The corrupted butterfly looked as though it were drifting slowly on the wind, but it was far faster than it appeared.
Just as it was about to close the distance in an instant—
[Light of Life(Light of life)]
A dazzling radiance of life cut between Jun and the corrupted butterfly.
When the light of life collided with the corrupted butterfly, the two forces repelled each other like oil and water.
Jun was concentrating so intensely that he did not even have time to turn his head, but it had to be Divine Magic cast by Eleanor, who had broken free of the Status Effect.
However, facing the corrupted queen of the forest alone was evidently beyond her. The light of life gradually began losing ground against the corrupted butterfly.
“That's enough……!”
Yet Eleanor had bought him those few precious moments.
And those moments were exactly what Jun had desperately needed.
The blood-red fireball swallowed the directionless Mana into its maw.
At last, the crimson blaze shot forward, escaping Jun's control and racing toward its enemy.
True to its nature as a flame that devoured everything, it found the easiest target in the area to burn.
-……!
When the blazing mass came toward her, the Fairy Queen spread her wings.
Her wings were torn in several places, but they presented no obstacle to evasive movement.
That monstrous Fairy Queen had chosen to dodge rather than defend.
It meant that even the corrupted queen of the forest sensed how much energy was contained within the spell.
Just as the crimson blaze was about to pass by the Fairy Queen, Jun cast another spell.
[Detecting Target]
A Mana targeting point formed and locked onto the Fairy Queen.
Apparently, the crimson blaze recognized that as prey as well, because it changed direction and flew after the Fairy Queen, following the targeting point.
A chase began.
In the end, however, the crimson blaze was the one that lost.
Unable to catch its prey, it began consuming itself, signaling the end of its existence.
Jun drew up his Mana once more.
He twisted the Mana targeting point and aimed it at the crimson blaze instead.
The moment the targeting point touched it, Jun altered the spell's Mana Pattern on the spot.
It was an absurd feat, but the effort Jun had put into practicing throughout the past year, combined with the precision of his mental imagery, made it possible.
Of course, he could not rewrite the fundamental structure of the spell itself.
‘But I can overload the Mana Pattern.’
He could make the raging flames that were devouring themselves explode.
BOOOOOOOOOOM——!!
-SCREEEEEEEEEEEEEECH——!!
The forest burned.
The air itself burned, and the greed-soaked flames voraciously devoured even the oxygen in the surrounding area.
The Fairy Queen within their range was no exception.
The Power of Corruption resisted the flames, but even as they burned themselves away, the fire clung tenaciously to its prey and refused to let go.
“Gah…….”
The aftermath of the explosion reached Jun as well.
An enormous wave of heat engulfed him in an instant.
Fortunately, it also knocked him out of the corrupted butterfly's area of effect, but…….
His skin flushed bright red as blisters began forming across it.
“God…… damn it…….”
It was the first time in his life that Jun had been injured by his own magic.
He hurriedly pulled out a potion and poured it over his face.
“Urgh…….”
His skin felt as though it were burning alive.
The urge to simply lose consciousness surged through him, but [Steadfast Will] and [Unwavering Heart] refused to allow it.
“Jun!”
Eleanor's voice came from the distance.
A moment later, warm light seeped into his body.
Experiencing a Priest's Divine Power firsthand rather than merely hearing about it, Jun turned his gaze toward the Forest Guardian.
Toward Luke's back as he went to finish it himself.
“Urgh……!”
Luke's ability to climb the Forest Guardian's body without being caught in Jun's magic was entirely thanks to Jun's efforts.
Jun had deliberately lured the Fairy Queen as far away as possible to keep Luke out of the spell's aftermath.
Even so, the scorching heat tormented him, but Luke refused to stop climbing.
At last, he reached the Forest Guardian's chest.
“No……!”
But the opening in its chest was almost completely restored.
Perhaps because the Fairy Queen had turned her attention toward Jun, the regeneration had briefly stopped, but the opening was now noticeably smaller than before.
At this rate, there would soon no longer be enough room to insert a sword.
Luke hurriedly concentrated on the sword he had drawn and formed Aura around it.
“Just die already!”
He brought the sword down.
With greater desperation than he had ever felt in his entire life.
The blazing blue Aura struck the Forest Essence.
VVVVMMMM——!!
Powerful resistance forced the blue light backward.
The sword in Luke's hands felt as though it might be hurled away at any moment, but he clenched his teeth and endured.
The skin of his palms tore and blood ran down his hands, yet his gaze never left his sword or the Forest Essence.
CRACK—
Was it merely a hallucination born from desperation?
Or had his will truly produced a result?
A hairline crack seemed to have formed in the Forest Essence.
It was so faint that he would never have noticed it without concentrating carefully, but…….
There was unmistakably an effect.
-SCREEEEEEEEEEEEEECH——!!
Otherwise, that monstrous queen of the forest would never have screamed.
Luke felt her hateful gaze upon him.
Ironically, that very hatred twisted his lips into a grin.
“Hah…… So you can feel pain too?”
That monster had incapacitated dozens of humans in a single instant, yet now she was directing hatred toward him, a mere Level 3 Adventurer.
He could not help finding it amusing.
“HAAAAAAH!!”
Perhaps that emotion drew out even more strength.
Luke's muscles swelled as he drove his sword down even harder.
CRACK-CRACK—!
This time, he heard it clearly.
He could see it as well.
Cracks were spreading across the Forest Essence like a spiderweb.
But the Fairy Queen had no intention of simply allowing it to happen.
Just before the Power of Corruption could seep into the Forest Guardian—
BOOM-BOOM-BOOM——!!
Blades of wind shot toward the Fairy Queen.
Jun, who had once again drawn up his Mana, used his magic to irritate the Fairy Queen and draw her attention.
Unlike before, there was no detailed mental image behind the spell, so its power was lacking.
Even so, it succeeded in drawing the Fairy Queen's gaze for a brief moment.
SHNK—!
Unfortunately, the Fairy Queen understood what was happening as well.
“Guh…….”
A tree branch protruded through Luke's abdomen.
Responding to the Fairy Queen's power, a branch had erupted from the Forest Guardian's body and pierced straight through Luke's side.
Only then did Luke understand how Benjamin had died.
But the realization came far too late.
“Not…… yet……!”
Strength drained from his entire body.
The Aura that had burned so fiercely gradually faded, and the resistance radiating from the Forest Essence forced his sword back out.
“HAAAAAAAAH!!”
A voice rang out behind him.
Through his fading vision, Luke saw a young man leap high into the air, gripping a sword glowing red-hot.
Radiant blond hair streamed behind him, while his blue eyes were fixed unmistakably on the enemy's heart.
CLANG—!
Aiden's sword drove into the crack Luke had created and pierced completely through the Forest Essence.
Aiden's strike landed.
Unlike all their desperate efforts until now, Aiden's red-glowing blade pierced sharply through the Forest Essence.
The Forest Essence released a dark violet wave and vanished completely.
The guardian of the forest, the Forest Guardian, collapsed.
It looked like an ancient tree finally falling because it could no longer support its own weight.
The forest began to die.
It was not a metaphor.
The trees visibly began withering, and the forest itself started collapsing in real time.
‘Phase 3, then.’
This was what happened immediately after the Forest Essence was destroyed during the process of killing the Fairy Queen.
At this point, the Conquest Operation could effectively be considered a success.
Having lost the Forest Essence that served as the source of her power, the Fairy Queen would enter a prolonged Groggy state.
It lasted roughly ten minutes.
In a normal Conquest Operation, everyone would launch an all-out assault on the Fairy Queen during that window and bring the Raid to an end.
‘If you don't kill her within that time…….’
A Wide-Area Instant-Death Pattern would begin immediately afterward.
The power of the forest that formed the Fairy Queen's foundation would disappear completely.
All that remained in its place would be a pure crystallization of corruption.
And the corruption born from that would annihilate everything around it.
Back when he had still been Lee Jeong-jun, Jun had deliberately allowed the pattern to activate once as an experiment.
A party composed entirely of Level 6 players had been annihilated without being able to do a thing.
‘We need to escape before that happens…….’
The problem was the condition of the Adventurers and mercenaries.
The Fairy Queen's wide-area Status Effect skill, [Forest Cycle], had ended, but its aftereffects had not completely disappeared.
‘This is why I wanted to finish it before the Fairy Queen joined the battle.’
One option was to leave with only Aiden, Eleanor, and the wounded Luke.
But if possible, Jun wanted to take everyone with them.
Part of that was simple human decency, but what happened after they survived mattered as well.
They would need the survivors gathered here if they wanted the Imperial Family's subsequent investigation to conclude properly.
But even Jun had no way to remove the Status Effects from everyone here at once.
‘Damn it. Why are there so many spells I still need to learn?’
Adding yet another spell to the list of things he needed to learn once they escaped, Jun turned toward their final hope.
“Priest Eleanor. Think you can do it?”
“Haa…….”
Exhaustion covered the face of the Priest with the black eyepatch.
She too had been part of the Assault Force and had her life force drained by the Fairies.
Instead of resting afterward, she had immediately treated the wounded.
Then she had used Divine Power throughout the ensuing Conquest Operation.
And as though that had not been enough, she had been struggling against [Forest Cycle] until only moments ago and had only just broken free.
“……It'll take a little time.”
“How long?”
“About eight minutes.”
“……That's too long. Can't you shorten it? It needs to be done within three minutes at most.”
“Then there's no way. You'll have to choose. I can save only half of them.”
A Priest of the Church serving Ariclotos, the God of Healing, who was supposed to value life above all else, was weighing human lives against one another.
Someone watching might have condemned her for it.
But idealism like that had no place in their current situation.
Behind her eyepatch, Eleanor turned her gaze toward Jun.
She was asking the man who had directed the operation this far.
Who should they save?
“…….”
“…….”
Amid the brief silence—
Jun found the situation infuriating.
Why did merely struggling to survive keep forcing choices and dilemmas like these upon him?
It was an unbearably cruel question for a man who, only a year ago, had worried about nothing more serious than what he should eat for lunch at work the next day.
But he was no longer an office worker.
He was a Mage.
More than that, he was the Operations Officer who had carried out this plan.
“Phew…….”
Before Jun could even ask anything else, Eleanor had already entered a state of concentration.
If Jun refused to decide, Eleanor would choose whom to save according to her own judgment.
Jun disliked even that outcome.
It simply irritated him.
But in the end, he was a Mage.
Throughout the past year, in order to survive, he had tried harder than anyone to view the world through the perspective of a Mage.
What was a Mage?
One observed.
Imagined.
Projected.
And derived a result.
That was what a Mage was.
Their gaze stood proudly upon those four principles whenever they looked upon the world.
At least, that was what Jun believed a great Mage should be.
“…….”
And so he looked.
At what?
The Adventurers who had fought at the front while risking death to atone for their crimes?
Or the mercenaries who had been forced to embrace even their enemies for the sake of survival?
No.
Mages did not solve questions that other people decided for them.
Only the laws of the world itself were permitted to pose questions to them.
Therefore, what Jun needed to see—what he needed to observe—came before the question of ‘whom should I save?’
It was—
‘What can save them?’
Jun focused his gaze on Eleanor.
“Eleanor. That staff…….”
The staff held by the Priest with the black eyepatch.
Until now, Jun had been so occupied with everything else that he had never properly noticed it.
Only now did it truly enter his sight.
“How do you know about that……? Huh?”
For an instant, an image flashed through Jun's mind like lightning.
At the same time, he remembered the identity of the Priest standing before him.
But he quickly pushed that realization into a corner of his mind.
‘Who this woman really is doesn't matter right now.’
The problem was the staff in the black-eyepatched Priest's hands.
“That staff is definitely…….”
At first glance, it looked like nothing more than an old staff worn smooth by frequent handling.
A plain object that anyone might carry.
The only unusual feature was that the grain of the wood formed a regular pattern along the handle wrapped in scraps of cloth.
The markings followed the natural grain so perfectly that one could hardly recognize them without looking closely.
But Jun's [Keen Eyes] missed none of those lines.
And astonishingly, the pattern drew even memories from his days as ‘Lee Jeong-jun’ back to the surface.
[Exceptional Memory] had done its job.
“[Lament's End]…….”
It was the name of a piece of equipment belonging to a boss from a World-Scale Raid in the far later stages of <Blackout>.
For a Mage, it was effectively endgame equipment.
Its acquisition difficulty was so brutal that even within a community filled with veteran players, only a tiny handful had ever obtained it.
And that equipment was now sitting right in front of Jun.
“P-Priest Eleanor. Wait, just a moment.”
“What are you suddenly doing?!”
Jun reached toward Eleanor's staff while she was deeply concentrated.
Startled, she immediately pulled away.
Ignoring that, Jun raised Eleanor's hand and carefully examined the staff's handle.
‘If I remember correctly…….’
He pulled out a potion and drank it.
Its effectiveness had dropped considerably because he had consumed several in such a short period, but even that was better than nothing.
He needed to calm his still-burning Mana Circuits, even if only slightly.
With his other hand, he concentrated his gaze on Eleanor's staff.
Following the pattern formed along the grain of the wood, his fingers eventually caught on something.
Jun hurriedly pulled away the cloth covering that section.
A small groove had been carved into the wood beneath it.
“Priest Eleanor. I don't have time to explain this properly. But we might be able to save everyone here.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Did you know this staff is an Artifact?”
“What?”
The black-eyepatched Priest looked down at her staff as though she had never heard such a thing in her life.
Judging by her reaction, she clearly had no idea what it truly was.
“I'll keep this simple. This staff has the [Conversion] trait.”
“Conversion……?”
“It draws in external energy and converts it into a different form of power.”
Jun pointed toward the groove in the staff.
“This part is responsible for the [Conversion]. Do you understand what I'm saying?”
“Phew…….”
Eleanor looked bewildered by Jun's sudden explanation.
So rather than continue explaining, Jun demonstrated.
“Focus on the staff.”
“……All right.”
Jun pressed his thumb against the groove in the staff.
Eleanor concentrated on it exactly as he instructed.
And then she saw a blue wave.
No—
Something resembling a wave surged toward her.
Was this what the sea she had only ever heard about looked like?
A vast blue form churned beyond the horizon like an enormous wave, overwhelming her vision.
The moment she realized that what she was seeing was Mana itself, Eleanor stared at Jun in shock.
“Focus…….”
But Jun had no strength left to explain anything more.
His hand was already resting on the Choker.
He had released only five percent of the Word of Power, [Odyssey of the Lazy Pilgrim].
But five percent was enough now.
Mana flowed through his Mana Circuits, which still retained a faint reddish glow.
His entire body began heating up again, but it was far better than before.
This time, Jun was not going to use the Mana himself.
Eleanor was.
“Convert the Mana…… into Divine Power…….”
Those few fragmented words were enough for Eleanor to understand.
‘He said to convert it.’
She had to accept the ocean-like Mana Jun possessed and immediately transform it into Divine Power.
The moment she tried, Eleanor suddenly retched.
“U-ugh!”
“Don't absorb it…… Convert it…….”
“You insane Mage…….”
Was that not something he should have told her beforehand?
Unlike Jun, a Mage, Eleanor possessed Mana Circuits no different from those of an ordinary person.
She had nearly suffered severe internal injuries.
Eleanor bit her lip and concentrated again.
Fortunately, her mistake had at least given her a rough understanding of what Jun was asking her to do.
She willed it.
She wished for it with all her heart.
If Mana could become anything, Divine Power could embrace anything.
The two energies synergized.
Through her staff, Eleanor overlaid the image of Divine Power upon the Mana surging toward her like a vast tide.
Then she moved that Divine Power without the slightest doubt.
A Priest could only draw out the true performance of their power by believing in it without even a trace of hesitation.
‘O you who illuminate the world with the light of life, this humble servant beseeches you.’
The blue waves gradually began to glow.
Like the surface of the ocean reflecting the first sunlight rising in the east.
But the light was not satisfied with that.
It steadily expanded its domain.
Eleanor had never seen a light so warm in her entire life.
And because of that, she simultaneously felt something dangerous stirring within her.
It was a kind of omnipotence.
The instant an emotion no mere human should ever possess while handling the power of a god crossed her mind, Eleanor startled herself.
“Fo…… cus…….”
Jun's voice, distorted by pain, dragged Eleanor back to reality.
This was not her power.
It was a miracle created by the Mage before her.
And at the same time, it was a possibility granted by her god.
She was merely borrowing it.
It was something she had always known, yet somewhere along the way had begun forgetting.
That realization brought Eleanor to her knees.
[Sphere of Light(Sphere of light]
The vast ocean filled with radiance began taking a spherical form as the light refracted.
It was only about one meter in diameter.
And yet—
Within the forest upon which death had begun to descend, the light of life came down.
“…….”
Even Jun's face, twisted in agony from Overheat until he could barely see what lay before him, gradually relaxed.
‘It's completely different from the magic I create.’
Warm light.
So utterly unlike his blood-red [Fireball].
Jun wondered whether the mental images infused into his own magic might someday resemble something like this.
For now, he could not even imagine such a scene.
But his thoughts went no further.
At the edge of his vision, among the people beginning to regain consciousness, he saw Aiden running toward him.
His body, already pushed beyond its limits, took the warm light and the sight of his companion as permission to relax.
And then it severed its connection to his consciousness.