Chapter 144 - Lumen, Asirante (1)
Chapter 144 – Lumen, Asirante (1)
I’ve never thought about it. Fighting against myself?
Of course, I’ve often been told that I have to win against myself.
That’s what they mention in real life. But that doesn’t mean that one must fight against themselves physically. It refers to things such as one’s New Year’s resolution, or some imaginary fight related to one’s will, for example, determination to overcome one’s laziness, greed or desire that has always stood in the way of their success.
But this is an arena where I have fought a total of 49 users or NPCs until now and beaten them all. In other words, it’s a real, not imaginary, fight.
Of course, it was a quest anyway, so all I had to do was beat my opponent regardless of who they were. But what if my opponent is me?
At that moment, my body trembled because I was fully aware of my strength.
It would be most stupid for someone to not realise their own strength.
In short, I’m extremely strong. So much so that others might think me arrogant or conceited even if I slightly wave at them.
But the problem was I was supposed to fight against myself one on one in Round 50.
At that moment, I could not help but feel dizzy because I had never imagined an enemy as strong as myself, and I never expected that I myself would appear as my own enemy.
However, as if I didn’t care about my disturbed mind, I left the waiting room before being sucked into the arena like before.
Inside the arena.
It was as if I was looking at myself in a mirror. However, I could review my surprise or embarrassment here by viewing the Memory Bead recording later, so I started attacking immediately.
“Ice Field! Multiple Thin Ice!”
Pasa Sasak!
Pitter-patter! Pitter-patter!
Based on my experiences of fighting 49 users and NPCs up until now, I realized that an NPC fought much better than an inexperienced user.
First of all, NPCs did everything they could in battle.
Unlike the users, they were not even embarrassed, nor did they get cold feet at the huge gap in power.
So, I quickly laid the Ice Field and Multiple Thin Ice before Lumen, Asirante appeared in the form of my enemy NPC. But I had no choice but to swear right away because Lumen, Asirante, my replica, would also be buffed by the icy terrain.
Of course, since I used the Ice Field, It should inflict some damage on my replica.
But Lumen, Asirante, my NPC opponent just stood there blankly.
‘Damn it! Isn’t Iceman a scam?’
My Iceman trait provided an option of perfect immunity against frostbite.
I’ve made good use of it until now because reducing the enemy’s movement speed meant that I, heavily armed with AOE attacks, was in a favorable position to defeat the enemy easily.
That’s why I have kept my passive frostbite skill.
But my enemy Lumen, Asirante, was completely immune to frostbite. Besides, in addition to increasing the power of all ice-type skills, “Icemman” also had such a good option that reduced damage from opposing ice-type skills by 30%.
“…”
I’ve taken things like that for granted rather than treating them as something special.
When I was faced with them from the other side, I immediately thought this was a scam.
I even felt sorry for the numerous enemies I faced because they must have felt the same as what I was feeling right now.
I especially could not forget Soktae Kang, the former leader of the Gahwa Guild, who died venting extreme anger and frustration while shouting, ‘Damn unbalanced game! I’ll never play it again.!’
[Ice Field! Multiple Thin Ice!]
Of course, my enemy NPC replica Lumen, Asirante didn’t sit idle in the face of my attack.
Like me, he also laid down the same Ice Field and Multiple Thin Ice.
But I didn’t use the same skills like him this time because I had the skills that he possessed, or his skills were originally mine.
Anyway, without moving one step from the place I was, I launched a series of attacks against him, starting with AOE skills because they had a long cooldown.
“Ice Storm! Ice Rain!”
Whuynnnnnnnng!
When I used two AOE skills at the same time, a tremendous snow storm occurred.
But my attack fell flat because he used an indispensable skill of mine, Blink with zero cooldown.
[Blink! Blink!]
As if he has been using it all the time, Lumen, Asirante used it against me naturally.
Honestly, I felt rather frustrated by his Blink.
So, I swore before I knew it, “Damn it! That’s the skill I won by pushing myself so far!”
Of course, I didn’t go through so many hardships to obtain it. In fact, there were a total of 14 active skills in my skill window right before Blink was chosen and the skill to have its cooldown removed.
And there were some skills like Ice Ball and Ice Bolt that had a very short cooldown. Anyway, at that time I had to go through a tremendous mental distress because if something like Ice Ball or Ice Bolt was selected to have its cooldown removed, it would have been a huge loss for me.
So, when Lumen, Asirante used Blink, which I spent numerous efforts to obtain, and which became my trademark, I could not help but feel upset.
[Ice Ball! Ice Bolt!]
Anyway, my enemy Lumen, Asirante escaped my AOE skills using Blink with zero cooldown.
Then he immediately used the lowest level skills on me.
Of course, I could endure such an attack without avoiding it because it was a low rank skill.
Moreover, I also have complete immunity to frostbite.
However, as I felt a bit upset and frustrated, I immediately dodged using Blink.
Then I immediately used a different AOE skill, Pouring Hail, on my replica.
But, as expected, he escaped from Pouring Hail’s range using Blink.
“Son of a bitch!”
At that moment, I hurled abuses again because I thought his action was mean and nasty.
I even felt it ridiculous that he would continue to fight me like this.
I have played various games so far, but this was the first time I had seen the balance of the game messed up. So, I wanted to find this game’s administrator and pick a fight with him.
I wanted to argue with him over the validity of this game.
Of course, I tried to calm down as much as I could.
Excitement sometimes served as the source of victory, but most of the time it ended up being the source of defeat. But I could hardly calm down because of the fact that my victory was just around the corner.
I didn’t want to collapse here when victory was within my reach.
Moreover, if I was defeated here, I would feel really bad, being gloomy over the fact I lost to myself.
So, I desperately did my best to beat my enemy, who was myself.
While Juyoung Hong was busy fighting against himself, his father and Director Sok held a meeting in the Myongjin Group chairman’s office.
Director Insu Sok said to Chairman Sangman Hong, “Currently, people are paying a lot of attention to Juyoung, or Asirante.”
“Hmm… Eventually, the pointed awl that you try to hide in your pocket will pierce through anyway. Moreover, no one expected that Korea would win first place in the 4th Anniversary event.”
Chairman Hong never thought that he would worry about this kind of stuff because of his smart son. But it was fact that his son was way too smart. So much so that even if he stayed put, there would still be endless rumors about him because of his ID Asirante.
And some of the rumors were quite dangerous.
Of course, Chairman Hong could understand why. Honestly, Chairman Hong would also think of doing something inhumane to Asirante if it were not his son in order to make him his subordinate.
“How about protecting Juyoung from any harm?” asked Chaiman Hong.
“We’re maintaining tight security around him,” replied Director Sok immediately.
“Good. Keep protecting him like before. Any sudden overprotection can invite others’ suspicion.”
“Got it, sir!”
As usual, the chairman wrapped up the day’s work with some concern about his son’s safety who had become an excellent man like his late father and his predecessor predicted.
At Ferrero Castle’s arena.
Pop! Pop! Bang! Bang!
The duels in the arena didn’t last all day long. There was a set time by which the fight was declared as a draw if it had not concluded by then, regardless of who had more health remaining. And a draw was not included in the winning streak. It just didn’t count toward defeat.
So, I persistently attacked my NPC enemy.
Although it was only a one win difference, there was a big difference between 49 and 50 consecutive wins than one might think.
Fortunately, something good came out of this. Unlike the first time my enemy NPC replica Lumen, Asirante, used Blink constantly to stay on the defensive, he began to attack me aggressively as if he did not want a draw.
He attacked me more frequently, and whenever he did, I could not help but be surprised because it hurt.