Return of the Sword God-Rank Civil Servant-Chapter 450

“Ghuooooooooh!!”

[ Girard becomes enraged. ]

[ Girard uses ruler-grade Fear. ]

[ Dragon Blood is activated. ]

[ By the Dragon Mind effect of Dragon Blood, Fear does not apply. ]

Girard grew enraged.

The magnitude of that rage was so great that the moment he screamed, the entire boss room shook as if an earthquake had struck.

It was fine.

Anyway, the boss monster’s Fear did not apply to Su-ho, and physical sound damage could simply be dealt with by piercing his ear acupoints and knocking out his hearing.

‘It’s just me here alone, so what does it matter?’

Girard would say things now and then, but so what?

He honestly wasn’t very curious.

At best, it would just be shouting or insults belittling him.

But even Su-ho had something about Fear that he absolutely could not ignore.

[ By the effect of ruler-grade Fear, all buffs on Players are removed. ]

That was the removal of all buff effects.

Su-ho’s brow furrowed.

‘So Fear is finally starting to change, huh.’

In terms of level alone, Girard was a 2-star monster.

But on top of being a boss monster, he was also the first Big Gate monster of the second Great Upheaval, personally selected by the system.

So the performance he’d been granted was at least 3-star, not 2-star.

‘And 3-star boss monsters mix ruler-grade Fear into their attacks.’

Ruler-grade Fear was a higher-tier Fear above boss monster-grade Fear. In addition to basic debuffs like stiffness, paralysis, and terror, it possessed a nasty option that removed all buffs from Players.

So although Su-ho was immune to the mental debuff effects by virtue of the Dragon Mind effect, he still couldn’t defend against the buff removal.

Of course, it wasn’t as if he used ruler-grade Fear all the time.

Normally he would use boss monster-grade Fear, and whenever its cooldown reset, he would use it then and there.

‘If he kept firing off ruler-grade Fear nonstop, what a pain that would be.’

So this much was fine.

Buff removal could simply be solved by reapplying the buffs.

It would be a bit of a hassle, and it would cost a bit more mana, but so what.

It wasn’t like he’d ever intended to avoid this level of effort, and his mana was already beyond the realm of ordinary Players.

Thud!

Girard jumped.

At the same time, he began to cut through the darkness, dropping down toward Su-ho.

Su-ho immediately reapplied his self-buffs.

[ Blessing is activated. ]

[ Holy Enchant is activated. ]

[ Mana Perception is activated. ]

[ Endurance is activated. ]

[ Enhancement is activated. ]

[ Eye of the Blacksmith is activated. ]

[ Sword Aura is activated. ]

The visual effects of his self-buff skills raged around him.

At the same time, Su-ho sprang from his spot and got out of the way of Girard’s footprint.

Kwooooooom!!

A huge footprint was engraved where Su-ho had been standing.

He’d thought the starting point where he had been standing would be completely destroyed by Girard’s fall, but unexpectedly, it boasted sturdiness and was left with only the imprint of the footprint.

“You run away pretty well!”

[ Girard uses Dark Crushing Fist. ]

Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang!

Having landed, Girard began to swing his restored four pairs of arms in earnest.

His arms, whipping around like whips, began to crazily destroy the surroundings.

Su-ho’s eyes narrowed at the sight.

‘As expected, I’m not the target.’

You could tell at a glance with that sort of thing.

Whether he was the target or not.

Cunningly enough, Girard started by steadily destroying the floating stones around him, including the starting point he had landed on.

In addition to having already seized the visual advantage of darkness, he was now destroying the few remaining footholds to reshape the entire battlefield to his advantage.

It was fine.

Su-ho wasn’t the type to lose just because a bit of terrain disappeared.

Su-ho immediately began to use his counterattack skills.

[ Mark of Pain is activated. ]

The first to begin was Mark of Pain.

Dominion of the Desert Ruler was a terrifying skill that perfectly restored all of Girard’s health and body whenever time cycled.

Of course, in addition to the option that restored him in one shot, Dominion of the Desert Ruler also had a continuous effect that granted extremely high regeneration, so from this point on, using Mark of Pain was absolutely indispensable.

Mark of Pain was a skill that permanently blocked health regeneration for the marked target as long as the caster’s mana did not run out whenever that target tried to recover health.

‘If not now, then when would I ever use this?’

The enemy’s health recovery and his own mana going down together.

Of course, the ratio wasn’t 1:1.

When Mark of Pain had been A-grade, it had consumed mana equal to 20% of the health the enemy was trying to recover, but during the reorganization period just before the Big Gate challenge, he had raised Mark of Pain’s grade to S.

As a result, now he could block the bastard’s health regeneration by consuming only 10% of that amount in mana.

‘A 10:1 ratio is a perfectly fine value for money!’

On top of that, up to A-grade, the Mark of Pain symbol had appeared on the forehead, but now it rose above the head like an icon and glittered.

Su-ho then used a second skill.

[ Enrage is activated. ]

As Enrage was activated, an orange aura spewed from Su-ho’s sword, then instantly wrapped around Girard, and the Enrage mark was engraved above Girard’s head.

“Ghuoooooooh!! I’ll kill you all!!”

[ Girard becomes enraged. ]

[ Girard uses boss monster-grade Fear. ]

[ Dragon Blood is activated. ]

[ By the Dragon Mind effect of Dragon Blood, Fear does not apply. ]

As soon as the Enrage mark was engraved, Girard began to rampage even more wildly.

Su-ho laughed when he saw it.

‘The effect is nice.’

Smiling, Su-ho recalled the skill information from around the time he had first obtained Enrage.

[ Enrage ]

# Rage Crusader-exclusive skill.

# The Rage Crusader, who uses the power of rage, possesses the power to make their opponent enraged.

# The target under Enrage quickly falls into a state of rage, and as time passes, the rage amplifies even further. Rage caused by the Enrage skill is maintained until the caster cancels the skill or the caster’s mana is completely depleted.

Simply put, Enrage was a skill that made the opponent angry.

Seriously.

The options even explicitly said that all it did was make the opponent angry.

So he’d never had a reason to use it until now.

Because he’d never had a need to deliberately make the opponent angry.

In that sense, if Su-ho had been an ordinary person instead of a regressor, he would have tilted his head when he saw Enrage’s options.

‘What meaning could there be in battle in merely making the opponent angry?’

If you really had to answer, it would be that, when agitated, you easily lose your reason, and that clouded judgment leads to mistakes?

If that was all, then for a class skill obtained at level 250, it was pretty stingy.

Which made sense, because even after he used Gi Seung-hwan and Gi Seung-ok to raise it to S-grade—

......

# You can handle the power of rage better, allowing you to drive the target into a rage state faster and keep them enraged longer.

# You can use Enrage on multiple targets.

—only that level of options had been added.

But Su-ho had not been disappointed.

Because Enrage was the foundational skill for the Rage Crusader skills he would obtain from here on out.

Su-ho used his skills in succession.

[ Blessing of Rage is activated. ]

[ Curse of Rage is activated. ]

Blessing of Rage, obtained at level 260.

Curse of Rage, obtained at level 270.

Their names were as opposite as their effects were extremely different.

Su-ho called to mind the information for the two skills.

[ Blessing of Rage ]

# Rage Crusader-exclusive skill.

# Rage makes anything stronger.

# A target blessed by Rage gains a berserk effect while the rage state continues: their attack power and damage taken each increase by 10%, and the pain they feel decreases by 10%.

[ Curse of Rage ]

# Rage Crusader-exclusive skill.

# The power of rage is like a double-edged sword. In exchange for gaining power, it makes you forget what is important.

# A target under the Curse of Rage experiences their feeling of rage amplifying to its peak while the rage state continues, causing some skills to randomly become unusable.

# Number of skills that can be rendered unusable: 1

Blessing and curse.

At a glance, they looked like a buff and a debuff.

While in a rage state, the target became intoxicated by the power of rage and grew stronger like a berserker, but at the same time, they became so overly excited that they forgot more important things.

‘Curse of Rage is definitely a debuff. And Blessing of Rage is also a debuff.’

There were two reasons he thought {N•o•v•e•l•i•g•h•t} so.

Because the target of the blessing took 10% more damage and felt 10% less pain.

‘If the damage they take increases, I can kill them faster. And if the pain they feel decreases, they won’t be able to clearly grasp where and how they’re being attacked, so they’ll die even faster.’

On top of that, as for Blessing of Rage, he had also raised it to S-grade with Gi Seung-hwan and Gi Seung-ok before challenging the Big Gate. As a result—

......

# A target blessed by Rage gains a berserk effect while the rage state continues: their attack power and damage taken each increase by 50%, and the pain they feel decreases by 50%.

# You can bestow Blessing of Rage on multiple targets.

—those 10% values had all become 50%.

And he could now bestow it on multiple targets.

‘Where else are you going to find such a wonderful debuff?’

With this, there were now a total of four marks engraved above Girard’s head: Mark of Pain, Enrage, Blessing of Rage, and Curse of Rage.

‘Then shall we end this now?’

The instant after he’d slammed in four marks in a split second, Su-ho cast additional buffs on himself for the real battle.

[ Foxfire is activated. ]

[ Rage Mode is activated. ]

Right after the buffs were established, Girard, greatly enraged by the effects of the marks, rushed at Su-ho again.

“Die, you lowly thing!!” 𝑓𝘳𝘦𝑒𝑤𝑒𝘣𝘯ℴ𝘷𝘦𝓁.𝑐𝑜𝑚

[ Girard becomes enraged. ]

[ Girard uses boss monster-grade Fear. ]

[ Dragon Blood is activated. ]

[ By the Dragon Mind effect of Dragon Blood, Fear does not apply. ]

Along with the ineffective Fear, Girard thrust his fists toward him.

In that moment, bewilderment flashed across Girard’s face.

[ By the effect of Curse of Rage, Dark Crushing Fist has been sealed. ]

A system notification popped up.

Su-ho laughed when he saw it.

Yeah.

Of all things, that was exactly what got sealed.

In that case, now was the time.

Su-ho swung his sword hard toward the bewildered bastard’s arm.

[ Diamond Severance is activated. ]

And then—

[ Diamond Severance is activated. ]

[ Diamond Severance is activated. ]

[ Diamond Severance is activated. ]

......

Su-ho began to swing his sword like a madman and butcher the gigantic Girard.

In an instant, Girard became a pile of rags, all those many limbs severed.

Thud!

At last, like a sinking ship, he had no choice but to collapse.

But Su-ho did not relax his guard.

Because the bastard still had one last phase left.

It was then.

[ Girard begins to awaken ancient power. ]

Girard’s final phase had begun.