Fallen Priestess Lucia – 1

“Who are you……?”

The nun, who had stopped crying, slowly turned her head with a grinding sound. It was a sound effect that should never have come from a human neck.

“Is someone there……?”

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

It was an incomparably grotesque face. The skin on her right cheek was half-rotted and decaying, and black liquid overflowed from between her tightly closed eyes, dripping down her cheeks and chin onto the floor.

It almost looked like she was crying. Although, in reality, it was probably black liquid filling her body to the brim and then oozing out.

Even though her entire body was rotting, her features were quite beautiful. It seemed she must have been a considerable beauty before she became such a sight. Of course, now it was all meaningless.

“Ah… if someone is there… please help me…”

The nun staggered and rose to her feet. Perhaps due to the shock, a large mass of rotting flesh sloughed off her body. The spots where the flesh fell away were immediately filled with black liquid.

Parts of her body began to turn black. Proportionately, her human skin gradually diminished. With every step she took, the rotting flesh made a squelching sound.

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

Her right arm, extended with a desperate plea, collapsed weakly. Her squishy, black-rotted body vanished as if absorbed by the ground.

A new arm sprouted from her half-melted shoulder. However, even though the severed part regenerated, the recovery showed no sign of stopping. Black liquid adhered to the black liquid once more.

The nun’s right arm rapidly swelled in size. It was now in a state that could hardly be called a human arm.

“Why… why aren’t you helping me…?”

The nun bowed her head deeply. A sobbing sound leaked from between her closed lips. She looked incredibly pitiful, but there was nothing I could do for her.

How could I possibly help someone whose body had been contaminated long ago, clinging to only a handful of memories and moving purely by instinct? That nun had already been consumed by the abyss for a long time.

Unless helping meant allowing her to find eternal rest.

“So that’s how it was.”

Her deeply bowed head slowly lifted. Her voice had somehow turned cold. A grinding sound of teeth gnashing leaked from between her lips.

“You came here to mock me, didn’t you? You came here with the intention of further shaming me, who is suffering like this…”

Her sobbing turned to rage, and her pain turned to hatred. Her right arm, which had already swelled as if it would burst, grew even larger. Her entire body was almost buried in her shoulder.

As if that wasn’t enough, black liquid tore through the bare skin behind the nun’s back and surged upwards. The black liquid, writhing and forming the shape of a human arm, powerfully stomped the ground, announcing its arrival.

“Then…”

The nun’s eyes widened as if tearing, and she stared directly at me. Her entire eyes were black.

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

Between her wide-gaping mouth, densely grown teeth were revealed. If this were a game, the cutscene would probably end here, the OST would start playing, and the boss battle would begin.

That nun was none other than the boss of this place, Rune Dungeon, ‘Fallen Priestess Lucia’.

The word ‘fallen’ here carried a double meaning. Literally, it meant she had fallen from a bridge and survived, becoming what she was, and figuratively, it meant she had fallen from a priestess 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. There was no need to attack Lucia right now.

In Phase 1, I needed to use something other than an attack power buff. After all, only one buff could be applied to a weapon at a time.

Lucia approached me, striding across the floor with the arm that had surged from her back. The nun’s main body, meanwhile, hung in the air, swaying back and forth like laundry on a windy day.

Her abnormally large right arm opened wide. A sweeping pattern. I carefully observed its movement, then rolled backward just as it began to twitch.

The arm swept across an enormous area in the blink of an eye. In vanilla mode, the pattern would have ended here, but in Darkra Mode, it was only just beginning.

The nun’s main body’s legs dropped to the floor. Instead, two arms that had surged from her back were suddenly lifted. According to common sense, one would naturally think she would slam them down.

But that was a feint. I looked not up, but to the side. The right arm that had swept the floor just moments ago was swinging again.

This time, I swung my sword, deflecting the right arm, and as soon as my body was pushed back with a thunk, I rolled a couple of times to get out of the way. Only after that did Lucia slam down the arms she had lifted.

-CRUNCH!

I widened the distance further. If I blocked that slam with a parry, I would be completely exposed to the follow-up attack. It was similar to the charge pattern of the Headless Armored Cavalry.

The arm, embedded in the ground, split into multiple tentacles that stretched out everywhere, thrashing through the air. This was an attack that came during the parry’s recovery delay. If hit, it was naturally an instant death.

While Lucia was doing that, I surveyed my surroundings.

‘The Holy Catalyst…’

In a game, items would be clearly marked, but that wouldn’t be the case here, so I had to find it with my own eyes. It would definitely be somewhere inside the boss room.

“Why? Was this appearance not enough? Do you want me to be even more ruined?”

A scream mixed with deep sorrow burst out. I widened the distance from the right arm that was thrashing and swinging in all directions, then circled the boss room and ran towards where the Holy Catalyst was likely to be.

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

Of course, if I carelessly tried to drink a potion after creating a lot of distance, I would inevitably be hit by an instantly incoming harassment pattern and then launched into a statue.

‘There it is.’

As I expected, the Holy Catalyst was lying in the exact same spot as in the game. I quickly picked it up. The moment I picked up the Holy Catalyst, I heard a CRASH! from behind me.

I turned my body around. Lucia’s figure was nowhere to be seen. Confirming that fact, I counted to two in my head, then immediately rolled sideways to get away.

With an even louder CRASH! than before, Lucia’s body slammed down onto the ground. Black liquid splattered everywhere from where she landed.

While the boss was righting herself, I examined the Holy Catalyst. Black liquid had permeated every corner, making its original color completely unrecognizable, but this was enough.

I held the Holy Catalyst in my left hand and the Bloodstained Sword in my right. I concentrated power in my left hand, as if drawing something in. The black-stained catalyst began to emit a murky white light.

Half the battle was won. As I had seen in the game, I brought the Holy Catalyst just above the crossguard of the Bloodstained Sword, then pushed it upwards, letting it brush against the blade.

Then, a dull golden light enveloped the blade of the Bloodstained Sword. It wasn’t a perfect golden color like what Stella wrapped around her mace, but it was enough to recognize it as sunlight.

With this, the other half was also successful. I re-attached the Holy Catalyst to my waist. This was the core of Lucia’s Phase 1 boss battle. It was what was called the ‘Blessing Enchantment’.

Phase 1 Lucia had enormous resistance to physical attacks.

If I were to defeat Lucia with only normal attacks right now, even if the Bloodstained Sword’s attack power buff lasted indefinitely, it would take over two hours of hitting her.

Conversely, she took massive bonus damage from blessed weapons or holy spells. To the extent that a cleric, fully buffed, could clear Phase 1 with just two holy spells.

That was also why a Holy Catalyst with an enchantment-type special ability was inexplicably lying in the boss room.

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

That was something to think about only after defeating Lucia. I pulled out a potion, drank it, then carelessly tossed the bottle aside.

My HP would have been quite depleted from using the Holy Catalyst just now, so this was to replenish it. It’s always right to replenish such things proactively when a window of opportunity appears.

So that even characters who hadn’t raised their Faith or Holy Power could use the buff, this Holy Catalyst’s special ability was treated as black magic. According to the lore, it was because the catalyst had been contaminated by the black liquid.

Black magic dealt significantly more damage than regular magic of the same tier, but its use consumed a small amount of mana and additional HP simultaneously. The higher the tier, the greater the HP cost.

Unlike the Bloodstained Sword’s buff, the HP reduction was a fixed amount, which was disadvantageous for characters with low HP stats. For me, with a HP stat of 1, every single spell was practically a fatal wound.

I could even die from this. If black magic was used with low HP, the HP would drop to 0, and the character would collapse. Of course, this was treated exactly like a normal death.

I certainly 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 subtle glow. Until now, it had merely been preparation; the true start of Lucia’s boss battle was now.

“KIIIIIIIIIIYAAH!!!!!!”

Lucia shrieked and charged at me.