—
Seeing that Lucifa was determined to engage him in a swordfight, Will had no choice but to...
Compromise.
“Uh... just a heads-up, I don’t represent the average lee skills of adventurers. You probably shouldn’t use as a benchmark for your future combat strategies.”
“Who starts a fight with a boss by admitting they’re bad at lee?!” Lucifa snapped.
Clang.
Clang.
About ten seconds later, Will and Lucifa had exchanged two rounds of swordplay.
To be honest...
Lucifa was definitely not a “swordsmanship expert” as a boss.
And Will was certainly not a “swordsmanship expert” as an adventurer.
Their exchanges were so basic that Shuna was probably shaking her head behind them, and if Treya were here, she’d likely sigh in polite disappointnt.
Their movents were slow, their techniques lacked creativity or fluidity, and their duel felt more like a classroom swordsmanship drill than an actual battle.
But...
Sothing about it felt “familiar” to Will.
How to put it?
Even though Lucifa was encased in armor, making it impossible to see any “human” movents...
Even though her sword was technically part of her arm and not sothing wielded by a “human”...
Her sword techniques bore a striking resemblance to the Entark royal swordsmanship that Treya had learned from the “demons.”
For instance, the wide, sweeping strikes combined with feints of varying speeds—Will had never sparred with Treya, but he had seen her practice those exact moves countless tis.
What exactly are demons in dungeons?
This place was called “Tenth Demon Castle.” Did that an there were nine other “Demon Castles” before it?
And the swordsmanship Treya learned from the demons—was it so kind of universal demonic style?
“You’re zoning out! Your mind just wandered!” Lucifa’s vertical slash forced Will to retreat several steps.
“How do you know that?!”
“I’m a ntal-type boss. Of course I can read your thoughts!”
“Is that really how you’re using your ntal abilities?!”
“If you focused more, I wouldn’t have ti to read your mind, would I?”
“Actually, it’s because your sword techniques... remind of a friend of mine...” Will admitted.
Hearing this, Lucifa’s movents faltered slightly, her sword swing losing so of its force.
“But this is demonic... hmm... could it be that what I see in you is... demonic...” she began to say.
Before she could finish, Will seized the opportunity. With his free hand, he targeted the “shadow” beneath her feet—
“Light Rend.”
“!!!”
The spell had already been pre-channeled into his ring, requiring minimal energy to cast.
Will had noticed that Lucifa relied on the shadows beneath her feet as platforms for her agile movents. Without those shadows, her impractical high-heeled armor would make balancing nearly impossible.
So...
If he could eliminate her shadows!
Will took a step back as Lucifa’s downward slash caused her to overextend forward.
Thud.
Without the support of her shadows, Lucifa fell heavily to the ground.
“Oof... I hit my head.”
Uh...
Will barely managed to suppress his laughter.
This truly was one of the most unconventional boss fights he’d ever experienced. Normally, bosses were far more experienced than the adventurers they fought. But Lucifa exuded an almost codic inexperience—like soone saying, “This is my first ti being a boss; don’t laugh!”
Her high-heeled armor, designed for sliding on shadows like skates, was completely impractical for recovering from a fall.
Even worse, her arms were swords. This made it nearly impossible for her to use them to push herself back up.
Will watched as she tried and failed to get up multiple tis before finally sprawling out on the ground in a defeated “X” position.
“I... I can’t get up! How do I take this thing off?! And don’t you dare attack while I’m down!”
“If I wanted to attack you, I would’ve done it already. Do you think I’d wait through three failed attempts at standing?”
“Alright, fine! Let get these arm swords off first. Then I’ll have a chance.”
“I’m making my move now,” Will teased.
“No no no! Bosses are supposed to have invincibility fras during phase transitions!”
“Then hurry up and transition already!”
“Stop rushing !”
Watching Lucifa struggle to remove her arm swords so she could stand up properly reminded Will of his past life.
Back when he used to test new boss designs for ga levels, it wasn’t uncommon for bosses to fall over and get stuck in the ground due to glitches.
Apparently, dungeons weren’t all that different from their small-scale ga developnt projects after all.
“Alright, can you give a hand? I’m almost up,” Lucifa said after finally removing her arm swords. She extended one of her small hands toward Will for assistance.
“What are you going to do if you run into other adventurers outside? Do you think anyone else will help you up like this?!” Will scolded as he grabbed her hand.
“You sound like a dad scolding his kid for not knowing how to cook! Stop yelling at !”
“Fine,” Will sighed as he pulled her up.
There was sothing about Lucifa that stirred mixed feelings in him. While he had encountered playful bosses in other dungeons before—and while he knew from the original story that most dungeon Empresses enjoyed lively lives within their domains...
Lucifa was the first to lay it all bare without any reservations.
Perhaps months without adventurers had left her overly unguarded.
Or maybe her desire for adventurers to explore her dungeon and delve deeper into its mysteries was simply too strong.
Or perhaps...
She was just inherently friendly toward adventurers.
Either way...
Will couldn’t help but feel a little sorry for her.
As he helped her up, Lucifa suddenly pulled him closer with surprising force.
Then...
She locked eyes with him—those striking purple eyes of hers.
Oh right. Purple eyes.
From the mont she appeared, those eyes had carried an otherworldly allure. Now that he looked closely, he noticed swirling rings within them—like classic hypnotic tools designed to draw soone into another world with just one glance—
“Finally got you looking up. Welco to ‘Your Deepest Fears’—there are three stages, so take your ti!” Lucifa declared triumphantly.
!
Will blinked and found himself sowhere else entirely.
He glanced behind him—Shuna wasn’t there.
ntal-type abilities.
Right...
This had to be either a “dreamscape” or a blend of reality and illusion—a hallucination crafted by Lucifa, a demon who excelled at ntal manipulation.
But what kind of illusion was this?
ntal-type bosses typically created challenges tied to their victim’s inner psyche—forcing them to confront and overco deeply personal fears.
So...
“Your Deepest Fears,” huh?
Alright. This sounded like the typical “I’m a ntal-type boss; let manifest your inner fears” trope. Nothing new here.
He’d seen it plenty of tis before.
But what exactly were his fears?
Will froze for a mont as he gazed into the thick fog surrounding him. Erging from the mist were...
Three very familiar girls.
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