Evan D. Sherden, Preparing for the Next Scenario (2)

Even after the victory party was over, Evan had a pile of things to do. Restoring the damages was important. He had to provide compensation to those who suffered losses during this scenario along with dealing with the magic circle in the outskirts of Sherden, where the final stage of the action took place. Moreover, the temple’s reconstruction at the dungeon’s entrance, along with the fissures that appeared throughout the city, had to begin. Anyways, an exploration into the dungeon would take some time since the dungeon wasted all its mana. It was a given, but entering the submerged dungeon of Pellati was also impossible with all the deep floors getting involved in the Backflow.

“But I believe most of these tasks must be taken care of by the Marquis.”

Evan’s official maid, Diona, who was an unofficial secretary and a former bunny girl dealer, shrugged as she saw Evan wrapping up the mountain of paperwork and drafting his schedule for tomorrow. But Evan firmly shook his head as he sipped on the tea she brewed.

“The dungeon knights are a group that defends Sherden. We are the ones that have to work more than others for Sherden’s safety…and also, it was me who arranged these events to occur.”

Come to think about it, the purpose of the scenario came from the thought of eliminating all kinds of unstable factors in Sherden, and they’ve sure come far from it. It kind of felt like swallowing the entire rabbit burrow when they only intended on catching one or two rabbits. The Demon tribe wasn’t included at first. Still, somehow, they ended up defeating two of the Four Heavenly Kings, and officially declaring subjugation of one of the Kings was awkward too.

“Ah…did Rubecca leave any drop items?”

His expectations weren’t high. It was because after defeating Geffrel and Shabelka, two of the Four Heavenly Kings, when Sherden was under attack four years ago, they left nothing significant behind.

“Ah, yes. I heard there was. Let’s see…here it is. It’s said to be unretrievable, so it was buried.”

But the answer was unexpected. Evan narrowed his eyes and questioned back.

“Buried? Who said that?”

“Ms. Serpina.”

Burying a drop item because it was unretrievable? By Serpina, who was officially recognized as the Saint? Evan stood up right away.

“Why are you telling me this now?”

“The item is protected by the seal barrier set by Lin and Lan, so it’s not in danger. As expected, I fear those children the most…Huh? Master?”

So, the item was so dangerous that it had to be sealed. Evan was dumbfounded, so he stood up.

“I’ll be right back.”

“Aww, it’s been a while since I got a chance to serve you all by myself…!”

Diona lacked power, so she was completely excluded in this scenario. Of course, she took care of the regular tasks regarding the dungeon knights, and she became a little bit closer with the Junior group, but she didn’t come across Evan at all in the meanwhile. How worried was Diona, while looking at Evan, grow closer with Belois, Arisha, and Serena while the scenario was in progress?!

“Did you overcome your fear of Belois?”

“Nope, but if Ms. Louise survived without getting killed, then I might have a little hope.”

“Your will is surprisingly strong.”

“You can’t survive as a dealer in Roizen without this much spirit. No, my career as a dealer ended. But I was up against you, so there was nothing I could do.”

Looking at her strong will, Evan decided not to question her about her provocative outfits and her attempts to seduce him boldly. Of course, he promised to sleep ‘alone’ for tonight, so he didn’t have any intentions of falling for her seduction.

“Then I’ll be back soon. Go home.”

“I can still wait?”

“No, you can go ahead.”

“I hate you.”

What’s up with loving a man who officially had two fiancées? Evan thought he adapted to this world, but there were some cases that he couldn’t understand.

* * *

Evan thought of whether he should bring Lin or Lan to undo the seal, but he just went to the site thinking that he should check the item first by its look. Thanks to the ability of Heaven’s Step progressing into Annihilation, he was able to reach his destination in just one step. It was different from the ancient teleportation magic.

“You know…the aura that it is giving off is just too severe, although I was a bit occupied with the Great Backflow, so I wasn’t able to check on things on this side.”

Evan arrived at the battle site and approached when he found the seal Lin and Lan worked together to create. A semi-transparent green crystal was glowing brightly while half-buried within the seal. There was no need for further explanation. That was the Blood Crystal of Rubecca.

“Ha, so this thing exists in the real world too…if it appeared in the game, I would have taken a screenshot and posted it on the community because this is that special.”

Blood Crystal was an item that contained the knowledge and ability of the Demon, and it was rarely found in their corpses. It was a drop item from the Four Heavenly Kings with an incredibly low rate of acquisition, and despite its huge penalties, it had unique abilities, so many perverts endlessly hunt the Four Heavenly Kings by loading the save file just to acquire it. The same applied to Yeo Ban-Min.

‘A Blood Crystal from Rubecca means its ability is related to poison. I would have let Shine absorb it with his sword if it was a regular Blood Crystal, but this…’

There was no guarantee that he could manage the poison due to its high intensity, even if his weapons were able to absorb the Blood Crystal. Shine did his share of training for poison resistance, but it wasn’t enough to withstand Rubecca’s toxins.

‘Hmmm…I guess there’s no better solution than using it as an ingredient for alchemy.’

Evan could manage this poison, but it’s also difficult for the non-Demon tribe to wear an artifact made from a Blood Crystal. Considering the penalties given, it could be used somehow, but receiving penalties while using Rubecca’s poison seemed more like a loss for Evan. So, the final option was material for alchemy. With this at hand, it would be great to create the strongest poison in the world. No, if he let two alchemists who mastered their alchemy skills work on Rubecca’s Blood Crystal, wouldn’t that mean the alchemists can create an edible poison for the Devil…?

‘Wait, isn’t that too much? Even the ancient great wizard of Yo-Ma Great War Zero used poison magic, but I believe it had no effects on the Devil.’

Yo-Ma Great War Zero had monsters with hardcore abilities that matched the protagonists. And one of them was the poison magic, but nothing of that sort existed in this world. It could rather be called as the authority given only to the great ancient wizard. The feeling of dealing ten million damage per turn to monsters that had health up to a hundred million was great. The Devil, the last boss of the game, was a living hell in that sense. It had the most HP among all other monsters, yet the specialty of the great ancient wizard, the poison magic, didn’t work on it at all! And after repeating the fight several times, he realized that he just needed to deal a certain amount of damage instead of depleting it all, and that would be considered the condition for clearing the game, as the seal on the Devil would be completed.

‘The Devil…perhaps there would have been an ending where it can be killed completely by surpassing the seal on it in Yo-Ma Great War Zero.’

Surely if someone defeated the Devil at that point, the sequels for the Yo-Ma Great War wouldn’t continue. Evan giggled at his thoughts for a while before approaching the barrier.

“Good, they’ve sealed it quite tight. Then…argh.”

―Crumble!

Lin and Lan’s sealing abilities were superb, but it couldn’t hold on against Evan, who learned Annihilation. Evan broke the barrier by lightly swinging his hand and quickly grabbed the Blood Crystal that was buried in it. The Blood Crystal of beings like the Four Heavenly Kings had a weak ego that makes it disappear by itself when not held tightly. Half of it was exposed when Serpina said she buried it into the ground.

―…! …!

The Blood Crystal tried to transmit its vile intent, but Evan ignored it without a sweat. He didn’t learn his resistance against curses and miasma for fun. A sinister intention from a mere Blood Crystal and not from the Four Heavenly Kings themselves was a petty thing. But something unexpected happened at that moment. The boots he always wore…the blessing of the Devil seemed to shine intensely, and the Blood Crystal started to shake because of it.

“What’s this…hmm?”

Something unbelievable happened. The vibration became stronger, and the Blood Crystal melted down, but it wasn’t disappearing into thin air. Neither was it being absorbed into Evan’s body. Instead…it was mixed within the Annihilation energy inside Evan’s body.

‘No, to be precise, among them…right, it was a power that belonged to the Skin Blade!’

Through the help of Dwarf Ella in the past, Evan learned a skill called Skin Blade, a magic sword based on a combat technique. It evolved into Heaven’s Blade due to the effect from his Heavenly abilities, and as the Heavenly abilities evolved into Annihilation, it was integrated with the Annihilation skill. And now, the aura from the Blood Crystal got absorbed by the power among the Annihilation skills that created Heaven’s Blade. Perhaps it was possible to utilize the power in other skills in Annihilation as well.

‘At first, it reacted to the miasma stored within the boots. But it feels like Heaven’s Blade intervened and absorbed it instead…’

Considering that his boots were vibrating unpleasantly made him think that this unique situation happened because he fulfilled a difficult condition without him knowing. The reason why the boots reacted to the Blood Crystal was understandable. The Four Heavenly Kings from the Demon King’s army was told to have received quite a bit of the Devil’s blood, so it wasn’t a surprise how the boots, which had been absorbing miasma by breaking the statues of the Devil, resonated with the crystal. But one thing that was left as a mystery was why of all things, the Blood Crystal got absorbed by Heaven’s Blade…and Evan thought of a possibility while standing still. He recalled what Ella said about the Skin Blade.

Perhaps this could be…

‘Unique weaponry? Did I fulfill a portion of the requirements for the unique weaponry? Ella said the Skin Blade was part of the unique weaponry…!’

It was a moment of thrill where his dreams had grown bigger. The possibility of him being able to complete his unique weaponry just made his energy soar. As Evan poked the ground with the poisoned Heaven’s Blade, which was now the poisoned Annihilation Blade (everything in its surrounding started to melt), he nodded in satisfaction.

“Great, I can’t rest since things turned out this way.”

Although he was in a mess with taking the after-measures of the scenario and planning to conquer the Merdin Dungeon, he realized that one more task was added. Yeah, come to think about it, he hadn’t been to the Volcanic Desert of Eskarothi, where attributes that were opposite to the Eternal Glacier filled the atmosphere. If he happened to find something similar to the King Ice Spirit’s heart, there might be a great advance in the research on the unique weaponry.

‘Since we can’t conquer Merdin without Louise’s party reaching level 100, I should take a quick break.’

He wanted to head for the Volcanic Desert right away…but Evan steadied his posture, which was going out of control due to his excitement over the Volcanic Desert. And yes, he had a date tonight. Perhaps a date with the lady who visited him in his dreams.