth motion.
Kick!
Right after, I kicked my Zweihänder up into the air and caught it. I then tossed up my longsword, freeing my hand so I could grip the Zweihänder firmly and swing it horizontally.
The two merfolk charging at me from the front were bisected at the waist, dying instantly.
With my Zweihänder now pointing to the right and held solely in my right hand, I used my free hand to catch the falling longsword.
Slash.
A slightly diagonal horizontal slash from my longsword sliced through the neck of a serpent. Swish. After shaking off the blood with a flick, I returned the longsword to its sheath.
“Kahahaha, die, die!!”
Good. It seemed that side was pretty much cleared.
I felt slightly reassured seeing Bers getting even more kills than me.
As long as she kept rampaging like that, the monsters could never reach the Inquisitor. With her killing speed, those things wouldn’t last long enough to pose a threat to the Inquisitor.
So, now would be the best time to resume attacking the boss.
Recorrecting my grip on the Zweihänder, I stepped on the head of a merman that was stabbing its spear at me and leaped even higher into the air.
Thousands of meters in the air, my coattails, dusted with ice, fluttered in the cold wind.
And as my breath became white mist in the chill, I stood before the whale as it gathered water into its mouth, raising my Zweihänder high above my head.
My hair, covered in frost, brushed lightly over my eyes.
‘Kill him.’
Seemingly sensing an imminent threat, Moby Dick shot out water snakes at me, but it didn't matter.
My [Triple Claw Strike] disintegrated the snakes, and the straight blade unleashed a pillar of dark Arcane Power, roaring as it surged forward.
‘Tear that damned bastard to shreds.’
Booooooom!
Before Moby Dick’s gathered water-type Demonic Energy could shoot from its mouth, it collided with my Arcane Power, causing a massive explosion.
____
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