Brand New Life Online: Rise Of The Goddess Of Harvest

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“I don’t know if I should abuse that. I doubt the System will be so forgiving the second time…” Elayne sighed, glancing around. “But at the same time, I feel like the System is testing something with me. Now that I’ve obtained these Skills, they’re part of my soul. I would have to have my soul shattered completely to lose them again like before. Even then, I can feel traces of my older skills now. It happened with swordsmanship earlier, but now I can sense it more clearly with the rest… I had created spells using those traces before. These spells might be even stronger now.”

“Huh, that’s not bad at all,” Gardenia nodded. “Well, we might as well make use of your new power. We should create as many Sporeborns as possible!”

“I think it depends on how many I can maintain with my current energy reserves. They still require me to feed them Nether,” Elayne explained. “An endless army would likely drain me completely and then kill me. But yes, I could make a few dozen more… However, I would prefer to choose stronger beings for this…” As she spoke, she watched her Sporeborns fiercely battling the Bone Beasts.

Some began to be pushed back until they were torn apart by the Bone Monsters, which then rushed toward Elayne. “I guess I cannot really take a break… And is everyone okay? They’re taking too long. No monster has sneaked in there yet, so what’s delaying them?”

As Elayne looked toward the cathedral where the Class Changing Stone was located, she swung Asteria, slicing through the body of a Bone Monster that charged her. Then she repurposed the Spore Colony from her recently fallen Sporeborn and fused the monster’s corpse with it, creating a stronger form for her Undead Servant. “I see, so I can combine you like this too… This gets more interesting by the second—”

“I’VE SEEN ENOUGH.”

RUMBLE!

“Eh?!”

Elayne’s eyes widened as the ground in front of her shook violently and split open. Giant boulders exploded outward to reveal a towering structure of bones and ghostly energy. An immense phantasmal and cursed pressure washed over her, forcing her to vomit black blood as her entire body and soul writhed in agony.

“Aaaaghh?!”

The shockwave hurled her toward a nearby cathedral. She crashed into it, blowing the building apart. The largest structure in the monastery collapsed in a thunderous roar.

“Ahaa…! W-What…! What is that thing…?!”

Elayne slowly stood up, staring in disbelief at a giant composed of countless bones, radiating power unlike anything she had faced in the Netherworld.

Perhaps not even in the Living World.

“It is commendable that you survived a direct attack to your soul using my Phantasmal Consciousness. It seems I severely underestimated you, traitor. Your power is… too dangerous. You possess immense potential. I will make sure your journey ends here. Your bones and your soul will become one with me. Your power shall become mine.”

“What…?!” Elayne’s face twisted in disgust. “W-Who the hell are you anyway?!”

“I am the Bone Tyrant, Atrokus. One of the Death Generals in direct service of His Majesty the Demon King of Death. Alongside Franken and Bellarine, we have been tracking you since you killed Blazer and caused an incredible amount of chaos and destruction in the Undead Camp. Since then, we have followed your footsteps. Once we were certain where you were, we used you as an excuse to completely destroy this entire city.”

“…!”

Elayne’s eyes widened as the truth finally struck her. This monster was one of three that had come chasing her. The deaths of those brave soldiers on the frontlines, the destruction, the chaos… it was really all her fault! She had brought this upon these people. It was her fault.

“N-No…” Elayne muttered, gritting her teeth. “If you wanted me so badly, why not just call for me?! If you had spared these people and simply taken me… T-There was no need to do all of this just for a single person or a small group!”

“People? Persons? You fancy yourself worthy of being called a person, you disgusting thing? You don’t even devour souls nor properly cultivate nether. What sort of bizarre being are you, clinging to the world of the living like an obsessed lunatic? Your class is commendably strong, and that’s about it. You are not the reason but the excuse. We wanted this city for a long time, and we shall seize it and everything within it!”

RUMBLE!

Atrokus wasted no more time on words. His entire bone tower-like body began to transform, expanding into a gigantic six-armed humanoid chimeric being composed of millions of white and black bones. An aura of ghostly energies, made of millions of agonizing souls he had devoured without mercy, overflowed from him.

As he transformed, he raised his massive claws and manifested towering structures of bones everywhere. They glowed with mysterious ghostly flames and began targeting Elayne, firing beams of soul-destroying energy that chased her relentlessly.

“D-Damn it!”

BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!

The entire monastery crumbled into ruins as she fled from the destructive turrets of bone and cursed souls. Atrokus blocked her path, catching up and swinging his enormous bone fists downward, each fist composed of millions of bones.

“PERISH.”

CRAASH!

CRAASH!

CRAASH!

RUMBLE!

Three punches struck toward Elayne. With her reflexes, she avoided two, but the third hit her almost point-blank. If not for her Spiritual Barrier and her Aura extending around her body, shielding her alongside Gardenia, who raised all the nature in the surroundings to protect her, she would have been obliterated.

“Aaaagh!”

Even so, Elayne was injured terribly. She felt every bone in her body break, her flesh barely holding together before it threatened to explode and tear her apart. She fell, crashing into a wall and rolling across the ground, gasping for air, realizing she had been completely overwhelmed.

She had no time to fight back, no time to even use a technique or her skills properly. Atrokus had utterly defeated her…

This was the massive power gap between them!

“Kukuku, what a pathetic sight. I suppose that’s all I can expect from a Tier 2 Undead…” he laughed. “As someone bordering Tier 6, I suppose you never had a chance against me. Have you only ever fought weaklings before, I wonder?”

“Hah…” Elayne sighed, slowly regenerating as she sat up. Then she smiled at him—a smile she had never shown before—her eyes blazing with madness and defiance, glowing bright red as her long white hair rose with her surging aura. “Thank you for being so kind as to give me a few seconds to set up.”

“…?” Atrokus raised a bony eyebrow. “What nonsense are you speaking about, lowly creature—”

“Harvest of Duality + Twilight Bloom!”

FLAAASH!

“Ngh?!”

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