Episode 27 : Back in Action (7)

Garden of Eden, along with Eve and Adam are not the same as the ones on Earth. Instead, the garden and its residents were created by the 'Creators'.

Using Earth's stories to bring their own creations to existence, the 'Creators' were no more than patronizers. From the seven Archangels to me, Satan, the creatures made from 'Creators' were mere copies of the Earth's.

That's why I wanted to rebel. That's why I didn't want to live a life as a replica, but be my own person.

Despite that, aren't I being the same as the Satan from Earth? Right, I was only created to be like Satan, just like all the others creatures.

I met with Eve and Adam, persuaded Eve to eat the forbidden fruit. Exactly like Earth's Satan.

Fought with the Archangel Michael and was easily defeated by her every single day and life I went through.

But for once, I'm honestly surprised when the 'Creators' finally made something that wasn't a copy.

The 'Helpers' of this life, names like Ruby, Sapphire, Turquoise, Tanzanite and Zircon, almost seemed like they were angels with their names being the birthstones from Earth.

"In their cores, they are still holy beings." I mumbled.

So if these new angels were truly angels, what would happen if I were to try to destroy the Garden of Eden's precious tree?

The tree of life.

This tree is the source of all the mobs that the players would encounter, not only does it give life to newer beings and use its life essences to create tons and tons of mobs.

It's the 'Helpers' precious tree that gives them an infinite amount of creatures for the stages.

If I manage to destroy this, no newer mobs will be spawned unless the 'Helpers' personally took their time to create those mobs themselves, then it would mean less creatures to deal with than before.

..And the tree's death has another reason other than the ones above..

In any case, if these two angels attempt to prevent me from doing what I must, they would definitely be stopped by Adam, Eve and my comrades.

[JoonChul. How long will it take?]

"1 hour at most."

After asking what he wanted, Adam just nodded and went back to standing guard around me, along with Eve.

It wasn't long when Sapphire and Ruby noticed the branches of the tree they were sitting on to be rotting away faintly.

And because of that, I was certain that they would want to ask me why or prevent me from harming the tree.

"How crude.." I grumbled.

CRASH!

..But to think they didn't once question me the reasons why I did this, they had to crash down to the ground with dusts and dirt flying everywhere.

Once the dust smoke vanished completely, the glances of holy terror directing from the eyes of the 'Helpers' on my right side were as elegant and frightening as their truculent entrance.

Both with cold-blooded presences filled this peaceful garden to that of a riotous atmosphere.

The moment their lips moved at the same time, words were exactly the same as each other, reverberating out loudly to everyone's ears.

"How dare a mere human like you bring such harm to this tree?"

It was odd that their words matched one another, but that wasn't something to be questioned about. Because in this moment, two angels were furious by my action.

Not only that, they wanted me gone.

"Now!" I called out to my comrades.

From my signal, Frostina and Raiden had jumped in to stop the 'Helpers' from ruining my plan. As per my instructions, I informed Frostina to deal with the fiery Ruby while Raiden handled Sapphire.

Blaze! Zap!

I wish I could just use Alaine's Hidden Skill, 'Bodyjack' on the 'Helpers', but wouldn't that be too unfair and easy? Plus they are angels, they would be able to resist it completely.

'To he honest, if I had remembered that skill earlier, I wouldn't have died by Noel's hands. Damn, I'm such a fool.' I let out a long sigh, knowing that the battle will take long.

"JoonChul-ssi! What are you doing?!"

Amidst the crash between my comrades and the angels, a voice was heard from all those ear-piercing sounds and destruction emerging at that area.

Of course, I knew who it was without spending a second thought about it.

..It was Seong HwanGi.

[Didn't he tell you that he's getting you all out of this place?] Adam stepped in to help me.

Although I didn't need his help, it was better than needlessly answering HwanGi's questions.

For the most part, I must concentrate on reaping this tree's life to let all of us escape this snow-covered place.

"Hyup!"

With my other arm, I thrusted it deeply into the tree's trunk, penetrating my arm in its entirety. Upon getting two of my arms rooted inside the tree, I resumed on releasing more of the 'Wither Storm' within this worthless tree.

"Ho.."

But during this process, I was almost blown away by the forces emerging from my right side. Winds gusting so disruptively that my hair and clothes were roaring through this gale.

Swoosh!

Since my arms were already preoccupied, I clearly had nothing to grab on my fluttering clothes and hair poking my eyes constantly.

"Frostina! Don't overdo it!" I exclaimed to her once I sensed the chilling atmosphere arising.

And as if he was trying to show off, Raiden seemed to have summoned forth a thunderstorm within this place.

"Oh dear.." I knew what would be occurring soon.

Accompanied with the electrical storm, the beginning of a winter tempest was whirling alongside the previous storm, being combined into one massive superstorm.

In spite of it being already too immensely disastrous from these two storms, there seemed..to be another.. one?

"What.." I murmured when I realized the ground being wet and water raining down on me.

..It wasn't snow from Frostina's storm nor was it Raiden's thunder.

..It was a raindrop..

"I don't know what you're doing to this nice tree, but it's not like it will matter if it helps us get out of this."

Beside me, HwanGi arrived with his 'Divine Flame' masking his sword, staring at me with his matured gaze. Hold on, I wasn't even sure how to describe his expression.

Was it a realization? Commitment? Precarious?

What's more, how did this person turn out this way? It was as if he changed from the time I was dead.

All I know is, it's that his expression reminded me of a certain archangel. And I didn't like it one bit.

"Do what you want." I responded.

When HwanGi heard me, he nodded his head before standing right behind me as though he was trying to protect me.

I gritted my teeth when I felt a resemblance from HwanGi and that archangel.

'Ha.. Why do you act so much like her? You're really making me mad, HwanGi-ssi.'

As if my vexation were fueling me, I blighted the 'Wither Storm' much more vigorously to distress my anger. Withering all the slightest life that this tree could have, I was hastening the rotting process a lot quicker than before.

And it was a fortunate thing because right now, there was a blooming chance that Frostina and Raiden wouldn't be able to prolong the fight with the angels..

———

Meanwhile in the battle against former NPCs and angels, it was looking awfully one-sided.

"Rai!" Frostina uttered while sprinting on her ice platforms in the middle of stormy weather.

But either way, that mattered nothing to Frostina who was passing through the storm. Gathering snow flakes into the palm of her hand, she had created an ice lance ready to take down her enemies.

With a toss, Frostina had shot the big lance toward Raiden. It was because Frostina's opponent was in Raiden's direction, allowing him to use the lance with his lightning combined.

"Haa!"

Without a doubt, it was Raiden who was throwing the thunder-ice lance straight at Sapphire and Ruby, cracking the lance into pieces to rain down plenty of its shards toward them.

"Is that how you fight!? Just fight me instead and not her!" Ruby growled as she jumped in to help Sapphire.

Illuminating the area with her steaming hot aura, the thunder-ice shards were soon melted into steam instead of water. It told Frostina and Raiden how fierce Ruby's fire was.

Raiden exhaled as he hopped by Frostina's side. "This is definitely tough."

"..." No response, Frostina glared at Ruby and Sapphire.

"Can we really beat them?"

"We need to stall them, not here to defeat them."

Raiden chuckled. "Gomen, gomen. Looks like I forgot what Sensei said."

"That's strange. Why would you forget your Sensei's words?"

"Haha.."

Raiden smiled toward Frostina before suddenly disappearing from his position only to reappear in front of Sapphire.

At that moment, Raiden had generated a staff made out of lightning, wielding it as he spun his staff around. By then, large quantities of thunders and lightning were being zapped from the rapid circle rotation that Raiden was doing.

Electrocuting the air with a bang before scattering sounds started to reverberate, Raiden had shot all of those directly to Sapphire to obliterate her body in one go.

Bang!!

Because it looked like Sapphire was definitely dead from this attack, Raiden felt all the more doubtful about it.

"As if it was that easy." Raiden scowled as he quickly dashed away from his spot.

Seeming like luck was on his side..

Raiden managed to avoid a rain of chilly beams that could have potentially punctured countless holes into his body.

"Stay on guard." Frostina spoke after blocking Sapphire's ice beams with her snowflake shield.

From there, Frostina was passing around the angels while also appearing like she was making a diamond shaped ice on her hands.

Until Frostina could finish it though, Sapphire swayed her hand, causing tons of sharp snowflakes around her to shower down on Frostina.

Frostina scowled. "Tch!"

But thankfully for Frostina and sadly for Sapphire, Raiden had halted Sapphire's attack by lashing down his thunders onto Sapphire's vicinity.

"I won't let you hurt her while I'm here!" Raiden smirked at Sapphire as if to taunt her.

Although it was barely a prevention, Sapphire's focus was soon on Raiden while Ruby who was like a sun, was beating down on Frostina with her fireworks.

Ruby laughed while she looked like she was having fun in an irked way. "I'll be done with you in no time!"

Fireworks that weren't for show, were shooting at Frostina until it bursted into a true firework by Frostina's counterattack.

But even the tiny sparks of fire were dangerous when it hit Frostina's clothes, setting fire on it in the process. Fire that wasn't easily put out when Frostina tried to save her outfit, was giving her a hard time.

"How unfortunate."

Frostina grunted while grabbing her dress firmly, ripping it apart only to get the burning dress off of her.

..And for obvious reasons, Frostina had a backup suit underneath her dress for this occasion.

With a whip on her waist, Frostina wielded her whip and swept forward to where Ruby was, sending that angel a payback by unleashing a continuous attack of ice lances.

"Why you little!? Grrrr!!!" Ruby groaned as she attempted to protect herself with her arm.

In that moment where Sapphire was preoccupied with Raiden and Ruby being pummeled by Frostina's drizzling ice lances, Frostina took this chance to crush the diamond shaped object she was creating earlier.

Glimmering…

Upon its demolition, the diamond shaped wasn't a small thing in Frostina's hands anymore, but a cage that took shape around the 'Helpers', blocking their paths and preventing their attacks to escape this cage.

Frostina cried out as she made a cage with her hands using her fingers. "Now!"

In a blink of an eye, Raiden went into overdrive and charged straight through the cage, zapping like that of a fast-paced thunder to pierce his enemies.

Even Sapphire and Ruby were too shocked of the cage that they weren't to even notice him coming.

Razing, Raiden managed to penetrate in and out of the cage, along with the prisoners inside. And because of how speedily he was, he purposely caused a sonic boom inside the diamond shaped cage, prompting the cage to crack like a mirror in one attempt.

Obviously, Raiden went overboard with this and his body would definitely react badly to it. But thankfully for him, he had Mirai to boost his body with her skill.

As a thank you to Mirai, Raiden waved his hand toward Mirai to catch her attention in which she noticed him and just looked away immediately, acting like she didn't mean to help Raiden.

"Kawaii." Raiden grinned.

Afterwards, Raiden panted a little while he was backing away from the shattering cage, descending down toward Frostina in a way.

Slightly out of breath, Raiden asked Frostina. "Was that enough to keep them at bay?"

"No, it's only the beginning."

"..!"

BOOM!!

As to accompany her words, the two angels that were left unscratched by both Raiden's and Frostina's attacks, they were walking out of the cage with ease even though the cage was scattering ice shards around them.

"Is this how you feel when you're annoyed?" Raiden muttered before grasping his staff to split it in half.

Preparing for the next round, Frostina clasped her second whip that was wrapping normally around her waist just like a belt.

"Indeed, it is." She replied gracefully as she held two deadly whips within her chilling hands.

Ruby, smiling in a way that wasn't angelic, declared blaringly. "Let's the next round begin."