ReLife Player

[Flowering Night (11)]

Help me.

Save me.

Save me, please.

It was hell, that place.

A horror that burned through the world like it would consume anything.

Crumbling ground, collapsing bridges.

The sky was filled with soaring flames and smoke, and monsters emerged from the raging inferno.

The creature glowed with an inner light in the searing heat.

Its eyes were glowing in the heat, and it was glaring at him, a gaze that made him feel the fear of death just by looking at it.

‘My g-god, shouldn’t we get off too?’

‘…Let’s get out, too.’

He could hear his parents’ voices in the driver’s and passenger’s seats, but he couldn’t look away from it.

My body wouldn’t listen.

From head to toe, my body was stiff with fear, and there were no tears in my eyes.

‘Eunha, Euna, let’s get out of here.’

‘It’s okay, Daddy will chase those bastards away….don’t worry…’

Then, my vision reversed.

It happened so fast.

‘That’ in front of me had just struck the leg that had been pulled out from under the water like a whip.

The ground collapsed.

The water rose greedily to swallow the falling debris, and my vision spun out of focus.

The world was now a bubbling mess.

Looking up from the water, where all I could hear was the cries of people and the screams of their families, the world was fucking beautiful.

A symphony of flaming water, bubbling bubbles, and human screams.

And in the midst of the music I didn’t want to hear, there was a ding, ding, ding, ding-.

‘It’s okay, Eunha.’

‘I’ll protect you.’

The world faded to white.

When I woke up, I was floating down the river.

No one was there.

Not my father.

Not my mother.

Not even my sister.

…Lies. It’s a lie.

A reality he didn’t want to admit.

Looming over his fading consciousness was the kraken that had taken everything from him.

A wall he couldn’t cross even if he wanted to, a traumatizing reminder of the horror─.

«─Don’t be ridiculous.»

An unfamiliar yet familiar sensation jolted him awake.

An arm lifted from the water,

«You think you can break me?»

I slammed it down toward it.

Uki-e-e-ee-eeekkk!!

☆

A sixth-tier monster, the Stygian Gloom.

This monster’s fear lies in its ability to blend into the darkness, making it difficult to recognize.

It can control its own size at will. It shrinks when it’s being attacked and inflates when it’s attacking.

So when you try to attack its body, you sometimes don’t know what you’re fighting.

It’s like you’re fighting a formless terror.

It gets bigger when you’re scared, and smaller when you’re not.

The only thing that makes it recognizable is its eyes, which are as big and round as the full moon.

The way to attack the creature was to attack its eyes, which could identify its presence in the dark.

The problem is, the moment you look into its eyes, you’re faced with your own fear.

«No, no, no, no, no, no. It’s wrong, p-please, I- I’ve paid you back, what more do you want me to do, please, open the door, I don’t want to be here, I’m scared, please, please, please open the door. I messed up, I messed u-up, I’m scared, please don’t come, I’ll pay it all back with interest, please, please, please, PLEASE, open the door!»

«No! Never! Don’t come. Don’t fucking come! I didn’t kill him, why do you keep fucking with me!»

«…This can’t be happening, this can’t be happening, why am I the only one who has to suffer this, why, why my family!»

«H-hyung. Get a grip on yourself. I brought you a potion, why can’t you drink it, drink it. D-do you want to die? No, no, no, no, you can’t die. I was just kidding, so don’t d-die. Please, p-please, don’t leave me alone. Without my hyung…, how w-will I live?»

This way.

Even if you increase your mana resistance, you can’t look him in the eye and fight him, and at some point, fear will take over.

Whooosh.

The wind blew.

It rustled the bushes, and a yellow eye flashed overhead.

It was almost dangerous.

The moment the creature opened its eyes in the darkness, Eunha sprinted away.

I don’t know how much time passed.

When the creature first appeared, one of the masked players was unable to resist its mana and found himself staring into its eyes.

The rest of the party scrambled to keep it at bay, but one by one, everyone but Eunha was overcome with fear.

He, too, was caught up in its visions as he drained his mana.

«Don’t think you’ll die peacefully.»

One-point breakthrough.

With a wall walk, I kicked a wooden beam and climbed up, my rapier clutched in both hands.

The wind swirled around the tip of the blade, turning it into a giant drill and enveloping him.

He stomped his foot. Leaping diagonally, he stabbed the rapier into the air.

The tip shattered the creature’s barrier.

For a moment, the big eyes fluttered open.

«Tsk.»

He felt a rush of air from above his head.

Breaking the spell, he closed his barrier, twisted, and spun in the opposite direction.

Madness.

He scattered the remaining mana in his rapier toward whatever was attacking from above.

The slender stinger did little damage.

Eunha fell with the barrier intact.

He couldn’t nullify all of the impact.

Rolling on the ground, he lifted his head.

The position of the eyes had shifted.

When he met the yellow eyes, he furrowed his brows.

For a moment, his body trembled.

He almost lost consciousness.

If only the nameless gift hadn’t triggered.

«…Annoying.»

Sixth-tier monsters are not something that can be hunted alone.

The Stygian Gloom, in particular, was a monster that posed a threat comparable to a 5th-tier monster in environments without light.

Before the regression, he was not a child, and it was not a monster he could defeat alone.

But he had no choice.

The members of the hastily assembled party were still in a state of terror.

Waking them up would be simple, but there was no point in doing so only to lose them again at the sight of the creature.

Except for one.

«Hey. Wake up.»

Eunha nudged Oh Yeon-jung, who was having a nightmare about being tormented by a corpse dealer.

Mana flowed through her.

The body reflexively rejects mana that is not its own.

In order to break the spell of the Stygian Gloom, I had to disrupt its mana by infusing it with someone else’s mana.

If done incorrectly, it could cause a mana explosion.

«…Uh, uh, what? This is….»

«When you wake up, buff me, take your friends and hide somewhere.»

«What?»

«Do I need to say it one more time?»

«Uh, no.»

Waking up from her nightmare, Oh Yeon-jung quickly assessed the situation.

The only way to survive this situation was to cooperate with him.

She gave him the buffs she could, then turned her back on him and fled.

She had no regard for her teammates.

Eunha didn’t mind her fleeing without hesitation.

She’d be back anyway.

«Hey, what the hell!»

She was stuck fighting a Stygian Gloom.

It was not too late for the monsters that would have stormed the Dawn Hotel, even if it had been possessed by Oh Yeon-Jung’s mana.

Though it did make things more difficult.

It was hard enough to deal with a single Stygian Gloom.

I didn’t have enough hands to deal with the other monsters.

Not to mention mana.

Ever since he’d awakened from his nightmare, he’d been manifesting the power of his nameless gift, and he fretted inwardly when he saw how little mana he had left.

He didn’t show it outwardly.

He couldn’t afford to appear anxious to the creature that fueled his fear.

If he showed it, it would be consumed by fear.

Even if he had an unnamed gift, he had to think of the worst-case scenario where the power of the gift would not work.

«I don’t know how well it will work, but….»

There was a way out of the situation, though.

Eunha threw away the gun, which had run out of bullets, and dug through his handbag.

Jung Seok-hoon’s potions had been used a long time ago.

The rest of the potions were inferior. They were ineffective, but he had to recover his mana with them.

Still, I had to save one.

I had to save one to defeat him and escape from the mountain.

Skill No. 001: Violent Venom.

Mana tainted black with poison colored his rapier.

Leaping from the ground, he created a foothold, just as Euna created a foothold in the air.

His imagination was weak.

The support wavered.

It didn’t matter. He jumped up before the support disappeared, kicked off a wooden pillar, created another support, and swung his rapier at the creature.

Done.

Violent Venom worked.

The unstoppable trickle of blood to the floor proved it.

Its full-moon eyes narrowed in agony.

It closed its eyes, and darkness fell.

I deployed my mana sensors.

I could locate it, but I couldn’t pick up the shrunken creature.

No need to worry.

He would have to open his eyes to attack.

And when he meets its eyes, he wouldn’t be consumed by fear.

Kikiiiikkikicikcikic-

The creature opened its eyes.

Eunha shifted quickly.

It couldn’t resist the magic the Lizard King had left behind.

The problem was, the toxicity was weak.

Even if he left it as it was, the poison would eventually spread throughout its body and lead to its death. However, he had to ensure its death before he exhausted his strength.

He had to push through.

No, would push through.

Blackening his sword once more, he charged forward.

He unleashed his mana. He concentrated, trying to squeeze every ounce of efficiency out of his remaining mana.

The black light, the paradoxical power of magic.

The mana in his body was nearly depleted.

Squeezing every ounce of power he could out of his body, he blasted away the monsters charging at him from the flanks.

Mana splashed from his blade, engulfing the monsters.

The monsters vomited blood, and the monsters covered in it ran out of breath, setting off a chain reaction of poisoning.

Eunha ran in a straight line across the battlefield as the monsters ran out of breath.

He pulled his rapier hand back as far as it would go.

Celestial Step Technique.

One-point breakthrough.

«Ugh…!»

His body lunged forward, his mind barely keeping up with the situation.

His body and mind were disconnected.

With his internal mana running low, his magic was incomplete.

He gritted his teeth.

There wasn’t much time left.

Just then, the creature changed its gaze and fled.

It hit the brakes on the way.

His ankle twisted for a moment.

It didn’t break, but when he changed direction, pain surged through it, as if the ligaments had stretched.

Celestial Step Technique. Celestial Step Technique.

One-point breakthrough.

He withdrew the mana stored in his rapier.

Naturally, the power of the magic he had imbued in the rapier weakened.

Jumping onto a tree branch, he fell towards the fleeing creature with narrowed eyes.

«You’re quite annoying, you know.»

Violent Venom

The creature screamed.

The toxicity drawn out with the remaining mana penetrated its body.

Blood gushed from the wounded area, and the creature reversed the blood it had shed.

The moment it reversed the blood, everything came to an end.

All that remained was a chain that spelled out death for the creature.

☆

It was over.

Covered in the reversed blood of the creature, Eunha finally caught his breath.

He looked around and saw that the monsters were all dead.

This was the result of the Violent Venom.

Not a single monster had survived.

«…These guys are dead too.»

Eunha frowned at the players on the ground.

Unable to escape Stygian Gloom’s spell, they had fallen victim to the Violent Venom.

«I needed these guys to help me figure out their location….»

Luckily, I had the approximate location stored in my head.

At the end of this path, beyond the valley, the monsters should be moving.

If I recover my mana and deploy my sensors, I should be able to get a sense of the flow.

«All I need is Oh Yeon-jung….»

Eunha confirmed that Oh Yeon-jung was alive and well. An A-grade supporter would have been able to deploy a barrier to protect only herself.

But as it turned out, Oh Yeon jeong was hiding in the nearby bushes.

«Did you think you could escape?»

«Behind, behind!»

Eunha sneered.

But then she shook her head, trembling with fear. Raising a finger, she pointed over his shoulder.

He felt a little uneasy.

He glanced back.

«…….»

Keiiiieeeeeeeeeeee

A giant monkey, covered in blood.

Stepping out of the trees, the Stygian Gloom was reaching for him.

It wasn’t dead yet?

It didn’t make sense.

It couldn’t be alive, covered in poison.

He made a grunting sound and stared at the creature as it approached.

There was no focus in its eyes.

It was already dead.

Only the single-minded determination to kill him was moving its body.

The poison had consumed its entire body.

All that remained was the mana that made up its organization scattering and disappearing.

Bastard.

There was no time to drink the potion.

His physical abilities had deteriorated rapidly since the Gift had been removed, and he lacked the mana to use magic.

I couldn’t even run. Even if he tried to run with what little strength he had left, he knew he’d be crushed by the wrist reaching for him.

…Shit.

The body corrupted by Violent Venom shuddered violently.

It didn’t stop there.

For some reason, the structure broke down into small pieces, forming a wave that began to wash over him.

No. If he were swept away here…

Monsters are coming up from the bottom of the mountain.

If he were swept away by the wave, he would flow down below the mountain and be surrounded by monsters.

I had to hold on somehow.

«…Oh Yeon-jung!!!»

Eunha called to Oh Yeon-jung, who was at his back.

If she deployed the barrier, the waves could be blocked.

«─Good.»

When he looked back, she had already deployed a barrier around herself.

From within the barrier, she smiled broadly.

─Here it comes!

Without any other choice, he clenched his teeth.

He quickly raised one hand to cover his head and tried to use the remaining mana to create a barrier somehow.

The mana that flowed out of his body scattered into the air before he could form the barrier.

He was out of mana.

He hastily searched his handbag.

I had to find a mana restoration potion.

Come out, come out!

Bodies raining down overhead.

A sea of blood splashing before his eyes.

The stench was right there, and the blood level was rising up to his head.

Where is it!

Finally, the wave swallowed the area.

Eunha gritted his teeth to prepare for the impact.

His vision flashed white.

☆

«─Eh?»

Time passed, but the shock didn’t come.

When he was swept away by the wave and instinctively closed his eyes, Eunha slowly opened them.

«…What is this?»

A protective spell unfolded around him.

Flower petals that had blossomed in the darkness, taking on the form of trumpet flowers, were protecting him.

As the wave made up of the remains of monsters turned into mana and disappeared, the flower petals in the air lost their luster and became faint.

In the place where the flower petals had vanished, a white handkerchief fluttered.