Chapter 199: Even Nightmares Must Die (1)

—Ethan’s POV—

“Monster! YOU’RE A MONSTER!!”

Aldrich screamed, his eyes trembling with terror as he crawled backward on all fours, desperately trying to put some distance between us.

He looked as though he had just come face-to-face with the Grim Reaper himself, as though he had witnessed the very embodiment of death.

As for me, I was utterly bewildered, unable to make sense of what was happening.

That bastard had used the same filthy ability he had employed to bring down the Golden Dawn Knight. His attempt had succeeded, and I hadn’t possessed any means of stopping him.

My body should have collapsed and become his puppet, something he could control and manipulate however he pleased.

But that hadn’t happened.

I flexed the fingers of my hand, then took a step forward. My body responded perfectly, without the slightest difficulty, confirming that I was still in complete control.

Unfortunately, that sudden movement only intensified the fear in Aldrich’s eyes.

“STAY AWAY FROM ME! DON’T COME ANY CLOSER!!”

He screamed, mistaking the step I had taken for an attempt to approach him.

I remained silent for a while, studying his face and the uncontrollable trembling of his grotesque body.

‘What the hell is going on?’

What exactly had he seen to leave him so utterly terrified?

I didn’t know the answer, but I received something resembling a clue when a sharp, stinging sensation spread across the back of my neck.

The Bloody Eclipse mark was burning.

An intense heat radiated from the tattoo as Luna’s seal activated around it, struggling to restrain whatever was stirring beneath its surface.

The Beloved by Darkness Curse was forcibly awakening.

For a brief moment, my heart sank at the realization, but I quickly forced myself to focus on the enemy in front of me. There was no point worrying about a curse I couldn’t do anything about.

“It’s strange, being called a monster by an actual monster… I don’t know what you saw or experienced when you tried to take over my body, but I know you failed. And that’s why you’re cowering in front of me like a coward.”

I stared down at the trembling Aldrich with a mixture of hatred and contempt.

He was nothing more than a vile, worthless creature whose only real value lay in his ability to possess powerful beings.

And now that his greatest ability had failed against me, he seemed utterly insignificant.

Raising the Executioner’s Sword, I decided it was time to put an end to the filthy creature’s life.

“Just die already.”

I brought the sword down with all my strength, reinforcing my body with Aura Armor as I delivered the blow.

Aldrich saw the attack coming, and his survival instincts immediately took over.

He raised his long arms above his head, crossing them into an X, and managed to block my attack after reinforcing his limbs with a strange shroud of darkness.

When my sword struck his black skin, it didn’t feel as though I was trying to cut through flesh and bone.

It felt more like striking a solid rod of metal.

“You might be nothing but a coward, but you’re still a Saint-level monster… Even trash is annoyingly difficult to kill in this world.”

Tightening my grip around the Executioner’s Sword, I brought my mechanical hand onto the hilt as well. The Legion Arm added five points to my Strength stat, allowing me to put considerably more force behind the attack.

Aldrich resisted, screaming all the while.

He managed to withstand the pressure of my sword, but he was so terrified that he seemed to have lost his mind. He didn’t even attempt to launch a counterattack.

Seeing him behave that way made me change my approach.

“If you’re just going to defend yourself, that makes things a lot easier for me.”

Instead of trying to force my sword through his crossed arms, I began swinging it rapidly, unleashing a succession of strikes from different angles.

Naturally, attacking at such speed meant sacrificing some of the force behind each blow, and Aldrich’s body was irritatingly tough.

No matter how much weight I put behind the Executioner’s Sword, he managed to block the attacks with his limbs alone. The only damage I could inflict amounted to a handful of shallow cuts across his body.

Dirty black blood, resembling some kind of poison, began seeping from those wounds. One drop after another fell to the ground, leaving dark stains beneath his feet.

The damage was negligible. Through Wise Raven Insight, I could see that Aldrich’s HP bar had barely decreased.

But dealing damage had never been my real objective.

I was after something else entirely.

By the time my tenth consecutive strike connected without any retaliation, I felt the corners of my mouth rising on their own.

I realized I was wearing a wicked grin.

“You’re bleeding, Aldrich. That filthy blood of yours proves that even these pathetic little attacks managed to hurt you. Which means…”

Overcharge: 10/10

The Legion Arm’s third ability activated at its maximum output.

The condition for Overcharge was simple: land consecutive successful strikes against an enemy without taking any damage in return.

If Aldrich had managed to hit me even once, the accumulated Overcharge would have collapsed and reset to zero.

But thanks to his overwhelming fear, he hadn’t even tried.

And now, I could finally unleash the Legion Arm’s most powerful ability.

An enormous amount of lightning began gathering around my mechanical fist, accompanied by a sharp, violent crackling that filled the surrounding air.

The electricity initially glowed yellow before rapidly shifting to light blue, then deep violet, and finally…

Dark crimson.

This was the absolute pinnacle of the electrical power the Legion Arm could produce.

“THIS IS GOING TO HURT LIKE HELL!!”

I roared as I unleashed the crimson lightning directly at Aldrich.

The resulting electrical explosion produced a deafening roar, like thunder crashing overhead as a monstrous storm descended upon the battlefield.

Crimson lightning erupted from my mechanical arm, slithering through the air like a nest of crackling serpents before striking Aldrich’s body in several places at once.

The overwhelming power tore into him with devastating force.

The monster screamed, releasing a horrifying, bestial howl that conveyed the sheer agony of having those lightning serpents strike him directly.

They gouged deep holes into his chest and shoulders, then tore through his legs and face. The destruction was so severe that even his long, plague-mask-like beak shattered completely.

It was a truly brutal sight.