The Mysterious Black Magician

As expected the Winged-Demons were hit at every part of their bodies when the Wind Blades and Earth Javelins rained towards them.

Everyone's face contorted into bitterness and thought to themselves, what if those magical attacks were fired at the participants, for certain, only a few could survive.

Even the expert can't guarantee their safety if they were the ones receiving the attacks.

Anyhow, after killing most of the Winged-Demons, the skeleton descended and landed about 25 meters away from the Headless Boss of the room.

However, this move of him gathered attention from the participants around him.

At the corner of everyone's eyes, "Eh! The skeleton landed in the middle of the scorching floor?!" Most of the participants who noticed it was puzzled. It was known that skeletons were weak against fire. "Also, it was in the range of his enemy, the Headless Boss. It will lower his stats!" Everyone said so.

Regardless, they noticed the skeleton had seemingly no plan on moving away.

A second later, the floors seemed like it was grieving when another wave of demons crawled up from it. Then they sprung on their feet while surrounding him.

About 25 Lesser Demons and 25 Winged-Demons currently crowded on him. Now there is no way for him to escape.

Even if he used those Wind Blades and Earth Javelins once again, he could not kill them all on the spot, seemingly because he could only fire them at once and more demons were unceasingly coming up beyond the scorching floor to where he was currently standing.

"This is bad, Captain! The skeleton went inside the range of Hell-Bound. Now he's surrounded," one of Leon's members reported.

Leon and Hilion took a glance before returning their gaze at the enemies in front of them. Leon replied, "that is certainly bad! We can't have him lose yet."

Everyone was eyeing for the last hit at this moment. But if the skeleton would be defeated so soon, every participant would eventually become wary of each other. 

If only their strongest Artefact was not frozen inside their storage, they could fight the boss head-on. But as of now, only their spare one was available for them to use. Roman was lucky for not storing the Lightning Mayhem in his storage.

Hilion frowned. It was certainly not good for them if the boss was able to defeat the skeleton sooner.

After it became a Headless, everyone came into understanding that simply cutting could not kill it.

If they wanted to defeat the boss, they needed to shoot a very strong attack that could disintegrate it wholly.

Though it was a difficult task if the boss was still in his stronger state; therefore, they had to exhaust him first to achieve their plan about killing it. And that was the reason why they were letting the skeleton fight with it without disturbing him.

The only variable was Roman. They were wishing that he would join the fight to tire himself, but it looks like, Roman was also waiting for something.

However, even if they were 'ganging' for the last hit, it was still uncertain for them to succeed or not, it's all up to their luck.

"Young master, are we going to help the bone?" Leon asked.

Hilion was narrowing his eyes and thought that it was risky to do it. If they helped the skeleton, there was a big chance that those demons would flock to them instead.

Then Hilion creased his brows. Because at this point, the skeleton was in an unfavorable situation. 'Tsk, the hell with this creature!' He glanced around him, to the other participants especially to the experts.

He noticed both of them were busy fighting with Lesser Demons. Even his brother was being surrounded by 5 demons.

Hilion knew that Gilion could easily defeat those enemies if he wanted, but looks like he had something in his mind too.

Harou and his cousin also had their hands full. Even Jura and Nicholas were the same. In any case, he could not ask for help from those people. 

But in truth, Jura and Harou were just eyeing Hilion. They both knew that he would do something about the situation.

"Tsk!" He clicked his tongue. Looks like he was left with no choice.

"Leon! Those who are flying!" He shouted.

"Okay!" Leon understood what he meant, then he called out to his men, "Andrew, Felica! Snipe those Winged-Demons that are flocking the shitty bone!"

"Aye, sir!"

"Yes sir!"

"!!"

"Wait, sir! Look—!" Before his men could aim their attacks, Anthony shouted and pointed to the skeleton.

Weirdly, they saw the skeleton waving his bone hands in the air. The next second a large magic array appeared on the floor. Then something jutted out from it.

"P-Pagoda…" mumbled Leon.

"It was bigger and black in color!" Exclaimed Anthony. 

"But… he summoned it inside the Hell-Bound range, Captain!" Andrew pointed.

"....."

Leon and the others didn't know whether to laugh or cry at the skeleton's idiocy.

They knew what it was for, but since it was inside the boss area of effect. It would certainly weaken the skeleton soldiers that would come out of it.

A towering black pagoda protruded from the floor. Then, as expected, from the four sides of it, the door opened simultaneously. And a small version of the skeleton walked out from it. The same as usual, they were holding swords and shields. However, they noticed something different, the skeletons from the black pagoda were wearing black cloak on their backs the same as the huge skeleton.

"Skeleton Knights," someone outside the painting commented.

Without warnings, after the Skeleton Knights walked outside the pagoda, they rushed towards the Lesser Demons who were surrounding the huge skeleton.

Claaaaaang! The battle against skeleton knights and demons immediately commenced.

Not just that, they also noticed that the pagoda was oozing with black miasma, unlike the red miasma from the pagoda of the Elder Skeleton summoned on the wall.

The battle was surreal and it was happening inside the Hell-Bound range.

Not all but most of them expected that the skeletons would be a disadvantage. But sooner, their jaws dropped on the ground when they saw the skeleton soldiers were evenly fighting with the demons that were noticeably larger than them.

They wondered how the skeletons could handle the demons that were supposedly higher than them in both attack and defense.

"Fufufu, I think those black cloaks on their backs are not ordinary cloaks." The empress said what she noticed which made Ella force a soundless laugh.

"And those black miasma… they look suspicious to me. It was supposed to be a red miasma. Maybe because of that person?" The empress added while glancing at Ella.

Ella nodded at her, indicating that her initial thought must be right as she too was thinking the same. That it was made by that mysterious man. After all, based on what she knew, there was no such creature in that world that could let out such a kind of miasma.

Everyone gaped in disbelief when the battle continued for longer. Because the longer the battle between the skeleton soldiers and demons, the more the demons turned to the disadvantageous situation.

The ratio of the battle became one-sided too. Those who died around the pagoda would soon rise as skeletons. Then rushed towards the Lesser Demon.

The demons also constantly reinforce their troupes. But not as fast as the skeleton knights,

Right at this moment, 1 demon was surrounded by mostly four to five skeleton knights.

Even the demons who were supposed to be fighting the participants dissed their opponents and went to help their comrades who were fighting against the demons.

On the other hand, the Winged-Demons could not help their comrade as well, because they were shot down by Skeleton Archers and Caster through the windows of Black Pagoda.

"Holyshit, that pagoda becomes a real fortress!" Nicholas grunted. All the participants had become audiences in their competition.

Even Roman remained quiet.

Then everyone's attention was turned to the huge skeleton, he was walking towards the Headless Boss while resting the huge scythe on his shoulders. His steps were unhurried. Like a calm boulder amidst the storm around him.

Noticing the enemy slowly approaching towards him, the Headless Boss once made a chest up pose and summoned another dense scarlet energy from within.

Then he strode towards his rival, the huge skeleton!

A second later, (TTTIIIIINNNGGGG!!!) an ear-piercing sound tinkled their ears when the scarlet blade met the huge scythe.

Then it was followed by a combo of attacks from both of them.

(Ting-ting ting ting ting…!)

Sparks were flying everywhere when their weapons repeatedly collided.

The Headless Boss' whole body exuded scarlet energy, then he made a horizontal slash and created a scarlet gust of wind that was sent toward the huge skeleton.

Then again, to repel it, the huge skeleton spun his scythe and created a wind and fire vortex.

The two opposing forces exploded and created a much larger hole on the ground. The Headless Boss leaped immediately and brandished his weapon, then the skeleton twirled the scythe around him while engulfing it with fire.

(Tiiiiiinnnggg!!!)

Another piercing sound reached their ears.

Their battle was so fast-paced that the watchers could not perceive all their movements.

The force of the collision sent both of them away from each other, about 25 meters. 

"Looks like the Headless Boss will end the bout!" Shouted Anthony.

They saw the Headless Boss gathering a massive amount of scarlet energy in his left hand. A scarlet sphere that grows larger every second as more energy is reinforced on it.

Until it grew into a sphere with a diameter of two meters.

"Fuck it! What the hell is that!?"

"So huge!"

"Looks like it was the end!"

"Nah, it's also the end of us!"

"Dammit! Let's hide at Roman's back!"

"Shhh! Quiet, that's my plan..."

"....."

The other participants started to cause commotions out of worry that they become unlucky victims

Seeing a large scarlet sphere, the hollow eye-sockets of the huge skeleton suddenly ablaze with crimson fire.

Then he lifted his cloak to the back. Everyone gasped in surprise upon seeing the 6 spheres inside his chest with different colors. Specifically, they were inside his ribcage.

"The hell is that?!"

"Are those his life force?"

"Lifeforce?"

"Isn't those his energy sources?"

"With six of them?!"

"No wonder he's too broken!"

"Noooo! These two monsters are just too powerful! Did the empress want us all to die?"

"If that happens no one will win the elimination round! For Her Grace Sake!"

Everyone lamented.

The audiences outside the painting were watching at it with solemn faces. They wondered if the empress didn't want someone to win.

On top of it, it was only the elimination round!

They focused their eyes towards the huge skeleton who lifted his right hand. And on top of it, different colors of energies were gathering.

Like the Headless Boss, the different colors of energies were forming into a sphere. And it was also growing bigger.

While watching at it, Harou was twitching his brows. He glanced at Hilion and the others. But he noticed that all of them were in trance.

"These bastards!" He grunted.

Then he called out, "Hilion, Jura, Roman, Gilion! What are you guys waiting for?! We can't let those guys do their thing!" Harou was worried the monsters would pulverize themselves and disappeared at once when those two super dense and huge spheres fired at each other.

Jura and Hilion understood his worry. But they were wary of the other.

They did not expect that these two monsters would settle their battle with such kind of attacks.

"Right, we can't let them settle their battle in such a way!" Jura replied.

"I agree! Damn it!" Hilion bellowed.

Gilion on the other hand just nodded and Roman stayed in silence.

Mus who was hiding behind the huge golden chair was gulping with sweats trailing on his face.

"Damn damn….. I needed good timing when they fired those spheres!" He needed to rush and steal the treasures while the others were busy with the monsters.

Before everyone could make a move: BANG! Whoosh! Thud thud thud… crasssssss…!

"!!"

The towering wooden door of the room was sent flying which caught everyone's attention.

All their eyes followed the door, then out of reflex darted their eyes to where the door was supposed to be.

Tap tap tap… six people walked in from it.

"....."

Everyone went silent.

"Hehe, he's here!" The empress giggled.