When Lin Jun began mustering the pujis at the bottom of the Dungeon, the fighting at the entrance had already reached a fever pitch.
Aside from the two engaged in fierce combat, the nearby elves had long since kept their distance.
One who hadn’t fled and hadn’t kept track of the battlefield was now a corpse—whoever’s attack had struck him is unknown—and the remaining elves could only wait at a distance for the clash to end.
After finding he could not fully counter Iros’s Dual Casting and being suppressed, Eko’s fighting style grew ever more aggressive.
He gambled with his own grievous wounds and managed to leave two gashes on Iros.
But that was all he achieved.
Though deep, those wounds meant little against the full-level [Nature Magic] restoration; they couldn’t truly hinder Iros.
As for Eko, he had taken heavy losses in both confrontations, and even with continued use of healing potions, he was gradually unable to hold out.
He knew he had only one final chance.
At the moment Eko moved at high speed, roots summoned by Iros burst from the earth and stalled his movement slightly.
Simultaneously, a scorching beam stored at the tip of the staff shot forth!
Faced with the lethal strike, Eko hurled his curved blade with all his strength.
The blade turned into a silver disc and flew straight at Iros’s face, but Iros was prepared: a huge vine he’d wrapped around himself snapped, using its severing as the price to deflect the thrown blade.
Losing a weapon would greatly reduce Eko’s combat effectiveness. Iros intended to end the fight quickly and retrieve the artifact, but the crisp clang of metal came from the direction the thrown blade had flown.
Iros turned—and a spinning silver blade had already pierced his shoulder!
His left arm flew off, falling to the ground together with the curved blade.
At that moment, the other curved blade in the air fell weakly to the ground.
“Ahhh! That… reckless fool!” someone cursed.
Iros had never expected that, when faced with the lethal beam, Eko would forgo keeping one blade to defend and instead strike the first deflected blade midair with his second, changing its trajectory to attack Iros.
The cost was…
When the dust settled, Eko was blackened all over, his breastplate melted into a dent, metal and flesh emitting a charred smell.
Iros couldn’t even be sure if Eko still had consciousness.
He staggered backward two steps and toppled down the Dungeon’s spiral. By the time Iros reached the edge, there was nothing to be seen.
Ignoring his severed hand, Eko’s twin blades had the “destruction” attribute—there was no reattaching them, and the two cuts across his body were only barely suppressed by continuous healing spells.
Now time was pressing. After a quick tourniquet and some emergency measures, Iros, pale-faced, dashed down to the lower levels.
After he left, the other elves, seeing the commotion finally subside, hurried over. They looked at the battlefield’s traces and the deserted Dungeon entrance in dumbfounded disbelief.
A search turned up only Eko’s twin blades and Iros’s severed arm.
“Could it be… mutual annihilation?” someone whispered.
If so—the King, the Chief Mage, and the Captain of the King’s Guard all dead in one day—this would be as if the sky had fallen for the elves.
In the end, the royal guards rushed back to report the dire situation to the Elf King’s daughter, Gelladriel, while the rangers entered the Dungeon to search for the missing two.
…
Three days later.
Because the great tree’s activity had grown sluggish and weak, the besieged ranger units finally began moving again.
They hadn’t gone far before they ran into the hurriedly descending Iros.
“Ma—master?” Saryan stared incredulously. He had never expected to meet Iros again in such a state.
Pale, hair disheveled, and most distressing—a sleeve hanging empty where the left arm should be; the arm was clearly gone.
“Saryan, you’re here too…” Iros murmured.
Another of Iros’s mage students stretched and craned his neck from within the crowd, but Iros didn’t seem to notice him.
“Saryan, I know you have much to say, but I must first retrieve the stolen artifact—do not stop me!”
“Stolen?!” Saryan recoiled. He didn’t wish to oppose his teacher; even at their worst, the teacher hadn’t tried to kill him, the disagreement was something that might yet be reconciled.
If everything had gone according to Iros’s plan, when they were released afterward, Saryan might grumble but accept the situation.
Hearing the artifact had been stolen and seeing his teacher thus, Saryan instinctively stepped back.
Not every elf, however, made way.
Eko’s lieutenant stepped before Iros, cold-eyed at the sight of the severed arm.
Although Eko had never told him about Iros’s conspiracy, the lieutenant had drawn his own conclusions.
“If I’m not mistaken, that wound was caused by the Captain’s curved blade?” he said.
At these words, all the rangers’ gazes focused on Iros’s severed limb.
They might not be able to discern the specifics of wounds, but they trusted their captain’s words.
“Chief, where is the Captain now?” the lieutenant asked, his hand resting on the curved blade at his waist. The sound of swords being drawn Ekoed nearby.
Iros gripped his staff, barely able to contain the fury rising within him. “You idiots! One after another! Can’t any of you just wait and not jump out to be a hindrance at a critical moment?”
Huge vines ripped up through the ranger formation, and magic, blades, shouts, and cries erupted into chaos.
When Iros finally reached the spiral center and the Divine Tree sapling, he bore several new wounds.
The deepest cut around his waist had been delivered by that lieutenant, who had been pierced through the chest by Iros’s branch.
Iros’s goal had only been to break out, not to slaughter the ranger unit—and not every ranger would dare unleash everything against the Chief. In the end, Iros escaped them and reached this place.
His magical mark disappeared here; there was no need to guess where the artifact had been taken. Whoever could hide in the Abyssal Chamber—there was a high chance they were the same person who freed Eko.
Iros felt he had been plotted against!
Everything seemed like a conspiracy—an unknown being had used him!
Even if he didn’t yet know who it was, the hatred in his heart had reached its peak.
So too had his dread.
The other’s strength might be inferior to his, but they were monstrously cunning—treacherous and unpredictable. Even if he himself could not take the artifact, it must not fall into that person’s hands!
He knew his condition was terrible—perhaps the weakest he’d been in a century. And ahead might be a trap.
But there was no choice. The bow had been loosed; there was no turning back—succeed or die!
For the Ark plan! For the future of the elves!
He arranged the ritual, layered himself with multiple tiered buff spells, then drank a stimulant potion to awaken the potential at his waist.
The potion’s jolt restored his stamina and reactivated his mana. Aside from the missing arm, Iros returned to his peak.
Time was short. With practiced speed he linked the magic circles, and in the next moment Iros arrived in the empty Abyssal Chamber.