Chapter 62

Hexi descended the stairs, cloak trailing behind her, and swept her gaze across the room. At that same moment, the wide-open doors of the audience chamber shut with a heavy thud, and countless orbs, like floating soap bubbles, appeared in the air.

The orbs drifted idly around Hexi, as though waiting for her command.

Lifting the royal scepter high with both hands, Hexi slowly closed her eyes and began to sing. Her crystalline voice filled the chamber, and the orbs rippled in waves, encircling her in time with the melody.

They looked like a school of fish deep under the sea, or like leaves caught in a fierce wind. As Hexi sang, she opened her eyes again. The gentle tune grew sharper, faster.

Reacting to the change, the orbs burst outward with wet pops, scattering across the chamber like exploding water balloons. From each orb, bursts of elemental magic rained down.

Players quickly drew their weapons and scrambled to respond. The mages countered with opposing elements, ranged fighters aimed at the distant orbs, and melee fighters smashed the ones closest at hand.

But no matter how many were destroyed, their numbers didn’t diminish. Instead, the more Hexi sang, the more orbs appeared. The higher and faster her voice rose, the stronger the barrage became.

As everyone fought frantically, a massive magic circle bloomed across the chamber floor. Nobody needed to check to know—it was Blaine’s work.

When the spell activated, the countless orbs and their relentless spells plummeted at once. The attacks vanished without a trace, and the orbs shattered under the crushing weight, littering the ground like shards of broken glass.

The once-chaotic chamber fell silent. Everyone breathed a sigh of relief thanks to Blaine. Even Hexi stopped singing, fixing calm eyes on him.

But then, raising the scepter even higher, Hexi resumed the song—and this time summoned more orbs than before, an overwhelming tide unlike anything in her usual patterns.

The sudden escalation left everyone stunned, their breath caught. Blaine alone stayed unshaken. He unleashed another gravity spell, creating a gravitational field at the center of the chamber. The orbs were sucked inward as if drawn into a vortex.

Blaine cast a wide-area spell over the field, crushing countless orbs at once.

“Fufufu.”

Hexi chuckled. Despite losing her orbs twice, she covered her mouth and laughed like it pleased her. Then, singing again, she began conducting with the royal scepter itself.

The melody grew sharper, faster still.

As orbs scattered in every direction, Blaine didn’t bother shattering them. Instead, he bound them together with gravity. Destroying them was pointless when Hexi could simply summon more—it would only waste his cooldowns. The smarter play was to bind them as long as possible to create an opening for an attack on Hexi.

When the orbs were pinned midair, Hexi looked momentarily unsettled. Within the gravity field, even their magic attacks were useless, crushed and snuffed out by the pressure.

Seeing this, several melee fighters charged straight at Hexi. Only a handful of orbs hovered at her side, hardly enough to be a threat. But just as the fighters reached her, Hexi smiled—as if she’d never been flustered at all—and summoned a storm of orbs to shield herself.

The melee fighters slammed on the brakes and tried to retreat, but they couldn’t dodge the sudden rain of attacks. Most took heavy damage or collapsed on the spot, incapacitated.

Theo and Aslan barely managed to escape the barrage. Heart pounding from the close call, they hurried to down potions. Behind them, Blaine, still binding the orbs, and the ranged fighters supporting from the rear looked rattled as well.

They had no choice but to hold on until the fallen players respawned and fled the chamber. Only then could the survivors regroup for another attempt.

“That damned scepter needs to be smashed.”

Aslan muttered while glaring at the royal scepter in Hexi’s hand. Without it, Hexi couldn’t control the orbs. Once the scepter was broken, the next phase would begin with him taking up the orb.

Normally, nobody could so much as lay a finger on Hexi during Phase One. But with Blaine’s gravity magic, things should have been different. Even so, Hexi wasn’t going down so easily.

Hexi was a boss that learned. She stole the most troublesome or dangerous attacks used against her. That meant once Phase Two started, Blaine’s gravity magic would be useless.

The strategy against Hexi was simple in theory: break her regalia in order—scepter, orb, crown—to obtain the relics, and prevent the seal on the fourth regalia, the holy sword, from being undone.

“…”

Theo, silently watching Hexi encircled by freshly summoned orbs, sank into thought. Then, cloaking himself in a veil, he stepped forward.

“I think I can handle Phase One.”

“What?”

Aslan asked in surprise, but Theo didn’t stop. Dodging the orbs’ attacks aimed at him, he leapt past Hexi. On his seventh step, black darkness surged behind him, rising like a curtain. Turning briefly to confirm the veil, he took another step forward. The veil rippled like mist, then exploded outward, annihilating everything around it.

The orbs surrounding Hexi were obliterated, and even the scepter in her hand.

The scepter shattered to pieces in an instant, and Hexi let out a piercing scream. Her now-empty hands trembled violently.

At the same time, a relic appeared in one of the supporting pillars of the chamber, and a great chain dropped diagonally from ceiling to floor, embedding itself into the ground.

Shaken from the loss of the scepter, Hexi checked the chain. Then, regaining her composure, she climbed the dais with renewed majesty and stood before the altar.

Upon it still rested the crown and orb. Hexi took up the orb and turned. Everyone expected her to steal Blaine’s gravity magic. Yet Hexi only shifted her gaze between Blaine and Theo, wary of the terrifying veil attack Theo had unleashed earlier.

The hesitation was brief. In the end, Hexi stole Blaine’s gravity magic.

Blaine had been warned by Theo and Aslan that his magic would be taken, but actually experiencing it left him unsettled. His action slots for gravity magic were now bound by chains.

[Party] [Theo: Blaine, are you okay?]

Theo’s voice came from afar. Blaine, staring blankly at the chained slots, quickly raised his head and forced a smile at Theo. Relieved, Theo nodded back.

Blaine might have said he was fine, but inside he worried. Without gravity magic, would he be of any use to Theo at all?

Meanwhile, Hexi hummed softly and poured her mana into the orb. Then, hugging it to her chest like a partner, she began to dance.

Her graceful steps made her dress flow and twirl. Entranced by her dreamlike movements, no one noticed the shape forming above her head.

Only when the colossal figure fully manifested, filling the chamber to the ceiling, did they finally look up.

The towering shadow of the figure darkened the entire chamber.

“Heuk—”

A sharp gasp broke out.

Behind Hexi, the upper body of a massive woman knelt with both hands pressed to the ground. Her eyes were closed, her skin smooth like a mannequin’s, her head slightly bowed as if the ceiling were too low for her.

It was Hexi’s mana, given form through the orb.

The woman-shaped figure let out a grinding sound as she raised her enormous hand. Then she swung it toward the melee fighters, Theo and Aslan among them.

Startled players scrambled to throw up shields, and Aslan planted his sword into the ground to defend. But the impact couldn’t be absorbed completely. Everyone was knocked back, rolling across the floor with groans.

Hexi didn’t stop. The massive hand came sweeping in, edge first, as if to scrape the floor clean. Aslan rushed to his feet and tried to block again, but before he realized it, the palm loomed right in front of him.

A chill certainty told him he couldn’t stop it. He shut his eyes tightly, bracing for the blow. But the crushing pain never came. Instead, a violent gust pressed against his back.

Opening his eyes in confusion, he saw a wind spell holding back the massive hand. Turning, he spotted Blaine, staff Via Lactea in his grasp.

“Move, now!”

Theo’s thunderous shout snapped Aslan out of his daze. He scrambled back, widening the distance between himself and Hexi.

Hexi’s gaze shifted to Blaine. With a slight frown, she poured more mana into the orb. The already massive figure began to grow larger, bones cracking and stretching grotesquely as the body expanded. The sheer sound of it made everyone’s skin crawl.

The body swelled unnaturally, filling the chamber until it could no longer be contained. The ceiling shattered under its bulk, rubble crashing down as players scattered to avoid being crushed.

Bathed in sunlight streaming through the ruined ceiling, the empowered figure loomed behind Hexi, stretching out its ever-lengthening hand toward Blaine.