Solo Leveling: Ragnarok - Chapter 152
Chapter 152
Aaaaah!
Hwang Dong-seok.
His soul was weeping blood tears in the darkness, screaming in agony.
His entire body, except for his face, was bound in chains stained with blood.
The chains not only wrapped around his body but also pierced through his soul, with their ends taking root.
These chains were the curse of punishment Harumakan had engraved on Hwang Dong-seok’s soul, the prison of sin where he was to be trapped for eternity, even after death.
Aaaaah…!
Hwang Dong-seok was wailing in pain.
There was no escape from this infinite torment for his soul.
All he could do was just.
Scream.
Wail.
Suffer.
Grind his teeth in this hellish prison that wrung his soul to its limits, weeping blood tears.
It was then.
-Arise.
At last, a voice of salvation calling his soul came from above.
Hwang Dong-seok lifted his head, tears of blood streaming down.
Crack.
At that moment, the chains broke.
The curse of Harumakan that seemed eternal was scattering.
His limbs were freed.
Hwang Dong-seok rose to his feet.
But.
Aaaaah…!
The blood tears flowing from his eyes did not stop.
The chains of the curse were broken, but the prison of sin that had confined him still strangled his soul.
The armor of evil spirits.
The curse of the Death Knight, specially crafted by Harumakan to imprison evil spirits.
Even though the chains were broken, this armor still wrung Hwang Dong-seok’s soul to the extreme, inflicting terrible pain.
However, for a Death Knight, pain is power itself.
Ironically, the more pain Hwang Dong-seok felt, the stronger the armor he wore became.
Therefore…
[Shadow Slave Soldier Lv.1]
Elite Rank
Hwang Dong-seok’s soul, clad in the armor of evil spirits, rose from the shadows, tears of blood streaming down.
Although he became a shadow soldier, the pain he felt remained, and more soldiers like him, tormented by evil spirits, gradually increased.
[Shadow Slave Soldier Lv.1]
[Shadow Slave Soldier Lv.1]
[Shadow Slave Soldier Lv.1]
……
Aaaaah!
Full-body armor rippling with black mist.
From the mouths of dozens of Death Knights wearing the armor of evil spirits created by Harumakan, terrible screams erupted.
It was a cry of pain and, at the same time, a roar of anger towards Harumakan, who had forced them into such dreadful armor.
“Attack, all forces.”
At that moment, Suho’s command was issued to them.
[Aaaargh!]
[Aaaaaaargh~!]
Harumakan was forced into confusion by their ferocious attacks, rushing in one after another.
“This, this can’t be…!”
Harumakan hastily summoned ghosts to counter their attacks.
Swoosh!
As he pulled out Vulcan’s horn embedded in his body, blood spurted out.
With that blood, Harumakan formed hand seals in the air and chanted a curse.
“Evil spirits who dare to rebel against me! May you all be cursed!”
In that moment, the stench of blood spread all around him.
[The Great Chieftain of the Demon Spirits, Harumakan, uses ‘Skill: Damage Amplification’.]
[Increases the damage taken by those who are cursed.]
[Even ordinary attacks will cause critical wounds.]
‘Damage Amplification?’
Suho’s gaze sharpened as system messages continued to appear.
Harumakan’s curse had been applied to all the shadow soldiers.
Consequently, the attacks of the ghosts he commanded began to inflict much greater damage on the shadow soldiers.
At the same time, Harumakan unleashed a new curse.
“Let this place become the land of death!”
[The Great Chieftain of the Demon Spirits, Harumakan, uses ‘Skill: Exploitation’.]
[Harumakan recovers 2% of his health for the damage he inflicts on the opponent.]
Whoosh!
With each attack the ghosts made on the shadow soldiers, the wounds Harumakan had suffered from Vulcan’s horn began to heal rapidly.
Beru exclaimed in admiration at the astonishing sight.
[My lord! This one is proficient in curses!]
“Indeed. Quite the combination he has.”
Should he be called the great chieftain of a tribe?
A curse that amplifies damage and then absorbs a portion of that amplified damage.
It was quite an annoying combination.
However.
“It means nothing to me.”
Suho thoughtfully smiled as he looked at the messages that appeared before him.
[Curse detected.]
[Starting to dispel with the effect of ‘Blessing: Longevity’.]
[3, 2, 1… Dispelling completed.]
Whoosh!
The curse that Harumakan had placed on Suho’s body was washed away in an instant.
The blessing ‘Immortality’ received from the great sorcerer of the demon spirits, Candiaru, has overcome the curse of Harumakan, the great chieftain of the demon spirits.
“It’s clear who is the greater of the two.”
At the same time, Harumakan also noticed this fact and looked at Suho with an expression filled with astonishment.
“Candiaru’s blessing?! You are indeed related to the Shadow Monarch! Could you possibly be his successor!”
Initially shocked, Harumakan soon licked his lips with a greedy look towards Suho.
“Kuhuhu! What a windfall! I thought I only had losses today, but to think I would discover such precious research material!”
In that moment.
Whoosh!
All the ghosts swirling around Harumakan were sucked in towards him.
Along with that, Harumakan’s presence began to grow increasingly immense before Suho.
Rumble!
[The Great Chieftain of the Demon Spirits, Harumakan, manifests.]
“……!”
Harumakan had emerged from the body of the village chief of Yamiri, which he had been possessing, revealing his true form!
[Aaaaah!]
[Aaaaaaaah!]
At that moment, the Death Knights and shadow slave soldiers, freed from the ghosts, burst forth with explosive momentum and charged at him all at once.
…Boom!
Astonishingly, they were all repelled with a force greater than their charge.
“Kahahaha!”
A strange energy swirled around Harumakan, who was laughing at the center.
[The Great Chieftain of the Demon Spirits, Harumakan, uses ‘Skill: Thorns of Pain’.]
[Harumakan shares all the pain and damage he receives with the attacker.]
“Thorns of Pain?”
After a single blow, the shadow slave soldiers were annihilated in an instant, causing Suho to frown.
‘A skill that reflects all the damage received back to the attacker.’
Of course, Harumakan himself could not escape the pain and damage.
But the problem was the damage amplification and exploitation.
The curse skills he had used before were the issue.
‘Sharing the pain, but increasing the damage the opponent receives with damage amplification, and at the same time, he recovers with the exploitation skill?’
The combination of skills was indeed terribly efficient.
“…What an interesting guy.”
Suho smirked as he ordered all the shadow slave soldiers, who were repairing their damaged bodies, to fall back.
Then, after commanding all the shadow soldiers to eliminate Harumakan’s Death Knights that were still swarming all over the village.
“Esil!”
Having spotted the boss mob, he decided to go all out on this side as well.
Whoosh!
The horn of Vulcan that Harumakan had pulled out from his body flew through the air and was caught by Suho’s hand,
Esil, who had come running at Suho’s call, cast spirit form without any fuss.
[Vulcan’s horn devours the soul of a demon.]
[Equipping ‘Item: Vulcan’s Horn’.]
[The ‘Buff: Desire for Destruction’ is applied, increasing physical damage by 300%.]
“Ah, the horns of a demon?!”
As two horns suddenly sprouted above Suho’s head, Harumakan’s eyes widened in shock.
“How can the successor of the Shadow Monarch use the power of a demon noble?!”
But it was too early to be surprised.
Divine Possession.
Armor of the Giant.
Wind of the Plains.
Body Reinforcement Technique.
Suho applied all the skills to his body.
And with each one, Harumakan’s eyes seemed to bulge out even more.
“This is absurd! Even if you are the successor of the Shadow Monarch, how can a mere human body wield such diverse powers…!”
Whoosh.
The enlarged Suho, with his silver hair fluttering, walked towards Harumakan.
“Do you know? They say my father was a necromancer. Then what does that make me?”
With each stride, the smile on Suho’s lips grew thicker as he approached Harumakan.
Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang!
Suho’s fists, wrapped in the Body Reinforcement Technique, began to rain down on Harumakan in earnest.
With each punch, tremendous explosions erupted.
The aftermath overturned the entire area.
“You, you fool! It’s useless!”
Harumakan gritted his teeth and countered all the attacks, shouting.
“No matter if you have Candiaru’s blessing, Thorns of Pain is a curse I cast upon myself!”
[The Great Chieftain of the Demon Spirits, Harumakan, uses ‘Skill: Thorns of Pain’.]
[All the pain and damage Harumakan receives are shared with the player.]
Gulp.
Just as Suho, who had been relentlessly attacking, spewed blood from his mouth.
The recoil returning to Suho was just as strong as he had become stronger.
Seeing this, Harumakan’s lips twisted into a bizarre laugh.
“Kukuku! I see, you are indeed formidable! But how long can you last?”
Bang bang bang bang bang!
Of course, blood was also flowing from Harumakan’s mouth, who was taking all of Suho’s attacks.
But Harumakan was confident.
“Do you know this! This place is an instance dungeon created from Candiaru’s legacy! And I am the king of this dungeon! That means, all the spirits that died on this land become my strength!”
Instance dungeon.
Candiaru’s legacy, which he had stumbled upon in the boundary world.
Since he began to research it in earnest, Harumakan’s power could become incredibly strong.
The reason he could rise from being just a tribal chief to the great chieftain was precisely because of that time.
“You may only have Candiaru’s blessing, but I am different! I, Harumakan, am a disciple of Candiaru, the greatest sorcerer of the demon spirits!”
Being a disciple of Candiaru.
The implication of that was truly enormous.
The power of the great sorcerer Candiaru, who designed the leveling system, was once so formidable that even the next ruler of the demon spirits feared it.
And that power was such that Harumakan became the great chieftain just by discovering a part of Candiaru’s legacy.
So, no matter how much Candiaru’s blessing protects Suho.
This land of death, the instance dungeon, was also Candiaru’s legacy…
“Kahaha! Come at me as much as you want! The stronger your power, the more it will eventually consume you…”
But then.
“You talk too much.”
Shiver.
At that moment, Harumakan couldn’t help but feel a chill at Suho’s words.
‘Wait a minute.’
Something was off.
Come to think of it, Suho had been taking in all the pain continuously without stopping his attacks.
Does it hurt?
Of course, it hurts.
But.
‘So what.’
Suho was still smiling with blood on his lips.
“I’m confident in my toughness.”
Beru used to sit idly by Suho’s side and tell old stories when Suho was about to sleep.
And most of those stories were what Beru had seen and experienced himself, but they were also mixed with a little about Sung Jin-Woo’s youth, which Beru knew from hearing.
‘They say my father even did a job change quest.’
The first job given to his father was said to be a necromancer.
It must have been the first job assigned until the power increased little by little according to the design of the leveling system, and the size of the vessel became suitable.
However, it was said his father achieved growth beyond the system’s design and was able to change jobs directly to the Shadow Monarch.
Back then, my father’s level was merely 40.
But even as I surpassed level 40 and approached level 50, no job change quest appeared.
The reason was obvious.
The leveling system was solely designed to create the vessel for the Shadow Monarch.
Any job change quest was just for show, merely a step for my father to grow into the suitable vessel.
That’s why Suho could not become a necromancer, a Shadow Monarch, or anything else.
[Job: None]
Suho’s eyes shone intensely as he looked at the status window’s top row, which had always been blank.
‘…So.’
Even without a job.
Even without a job change quest.
What does it matter?
‘I decide what I become.’
Now, I just trust this sturdy body inherited from my father.
To destroy and smash any enemy that appears before me with all my might, to keep moving forward.
That’s all I need to do for now.
“So, for now, I’m a Barbarian.”
Thud thud thud thud thud!
Barbarian.
A warrior who endures all pain with toughness, pouring all his might into attacking formidable enemies.
“I have decided so.”
Ding!
[‘Skill: Martial Arts Lv.1’ learned.]
In that moment, even greater strength filled his two fists.
“Argh!”
Finally, a scream of pain burst from Harumakan’s mouth.
[To be continued…]