Meanwhile...

——

While Cedric lunged forward to attack the Sleeping Queen, Athena moved to intercept the twenty-eight Lemures that had suddenly risen from the shattered debris. Without a moment of hesitation, she gritted her teeth and stepped directly into their path, determined to stop them from advancing to protect their queen.

But rather than taking flight, she dropped into a low crouch with one leg behind her. And then, with a sudden, loud boom, she propelled herself forward, lunging straight toward the closest creature, which was already gathering a heavy mass of darkness in its open mouth to strike.

By the time Athena closed the distance, the Lemure unleashed a concentrated beam of dark energy. She cleanly sidestepped the initial blast, but before the creature could adjust its aim, she dropped and slid low across the ground, passing seamlessly right beneath its legs.

Then, she rose and cut a quick half-circle behind it, darting toward its left flank before launching herself upward. The creature began spinning around from its right to catch her, but while it was mid-turn, Athena — who was now already airborne with her shield arm cocked back — thrust forward and delivered a devastating blow straight to its head.

The heavy impact made the creature stumble, violently jerking its face toward its companions. Because the Lemure was still actively discharging its attack, the sudden twist redirected the dark beam, sending it tearing straight into the chests of two advancing monsters.

The creature quickly shut its mouth to cut off the blast, but before it could recover, Athena thrust forward again. Her sword arm drove the blade straight into the side of its head.

And just like that, three of the Lemures fell.

Then, without missing a beat, she quickly lunged into the air while spinning. In that brief window of time, the massive, stone-carapaced hand of a fourth Lemure descended, crushing the empty space where she had been.

Athena stopped spinning and unfurled high up in the air. She cast a sharp glance down at the monster below, and like a falling meteor, she plunged straight toward it.

***

At the same time, right from the moment Cedric had approached the Sleeping Queen, he too found himself fighting the Lemures alongside Athena. He was forced to engage the boss while simultaneously fending off the surrounding monsters. Truth be told, this was the first time he had ever been forced to split his attention in this manner.

All along the ruins around them, there were over two dozen ravens perched still on different high places, and every single one of them served as his eyes at the same time.

As much as the cognitive strain was immense, he had been training his perception skill over the past months. And so, while he directly attacked the Sleeping Queen with his sword, the black orbs above kept descending like falling meteors on the other Lemures in perfect sync.

Of course, the Lemures were smart and tried to shield themselves from the descending orbs which were all targeting their heads. But between doing that and also watching out for Athena, whose job was to keep pressing the offensive, it became an impossible defense.

Explosions of black flames erupted all around, plunging the dark ruins into utter, explosive chaos. And the terrifying part was that the number of black orbs above did not lessen. When one dropped, another suddenly flickered to life around the massive moon in the center.

Even after Cedric had suddenly been sent crashing into the archway, and even after he was being buried under a pile of rubble on the brink of death, somehow, he managed to keep hold of his fading consciousness, and in turn, his skills.

The Sleeping Queen, upon seeing the daffodils rush into the cascade of masonry, raised a hand, sending much of the debris floating around toward the mound of rubble. All the hovering shards of stone crashed down at once, ensuring that whatever was buried beneath was dead.

However, unbeknownst to the creature, Cedric had now appeared on a raised stone ledge somewhere not too far away from it.

He was crouched and rubbing his neck. "Ouch, that hurt like hell."

That hit definitely had to be up there among his list of the most painful things he’d ever experienced.

He straightened, planting the tip of his nodachi firmly into the ground so it stood upright. Then, he rested his hand casually on the pommel.

"Okay, let’s try that again."

Not long after he said that, the Sleeping Queen, who had been scanning the debris for signs of life, suddenly sensed his presence and snapped her gaze toward the ledge.

This time, she could see what looked like a mirage unfolding behind him. That growing, massive illusion was of a hooded skeleton holding a scythe, looming directly behind Cedric’s shoulders. The towering specter burned with an eerie green fire as it watched the Queen with hollow, lifeless eyes.

This terrifying manifestation was the result of [Aura of Decay] and [Blight of Will] slowly beginning to take full effect on the battlefield.

Seeing that grim sight, the absolute calm the Queen had displayed before suddenly began to fracture. She let out a piercing, panicked shriek and frantically pointed towards Cedric, causing all the massive rocks floating around to suddenly hurtle toward him like a barrage.

When Cedric saw the oncoming onslaught, he calmly raised his nodachi, pointing the blade straight at the monster, and muttered:

"Descend, flames of decay."

Suddenly, the massive black moon in the center above shuddered and then, dozens of tentacles began to burst out from its dark surface.

Then, with the descending force of massive pillars, they slammed downward at the approaching barrage of massive rocks, forcing them to the ground or shattering them to pieces before they could reach Cedric.

At the same time, the massive moon, which now looked like some sort of massive black jellyfish, began to drift closer.

Simultaneously, directly in front of its dark core, three massive magic circles began to manifest, locking into place one after another as if Cedric was preparing to stack a devastating spell.

The magic circles took quite a bit of time to fully form, and in the meantime, the moon kept deflecting whatever projectiles the panicked Queen kept throwing at him.

After a few seconds, the Sleeping Queen opened her large maw and a blinding torrent of darkness began to swirl inside it. But before she could unleash her attack, Cedric’s stacked spell shot first, erupting in a massive beam that engulfed a big part of the Queen and forced her backward.

The Queen staggered from the devastating impact, but her own beam also tore out of her maw in a wild reflex, slicing straight through the large moon above and carving a massive, hollow ring through the surrounding ruins.

When that counterattack shot out, its sheer speed almost caught Cedric off guard, but he vanished at the very last second.

The Queen kept stumbling back until she finally collapsed onto her back, sending up a massive shockwave as the beam sputtered out.

Within moments, the Queen began to succumb to the heavy damage. At that exact moment, Cedric descended from above with his flaming nodachi, landing dead-center on the Queen’s forehead and driving the blade deep into her skull.

"Game over..."