By the time the last Desiccated Jailer fell, the great stone door was already close at hand.
The guard layout along this branch was not much different from the first two. Armored Desiccated Corpses and Desiccated Jailers still stood watch in alternating groups. If this had been Rayne’s party yesterday, they might have needed some effort to get through them.
But now, things were completely different.
Barton could steadily turn aside a corpse’s downward slash with his new shield, then drive his sword through its rotted throat with a backhand thrust. Tyren needed only a single ordinary arrow to punch clean through a corpse’s eye socket before it could get close.
In a matter of moments, all that remained before the stone door was a floor strewn with shattered bone and wisps of slowly fading ash.
“Everyone still good?” Rayne glanced back.
The others nodded one after another.
After a full night’s rest, most of their strength had already recovered. Even Tyren, who was usually the first to complain about being tired, had a look of eager anticipation on his face.
“The last one.” Asar looked at the stone door before them. “The final token is inside.”
Greer followed at his usual unhurried pace, leaning on his cane. His clouded eyes lingered on the stone door for a moment.
“Same rule as before,” he said. “Proceed carefully.”
Rayne took a deep breath, set both hands against the stone door, and shoved it open.
◆ ◆ ◆
The prison beyond the door was quieter than either of the first two.
The silence all around was enough to make their skin crawl. The air they breathed in was dry and cold, filled with a thick, stale smell of decay.
Strangest of all, the darkness in this place was like a bottomless pit.
The torches in their hands burned bright, yet the moment the light reached toward the depths, it seemed to be swallowed by something unseen, vanishing without a trace.
Deep inside the prison, there was a figure.
Tall and gaunt, it sat on the ground with its back against the wall, its head lowered. A ragged prison uniform hung from its body, and its limbs were twisted at unnatural angles, as if they had once been forcibly broken, then healed over long years into the wrong shapes.
Across its knees lay a sword.
A longsword.
The blade was covered in dust, yet it still caught the torchlight faintly.
“Aha, another boss!” Tyren let out a hushed exclamation, then immediately began muttering under his breath. “But… why does this one look skinny as a matchstick?”
“Don’t tell me this is the weakest of the three.”
“Tyren!”
Serin immediately hissed at him.
After being scolded, Tyren sulkily shut his mouth.
Still, his words were not completely unreasonable.
Compared to the bosses in the first two prisons, this one really was as thin as a rail. One had dragged heavy chains behind it, and the other had been built like a small mountain. Either one gave off tremendous pressure just by standing there.
But the figure before them looked as if it could barely stand at all.
No matter how they looked at it, it did not seem like a powerful enemy.
Even so, Rayne did not lower his guard.
He dropped his stance, his eyes locked firmly on the gaunt figure.
“Don’t get careless,” he said in a low voice. “Spread out slowly. First, we test—”
He did not get to finish.
The figure moved.
It slowly raised its head.
The torchlight lit up its face.
It was a withered, aged face, with deeply sunken cheeks and skin cracked like bark that had weathered for countless years. In the hollow pits of its eyes, ashen-gray pupils slowly turned, passing over Rayne, over Barton, and then across each of them in turn.
As if it were trying to recognize something.
After a moment, it spoke.
Its voice was dry and rasping, like an old bellows that had not been used in years.
“…Cassandre’s scent.”
Rayne froze.
“Not him…” A red light suddenly flared in those clouded eyes. “You… you carry his scent.”
A dead silence fell over the prison.
Barton froze where he stood. Tyren’s mouth hung open for a long moment, unable to close. Serin instinctively took half a step back, gripping the oak staff against her chest.
It… was talking to them?
A monster in a dungeon was speaking to adventurers?
“Cassandre…” Asar’s voice sounded a little dry. “Whose name is that?”
No one could answer.
They were all still reeling from the shock of what it had just said.
Among them, the one who reacted most strongly was Greer, who stood at the rear with his cane.
The old man’s clouded eyes widened sharply, and the color drained bit by bit from his deeply furrowed face.
He stared fixedly at the gaunt figure. His fingers tightened around the head of his cane until his knuckles turned white, even trembling faintly.
Decades.
He had seen more dungeons than he could count, and he had slain all kinds of monsters.
Desiccated Corpses, magical beasts, undead, puppets…
He had seen monsters that howled, monsters that mimicked their surroundings, and even monsters that could imitate human voices to lure in prey.
But he had never once seen—
A monster that could truly hold a conversation with adventurers.
Worse still, there was not only killing intent in those ashen-gray eyes.
There was hatred.
Pain.
And a deep, long-buried sorrow.
Those were emotions that should have belonged almost exclusively to humans.
“Impossible…” Greer murmured, his voice carrying a tremor even he had not noticed. “How could a dungeon monster possibly have…”
◆ ◆ ◆
In the Core Chamber that no one could see, Owen was comfortably “nestled” inside his crystal, watching the scene unfold with great enthusiasm.
“Here it comes, here it comes!” he cheered. “My proudest work is finally making its entrance!”
The Whisperer wasn’t some throwaway boss Owen had cobbled together on a whim.
To give it abilities that matched the backstory he had dreamed up, he had put in a stupid amount of work. He had spent hours digging through that massive, seemingly endless ability pool, checking options one by one.
Weakened traits. Old wounds. Half-broken skill fragments.
He had stacked every discount he could find before finally dragging the cost down to something he could actually afford.
“Do you have any idea how hard I worked on this?” Owen muttered, though the pride in his voice was impossible to hide.
On paper, it was only an early Bronze-rank boss.
In reality, the Whisperer had never been anything that simple.
Watching the six people inside the prison, especially that old man, stand there slack-jawed and pale-faced, Owen was practically blooming with joy.
“Well? Well? Scared you, didn’t it?” He held back a laugh. “A boss that can talk and looks like it has a whole story hidden behind it. Isn’t that way more interesting than those two silent lumps?”
Speaking of which, he had put quite a bit of effort into this script.
After all… he was stuck alone inside this lousy rock, unable to move, unable to make a sound, without even anyone to talk to.
The stretches of time when no adventurers came in to clear the dungeon were boring enough to drive a man insane.
Since he had nothing else to do, Owen had simply started adding backstories to the monsters he liked.
A swordsmanship prodigy who had gone completely mad after losing his wife, child, and comrades.
A prisoner locked away here by an archenemy named Cassandre, forced to endure torment day after day.
All of it had been made up by Owen alone, holed up in the Core Chamber, bored out of his mind.
“Heh heh. I revised that line several times, you know.”
Owen savored the Whisperer’s opening line, “Cassandre’s scent,” and the more he thought about it, the more he felt he had real talent as a director.
“It has atmosphere, it leaves room for imagination, and he’s even talking in riddles. Perfect.”
He glanced at the old man, whose face had gone pale, and that tiny bit of creator’s vanity inside him was instantly fed to the brim.
“Ha! Finally, something even that old man can’t see through.” Owen was positively smug. “Look at that, look at that—even he thinks it’s real.”
As Owen watched, he suddenly paused.
“…Wait. Hold on.”
A fresh spark of inspiration seemed to hit him.
Last time, he had only written as far as “limbs broken by Cassandre, exiled here.”
But now that he thought about it, the setup could use a little more.
So he immediately opened the editing panel and started clattering away, tweaking and revising.
They had not started fighting yet anyway.
Otherwise, the real show was about to begin.
◆ ◆ ◆
Inside the prison, the Whisperer’s ashen-gray eyes slowly swept over the group, finally stopping on the weapons in their hands and on their backs.
“You…” A trace of understanding surfaced in its voice, along with a faint, unsettling mockery. “…mean to claim glory by taking me down?”
Its withered fingers slowly closed around the hilt of the rusted sword across its knees.
“…Then come.”
A note on provenance: www.NovelPhoenix.com has the author's chapter, while this copy appeared without approval; the source supports them.
The instant the words fell, it moved.
There was no warning.
No sign of a windup.
The gaunt figure sprang up from the ground like an arrow loosed from a bowstring, shooting straight toward Barton at the front.
Fast.
Unreasonably fast.
“Barton!” Rayne shouted, his voice cracking.
Barton’s reaction was already quick. He raised his shield almost entirely on instinct.
But the figure’s speed far exceeded his prediction. The longsword slipped along the edge of the shield, carving a screeching trail of sparks across his pauldron before grazing past his neck by a hair.
Cold sweat instantly soaked Barton’s back.
If he had not tilted his head aside by reflex just then—
“Scatter! Don’t bunch up!” Rayne gave the order without hesitation. “It’s too fast. We can’t take it head-on!”
The party spread out at once.
Thanks to the coordination hammered into them by yesterday’s brutal fight with Bonecrusher, their formation did not collapse even under such a sudden assault.
Tyren retreated to the rear and nocked an arrow. Serin stayed behind him. Rayne and Barton moved to the left and right, closing in from both wings, while Asar remained ready to support at any moment.
The Whisperer stopped for a brief moment at the center of the prison, its ashen-gray pupils turning as they swept over each of the scattered figures.
Then it moved again.
This time, it slipped through the gap between Barton and Rayne and lunged straight at Tyren.
“Waaah!”
Tyren nearly jumped out of his skin. He stumbled and fell backward.
At that critical instant, a flash of sword-light cut in at an angle and blocked the longsword.
It was Asar.
The two blades met, and Asar felt a jolt run up his arm.
But the force behind it was far lighter than he had expected.
His eyes sharpened, and he immediately caught the key point.
Astonishing speed, but not much force.
“Its raw strength is weaker than an ordinary Bronze-rank opponent’s!” Asar immediately called out, forcing the Whisperer back with a backhand slash. “Don’t be scared by its speed. It can be blocked!”
That discovery instantly steadied the panicking party.
That was right.
This monster was fast.
But that gaunt, broken body could not squeeze out much strength. On top of that, its limbs all carried old injuries. Every swing of the sword, every step it took, had a subtle break in the motion.
As long as they did not let that eerie speed disrupt their rhythm, finding an opening to counterattack was not impossible.
Barton stepped forward again, veins standing out at his temples as he used his shield to turn aside the Whisperer’s lunges again and again.
Asar and Rayne seized the openings whenever it drew its sword back, cutting in from both sides.
Tyren steadied his nerves and loosed arrow after arrow, forcing it to split its attention and dodge.
Little by little, the tide of the battle began to turn back in their favor.
But at the very rear of the party, Greer was not watching from the sidelines as he usually did.
The old man leaned on his cane, his clouded eyes fixed motionlessly on the gaunt figure in the field, his expression growing more solemn by the moment.
Something was wrong.
Very wrong.
That monster’s sword—
Greer’s pupils suddenly shrank.
◆ ◆ ◆
At twenty-seven, Greer had already been a true Gold-rank swordsman.
Back then, everyone who knew him had said that reaching Orichalcum and Adamantine was only a matter of time. Some had even believed that the Heroic rank was not beyond his reach.
Until the Demonic Tide War took his leg and brutally severed the road that should have led him higher.
In those first few years, what he found hardest to bear was not the pain.
It was the way people looked at him.
Pity.
Sympathy.
Regret.
Those gazes were like dull knives, scraping bit by bit against the last of his pride.
So in the end, he had requested a transfer himself and come to this remote little town, becoming a Guildmaster whose past few people still remembered.
And once he came, he stayed for more than twenty years.
But even with this leg ruined and these eyes grown old, the ability to read the path of a blade had long since been carved into his bones.
It was something he would never forget as long as he lived.
That was exactly why he could see it.
The path of every stroke that monster made, the angle of every withdrawal, and the smooth, flowing way it linked one form into the next all pointed to the same truth.
That was not a monster’s instinct.
That was swordsmanship.
Pure, refined swordsmanship, honed through years upon years of relentless training.
More than that, Greer’s breathing had grown heavier without him noticing.
The level of that swordsmanship was very likely above even his own in his prime.
It was only that broken body and those twisted, deformed limbs that had forcibly suppressed its strength and speed to their current level.
Otherwise, based on the subtlety hidden in those few strokes alone, Rayne and the others would never have been able to last this long.
The old man’s hand slowly tightened around the head of his cane.
He had not intended to step in.
This was the children’s trial. It should have been something they overcame on their own.
But the thing in front of them… had already gone beyond what a “trial” should be.
Greer drew a deep breath and slowly slid the rapier out from within his cane.
“Move aside, all of you.”
The aged, rasping voice cut through the clash of blades in the prison.
Dragging his stiff prosthetic leg, Greer took a step forward. The slim blade hidden inside his cane slid free inch by inch.
“Looks like these old bones will have to move a little today too.”
He was in no hurry to attack.
His clouded eyes remained fixed on the Whisperer as he spoke, calm and unhurried.
“Rayne, don’t watch its sword. Watch its shoulder.”
Rayne froze slightly.
“Its shoulder?”
“Watch the right shoulder. Wherever it drops, that’s where the sword goes.”
Still half-doubtful, Rayne did as he was told.
The next time the Whisperer lunged, he forced his eyes away from the tip of the blade and looked at that gaunt shoulder instead.
Sure enough.
In the instant before the strike, its right shoulder sank almost imperceptibly.
Rayne’s body moved one beat ahead of time. His longsword rose and steadily turned the blow aside.
“It worked!”
“Barton, watch its feet. Don’t just hold your shield in front of you.”
Greer’s voice remained steady.
“When it dashes, the foot pushes off first. Cut off its path with your shield.”
Barton gritted his teeth and nodded.
“Got it!”
The old man continued.
“Whoever it attacks, the nearest one covers. Don’t wait for a call!”
“Its old wounds are in its limbs. Force it to keep turning. Make it change direction again and again, and it won’t be able to build up speed.”
Each piece of guidance was like giving the rattled party a new direction.
Watch the shoulder. Mind the footwork. Cover in time. Force it to turn.
Each order was simple on its own, but together, they were frighteningly precise.
The party, which had been thrown into disarray by that eerie speed, slowly found a method to deal with it.
Rayne’s heart shook.
Only now did he truly realize just how unfathomable this old man really was beneath that slow, frail, inconveniently hobbled exterior.
Under Greer’s guidance, the Whisperer’s attacks were blocked one by one by the combined efforts of all six.
The gaunt figure darted through the prison at high speed, only to be stopped again and again. It could never tear through the net that was slowly tightening around it.
“At this rate, we can actually win!” Tyren said as he loosed an arrow, unable to hide the surprise and delight in his voice.
Even he, who had been terrified only moments ago, could now see a sliver of hope for victory.
And then.
The Whisperer suddenly stopped.
It came to an abrupt halt at the center of the prison. In those ashen-gray eyes, that faint red glow swelled without warning.
“…Not bad,” it rasped, its withered fingers tightening around the hilt. “But… still not enough.”
The hairs on the back of Greer’s neck stood up all at once.
“Look out—!”
The words had barely left his mouth when the Whisperer moved.
This time, no one saw how it drew its sword.
All they saw was an afterimage closing in on Barton.
Then three nearly overlapping slashes of sword-light fell across his shield in the span of a single instant.
Clang! Clang! Clang!
Three sharp impacts rang out so quickly they almost merged into one.
Barton felt three completely different shocks explode against him one after another. The web of his hand split open on the spot, and his entire body was forced back several steps before he dropped to one knee.
He looked down.
Three deep cuts had appeared across the new shield he had only just replaced.
And across his breastplate, the overflowing sword-force had carved three vicious gashes.
Barton coughed, and blood leaked from the corner of his mouth. His face was deathly pale.
“What… what was that…?”
For an instant, everyone in the prison seemed to stop breathing.
Behind them, Greer’s clouded eyes widened to their limit, and every trace of color drained from his deeply furrowed face.
Those three strikes.
A Combat Art.
Greer couldn’t have been mistaken.
Incomplete. Badly fragmented. So broken it could barely be called whole.
But it was still a Combat Art.
Under normal circumstances, only Silver-rank adventurers or higher should have been able to use something like that.
“Impossible…” The old man’s voice trembled violently. “How could a Bronze-tier monster use a Combat Art?!”
What chilled him even more was that, with his broken body, he no longer had the means to stand against it.
His old injuries had not allowed him to use any Combat Arts for a long time.
If he forced one out now, he would probably collapse on the spot, completely drained, let alone continue to fight.
In other words, inside this prison, the only one capable of using a Combat Art was that monster.
After landing that blow, the figure did not stop.
Instead, it seemed to go completely mad. Its ashen-gray pupils locked onto the back line.
Its body blurred, slipping past Barton and lunging straight toward Serin and Tyren.
“Aah!”
Tyren’s face went pale.
“Serin!”
A longsword cut in from the side at an angle, blocking the Whisperer’s strike.
It was Asar.
But Asar paid for it too.
That eerie speed and the sudden surge in strength forced him back several steps. In an instant, the blade opened a cut across his arm, and blood dripped steadily down his wrist.
The formation was broken.
In that single moment, the entire party’s footing fell into chaos.
Like a mad dog that had caught the scent of blood, the Whisperer no longer attacked them head-on. Instead, it relied on that ghostly speed to weave back and forth among the six of them, striking at every opening it found.
Every attack forced them into a frantic scramble to cover for one another.
Greer clenched his teeth hard.
He pushed forward in a single step, turning aside a strike aimed at Rayne, then threw everything he had into close-quarters swordplay against the Whisperer.
Sword-light too fast to follow flashed violently around the two of them.
He knew better than anyone that he could not hold out like this for long.
And the moment he fell, this party would be picked apart one by one.
“Retreat!”
The old man’s roar came out hoarse, carrying a gravity they had never heard from him before.
“This thing is not something you can handle right now! Out of the prison. Regroup—move!”
Rayne was full of unwillingness, but he understood that this was no time to be stubborn.
He gritted his teeth and immediately gave the order.
“Do as the Guildmaster says! Barton, cover the rear. Serin, Tyren, move first!”
Forcing down the turmoil in their chests, the group prepared to locate the exit and fall back.
But when they turned and saw their surroundings clearly, every one of them froze.
A chill instantly wrapped around their spines.
The exit, the stone door they had been looking for, stood right behind the two figures locked in combat.
No. More precisely, the Whisperer was blocking that stone door.
Greer flicked his rapier and knocked the Whisperer’s longsword aside, then staggered half a step back.
He stared at the Whisperer in disbelief.
It stood there quietly, barring the exit. The rusted sword hung at its side, and the red light in its ashen-gray eyes burned low as it looked down at the prey who had walked willingly into its net.
The way out was gone.
Greer felt as if he had been struck.
Only now did he suddenly realize the truth.
From the very beginning, those seemingly crazed lunges and that aimless weaving had all been for this moment.
Step by step, without anyone noticing, it had driven all of them away from the exit.
Then, by engaging Greer directly, it had forced the others deeper into the prison.
Cold sweat slid down everyone’s spine.
Six figures stood frozen at the center of the cold, dim prison, staring at the mad swordsman before the door. None of them dared to move.
“Still thinking… of leaving…”
It laughed.
The sound was dry and broken, like sandpaper scraping over dead bone.
“Too late… I won’t… let you… carry word back.”
The Whisperer slowly extended its empty left hand.
Pale violet motes of light gathered in its palm, slowly condensing into a second longsword.
The torchlight shook violently. Under the violet glow, the group’s faces turned even paler.
“Now…”
It raised both swords.
One was covered in rust.
The other flowed with violet light.
In its ashen-gray pupils, the red glow burned like the last embers of a dying fire.
“You will be the glory I claim!”