Solo Max-Level Newbie - Chapter 61

Chapter 61 – Thousand Hands Thousand Eyes, Avalokiteshvara (2)

Jin-hyuk pulled out an old piece of wood from his subspace inventory.

It was a fragment of Merlin’s staff, a relic he had obtained from the Corridor of the Fallen.

“That…?”

Avalokiteshvara frowned as he quickly took up a stance.

It became wary because of the unusual energy from the relic, but it was too late.

It can blame itself for neglecting one arm.

Jin-hyuk merged the two items into one.

Woong!

[Merlin’s Staff Fragment (AAA) and Thousand Hands Thousand Eyes, Avalokiteshvara’s Jewel (AA) are fused!]
With an intense light, the two relics began to react.

[Fusion successful!]
[Merlin’s Staff (Incomplete)
Acquisition Difficulty: S
Description: Merlin was a British archmage and sage who served King Arthur. This staff was a relic used by Merlin when he was alive, allowing him to unleash his true magic skills. (However, since it is not yet complete, the maximum increase of ability is limited.)]
After a few moments, the light faded, and in its place was a wooden staff with jewels studded on it.

‘Finally, I have you in my hands.’

Jin-hyuk smiled.

Ba-dump! Ba-dump!

His heart was beating quickly even though this wasn’t yet the complete relic.

‘It doesn’t matter.’

This much was more than enough.

In the first place, the complete Merlin’s staff was a relic that only an archmage who had completed their 3rd occupation mission could wield.

Great. Now.

Jin-hyuk looked at the status window of his opponent with the Eye of Gluttony.

Because he needed to check on everything before an all-out fight.

Name: Thousand Hands, Avalokiteshvara
Gender: None
Age: 30,985
Level: ??
Strength ?? Agility ?? Stamina ?? Magic?? Karma ??
Unique Ability: Mandala
Skill: The skill window cannot be observed due to Eye of Gluttony’s insufficient level.
—

[Copy Condition: Avalokiteshvara detests western magic. Create a large and beautiful sculpture that insults the opponent using ice magic within the time limit of 5 minutes. (However, you must also select an appropriate song to match it during the sculpting process) if you successfully do it, you can copy the opponent’s unique ability.]
Uh?

W-wait…

Did something malfunction? Jin-hyuk blinked his eyes in disbelief.

But the contents of the copy condition didn’t change.

‘This system is quite a crazy one.’

Last time it had told him to take classes under Cadrick to receive the necromancer class, and now…

‘A song and a sculpture…?’

There was also the additional point that they had to match with each other.

Jin-hyuk held onto his forehead. He didn’t care much about the other things, but how could the system make a condition where he needed to creatively insult his target?

He could feel his head beginning to hurt. But, no matter how bizarre the conditions were, he wasn’t about to give up.

Because this was the only place where he could get the Mandala ability under the 25th floor.

“Phew.”

Jin-hyuk took a deep breath and began to broadcast.

He wasn’t restraining his stream.

It was one of the features that were afforded to BJs in the tower, which was.

[Please select a BGM]
To broadcast background music.

‘No matter what, this is the only music that goes along well with ice.’

Jin-hyuk selected the song, raised the volume to maximum, and a very familiar melody began to fill the air.

In the middle of winter, not long past, the Disney animated masterpiece Frozen had heated up the world.

The main hit song used in that masterpiece was Let it Go.

[Let it Go~! Let it Go~! Can’t hold it back anymore.]
He could feel the heat rise in his face as the song began to play.

Did it feel like he was being immersed in his past memories because of this?

It felt quite refreshing to hear the song again. On the other hand, the monster’s face was distorted horribly.

“You bastard! What is that!”

A roaring voice filled the room.

Its swords began to move, seeking to deliver death.

“Please, don’t ask me why.”

Because Jin-hyuk himself didn’t know why he was doing this.

But of course.

“Answer me! Human!”

It was impossible for the opponent to just let this pass. Enraged, it began to gather up its magic.

Kukuku!

Golden magical energy began to gather in the weapons it held. It was a power different from either sword or divine energy.

Mandala.

It had activated the strongest ability of Buddhism, energy that embodied all things.

“The jokes end here. From now on, I will use everything to kill you.”

It looked like Jin-hyuk had touched a sensitive spot.

The monster must have slaughtered countless humans till now, but not once had it used Mandala.

“But, will you be fine?”

Jin-hyuk shrugged.

“What do you mean?”

“If you use Mandala and lose, you won’t be able to have any excuses?”

It wasn’t the first time that Jin-hyuk had seen someone who declared they would use their full strength to kill an opponent. None of them had ever ended up winning.

He would just stay quiet and act it out if it was him.

Ah well. This probably wasn’t something a person playing a kid’s song should comment about.

“This… What a treacherous human being! Who dares to talk about my defeat when you cannot even live for 100 years!”

Cracks began to form on the ground.

… this was the start.

Kwakwakwang!

A golden wave of light began to move through the ground. However, the all-destroying power of the Mandala stopped right in front of Jin-hyuk.

[Glacier Formation’ Blizzard’ has been activated!]
Psss!

The ice began to take the form of a giant hexahedron roughly 3 meters in size.

A pure white coldness emerged from the great magic circle made of ice.

‘This is amazing.’

Jin-hyuk held onto the staff with both of his hands. His hands were trembling as it was difficult to control this magic.

‘As expected, this is a higher level skill.’

The newly acquired skill of Glacier Formation is entirely different from the Ice Formation skill he’s used so far.

If Ice Formation simply solidified water in the air around him, boosting his skill with Merlin’s staff allowed him to create ice itself from nothing.

“Those western tricks….!”

The monster grunted.

“Western trick…’

Jin-hyuk smiled.

If it thought of it in that way, then it was making a big mistake.

At a location far from the site of the battle.

Still observing from their tree, Li Qiao and Melena sighed in disbelief.

“I cannot believe it.”

“Not just his sword… but even his ice magic is this good? Was it possible to have so many skills in one player?”

As the battle continued, their eyes that had been observing this battle began to change.

They couldn’t help it, as everything they were seeing now made no sense.

The monster’s overwhelming force was clearly a sign that it was a named monster that had suddenly appeared.

And Jin-hyuk, who was confronting it head-on, looked like someone from beyond the realm of humans.

This was all too unreal.

“Even within our association, someone who can use that level of ice magic doesn’t…”

Li Qiao couldn’t say anything further.

It would be difficult to identify a mage as strong as this. Melena shared his unspoken thoughts.

She licked her lips as she felt an urge to say something.

“Can we win against those two by fighting all out?”

They were both warlocks who specialized in close-range fights. Even if the opponent was an S rank, they had been confident they could take him down.

But Melena wasn’t too sure now. She was only confident about taking the monster down.

“… it will be difficult.”

Li Qiao mumbled with a stiff expression. From a rational standpoint, victory was not guaranteed with just the two of them.

Perhaps they needed to even assume the worst-case scenario would happen.

“Let’s give up Li Qiao. We cannot do this alone. Unless an executive rank comes…”

“No. If we go, then the positions we have built up in the association till now will collapse.”

“So what? We might die there, but you want to take the risk?”

“No.”

Li Qiao shook his head. He had no intentions of recklessly gambling with his life.

But he also had no intention of giving up on the mission.

“I will use the relic.”

It was a relic that had been given to him. It had a usage limitation; after using it once, he would need to wait 3 months before using it again. That was why he didn’t want to use it if possible.

But there was no other way now.

He had to complete the mission at all costs.

‘Look at this.’

It seemed like Cadrick hadn’t been the only one here.

Jin-hyuk glanced to the side. He could feel unfamiliar magic.

From what he had noticed until now, they were at least higher-leveled than Cadrick. They were probably hidden cards prepared by the Demonic Human Association to complete the task.

‘This is good.’

This time, he would have the chance to learn about the association.

But as those thoughts ran through his mind.

A tingling sensation touched his wrist.

“Where are you looking now?”

A spear the monster threw had pierced through the ice shield.

A trembling spear had stopped mere inches away.

If he hadn’t activated his second layer of shields, the spear would have pierced his body instead of lightly touching his hands.

Right. This monster was still here.

Interrogating the Demonic Human Association agents was important, but he first needed to deal with the demon in front of him.

[Glacier Formation’ Polar Ice Arrow’ is activated!]
Tssss!

Over twenty ice arrows were created in an instant, the scale of this skill clearly different compared to the Ice Formation he had previously used.

The weapon produced by the skill resembled a whale-catching harpoon over 3 meters in length. However, it was impossible to inflict damage on the monster with this alone.

Because in addition to being able to gnaw away at an opponent’s magic, Mandala also gave the user the ability to predict attacks.

It wasn’t for nothing that this skill was considered one of the best.

In that case.

‘I will use both medium and short range attacks.’

No matter how well the skill could predict, there was a limit to how many attacks it could read.

Jin-hyuk infused magic into the staff.

And the staff shrunk to the size of a finger. It was now no longer a hindrance to his movement.

‘Nice.’

Jin-hyuk nodded to himself and took out his dagger from the subspace inventory. Its blade was quickly covered with black energy.

In order to fight against the Mandala, he activated Sword Grave.

“Until now, you have only used ice from far away. Now it seems like you want to approach me in person.”

“Before that song ends, I want to bring an end to this.”