Chapter 237: Episode 75. The Hell Lord (2)
The Soul Cavalry did not fight full-fledged battles with the enemies. They were overwhelmingly outnumbered, and charging from the front would be foolish. Instead, they repeatedly launched sudden attacks and retreated quickly.
They easily crushed regular monsters and demons. If the enemy was strong, I intervened and minimized the damage that the Soul Cavalry received.
“The enemy is moving much faster,” I thought.
I wondered why and realized that it was simple.
The Hell Lord had noticed the presence of the Soul Cavalry.
He must have been infuriated at the fact that the very soldiers whom he had created had returned as his enemies.
“He’s not leading from the front,” I thought.
It was a shame that the Hell Lord stayed behind.
Had he appeared in the front to crush the Soul Cavalry himself, I might have some chance. However, the Hell Lord chose to stay behind, and there were three million soldiers between him and me.
The best strategy that I had was buying time.
“I barely defeated Contegnome, the Shadow of Nothingness, with Depravity. Although I have become much stronger now, Roguzan and the Hell Lord came from the deepest part of Nothingness. They are indeed much stronger than Contegnome,” I thought.
It seemed that just because the two came from the same void, that did not mean that they were equally strong. When I checked with God’s Eye, Roguzan was much more powerful than Contegnome.
“The statistics add up to 721 in total…”
Roguzan indeed deserved the nickname “the Killer of the Dark Lord.” Its statistics were far beyond those of monsters. Balrogs were already so powerful that even the Dark Lords had to keep them in check, and Roguzan was exceptional among them. No wonder it could kill the Dark Lord.
When it came to bare statistics, I was not inferior to Roguzan. The difference was about a hundred. If the Soul Cavalry could buy me some time, I could duel the Balrog and easily finish it off. However, if I decided to combat Roguzan, I had to give up on saving time for the others in the castle. The enemy would quickly surround me, and the Soul Cavalry would evaporate in no time.
If I tried, I could hold the Hell Lord’s army for about four days. However, the aftermath would be a problem.
“I have other enemies besides the Hell Lord,” I thought.
The Spirits of Darkness could play tricks on me. I also had to keep Death Bringer, the Demon God, in check. I must save some energy for unexpected events.
Luckily, it seemed that Roguzan did not possess any power. It was dangerous only when it came to pure strength.
“I need to come up with a way to kill Roguzan,” I thought.
While commanding the Soul Calvary, I looked at Roguzan. The Balrog was calmly floating in the air, remaining still as though it could not care less about the Soul Cavalry.
“Balrogs are belligerent,” I thought.
I was told that Balrogs lose control when battles began.
Perhaps it was calm because it could not find enemies that were strong enough. The Soul Cavalry might seem too weak in its eyes.
The huge monster kept getting on my nerves. Such a powerful monster would easily destroy the castle, even though it was protected by magic.
“I will have to provoke it myself,” I thought.
I nodded. If the Balrog decided not to move, I needed to make it move.
In addition, I wanted to save energy, but that did not mean that I would not fight.
It was time for me to come upfront.
“I will return in half an hour. Make sure not to get surrounded.”
I ordered the Soul Cavalry.
I was confident that I could eliminate Roguzan in half an hour.
It was not difficult to destroy an enemy that came out to the front. I could kill it with some spells, which worked on even those who had entered the realm of transcendence, and I could retreat immediately. So long as the Hell Lord himself didn’t try to stop me with demons and monsters in the realm of transcendence, I could get out.
I thought that if the Soul Cavalry did not receive too much damage, I could continue to buy some time.
Flapping my wings, I charged at the Balrog from the front.
Rage and the Sword of the Emperor turned black. Then I struck them with Lightning God and Flame of Pride. When my superior mana was added to the swords, I activated a skill as powerful as Ariel’s celebrated Abyss Sword.
[You have repeated similar actions and mastered combination skills. You now have a new skill, Chaotic Blade (Legend).]
One hardly learned a skill by repeating an action. The chance was slim, even if they repeated an action for thousands or even tens of thousands of times. Even if one did get a new skill through repetition, it would be mediocre.
However, I just earned a skill of legend grade.
“I guess my high intelligence points helped,” I thought.
Intelligence had many effects. It canceled the side effects of skills, and it increased the magic resistance, mastery of skills, and mental power. In addition, intelligence quickly increased the chance of creating a new skill, something I had just witnessed. I had never experienced such an effect before, and it was quite useful.
Only after I got engaged in the battle did the Balrog look at me.
Boom!
The Balrog came to me, flapping its wings that were larger than its body.
The monster recognized the strong; it noticed how great the mana in my swords was.
The Balrog was far greater than me in size.
However, size did not matter in combats.
“I will give you a chance. Go back to where you came from.”
The Balrog was a legendary monster, and it was the infamous killer of the Dark Lord. I thought that I could show some respect.
Boom!
Roguzan flapped its two right wings twice.
Booom!
A lightning struck me.
However, I was so strongly resistant to the magic that it looked as though I faked my ability.
In contrast, Balrogs used magic.
I was going to make use of such an imbalance, and that was the reason I was so confident about my quick victory.
“Thanks for the greetings, Roguzan.”
Chaotic Blade became longer. Balrogs used magic, and they were strongly magic-resistant. They were also strong against physical attacks.
However, I questioned how long it could hold my attack.
“I now wish you could take my greetings, too.”
Slash!
My swords penetrated through the storm of lightning.
When I sliced Roguzan’s body exactly into two pieces, dozens of demons who were equivalent to counts attacked me at once.
“Stop.”
I used Kotodama. My words worked like a spell. No one, even those in the realm of transcendence, could dodge this spell. Of course, the stronger they were, the quicker they would be free from the spell.
This spell was especially useful when I fought a multitude of enemies.
And the counts stopped as I had commanded.
However, they only stopped moving for a very short period of time, which was one-hundredth of a second.
“The superposition of powers,” I thought.
I had experienced a similar situation when I was fighting with Karmiel. My power superposed with those of Karmiel, and its effects were reduced. I supposed that the effects of my spell were reduced for the same reason.
Demons and monsters, who were controlled by the Hell Lord, were protected by his power. It seemed that those who were equivalent to counts received much more blessing from the Hell Lord than any others did.
I activated God’s Eye.
[The encryption is beyond the level of God’s Eye (Demigod). Thanks to the high mana (168), 77 percent of the status was decrypted.]
[The Power of Protection (God), Guidance of Doom (God), Complete Dominance (God), Death (God), Song of the Dead (Legend), Curse of Shadow (Legend), Curse of Mountain (Legend)…]
The demons were protected by four different powers. No wonder my spell had little impact on them.
In addition, the types of power which protected the demons were extremely powerful.
The Hell Lord was almost as powerful as the Gods.
And what I saw was only a fraction of it; there were more.
“I see why the gods wanted to keep him in check,” I thought.
The Hell Lord was human. It protected the Earth as a guardian, and no one would dare invade.
However, he wanted to become more than a guardian. He wanted to become a God.
Unfortunately, the Gods did not allow the Hell Lord to become like them.
Together, the Gods put the Hell Lord in Nothingness.
The Hell Lord devised a plan to strike back, but his plan failed.
He was stuck in Nothingness until the Spirits of Darkness saved him.
“He must have become even stronger,” I thought.
I was quite sure that the Hell Lord had become much stronger than before when he was the Emperor of Shadow.
I suspected that the Spirits of Darkness helped the Hell Lord get stronger.
Even if they did, the Hell Lord had way too many different powers. No human, even if he was a strong as the gods, could possess that many powers.
The Hell Lord must have focused on mastering spells related to curse. However, there was a huge gap in effort and time between learning a spell and mastering it. In addition to the tremendous amount of effort and time, one also had to be in a similar league as the Gods.
In that sense, I suspected that the Hell Lord only learned the latter three curses of legend grade.
I could say that he gained the Power of Protection while serving as a guardian, but I could not understand how he had the other three powers.
He could have had more. After all, I decrypted only 77 percent of the powers protecting the counts.
“Is he really the true Hell Lord?” I thought.
I started to doubt his identity, so I decided to investigate him.
“Beat it.”
The Flame of Pride explosively surrounded the nearby area.
Demons around me paused for a split second, and I soared into the sky.
The Hell Lord’s army was great. Millions of soldiers, monsters, and demons stood in lines, and they stretched dozens of kilometers.
At the very end of the line was a man riding a demonic dragon. He was slowly flying towards me as though he was taking a leisurely walk.
As soon as I saw the man, my heart started to pound heavily, and I immediately recognized that he was the Hell Lord.
However, I was not looking at the Hell Lord. I was fixated by the force that was coming from him.
It almost made me pass out, and I felt as though I was in front of him completely naked. I could not move my entire body, as though a Leviathan had completely seized me.
I had experienced a similar feeling before.
I felt this from the person who offered me a deal before I came back to the Earth. That person was emitting the mana that was similar to the Hell Lord’s.
Back then, I could barely sense that mana. However, it helped me recognize who the Hell Lord really was.
“Death Bringer…!” I thought.
Death Bringer, the Demon God, was inside the Hell Lord.
The man was the Hell Lord, but not completely himself.
It was Death Bringer inside.
Death Bringer’s gaze struck me.
He smiled mockingly, as though he was laughing at my late arrival.
I knew that something was wrong. It just did not make sense that the Hell Lord possessed more than four types of power.
Now the puzzle was complete when I found out that Death Bringer was inside the Hell Lord. He was one of the strongest Demon Gods. Death Bringer was stronger than dozens of Gustartes.
“I can say that the Hell Lord was possessed,” I thought.
Even though Death Bringer was immortal, he could not just invade Devildom. Even if he went into another being and controlled it, his power would be greatly reduced. In the worst case, the Demon God could lose his status as a God.
Perhaps controlling the Hell Lord made a difference.
I did not know all the details. It could be that the Hell Lord was almost a God and that Death Bringer could enter his body without much penalty. It was a wild guess, though.
My heart beat heavily, and all of what was inside of me woke up.
Gustarte and Diablo, the Dark Lord, were extremely hostile against Death Bringer, the Demon God.
Rage erupted from inside, but I remained calm.
I could hardly defeat the Demon God, even with my full strength.
In addition, I was in the middle of the enemy’s army. My powers would have little impact on the Demon God. Should the fight take place here, I might not be able to escape.
I asked the two beings inside me, Gustarte and Diablo, if they had any other ways.
Then the two whispered to me that they had a way.
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