Chapter 262
Tap tap!
Simon surged forward toward Claudia, Darkness flaring from his feet.
Claudia’s response was simple.
She pulled out two potion bottles once more and smashed them at her feet. A brown poisonous gas billowed out, quickly shrouding the area.
‘Blocking close combat with poison. Makes sense.’
If the enemy's tactic is clear, there’s no reason not to counter it.
Simon summoned two types of creatures. The tentacle of Overlord caught hold of a zombie emerging from subspace and extended straight into the cloud of poisonous smoke.
Thud!
‘A wall?’
Overlord’s tentacle struck something.
Not that it mattered much. Simon clenched his fist.
‘Corpse Explosion!’
Boom!
The Corpse Explosion cleanly blasted away the surrounding poison gas.
“Whew.”
Simon lowered his right arm and stared straight ahead.
As the poison mist cleared, a crumbled green wall came into view, and behind it sat Claudia, grimacing as she collapsed to the floor.
“Ugh!”
She quickly got up and pushed the nearby slimes in front of her.
<Slime Wall>
The slimes that had been squirming around puffed up like balloons and once again formed a bumpy green wall in front of Claudia.
Simon’s eyes glinted as he watched.
‘She’s leaving the offense to Poison Fog and focusing entirely on defense.’
So far, it was a textbook match strategy for a Toxicology student.
Not seeing the need to break through the wall, Simon ran around it instead.
<Gorgones>
But just as he passed the wall, snakes attacked him from the air. Claudia’s hair had transformed into snakes.
‘A family-exclusive black magic!’
Simon ducked and twisted his head, desperately dodging the serpents. Their speed was incredible, making it hard to close the distance.
Left with no choice, Simon stepped on Darkness and launched into the air.
“Got you!”
Claudia didn’t only have six snakes.
Two more strands of her hair turned into snakes and shot toward Simon midair, confident he couldn’t dodge in the air.
“Don’t think so.”
Simon grinned, swung his arm behind him, and tore open the air.
With a loud crack, the sky split open, and a rain of arrows poured down.
“!!”
It was an attack from the skeleton archers waiting in subspace. The two snake hairs were struck and reverted to normal hair.
While Claudia scrambled to block the arrows with a Darkness Shield, Simon safely landed on the ground.
‘Open Gate!’
Rattle! Rattle!
Six subspaces opened simultaneously, unleashing a torrent of bladed tentacles.
Claudia urgently summoned another slime and once again cast ‘Slime Wall’.
Thwack!
Thud!
Overlord’s blades failed to penetrate the wall.
‘That’s not a normal Slime Wall. Claudia must’ve modified it.’
While she had been flustered by the irregular arrow barrage from subspace, she effortlessly blocked Overlord’s attack.
It seemed she had thoroughly prepared countermeasures for all known techniques.
Simon, without hesitation, recalled the tentacle blades, but then potion bottles came flying over the wall.
“Yikes.”
Simon immediately stepped on Darkness and dashed to the side. The bottles shattered as they hit the floor, releasing more poison gas.
Clink! Clink! Clink! Clink!
Claudia threw, Simon dodged—the pattern repeated. She hid behind the Slime Wall, catching her breath with a serious look on her face.
‘Just a little longer. If I can just hold out a little longer…!’
Among the current Poison Fog clouds, one contained a ‘nerve paralysis’ effect.
Soon, Simon’s movements would slow, and that’s when she’d launch her all-out attack. That was her envisioned victory condition.
But…
‘Why?’
Time passed as she exchanged attacks with Simon, yet his movements didn’t slow at all.
‘Why isn’t the paralysis working?’
Claudia grew anxious. If this dragged on any longer and Simon completed his Blood Golem, things would become dire.
Simon, too, had shifted from his initial ferocious assault to keeping a set distance, focusing on dodging Claudia’s attacks.
It was clear to anyone that he was preparing a magic circle for the Blood Golem.
‘I can’t just wait around for the paralysis to kick in. I need to push harder!’
Just as she prepared to break down her own Slime Wall and go on the offensive—
“......!”
She saw it.
In Simon’s outstretched right hand was the ‘Golem Core’. Emerald smoke coiled around it.
“You’re too late, Claudia.”
Simon grinned triumphantly. He opened a massive subspace behind him and summoned 23 skeletons onto the battlefield.
“I’m going on the offensive.”
As Simon lifted the Golem Core above his head, teal smoke scattered in all directions and began to coil around the skeletons’ bodies.
‘No way!’
Claudia’s face went pale at the sight.
She had reviewed the footage dozens of times using the Memorial Crystal, researching ways to counter that particular black magic, but for that spell, she had found no way to win.
‘…I have to stop it!’
Her legs trembled in fear, but she opened her subspace. From within, she pulled out two large potion cases.
‘Whatever it takes, I must stop that spell!’
Her heart raced. She quickly unfolded a large magic circle in front of her, opened the potion cases she held in both hands. Inside were potions shaped like fireworks, all highly toxic.
She clenched her teeth and pressed the cases against the magic circle. The potions flowed into the circle like a viscous liquid, lighting up its edges.
Claudia’s most powerful offensive technique to date.
<Poison Barrage>
Boom boom boom boom boom boom boom!
Toxic spheres exploded from the magic circle and bombarded the skeletons.
Kaboom!
Crash!
The arena filled with explosions. Originally, the spell was meant to finish off a Simon slowed by nerve gas, but this wasn’t the time to hold back.
“Huff, huff.”
Clatter.
Thunk!
She dropped the cases to the floor and stared ahead. Yellow, black, and blue smoke filled the entire arena.
‘I, I stopped it…’
Soon, amidst the dissipating smoke, faint shapes of collapsed skeletons came into view. Her lips trembled with emotion.
‘I just took down the strongest move of Special Admission No. 1…!’
But just then. She sensed something and turned her head.
Simon had circled around and was rushing at her from the side.
‘You still haven’t given up?’
Both had used their trump cards. With the field now covered in Poison Fog, she held the advantage.
If she could stop this final charge, she’d win.
Her hair lengthened and transformed into six snakes, which lunged forward. Simon dodged with agile footwork and leapt off the ground, stepping on Darkness to avoid the snakes coming from below.
In an instant, the distance between them closed.
“Hrrmph!”
She drew in all the Darkness she could muster. In addition to the snakes she was already using, six more strands of her hair turned into serpents and flew toward Simon as he approached from the air.
‘I did it!’
Just as she felt certain of victory—
Fwip.
Fwap.
Suddenly, emerald smoke began to rise from Simon’s body.
‘Huh?’
It morphed into hands that grabbed the necks of the snakes aiming for Simon’s nape and elbows, then twisted them aside. All six snakes were caught in the smoke.
“Sorry for tricking you, Claudia.”
Simon never intended to use the Blood Golem in the first place. What he showed earlier was just a feint to drain her energy.
In fact, this was how Cloud was meant to be used originally. Simon opened up space for a charge by restraining her snakes, then landed right in front of her feet.
“!”
She stiffened and raised her arms in a guard, but Simon didn’t attack—instead, he took a step back. Instantly, a Slime Wall surged up between them.
“You tricked me from the start?!”
“That’s right. That was just for show.”
Only after the Blood Golem is fully completed and envelops skeletons with its power does a ‘Royal Guard’ form.
Just now, he only pretended to coat the skeletons in Cloud, then, seeing her unload her firepower, he retracted all the Cloud and slipped to the side.
“And one more thing.”
She belatedly sensed something was off and looked down. Her shadow was stained red, stretching beyond the wall.
‘A curse?!’
Her lips trembled. He hadn’t just retreated, he’d cursed her before backing off.
“There was no mention of me using this kind of curse in your analysis, was there?”
Simon said as he activated the curse he’d learned from Bahil.
<Indolence>
All the accumulated sensations in Simon’s body—pain and more—were now shared between the two of them. Of course—
‘I… I can’t move!’
Along with the confusion effect came the nerve paralysis she’d been waiting for.
Her mind wavered, and the Slime Wall that had been blocking them crumbled into ruin.
Realizing she'd been played, her face flushed bright red with rage as she struggled.
But the paralysis effects that had built up until now hit all at once, and she couldn’t even move a finger. On top of that, the confusion made her head spin like she had motion sickness, she couldn’t even use black magic.
Of course, Simon was also unable to move.
“So, now what are you gonna do?”
Claudia forced a smirk.
“Chicken run? First one to cast black magic wins?”
“No.”
Simon smiled.
It was a perfectly reasonable calculation.
“Who do you think would be faster in this state? A toxicologist building a magic circle with Darkness, or…”
Vrrrm! Vrrrmmmm!
“A summoner issuing a command to undead through sheer will?”
Whoosh!
Shhhk! Shhhk! Shhhk!
Six bladed tentacles simultaneously shot out, slammed into her body, and pinned her into the arena wall behind.
Crash! Boom boom boom!
Dust clouds burst upward, and Claudia, embedded at the edge of the arena, let out a groan of pain.
Violet fragments of the shattered barrier scattered everywhere.
Screee.
Then, the longest blade aimed directly at her neck. She flinched and tilted her chin upward.
“Surrender.”
Simon said coldly.
“There’s no need to make this any more painful.”
“Grrk!”
She glared at Simon with venomous eyes.
But now that she was trapped by Overlord, there was nothing she could do.
Biting her lip so hard it bled out of frustration, she eventually lowered her head in resignation.
“I… surrender.”
At her words, the judge immediately raised their hand.
“Match over! The winner is student Simon Follentia!”
Cheers and applause erupted from all directions.
With victory secured, Simon let out a relieved breath and recalled Overlord back into subspace.
“Well done, Simooon!!”
“As expected! What a clean match!”
From the front row, Kamibarez and Dick shouted wildly. Simon waved to them in response.
And at the edge of the stands, there was someone more delighted than anyone else.
Standing up, twisting like a zombie, bangs hanging down, Bahil let out croaky laughs, his face openly reveling in pleasure like a monster drunk on ecstasy.
“Did you see that? Did you see that, Chehekle?! Simon won with a curse. The curse I taught him!”
“...Ah, yeah. Congratulations.”
Chehekle, noticing the eyes around them, quickly tugged on Bahil’s arm.
“Let’s go. And please, shut up, this is embarrassing.”
“I knew my sincerity would reach him! Winning with a curse! With a curse! You must major in curses, Simon Follentia!!”
Meanwhile, the judge who had just declared Simon the victor motioned to the assistant managers.
“There will be a 10-minute break before the next match resumes.”
Srrrk.
Claudia, who had slumped to the floor, stole a glance at Simon’s back.
‘A complete defeat.’
She had analyzed Simon thoroughly and was confident she wouldn’t lose.
But Simon had used even that confidence against her, turning the tables entirely.
She’d never imagined someone could exploit the paralysis effect of Toxicology to win.
‘…A real genius is a real genius after all.’
Even she had to admit, Simon’s tactical play was brilliant.
‘Ah.’
Just then, Simon was walking toward her.
Superb.
When are we getting more free chapters?
Thanks for the new chapters