Chapter 114: Duncan (3)
Oliver was flustered.
He had not expected this at all.
To encounter the holy art he had come across only once before in the past, here of all places.
And it was the Holy Light, a technique that inflicts extensive damage on black magic.
For a moment, Oliver wondered if he had misheard, but the brilliant light that engulfed the surroundings, the agony it inflicted upon the corpse puppet, the fading Hate Bullet disappearing like smoke, and the minions suffering from it all made him realize this was no illusion—it was reality.
Thanks to that realization, he barely managed to react in time and escape with his life.
"Die——!!”
Duncan roared, his voice booming like a beast.
He swung his club with all his might, smashing the corpse puppets before charging at Oliver and striking with his full force again.
Oliver instinctively raised his quarterstaff to defend.
Bang——!!!
With a thunderous noise, Oliver was sent flying to the side, but as Duncan raised his club to strike down, Oliver used Targeting to slip away, evading the attack.
Looking back to see if Duncan was chasing him, Oliver saw that Duncan had already assumed victory and was merely watching, not bothering to pursue. It was a relief, as it gave him a chance to save his life.
"......."
"......."
Covered in dirt and wounds from being forcefully thrown to the ground, Oliver staggered to his feet.
Duncan spun his club with a whoosh—whoosh— while staring at Oliver.
"What’s with that staff? Black magic should have been dispelled by now, yet it held up against my tonfa. Is it some sort of item?”
Oliver looked at his quarterstaff in response to the question.
It was strange, indeed. The Black Suit should have been destroyed by the Holy Light, and under normal circumstances, Oliver’s quarterstaff should have broken by now.
While Oliver found this odd, there was something else he was even more curious about.
“...How did you do that?”
"Hah! You mean this?"
Duncan, unusually, smiled as he lifted a golden bracelet.
It was emitting a peculiar aura.
"Is that an item that lets you use holy arts?"
"Yes, the Lord is merciful. Pay the price, and he’ll gladly share his power. Mahal-la... And with it, I can even do this."
Duncan pulled out a necklace as he spoke.
It was a string of beads, with a wooden cross hanging from it. As he grasped the wooden cross, a brilliant golden light began to glow, enveloping Duncan’s body.
With it, the burns and wounds Duncan had sustained in battle with Oliver began to heal. Though it wasn’t fast, Oliver could only watch.
The situation wasn’t looking good.
Oliver’s stamina and emotions were both heavily depleted, yet his opponent was healing. Worse still, he could use holy arts.
Even if Oliver could manage to overcome the immediate disadvantage by using the emotions he had left, there was no way to deal with the holy arts...
He suddenly craved a Filgaret.
"What will you do? How about handing over the girl and coming under my command? Then, I’ll show you mercy."
"Oh, I’m sorry. While I appreciate the offer, I’ll have to decline. And as for the girl, I’ve already entrusted her to someone trustworthy. Even if I die, she’ll make it to safety. So, there’s no need for you to worry about her."
Duncan’s expression turned emotionless, clearly displeased.
"Aren’t you afraid of dying?"
"Of course I am. But I don’t like things I don’t want to do, and a promise is a promise. So, as I said, even if you kill me, you won’t find the girl. Couldn’t you just let me go as well?"
Oliver spoke with sincerity, hoping that honesty would prevail.
However, it seemed Duncan took his words in a different way.
"Did you hand her over to those beggar bastards?"
"..."
Oliver slightly raised his eyebrows. How did he know?
Reading Oliver’s curiosity, Duncan explained first.
"When I heard you and the girl disappeared, I asked the police and the street gangs. I’ve been hearing rumors that beggars have formed a large organization recently."
"..."
"They say those rats use the sewers to run shady errands and eavesdrop here and there... Judging by your reaction, it seems I was right."
"..."
"I don’t know what ties you have with the girl, but now that I know where she is, there’s nothing to worry about... Shall we make a deal?"
"After killing you, I’ll wipe out all those beggar scum. That’s my specialty, after all, so don’t worry. The city will thank me for cleaning up those rats."
"Uh... That sounds pretty cruel. There are a lot of people among them."
"People? Beggars aren’t people."
As Duncan finished speaking, Oliver fired a Hate Bullet at his head.
Most people tend to react slower when talking, but Duncan, using his exceptional vision, blocked the bullet of hatred with his tonfa.
Not stopping there, he struck the ground with his other tonfa, sending debris flying at Oliver. As Oliver dodged the flying debris, Duncan used the opportunity to rush at him.
It was a real predicament.
His opponent possessed superior physical abilities, rapid reflexes, and now the overwhelming advantage of holy arts.
Fighting him was no different from facing a holy knight. Oliver had no idea how to deal with him.
‘But he’s using items, which means there’s a limit to how long he can keep this up.’
Assessing the situation, Oliver began to think of a way to win.
Dying now would be too wasteful, wouldn’t it?
Oliver quickly reviewed the emotions and life force he had left.
‘Emotions are still plentiful. But life force... I’m running low...’
Oliver glanced at the corpse of a fallen Pinkman. He needed to conserve life force.
Black Shield.
Oliver deployed a Black Shield to block Duncan’s attack.
Though it was only a single layer, it didn’t break like last time because Oliver had condensed it to increase its defensive power by reducing its range.
It was as though he had compressed a wide barrier into a disc.
The reduced defensive range was supplemented by reading Duncan’s emotions to predict the direction of his attacks, making it seem impressive, though it was an extremely dangerous method in reality.
If he misread the attack trajectory even once, he could die.
Duncan, apparently aware of this, grinned.
"You’re crazy!"
"Everyone says that about me. I don’t get it, though."
Oliver responded while blocking Duncan’s relentless attacks.
Duncan wielded the tonfa in both hands, thrusting, spinning, and striking from all angles without rest.
Not only was it fast and unpredictable, but each strike was so heavy that just blocking it consumed a considerable amount of emotions.
Oliver could even feel the air pressure from each swing. Continuing this battle of attrition was extremely dangerous.
So, Oliver took a risk and swung his emotion-charged quarterstaff.
‘Hit.’
Clang!
The decisive blow was blocked by Duncan’s tonfa.
Grinning, Duncan raised his other tonfa as if to erase his earlier humiliation and swung it down with all his might at Oliver’s quarterstaff.
He focused his magical power into his tonfa.
Wrath Boom.
Before Duncan’s tonfa could strike Oliver’s quarterstaff, Oliver used Wrath Boom.
The explosion erupted between Duncan’s arms, catching him off guard.
Duncan groaned as he slowly lowered his arms.
One of the tonfa that he had refused to let go of finally slipped from his grasp.
As Oliver bent down to pick up the fallen tonfa, Duncan quickly kicked it away, sending it flying several steps back.
Breathing heavily from the pain, Oliver still felt thankful.
This was exactly the situation he had been aiming for.
Oliver focused his eyes, quickly scanning his surroundings. He was so concentrated that it seemed as if time had slowed down. He saw Duncan, whose hands were burned and bleeding, take out his necklace to begin healing himself.
At that moment, Oliver used Targeting to snatch up the tonfa that had fallen to the ground. Afterward, he downed the last life force vial he had and used it to animate the surrounding Pinkman corpses.
Since he only needed to use them once, he gave them the bare minimum of life force to increase their numbers, then spent a significant amount of emotions to empower the zombies with black magic.
He had only one target—Duncan. So, he cast Object Hate on the zombies, ensuring they would attack only Duncan, and used Muscle Up to enhance their strength.
Thanks to that, Duncan quickly found himself surrounded by a dozen zombies.
Though Duncan had just finished healing, he didn’t panic. He swung his remaining tonfa with a whoosh—whoosh—whoosh!, taking down the approaching zombies one by one.
Of course, given his superhuman physical abilities, a mere dozen zombies weren’t enough to be a real threat, especially considering he could wield Holy Light.
Then, Oliver added more black magic to the zombies.
It was the same black magic he had used at the mansion—Blister.
With the incantation, purple blisters began to swell on the bodies of both the heavily and lightly damaged zombies.
Duncan sensed that something was wrong.
‘He’s not afraid of blades or bullets, but it seems he fears disease.’
As Oliver realized this, he immediately followed up with another spell.
Corpse Bomb.
It was the same black magic that had pierced through the druid’s bark armor. Even if Duncan could withstand the explosion with his strong magical armor, it was doubtful he could come out completely unscathed from the effects of Blister.
Duncan seemed to think the same, for he immediately used his item to cast another holy art.
Holy Light.
A radiant light enveloped the area, burning away the surrounding zombies and black magic.
The brilliance was blinding, and even now, it was as terrifying as ever.
"You really...”
Imprison.
Immediately after Duncan finished using his holy art, Oliver gathered all the remaining emotions he had and chanted.
Black emotions swirled together like mud, creeping towards Duncan before morphing into a large, amorphous mass that swallowed him right after his holy art ended.
It resembled a venus flytrap.
Caught off guard, Duncan tried to force it away by unleashing his magical power, even attempting to burn it away with holy art.
Though his resistance was fierce, Oliver had poured all his remaining emotions into Imprison, causing it to cling stubbornly to Duncan, burning but not vanishing easily.
"What the hell is this...!!”
Duncan shouted in panic, but before he could finish his sentence, Imprison engulfed him again.
His emotions were now a mix of confusion and fear, yet Oliver didn’t let his guard down.
The best Oliver’s Imprison could do was hold Duncan for a short while. If Duncan kept resisting, Imprison would eventually burn away first, and Oliver would be the one to die.
In this critical moment, Oliver had to find a way to turn the tide of this difficult battle.
‘But how?’
Oliver pondered.
Even though there was a limit to how many times Duncan could use the holy art-powered items, Oliver didn’t know how much longer they could last.
And he had no emotions left to fuel his black magic.
‘Should I pick up a rock and bash his head in? Or stab him with my quarterstaff?’
He considered resorting to simple physical attacks, but they didn’t seem promising either.
While he was deliberating, Imprison had almost completely worn out.
Unlike against magic, holy art resisted it strongly, causing Imprison to deplete rapidly. It was quite pathetic.
When Oliver had used it on Joanna, it had been able to resist even stronger holy arts without a problem.
Desperate, Oliver tried extracting his emotions once more, hoping something might come out in this dire situation, but, unfortunately, nothing emerged.
‘Why isn’t this working?’
As he wondered about the cause, Oliver looked at Duncan, who was still struggling against the now-shrunken Imprison.
‘For now, I need to extract something.’
With that thought, Oliver raised his hands into the air.
He then extracted a large amount of emotions and life force from Duncan.
Next, just as he had done when facing a previous magician, he poured those emotions back into Imprison, aiming to bind Duncan once again.
It was a fairly effective method in one-on-one fights. The opponent would usually collapse first.
However, this time there was a difference—Duncan used holy arts, and because of that, he was escaping even faster.
Realizing this, Oliver began extracting even more.
"You mosquito-like bastard...!!!”
Duncan shouted in fury.
But Oliver ignored his outburst and continued to increase the output.
‘This isn’t enough. I need more... more...! Even more...! Whatever I can get, I need more!’
In that instant, for the first time in his life, Oliver found he could extract something beyond emotions and life force.
He could extract magical power.