I Reincarnated into a Game Filled with Mods – Chapter 79

Chapter 79

“Who are you…?”

The nun, who had stopped crying, turned her head with a crunching sound. It was a sound that should never be heard from a human neck.

“Is someone there…?”

Only after the nun’s head had completely turned towards me could I clearly see her face.

It was a hideous face. The skin on her right cheek was half-rotted and festering, and black liquid overflowed from between her tightly closed eyes, dripping down her cheeks and chin to the floor.

It almost looked like she was crying tears. In reality, it wasn’t tears, but a black liquid that had filled her body to the brim and was now overflowing.

Even though her entire body was decaying, her features were quite beautiful. She must have been a great beauty before she became like this. Of course, it was all meaningless now.

“Ah… If someone is there… Please help me…”

The nun staggered to her feet. Perhaps due to the shock, a large chunk of rotten flesh slid down her body. The spot where the flesh had fallen off was immediately filled with black liquid.

Her body began to be stained black everywhere. Proportionately, her human skin gradually diminished. Every step she took made a squelching sound as rotten flesh splattered.

“It hurts… I’m in agony… Please… Have mercy on me…”

Along with her desperate plea, her outstretched right arm collapsed powerlessly. Her blackened, softened body disappeared as if being absorbed into the ground.

A new arm sprouted from her half-melted shoulder. However, even though the severed part had regenerated, the recovery showed no signs of stopping. Black liquid clung to the black liquid, layer upon layer.

The nun’s right arm rapidly increased in size. It was no longer something that could be called a human arm.

“Why… Why won’t you help me…”

The nun lowered her head. A sobbing sound escaped from between her closed lips. She looked so pitiful, but there was nothing I could do.

What could I possibly do for someone whose body had been corrupted long ago, clinging to a handful of memories and moving on instinct? This nun had long been consumed by the Abyss.

Unless helping her meant giving her eternal rest.

“I see.”

The bowed head slowly lifted. Her voice had turned cold. The sound of teeth grinding could be heard from between her lips.

“You came to mock me. You came to further humiliate me… in my suffering…”

Sobbing turned into rage, pain into hatred. Her already swollen right arm grew even larger. It was as if her entire body was about to be buried in her shoulder.

As if that wasn’t enough, black liquid surged from behind the nun’s back, tearing through her bare skin. Writhing and taking the form of a human arm, the black liquid slammed into the ground, announcing its presence.

“In that case…”

The nun glared at me with wide eyes. Her entire eyes were black.

“I’ll make you suffer the same pain as me!!!!!!”

Densely packed teeth were revealed from between her parted lips. If this were a game, a cutscene would probably end here, the OST would start playing, and the boss fight would begin.

This nun was the boss of this rune dungeon, the ‘Fallen Priestess Lucia’.

The word ‘fallen’ here had a double meaning. Literally, she had fallen from the bridge, survived, and ended up in this state, and metaphorically, she had fallen from a priest serving God to a heretic who hated God.

I calmly took my stance. I hadn’t used the special ability of the Bloodstained Sword yet. That was because there was no need to attack Lucia right now.

In Phase 1, I needed to use something other than the attack power buff. This was because only one buff could be applied to a weapon at a time.

Lucia strode towards me, using the arm that had sprouted from her back to support herself. The nun’s main body, on the other hand, was suspended in the air, swaying back and forth like laundry on a windy day.

Her abnormally large right arm swung wide. A sweeping pattern. I carefully observed the movement and rolled backward as it began to twitch.

The arm swept through a vast area in the blink of an eye. In vanilla mode, this would have been the end of the pattern, but in Darkest Light mode, it was just the beginning.

The nun’s main body’s legs landed on the ground. Instead, the two arms that had sprouted from her back were raised high. Common sense would dictate that she would slam them down.

But that was a feint. I looked to the side, not up. The right arm that had just swept the floor was being swung again.

This time, I swung my sword and deflected the right arm. As soon as my body was pushed back with a thud, I rolled a couple of times to get out of the way. Only then did Lucia slam down the arms she had raised.

ㅡCrack!

I created more distance. If I blocked that slam with a deflect, I would be completely exposed to the follow-up attack. It was similar to the Headless Ironclad Cavalryman’s charge pattern.

The arm embedded in the ground split into several tentacles and lashed out in all directions, whipping through the air. It was an attack that would hit during the deflect’s cooldown. If I got hit, it would be instant death.

While Lucia was doing that, I looked around.

‘The Divine Catalyst is…’

In the game, items were displayed separately, but there was no way that would be the case here, so I had to find it with my own eyes. At least it would definitely be inside the boss room.

“Why? Was this form not enough? Do you want me to be ruined even further here?”

A cry filled with grief erupted. I distanced myself from the right arm that was flailing wildly in all directions and ran to the spot in the boss room where the Divine Catalyst was likely to be.

Perhaps due to her body structure, Lucia never ran during the entire boss fight. Lucia had other means of closing the distance with the player.

Of course, if I tried to carelessly drink a potion because I had created a lot of distance, I would be hit by a ranged attack and turned into a statue.

‘There it is.’

As I had expected, the Divine Catalyst had fallen in the same spot as in the game. I quickly picked it up. As soon as I picked up the Divine Catalyst, I heard a bang! behind me.

I turned around. Lucia had disappeared without a trace. Upon confirming this, I counted to two in my head and immediately rolled to the side.

With a much louder crash than before, Lucia’s body slammed into the ground. Black liquid splattered in all directions from where she landed.

While the boss was regaining her composure, I examined the Divine Catalyst. Black liquid had seeped into every nook and cranny, making it impossible to see its original color, but this was enough.

I held the Divine Catalyst in my left hand and the Bloodstained Sword in my right. I focused my strength on my left hand, as if I were drawing something in. The blackened catalyst began to emit a blackish white light.

Halfway there. As I had seen in the game, I brought the Divine Catalyst to the spot just above the Bloodstained Sword’s crossguard and then slid it upwards, grazing the blade.

Then, a dull golden light enveloped the blade of the Bloodstained Sword. It wasn’t a perfect gold like the one Stella coated her mace with, but it was enough to recognize it as sunlight.

With this, the other half was also successful. I strapped the Divine Catalyst back to my waist. This was the core of Phase 1 of the Lucia boss fight. It was the so-called Blessing Enchantment.

Phase 1 Lucia had tremendous resistance to physical attacks.

If I were to try and defeat Lucia with only normal attacks, I would have to hit her for over two hours, even if the Bloodstained Sword’s attack power buff lasted indefinitely.

Conversely, she took massive additional damage from blessed weapons and divine spells. So much so that a cleric with stacked buffs could clear Phase 1 with just two divine spells.

That was why a Divine Catalyst with an enchantment-type special ability was inexplicably dropped inside the boss room.

‘I need it one more time, but not here.’

That was something to think about after defeating Lucia. I took out a potion, gulped it down, and threw the bottle away carelessly.

I had lost quite a bit of health because of using the Divine Catalyst just now, so this was to replenish it. It was best to replenish things like this whenever there was an opportunity.

The Divine Catalyst’s special ability was treated as dark magic so that even characters who hadn’t invested in Faith or Divine Power could use the buff. According to the lore, it was because the catalyst had been contaminated by the black liquid.

Dark magic was much more powerful than regular magic of the same tier, but it consumed a small amount of mana and HP in addition to its use. The higher the tier, the more HP it consumed.

Contrary to the Bloodstained Sword’s buff, the amount deducted was a fixed value, making it disadvantageous for characters with lower health stats, and for me, with a stat of 1, each spell was like a fatal blow.

I could even die from it. If I used dark magic while my health was low, my health would be reduced to 0, and my character would collapse. Of course, that was treated the same as a normal death.

I didn’t want to commit suicide in such a novel way.

I pointed the Bloodstained Sword forward. The half-blackened golden color on the blade emitted a faint light. Up until now, it had been a simple preparation process, and from now on, the real Lucia boss fight would begin.

“Kyaaaaaaaaaaaak!!!!!!”

Lucia screamed and charged at me.