Chapter 25: Everything I Have (2)

“Ah, no! I barely regained this life. Not here… not like this!”

“Then shut your mouth until I tell you to open it, unless you want to die.”

“First, let’s dispel your lackeys up there.”

“What…?” “Oh, and block the entrance down here with the White Ghost Lee Mooki.”

I didn’t want Choi Jinho or the 4 Trillion Squad to see me talking to the lich.

“Of course, just block the entrance. Don’t order it to attack.”

“This death-seeking madman… For Archmage Iratu to take orders from a mere human who isn’t even his contractor…”

“Shall I smash it?”

I checked the navigation.

The red dots that had filled the boss room had vanished, leaving only one White Ghost Lee Mooki, positioned at the central entrance to the altar leading below.

As expected, he’s listening now that his life is on the line.

The skeletal wizard narrowed his eyes, a grim expression on his face.

“Alright, then, first…”

Speaking to the lich, I opened my mouth, my left arm holding the urn of bones securely against my side.

“Hand over everything you’ve got.”

“What are you talking about?”

Had he not understood? Impossible. His Current Status Window’s real-time translator was clearly active.

Crunch!

Just as I thought.

The lich narrowed his eyes and spat out his words.

“Hand over everything…? Are you, a mere commoner, daring to threaten this body with such vulgar, lowly language?”

“Uh, is that supposed to be a threat?”

“I am Iratu, seeker of death! How dare a mere human!”

“Then I’ll break it.”

With a sullen expression, I raised the urn of ashes high in the air.

Just as I was about to slam it down, the lich’s jawbone snapped open in desperate urgency.

“Isn’t it pointless…?”

“Pointless?”

“Even if I surrender everything, you’ll destroy me in the end, won’t you?”

“Ah.”

Normally, that would be true.

Now that the Demon Sealing Cave had fully transformed into a true dungeon, we couldn’t escape until we defeated the boss, the lich.

But.

With a smirk, I replied,

“There’s another way, you know.”

“Just one way?”

“To take you as my subordinate. That would still count as dealing with the boss, and the path to the outside would open. Of course, you’d save your life as well.”

“Th-that…”

The creature ground its teeth, snapping, “Don’t lie! You dare void our life-and-death contract and try to forge another with me? How could a mere human like you possibly manage that?!”

“Impossible for an ordinary human, perhaps. But does this look like an ordinary human to you?”

”!”

“Do you really think some ordinary human could have found the Screaming Cave hidden beneath the boss room? Or climbed all the way down here to argue with you?”

“It… it’s impossible.”

“That’s right. I’m a being far beyond your comprehension.”

He balanced the jar containing the lich’s remains on his fingertips, spinning it as he spoke.

“Which means I can break our existing contract and form a new one with you.”

“Is it truly possible for you to wield such high-grade necromancy? If so, prove it…”

“Prove it?”

He tilted his head, repeating the question.

“Destroying this would be far less troublesome than proving anything to you.”

“No. This body has overstepped its bounds.”

The lich hastily nodded its skull.

“Yes, your power is real. The high-level Fireball spell, which should be impossible for a 1st-circle caster, and your instant detection of this body’s Sacred Relic.”

“Well, well.”

“Only an Archmage of at least the tenth circle, who has mastered all magic, could accomplish such a feat.”

“Moreover, considering he speaks the language of a dead empire fluently…”

“No, that’s utterly impossible.”

“I’m likely the only one like this on the entire planet.”

“Now that you understand, hand over everything you have.”

“Fine, for you, you…”

“And you’re addressing me incorrectly. You should call me ‘Master’.”

The Lich’s eyes flickered with rage.

But what could he do?

He slouched forward, approached me, and bowed his head.

From within his robes, he produced a fist-sized, violet stone.

‘Isn’t that the Lich’s heart?’

Even hunting a Lich yields less than a 5% chance of obtaining this ultra-rare byproduct.

Unsurprisingly, it’s one of the most highly sought-after items at auctions, commanding exorbitant prices.

Though his lips smiled, his eyes glared at the Lich with undisguised dissatisfaction.

He couldn’t afford to show his satisfaction just yet.

“N-no, of course, this isn’t all.”

The Lich hastily produced the next item: the bones of his right arm, disassembled at the elbow.

“This… isn’t much either, but it might be useful to the master.”

The Lich’s corrupted hand.

This material reduces the Mana cost of the [ Summon Skeleton ] skill, making it an essential component for crafting staves or accessories for necromancy hunters.

Only then did he nod and open his mouth.

“Next.”

“Next…?”

“There’s more, isn’t there?”

“No, there’s nothing more I can offer my master.”

“Really?”

I pointed to the lich’s remaining hand.

“What about that?”

“This…? N-no way.”

The lich’s eyes narrowed as he recognized what I was pointing at.

“You don’t mean… you’re demanding my staff?!”

Truthfully, this was a shot in the dark.

The skull staff the lich held wasn’t classified as an item, but as a part of its body.

Naturally, when a lich is exterminated, the staff turns to dust and disappears, making it impossible to loot.

So, if it didn’t work out, no harm done.

I figured it was worth a shot, thinking I’d hit the jackpot if it worked.

“This staff… it’s been with me since the beginning, since I first became known as the seeker of Mountain Blood. I just can’t… how can I let it go?”

See that?

Judging by Lich’s words, he clearly could give it to me, but he just didn’t want to.

Well, that changes everything.

“Hand it over.”

“Ah, you fiendish bastard…! Did you have to go that far…?”

“What?”

“Ah, no… here… take it.”

I grabbed the end of the staff he offered and tugged.

“Loosen your grip.”

After some initial resistance, the staff yielded without further struggle.

I nodded, stroking the smooth, silver skull part.

“Good. Now there’s only one thing left.”

“What nonsense! This body doesn’t have a single hair left!”

“You know, the sacrifice the contractor made to summon you.”

If you possess an S-rank item called ‘Cremation Coffin of a Dead Wraith,’ even a B-rank hunter could theoretically summon a lich.

However, using a lich as a summon is internationally prohibited.

The primary reason is, of course, that it’s the only summon that sacrifices human bodies as offerings.

The lich’s gaze narrowed.

“Sacrifice… is that so.”

“To forge a new contract, we must sever the old one. To do that, we need to destroy the offering that links you to your previous contractor.”

“Is that… so?”

“Indeed. Surely a Lich as capable as you wouldn’t find it difficult to understand?”

He spoke with the smooth fluidity of a seasoned orator, subtly stroking the lich’s ego.

In response, the lich’s gaze flickered upward.

“Hmph. Of course it is. Destroying the soul-linking medium is the fundamental step to sever a contract—a procedure any child would know.”

A small dimensional portal materialized beside the lich.

From it, he retrieved something and presented it to me.

“This is the offering the contractor sacrificed to summon me.”

“Throw it. I don’t want it getting too close to me.”

Swish.

What I caught was a human index finger.

I openly wrinkled my nose.

Though it was pale white, drained of blood,

receiving a severed finger wasn’t exactly pleasant.

Pinching it between my thumb and index finger, I asked:

“Is this the Contractor’s finger?”

In other words, he wasn’t a high-ranking Hunter who had mastered necromancy.

Moreover, since he had sacrificed only a single finger, it was somewhat understandable how the Lich had slipped out of control and rampaged so wildly.

After all, the bond between a summoner and this type of familiar strengthens in proportion to the value of the sacrifice made.

Perhaps if I’d given up more than just an arm, I would never have revealed myself, as the Contractor commanded.

I nodded and asked again, “Do you know anything about the Contractor’s face or personal details?”

“I don’t. When this body was summoned, the Contractor’s face was veiled. The summoning itself occurred right here.”

Nodding, I slipped my fingers into my suit. Just as I did, the lich spoke again:

“I have given everything I could give. Now it is your turn to fulfill your promise.”

“Ah, yes. But before that, I have one question.”

“What is it?”

“About your skeleton soldiers…”

“Ugh, hmm?”

I abruptly stopped speaking and quietly stared at Lich. His eyes nervously darted back and forth.

With a cold, steely voice, I asked, “Why did you summon them again?”

“W-what?!”

Lich’s jaw dropped.

“H-how did you…”

That’s right. He had summoned his forces back into the boss room where Choi Jinho and the other 4 trillion were still trapped. He must have thought I had no way of knowing what was happening down here in the boss room.

I pushed the 3D dungeon map aside and spoke. “Were you planning to stab me in the back while I was busy making a new contract?”

His intentions were obvious. He was waiting for the moment I focused solely on forging a new pact to strike.

The Lich had attempted to turn the tables by holding the remaining team members and Choi Jinho hostage.

“N-no, that’s not it! Master, oh, you’ve misunderstood!”

“Oh?”

“Yes! How could this humble being even conceive of such an impious act?”

The skeletal mage vigorously waved his remaining arm in denial.

I nodded with a wry smile.

“Well, I suppose you have a point. After all, you wouldn’t know how I plan to break our current contract and forge a new one, would you?”

“Ha ha! Exactly, Master! Your words are wise!”

“But the important thing is…”

“Hmm?”

“I don’t know either.”

”?”

The Lich froze in stunned silence.

“What nonsense is that?”

“I don’t know either. I don’t know how to break your contract, or how to make a new one.”

“If I were that skilled in those arts, I would have become a necromancer long ago and lived well.”

“Even the Nine Heavens Bone King, the hero of the Great Change and legendary necromancer, probably didn’t know.”

The lich stared at me with frozen eyes, as if denying reality.

Slowly, his gaze drifted to the staff clenched in my hand.

He looked at the heart and severed right arm lying on the ground.

Then,

The lich’s jaw dropped as he realized the truth.

“That filthy human! How dare you deceive this body…!”

But just as a sinister aura began flowing from his body, about to engulf me,

“We both tricked each other, so it’s even.”

With a bright smile, I tossed the urn in my hand to the ground.

“But I wasn’t fooled.”

“Aah—!”

A deathly shriek.

Crash!

But the shattering crash as the urn shattered drowned out the scream.

Pottery shards flew in all directions, and a pitch-black miasma spread rapidly.

“No, it can’t be. After eons of waiting, I seized this chance. How could I be tricked by such a mere human…?”

The Lich, who had been lunging at me, cried out in a voice dripping with despair, his words cut short mid-sentence.

Swish.

He was sucked into a dimensional portal that opened beneath him, vanishing without even finishing his anguished scream.

The broken Sacred Relic on the floor disintegrated into a pile of dark ash, settling into a heap.

“Phew.”

After confirming the Lich’s obliteration, I picked up his heart and hand bones, which lay on the ground, and stretched.

“Well, time to head back.”

Just then.

Suddenly, the navigation window that had been hovering in the corner of my vision lit up.

“Huh?”

A star-shaped mark was flickering where the Sacred Relic had been.

Come to think of it, the lich had mentioned this place being a hidden location, the Howling Cavern, within the dungeon. In that case, it wouldn’t be strange for a special hidden item to exist.

Soon, a noticeably distinct area on the map caught my eye, as if something was buried there.

Crack!

I began digging at the spot with the skull staff in my hand. Not long after, I felt something snag on the end of the staff.

Between the pitch-black soil, a sharp tip of something protruded slightly.

Carefully, I pulled it out.

“A crystal?”

The crystal was suspiciously dark, almost jet-black.

It was about the size of a Bluetooth earphone case, and its shape resembled a pyramid. Other than that, there were no other discernible features.

As this happened, the chat window beside me began to flicker excitedly.

“Let’s use the Item Analyzer!”

“That’s what I was thinking.”

I already had the Item Analyzer window open.

But.

“Huh?”

The line of text that appeared in the analysis window was completely unexpected.