Chapter 70 – Sword Art Online (38)
In front of the boss room on the 2nd floor.
Facing the huge door, people gathered.
There were several guilds, but the most numerous was, of course, the Aincrad Liberation Army. Besides that, there was one guild that stood out.
The name of that guild is 《Legend Braves》.
It was a guild that also appeared in the original work. However, there are many differences from the original.
‘It means he didn’t commit an enhancement scam.’
In the original story, ‘Nezuha’, one of the Legend Braves’ guild members, has weak dive disqualification symptoms and does not have good distance perception, which makes melee combat difficult, making him anxious at the thought of becoming a burden to his comrades.
In the original work, he gets an idea from a person presumed to be the guild master ‘PoH’ who ran the killer guild, 《Laughing Coffin》, and earns a lot of money by scamming customers’ equipment pretending to be damaged while working as a blacksmith.
As a result, his colleagues were able to fit expensive equipment and become members of the raiding group, but the fraud was revealed and they were in danger of being lynched. In fact, it was PoH’s ulterior motive to cause trouble among the players from the beginning.
But now, unlike the original.
Nezuha was still equipped with a melee weapon. All of this was possible because Seo-joon took measures to ensure that even those who were not eligible for full dives could enjoy SAO without any problems through Nerve Gear.
That’s why, unlike their original work, they didn’t use strengthening scams, but they hunted hard and came up to the level of being involved in strategy battles.
‘Well, at least it’s a small pony.’
Seojun turned his head.
After finishing his speech, Dearbell was opening the door to the boss room.
I’m sorry.
The heavy iron door opens.
***
The attacks that monsters use against players can be largely divided into two systems.
One is a direct attack that reduces HP.
And another indirect attack that does not reduce HP even if hit, but occasionally causes great danger… In other words, debuff.
Kayaba Akihiko, who designed this death game, seemed to have kept the consideration for beginners to a minimum, and the kobolds living in the labyrinth area on the first floor rarely used debuff attacks, including bosses.
Therefore, the Taurus, a small human living in the labyrinth area on the 2nd floor, is the first full-fledged debuff user that the player encounters.
“Come!”
The moment he saw the trajectory of the huge two-handed hammer rising vertically, Seo-joon shouted.
“Okay!”
“Okay!”
With various answers, the party members made a big back jump.
The striking surface of the hammer, which had stopped for an instant in the distant sky, was tinged with multiple layers of bright yellow t-park.
“Bouuuuu!”
A roar that seemed to have some ranged attack properties in itself shook the air, and the hammer fell right after that.
A chunk of metal clad in lightning struck the blue-black floor stone noisily.
It is a sword skill with a debuff unique to the Taurus tribe, 《Numming Impact》.
Numbing means to be paralyzed.
Of course, no one was already within the direct damage range, but thin sparks spread radially around the point of impact.
One of the stems that ran down the floor thinned out and was about to disappear.
I glanced at Aiko’s boots.
“Ugh.”
At that moment, tingling.
An unpleasant sensation appeared on Aiko’s feet. However, the stun icon did not blink on the HP bar because it was barely outside the debuff effect range.
“Are you okay?!”
“Huh! No nod!”
“Okay. Then go again!”
At the same time as Seo-joon gave the instructions, he drew aggro from the small people.
Then, the girls surrounding him in a semicircle unleashed their sword skills with the maximum power set for each weapon.
Sister Konno and Kirito’s straight sword, Asuna’s three-sword, Leafa’s spear, and Sinon’s bow.
It draws a colorful light source effect and hits the monster directly.
Papa papak, the guy’s HP is rapidly declining.
And Seo-joon’s curved sword emitted a red light as he finished it.
Among the sword skills currently available to him, the most powerful one was firmly planted.
“Uh uh uh…”
With Seo-jun’s blow, the last row’s HP becomes zero, and the dwarf disappears like pieces of glass.
His mournful cries echoed throughout the boss room. As if trying to take a breather, Seo-joon and his party each raised their weapons and looked in one direction.
“It’s still busy over there.”
A slightly cracked scream is heard from the other side of the vast boss room.
“Evasion! Evasion!!”
There were dozens of players in the direction I looked after defeating the nasty mob, Colonel NATO, and beyond that, there was an incredibly huge shadow.
The color of the short fur on the bulging muscles is crimson. A luxurious golden cloth was wrapped around the waist, but the golden chain hanging down from the shoulders on the upper body is a charming point of the naked body unique to the Taurus tribe.
In addition, the battle hammer he held with both hands was a dazzling golden color.
He is the boss of the 2nd floor, «I wished the General Taurus».
Commonly known as General Baran, he was well over twice the size of the first floor boss «Ilfang the Kobold Lord».
It seemed to be about 5 meters by eye.
And, of course, the hammer it held was also an object worthy of its size.
“Uuuuu!!!”
Grip support.
Sparks fly from the raised hammer.
It was a sword skill with twice the power and range of effect than that of Colonel Nato, whom Seo-jun had just been dealing with.
Among the many debuffs, it is the most common, and because of that, there are many times, but ‘Stun’, which has an effect that can never be ignored, was his indirect attack.
Stun time is 3 seconds.
I don’t know if it’s against the pyramids, but 3 seconds was too long for a boss battle that can be called the strongest at this point.
Fear appears on the expression of the player caught in such a stun.
It was not possible to run away from the guy’s range.
“How stupid.”
Seojun sighed.
Only then can you properly attack?
He was forced to step forward. He also had to be careful in front of abnormal conditions, but since he had fought in the beta, it was not difficult to attack if he paid a little attention.
That’s right.
He kicks off the ground and runs.
At the same time, General Baran raised his hammer high again. Keying, the hammer is wrapped in a red light effect.
“Ah.”
A player who was stunned makes a dumb noise.
It had just been released, but the second attack had already been carried out. It’s too late to dodge, and it’s sure to take massive damage if you block it.
He felt the fear of death.
“Sah, live…”
Wedge love!!
The hammer rips through the air and strikes.
At that moment, Seojun pulled out his curved sword and activated his sword skill.
Quaang-!!
Two weapons clashing in the air.
Due to the clash between sword skills and sword skills, Seojun and General Baran suffered severe stiffness.
“Stand back.”
“Ah, thank you!!”
A player with a dead end hurriedly leaves his seat.
Seo-joon, who had recovered his stiffness, quickly threw a sword skill at the general he wanted. The eyes of the players who were watching it widened as the curved sword was dyed with a blue light source.
This is because up to now, among the sword skills, no sword skill has been found that produces such a light source effect.
Of course.
That would also be the case because it was 〈Original Sword Skill (OSS)〉 that Seojun came to the 2nd floor and made himself.
In less than a second, Seo-jun’s five sword strikes create scars on General Baran’s body.
“Pour it!!”
HP cut into chunks.
Considering that at this point, there was no sword skill for 3 consecutive strikes, let alone 5 consecutive strikes, there was no doubt that it was enormously powerful.
“Zu, what is zugi?”
“… Also.”
Kibao stuttered in embarrassment, and Dearbell nodded as if it were Seojun.
They were astonished, but in reality, Seo-joon was not very satisfied.
It was because the current agility was limited to 5 consecutive attacks.
As he had reached 17 consecutive hits in the beta, he couldn’t help but feel regret. However, there was no need to worry as this would also increase as the floor went up.
In any case, Seo-jun continued to pour OSS that he developed himself.
It was only about 10 seconds, but the number of sword attacks he inflicted had already approached twenty.
“Everyone, don’t just watch, let’s join!!”
The players, who had been absent-mindedly watching the miracle, suddenly came to their senses at the cry and charged at General Baran. Several arrows hit the guy’s body, and various weapons hit him with light source effects.
I entered the yellow zone indicating that the tough General Baran had half of his HP left.
It was truly a mess.
“Pour it!”
When his HP reached half, General Baran’s skin turned purple.
Then, it radiated even more fierce momentum, the same berserk pattern as in the beta days.
The other players, including Seo-joon, stepped back.
“Fortunately, there seems to be no difference from the beta this time.”
Egil, who was next to Seojun, muttered.
He solved the fact that the boss’s pattern was different from the beta through Argo, so many people came across the information in the guidebook.
So, the trend of not blindly trusting the information from the beta spread.
‘It must be about time.’
Seo-joon guessed that the time had come.
So he secretly released the information.
“No, it’s strange again.”
“Hmm? What do you mean?”
“I’m sure the boss on the 1st floor has the modifier ‘king’ attached to it. But why is the boss of the 2nd floor the ‘general’?”
“… That.”
The expressions of the players who heard him, including Egil, hardened.
It certainly made sense.
And as if to prove that it was not an unnecessary worry, a roaring sound echoed through the boss room.
All players looked in the direction of the sound, the center of the Colosseum. There was nothing there, but the floor covering the triple circle was sliding in a counterclockwise direction, changing speed little by little.
The bottom surface rises slowly and eventually creates a three-stage stage.
From above, the background slowly distorts. The effect was a precursor to the appearance of a huge object.
The shimmering of the space rapidly expanded, and a jet-black shadow vomited from the inside. The shadow immediately acquired a humanoid body, and two legs the size of a giant tree’s trunk landed on the coo goong stage.
Dark chain mail was wrapped around her waist, but her upper body was still nude.
However, the bovine man with a twisted beard stretched down to the belly was wearing a platinum-looking crown with as many as six horns on his head.
“Cooooo!!!!!”
A roaring roar.
Along with that, the name comes to mind under the 6th level HP bar that appeared above the head of the little man.
《Asterios the Taurus King》.
It was the appearance of the real boss.
