Return of the Frozen Player-Novel

He heard a loud explosion and turned to look toward it.

“A blue flare... did it come from an ally?”

“Blue means success.”

“No.” Specter was well aware of Gilberto’s personality and knew that he would only use a blue flare if he had completed everything. “It means Isaac Dvor is dead.”

“What? Who killed him?” Christin Lewis turned to look at Specter in surprise.

Isaac Dvor was a Heaven and the right arm of the Heavenly Demon. He seemed like he had an outgoing personality because he was always all smiles, but he was an infamous fiend who had killed an innumerable number of Players.

“He died at the hands of the world’s best wingman,” said Specter.

The castle made out of thorny bushes, rumbled.

“Here we go again. There’s a fight going on down there, but it seems that it’s impossible for us to make our way there,” said Christin Lewis. He was right. They hadn’t been able to find a way down.

And it was all because…

“The owner doesn’t want us to go down.”

The thorny bushes were holding them back.

In other words, Valencia was dealing with all of them by herself.

Specter gestured with his chin. “Look.”

The flare was now below them, which meant…

“She’s raising our altitude.”

“It seems that the saying about how one’s senses would be distorted while they’re around Valencia is true.” Valencia had been pushing the two higher and higher to prevent them from getting close to her.

He crushed an encroaching thorny bush with his divine power before asking, “It will be difficult for us to go down because these bushes regenerate too fast. Can’t you just freeze and cut them all like what you did to enter this castle?”

“These bushes are nothing in front of my power to disregard.” However, going down the castle was a completely different story. Valencia’s thorny bushes regenerated at the same speed at which it was cut down.

“Wait, how did you come in here, then?” asked Christin Lewis.

“That was a different story...” Specter froze the bushes and cut them down at once to enter the castle. “However, I only managed to do that because Valencia and I reached a compromise.”

Valencia didn’t want Specter to attack her from the outside, while Specter wanted to go inside the castle. In the end, Valencia compromised and allowed Specter to enter her castle.

Things were different now…

Valencia was desperately keeping Specter at bay.

If Mio were overwhelming her, Valencia wouldn’t have the luxury to keep Specter at bay.

Specter opened his Inventory and asked, “The Sun God is omniscient, right?”

“Of course, wait, are you interested in the Sun God?”

“Not exactly, but…”

Christin Lewis blinked blankly at Specter. He had no idea what Specter had in mind.

***

Valencia’s attacks were innumerable, incessant, and unpredictable.

Her combat style was reminiscent of Specter, which didn’t allow his opponent even a moment to breathe.

“Ibuki! Are you okay?”

“I-I’m okay…” Mr. Shoot didn’t sound okay at all.

Mr. Shoot very much wanted to sleep, but he couldn’t allow himself to collapse.

However, Mr. Shoot’s lethargic body was betraying his burning determination.

Eventually, he collapsed to his knees.

“Ibuki!” Mio screamed.

Valencia saw that and took advantage of the opening. “You let your guard down.”

Spears made out of thorny bushes flew toward Mio.

Mio raised both her swords and cut the thorns down.

Unfortunately, there were simply too many thorns for Mio to handle.

The thorny bushes carved bloody lines on Mio’s pristine figure.

“You still want to keep going?”

Valencia sighed lightly. She wanted to end this pointless fight as soon as possible.

The weather was gloomy, and rain had been incessantly falling, bolstering her thorny bushes’ regeneration rate to its limit.

Isaac’s presence had disappeared, so she had to finish this fight to find out whether he was still alive or not.

“I’m busy, so hurry up and die.” Valencia flicked her sleeve, and a tsunami of thorny bushes loomed over Mio.

Mio had been using Sword Kinesis to move her swords without touching them, and it allowed Mio access to an endless variation of attacks from just about any angle.

It was a ridiculously powerful technique, but its magic, stamina, and mental strength consumption were enormous.

Mio had been swinging her sword all her life with the mindset that if she sweated one more drop of sweat during her training, she and her friends would shed one less drop of blood on the battlefield.

Mio decided to believe in the time and effort she had spent while walking on her path.

She gripped her two swords tightly, and a purple flame engulfed her swords.

Mio turned toward the tsunami of thorns and shouted, “Come!”

“Hey, you don’t have to rush me,” Valencia said coldly. “I’m still going to kill you, anyway.”

Valencia flicked her sleeve, creating hundreds of monsters made out of bushes.

Valencia gave Mio two options.

The latter could only cut all her thorny bushes down or die.

Valencia could theoretically create an endless amount of thorns during a downpour.

“...!” Valencia abruptly turned her head.

She heard a faint noise coming from the other side of her walls.

Something was trying to enter the battlefield…

Valencia could clearly tell that the intruder wasn’t Specter.

Valencia frowned.

However, the intruder finally broke through her thorny bushes and entered the battlefield.

Valencia saw a flying sword similar to Tenmei Mio’s flying swords earlier.

Valencia could clearly recognize the four swords, and they were none other than the parts of Specter’s Freedom Blade.

Valencia flicked her sleeve to restrain the swords.

The distance between her and Specter was more than a kilometer, and she was still raising the altitude of the castle, so the distance between them would only increase as time went on.

Valencia smiled, thinking that Specter had made a big mistake. Specter’s Freedom Blade was tricky to handle because Specter was manipulating them through Sword Kinesis, just like Mio.

“I’ll throw them into the sea.” Valencia’s thorny bushes engulfed Specter’s flying swords.

However, the flying swords sliced them all.

Specter was strong, but there was no way he could see what was going on here unless he were a god.

The flying swords moved nonstop and incessantly sliced the surrounding thorny bushes and monsters.

Valencia was baffled.

***

“What do you think? This is the power of the omnipotent Sun God. Isn’t it amazing?”

“Shut up,” Specter said, annoyed.

However, he had to admit that the Sun God’s divine power was indeed useful.

“The Sun God’s eyes are sunlight itself. Anyway, what about it? Do you want to become a follower?” asked Christin Lewis.

“No, and can you shut up, please? You’re making it hard for me to focus.”

“...” A golden hologram was reflected in Specter’s eyes, and it showed him a three-dimensional space a few kilometers away from them.

Specter was currently using Christin Lewis’ God’s Eye to intervene in the battle between Mio and Valencia.

“...”

His flying swords protected Mio and Mr. Shoot, and they cut down every single thorny bush that dared to encroach on them. However, Specter was well aware that what he was doing was just a band-aid solution.

He wasn’t hoping that this would be enough to kill Valencia.

He couldn’t do anything else aside from helping Mio from afar with his flying swords.

Mio was the only one who could kill Valencia.

Specter closed his eyes and focused.