Chapter 203
Rumble rumble rumble!
A thick cloud of dust rose where Wichasha had been hurled into the wall. Maelyn let out an admiring gasp.
"That was amazing, Kami! You’ve really been training hard!"
Kamibarez nodded brightly with a wide smile.
"Yes! I couldn’t keep falling behind the three of you forever."
"Kami."
At that moment, Dick, who had been staring straight ahead, opened his mouth.
"No one here thinks you’ve fallen behind."
Everyone turned to look at him, surprised by his unusually serious tone.
"You tend to tie yourself down too much. You should have a little more confidence."
"Mm, thank you, Dick!"
Simon patted Dick’s back encouragingly. On the other hand, Maelyn scoffed and let out a cold laugh.
"On the flip side, you could use a bit of urgency. You’re so careless about everything,"
"Ahem, how could mere racing dogs understand the grace a cheetah holds?"
"Hey! Did you just call me a dog?!"
Tap.
At that moment, through the swirling dust, Wichasha could be seen rising to his feet. He looked completely unharmed, casually rotating his shoulders.
They had expected at least some damage, but he looked barely affected. The expressions of the four stiffened slightly. Dick forced a nonchalant tone.
"Hmm hmm, okay. 0.5 Hongpeng, acknowledged."
"Keep slacking, and I’ll fold you in half at the waist."
Wichasha closed his eyes and stretched both arms outward. Thick Darkness oozed out like spiderwebs and began to spread.
It was the first time Wichasha had used black magic, and all four of them tensed. However, the Darkness didn’t launch forward, it simply spread over Wichasha’s body.
‘There it is.’
The emblem of a Magical Combat major, Dark Robe.
Unlike the typical transformation into a full-body metallic armor, Wichasha’s Dark Robe resembled the fur of a beast draped over his entire body.
Thud.
Like an animal, he planted his hands on the ground and then kicked off with his feet, charging forward with a snapping sound.
Boom!
Simon, the quickest to react, stomped his foot hard.
The scattered bones from the earlier fight floated up into the air, their sharp ends pointed forward.
<Bone Nail>
Shhhh!
The bones surged forward, radiating Simon’s dark-blue mana. Wichasha used all four limbs to scale the wall, dodging the bones before crashing down and charging in.
At that devastating charge, the four of them simultaneously retreated. Naturally, Wichasha targeted Simon, lunging at him like a massive grizzly bear.
Twang!
But once again, a force pulled him back, halting the charge. A transparent net had appeared before him, and Dick, Maelyn, and Kamibarez were all gripping one end of it, operating their Internal Darkness Divergence to the limit.
"……These little punks!"
"You think we’d just let you go for Simon?"
Dick chuckled and tossed a lit mana lighter. The ground the three had retreated from was soaked in oil.
"Wouldn’t be a proper necromancer if we didn’t use that, right?"
But Wichasha was not to be outdone.
He converted his Darkness into Internal Darkness Divergence Mode, stomped the ground once, and significantly boosted his charge. The three holding the net were pulled toward him.
"Whoaaa!"
Dick barely managed to throw himself and grab the mana lighter, while the two girls went tumbling across the ground. Having broken through the barrier, Wichasha reached Simon.
‘Open Gate!’
Six Overlord blades rained down, but Wichasha effortlessly deflected them with his Dark Robe and landed a punch on Simon’s guarding arm.
CRAAASH!
Simon was sent flying dozens of meters, slamming into the wall.
‘Kgh! No matter how I defend……!’
At this point, it was clear the story about fighting Hongpeng hadn’t been a bluff.
"Hey, commoner! Move your ass!"
Gritting her teeth, Maelyn conjured a series of ice spears mid-air.
"On it!"
As Dick touched each spear, they darkened like coal.
At Maelyn’s command, the ice spears fired off with piercing shrieks, but Wichasha didn’t even dodge. He simply strode toward the fallen Simon. The black spears bounced off his Dark Robe the moment they hit.
<Exhaust>
Kamibarez launched a hastily prepared curse. Wichasha merely threw one arm behind him, gripped the Darkness, and swung it.
Clang!
The wave of Darkness shattered the curse like glass, a display of truly professional skill, flawless in execution.
‘Heal.’
Simon moved his numb right arm behind his back, secretly activating Holiness to recover. He quickly finished emergency treatment and raised his arm again.
The moment he resumed his Internal Darkness Divergence, Wichasha was already charging.
‘Focus.’
Determination flashed in Simon’s eyes.
‘Among my skills, the only one that can actually damage the Dark Robe is Corpse Explosion.’
He summoned a zombie from subspace.
His opponent wasn’t trying to kill him. Whether it was a punch, a kick, or a body slam, as long as he didn’t lose consciousness, he could use the zombies to hold him and trigger Corpse Explosion.
Once the Dark Robe was gone, the remaining three could finish the job.
The zombies stepped aside, and Simon stood firmly in the center. Wearing the Dark Robe, Wichasha charged like an unstoppable tank.
‘Please, just don’t black out……!’
Simon stared straight into the incoming fist, muscles tense.
Thud!
At that moment, the oncoming fist stopped right in front of Simon’s face, as if frozen in time.
"Too reckless. Special Admission No. 1."
A woman was smiling, her tongue flicking playfully. Both their eyes widened.
Porcupine-like, spiky long ash-brown hair, ragged clothing, grime and stains all over, and even a pungent chemical stench.
"Professor Belya!"
At that shout, the three who were rushing to save Simon halted in their tracks.
"Did, did you say… Belya?"
"That woman?"
Brrrrrrrr!
Wichasha’s fist trembled. Just from her grabbing his wrist, he couldn’t move.
He immediately swung his free left arm at Belya.
Tap.
She parried it effortlessly with her other hand. As their arms locked, Belya leaned forward and spat in Wichasha’s face.
The moment the green spit hit his face—
SSSSSSSSSSS!
An awful sound rang out, and smoke billowed out like a steam engine.
"GYAAAAAAAARGH!"
Wichasha stumbled back, clutching his face and screaming in agony.
"How’s that?"
Belya stuck out her tongue and rested her index finger on it.
She then dragged her finger slowly across her tongue, pulling it out of her mouth, leaving a stringy, viscous fluid that arched backward.
"How do you like the taste of my saliva?"
Drops from the sticky arc hit the ground, melting it and releasing smoke.
Still writhing in pain, Wichasha finally calmed down enough to cover half his face with a palm, panting heavily.
"……You filthy woman!"
"Oh, that hurts a little."
By then, the Hupa tribesmen nearby had already been subdued by the rats and crows she brought with her.
Simon, breathing hard, managed to muster a strained smile.
"You came… Professor!"
"Take your friends and keep your distance."
Simon rejoined the group. Maelyn let out a disgusted chuckle.
"Spitting? You’re telling me Professor Keyzen uses such a vulgar move?"
Kamibarez covered her flushed face with both hands.
"S-So embarrassing."
It was understandable, Belya’s outfit was a bit provocative from a student’s perspective.
Like a true wildwoman, she didn’t seem to see any need to fully cover herself with clothing. Her rags were messily and tightly wrapped around her body, not quite exposing anything critical, but parts of her skin peeked through, accentuating her feminine curves.
‘That’s just an exhibitionist!’
That was Maelyn’s blunt verdict.
“Well, in a way, it’s convenient.”
At that moment, Wichasha’s Darkness began to surge with a terrifying intensity, unlike anything they’d seen before.
“This whole situation’s a mess, but it always had to end this way. Kidnapping students, laying traps, all that’s just noise. In the end, all I had to do was defeat you.”
“Mmm~ right. If you can.”
As Belya provoked him, Wichasha’s Dark Robe writhed and began a second transformation.
“I’ll hold back no longer just for the sake of capturing you alive!”
His aura changed completely, no longer that of someone fighting students. The beast-like fur of the Dark Robe sharpened into spines, wrapping his body without a single gap.
At the same time, he clenched both fists and slashed them upward.
<Magical Combat – Blade Thrust>
As his fists moved, Belya ducked her waist. The wall behind her split smoothly, as if sliced by a legendary sword.
She glanced back at the collapsing wall with a loud crash and burst into laughter.
"That’s Hongpeng’s technique, isn’t it?"
“There’s no such thing as ownership in fighting!”
As Wichasha stomped on the ground, Darkness rippled like waves across a pond and fired his body in all directions.
It was an upgraded version of Darkness Step. Simon and his teammates widened the distance even more to avoid getting caught in the battle between these two powerhouses.
Her pupils moved like a chameleon’s.
"Pointless little tricks."
Fwoosh!
Wichasha, who had been flashing through the air, appeared behind Belya and struck with a straight punch. This was a ruthless, thorough annihilation move, no holding back.
“…?!”
But suddenly, dense smoke erupted in the air, pushing Wichasha’s body back. Like being swallowed by an inflating balloon, he was flung away without being able to resist.
‘What the hell? No sign of a magic circle or anything!’
As Wichasha tried to retreat, something resembling a clump of bacteria flew toward his face faster than he could pull away and exploded.
BOOM!
“Gah!”
Blue pus coated his entire body in the blast.
Even with his Dark Robe shielding his mouth, nose, and skin, it was useless. The pus on his skin was crushed under the robe, bursting in boils and causing excruciating pain. Yellow liquid poured out from the gaps in his robe.
“Damn it!!”
It was a toxic-type black magic.
Once hit, the longer time passed, the more disadvantageous it became. Wichasha closed the gap again, swinging his fists, but Belya was easily evading him, lightly dodging with graceful sways of her upper body, like a dancer.
“Grgh!”
Violet phlegm oozed from between Wichasha’s clenched lips.
His eyes were half-lidded, his vision spun wildly. With each punch he threw, it felt like countless diseases were piercing him from Belya’s body.
Unable to bear it any longer, Wichasha abandoned his offensive and backed away.
“...This cowardly—! What kind of filthy trick is this?!”
“Cowardly?”
Belya raised a hand to cover her forehead and eyes, leaned back, and chuckled with a twitching shoulder.
Her witch-like laugh sent chills down everyone’s spine. With every shake of her body, colorful sand-like beads fell to the ground and rolled.
Simon’s eyes widened.
‘…Sweat?’
"Ahh, that’s hilarious."
As she brushed her bangs aside, the beads scattered like seeds in the wind. Wichasha didn’t dare approach, and Simon’s group instinctively took another step back.
Their bodies were reacting in intense rejection.
They knew it instinctively, physiologically.
That substance was dangerously lethal.
“You don’t know what to do, do you?”
Belya spoke, watching Wichasha hesitate.
“How to fight someone like me.”
“…!”
“Fighting with predictable patterns is a sin. It’s boring. You just charge in, hoping for a mistake or miscalculation from your opponent. That kind of fight only favors the one who did the most prep work. What’s fun about that?”
She turned her head toward the students.
“This is your first lesson. Necromancers have to be different. If your opponent can’t even imagine your attack, that’s when it’ll hit. Keep doing that and you become… strange. But so what if you’re strange? Better a victorious weirdo than a dead corpse, right?”
“Grgh!”
Wichasha reinforced his Dark Robe and charged again.
“Now look at this guy.”
As his wild punch surged in, Belya casually twisted her waist to dodge, a smirk on her lips.
“Punching. Kicking. Grabbing. Anyone born with a pair of arms and legs can do it. That’s why it’s all predictable. You gotta be like Hongpeng at least, throw in some variation. But this guy? Way too honest.”
She ducked under another punch and brought her index finger to Wichasha’s side.
“It’s always ones like him shouting ‘coward!’”
Ssssht!
Like striking a match, the Dark Robe ripped along the path of her finger, and a violet fluid seeped into his skin.
"GYAAAAARGH!!"
“They justify their lack of originality.”
Even as he screamed in pain, Wichasha swung a fist—but suddenly, the ground under his left foot turned to mush, tilting his stance and twisting his punch.
This time he lunged with open arms to grab her, but her body turned into a cloud of toxic mist and vanished, reappearing behind his back.
“Ghk!”
As Wichasha turned and raised his arms in a cross-guard, Belya lifted her right arm, only for the sand beads on the ground to shoot upward and explode.
BOOM!
At last, Wichasha dropped to one knee, blue fluid dripping from his eyes, nose, and mouth.
"This—"
Belya placed a hand on her waist, flashing a seductive smile.
“—is how a real necromancer fights.”
Superb.
When are we getting more free chapters?
Thanks for the new chapters