Climbing the Tower with Time-Stop Ability - Chapter 84
Chapter 84: Bug (2)
TL: DDTL
I summoned Plli and climbed onto his back.
Honestly, I was faster than Plli now, but I wanted to save whatever stamina I could before facing the boss.
“Let’s go, Plli.”
Time to find the boss that had appeared.
It was no different from Zone 3.
The plan was to start at the inner edge of Zone 4 and sweep clockwise in widening loops.
So I rode Plli, tearing across the snowfields, when…
Whoooooosh…
A faint sound reached my ears through the howling wind.
I lifted my head.
How to describe it… the sound of something enormous in flight?
I scanned the sky for the source, and then…
“…!”
I spotted it.
A massive shape on the far side of the sky.
What… was that?
A monster with several heads, like a hydra, was flying toward me at tremendous speed.
I’d never seen anything like that in Zone 4.
And it was overwhelmingly huge, even bigger than the Zone 3 boss Wyvern.
There was no way something like that was a regular monster, so it could only be one thing.
‘It’s the boss.’
…What is this, some kind of doorstep delivery service?
I hadn’t expected the boss to come to me first.
It cut down the search time, sure, but the problem was I hadn’t activated my Warp Device yet.
[9:59]
I quickly activated the pre-charged Warp Device.
The Zone 4 boss was almost on top of me.
My Sixth Sense confirmed what I already suspected: this was a strong enemy.
Though the feeling that I shouldn’t engage… wasn’t there.
Whoosh!
And then.
“…Huh?”
I thought it was coming for me.
But the boss just passed right by and shot off into the sky on the other side.
What the hell?
Where’s that thing going?
I went from tense to bewildered, watching the boss recede into the distance.
I gave chase anyway.
Riding Plli at full sprint, I pursued the flying boss.
I just barely kept it in sight, and after a while…
The boss landed.
I slowed down too.
I approached cautiously as the boss touched down in the middle of the frozen plain.
A beast with nine snake-like heads, its entire body formed of ice.
But something was off.
Unlike the Zone 3 boss, which had come at me the moment it spotted me, the Zone 4 boss showed no interest in me whatsoever.
Crash, crash, crash, crash!
Whether I came close or not, it just kept furiously digging at the icy ground with its forelimbs, like some kind of mole.
…What on earth was it doing?
[6:01]
I checked the timer on the Warp Device.
It still needed more time, so I watched the boss’s strange behavior for now.
Soon, having dug out a large pit, the boss laid itself down inside.
The way it looked, somehow…
It looked like a bird brooding over eggs in its nest.
The Warp Device had three minutes left.
Well… I should probably start fighting soon anyway, right?
I dismissed Plli.
And got closer to the boss.
Only then did the boss turn to look at me, letting out a savage roar.
Kyaaaaaaa!
Looks like it’s finally in the mood to fight.
I stopped time and thought it over.
I planned to open with Destruction Ray, of course, but…
‘…Where should I aim?’
Any creature’s most basic, obvious weak point is the head.
That’s why the Zone 3 boss had gone down clean when I blew its head off.
But this thing had nine heads.
I could probably overlap a few and hit them together, but blasting all nine at once was impossible.
…Should I just hit the center of its torso instead of the heads?
I debated which would be more lethal and settled on the torso.
After finishing Mental Concentration, I released time.
And fired a fully charged Destruction Ray.
A pitch-black beam punched clean through the center of the boss’s torso.
The destructive power of Destruction Ray made even an 80-level boss’s defense look like nothing.
But.
“…!”
The hole that had been punched through started freezing over and filling in almost instantly.
What the hell…
Does it have regeneration too? Like the Floor 3 boss?
Looked like the torso wasn’t the right answer after all.
The boss, having shrugged off Destruction Ray’s massive piercing wound, went on the counterattack.
One of its heads turned toward me and opened its mouth…
Sixth Sense sounded the alarm.
Roooaaaar!
A blue breath attack slammed into the spot where I’d been standing.
I’d already flung myself sideways to dodge.
Some kind of ice breath: the ground froze over, and a wave of chilling cold rolled all the way to where I’d landed.
The other heads tracked me as I moved.
Hold on. Pause.
I stopped time.
Let me think…
I’d confirmed that the Zone 4 boss had regeneration.
Even faster than the Floor 3 boss’s, in fact, near-instant.
‘Does this one have a core too?’
I’d punched through the center of its body and it had regenerated, so the core probably wasn’t there…
No, I couldn’t even assume there was a core to begin with.
But still, there had to be some kind of vital spot.
A monster that instantly regenerated from a Destruction Ray hit and had no weakness at all? That’d just be immortal. That can’t be how it works.
I came to a conclusion.
‘I should try the heads.’
There wasn’t really another answer.
If the heads regenerated too… I might have to just run.
I finished Mental Concentration and released time.
I cast Flame Strike. Balls of fire flew toward the boss’s heads.
Boom!
Explosions enveloped the boss’s heads.
I could see they’d taken damage, and…
‘…It’s not regenerating!’
I could see that the wounds on the heads weren’t healing.
So I did need to target the heads.
Just then, another head turned and opened its mouth toward me.
I flung myself aside again.
With Sixth Sense giving me a read on incoming attacks, dodging the breath wasn’t difficult.
Good. This is how I’ll play it.
I dodged the boss’s attacks while keeping my distance, firing off my magic skills as they came off cooldown. I activated Scorching Zone too.
The boss showed no sign of leaving the pit, just spitting breath attacks.
So I responded in kind. Of course, I dodged everything and the boss took everything.
I could deal more damage hitting up close, but there was no need to take the risk of melee.
I held Diul’s Pitch-Black Fog in reserve too, since its duration wasn’t long.
Circling the boss and pouring on the magic bombardment…
Crack!
One of the heads finally hit its limit and split off, falling away.
Kraaaaaaa!
Of course, the boss was still moving just fine.
I’d have to destroy all nine heads, I guessed.
At this rate, the rest would follow soon enough.
[0:09]
I cancelled the Warp Device with its timer expired.
I kept piling damage on the boss the same way, no need to push it.
Kaboom!
Another head went down to a Flame Strike.
When Destruction Ray came off cooldown, I fired it again and took out three heads at once.
The more heads I destroyed, the weaker its regeneration seemed to get; I could see the body beneath the heads slowly failing to recover from Scorching Zone’s damage.
Then I used Lightning Strike to destroy another head, leaving only three left.
That was when it happened.
Flap!
The boss suddenly heaved itself up and beat its wings.
A cold front blasted out around it and shoved me back a step.
The boss lifted itself slightly, as if about to take to the air.
Huh? This thing… is it trying to bolt?
‘Where do you think you’re going.’
Obviously, I couldn’t let it escape.
I used Leap to close on the boss.
And summoned Diul, immediately activating Pitch-Black Fog.
Hsssssss…
Darkness spread out in every direction.
Caught in the fog before it could rise into the sky, the boss staggered and crashed straight back down to the ground.
With all its senses cut off, there was no way it could fly.
Kyaaaaaaa!
The boss thrashed on the ground in a frenzy.
It fired breath attacks in every direction, wildly.
But attacks it couldn’t even land while sighted weren’t going to hit me with it blinded, so…
I closed in on the boss completely, inside the Pitch-Black Fog.
Activated Sword of Light.
Once the fog lifted, it would try to run again, so I needed to take all the heads before that.
Dodging the boss’s wild flailing, I focused fire on one head.
The remaining heads had already taken a lot of damage, so it came off quickly.
Another head, I detonated with a Flame Strike that had come off cooldown.
Thunk!
Then I closed on the last remaining head and drove the Sword of Light in.
“Off you go.”
Dispelling Pitch-Black Fog, I leaped back.
Kaboom!
The Sword of Light detonated, blowing away the boss’s final head.
[The Zone 4 boss has been defeated.]
[You have obtained the Zone 4 boss defeat reward.]
[You have obtained the Zone 4 boss first-clear reward.]
The messages popped up one after another.
“Phew.”
Clear successful.
That was a relatively smooth victory, I’d say?
Still, this boss had given me a proper fight.
Soon, the Zone 4 boss’s corpse vanished.
Maybe because the boss had been spraying breath attacks everywhere.
Feeling like the cold around me had grown noticeably sharper, I turned to head back.
“…”
That was when my eyes happened to drift toward the pit.
Come to think of it… why had this thing been digging a pit in the first place?
It hadn’t moved from that spot even while fighting. Well, except at the end, when it tried to run.
I walked closer to the pit.
I looked down inside it…
“…?”
Something was sparkling in the center of the pit.
An ice crystal? A gem? Something like that.
I climbed down into the pit.
Hmm… what is this?
‘A reward?’
Weren’t all boss rewards supposed to come in the Reward Room?
I carefully reached out toward the gem.
Sixth Sense didn’t raise any alarm, so I just picked it up.
[Item: Heart of the Frigid Demon King]
The heart of the Frigid Demon King, who froze the world.
The info appeared.
‘…It really is an item?’
The Heart of the Frigid Demon King?
But there was no description beyond that.
I tilted my head, examining the item…
[Item: Heart of the Frig#$■◇Demon^#◇▶%]
Suddenly the description glitched with noise and the font shattered into garbled characters.
W, what?
The moment I froze in confusion at the unprecedented phenomenon…
“…!”
A shudder of cold ran through me.
As if the chill was seeping into my mind itself…
The gem slipped from my hand.
My mouth, which I hadn’t opened, opened on its own and let out a wild laugh.
“Kuhahahahahaha!”
…Huh?
My body won’t respond.
Some other being was controlling my body. It felt like my own soul had been shoved to the back.
“Good, very good! Freedom at last!”
I swung my hand.
Kabooooom!
A massive wave of cold burst out, and the entire area froze solid.
What the hell is this…
I had no idea what was happening.
But I did know one thing.
Some weirdo had stolen my body.
‘Hey! Hey! What are you!’
When I shouted in my thoughts, the being spoke.
“Quit your chattering, Lesser Being.”
…Lesser Being? Me?
It clenched and unclenched my hand, muttering.
“A pathetic husk of a body, but I suppose this much will have to suffice. I shall put thy flesh to good use.”
What is this guy even talking about.
Boom!
It leaped high into the air and shot off across the sky.
Then it came to a dead stop.
Because I’d stopped time.
Ah, that still works.
I’d lost control of my body, but I could still stop time.
– …What? What is this?
A bewildered voice rang out inside my head. Sounded like some old geezer.
Oh?
I’d stopped time and this thing was still talking just fine.
Was it because it had entered my mind?
– You stopped time?
It seemed seriously rattled.
I spoke up too.
‘Give me back my body. What did you do?’
– Is this thy doing? What is it that thou hast done? (TL Note: I will be using archaic English in the translation wherever the demon king uses archaic Korean.)
‘Isn’t it obvious? I stopped time.’
– No, I mean, how on earth… what manner of nonsense is this?
The astonishment was running both ways here.
I’d cleared the boss just fine, and now what was this circus.
I spoke again.
‘Just give me my body back.’
– Do not jest. Thy flesh is mine now.
‘Says who? Give it back already.’
– It is thou who shouldst undo this at once!
Ha, who the hell is this asshole.
‘Then stay like this, see if I care.’
There was no way I was letting my body get stolen.
With time still stopped, I listened to the old geezer’s voice rattling on noisily.
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