When Someone Is About To Die, They Reveal Their True Colors (II)

3rd POV...

With a quiet sigh, Lucius slung the black flag over his shoulder and, following the map, he headed towards the green house.

In this game, every player's shirt color matched their house color.

So, players from the green house wore green shirts, while Lucius sported a black one.

After a short walk, Lucius arrived at the location of the green house and was immediately greeted by two familiar faces.

Alaine and Daniel.

"Both of them together should have at least 5,000 coins..." Lucius mumbled to himself.

However, before he could make his move, his unique skill unexpectedly activated.

[Name: Alaine Woods (19)]

[Authority: Gold (Locked)]

[Current Level: 9]

[Title: Regressor of Nightmares, Hopeless Lover, 998th Round Regressor.]

[Sponsor: -]

[Coins: 12.590]

[Attributes: Strength 21 | Dexterity 41 | Constitution 31 | Magic 71]

[Stat Points: 0]

[Skills: 

Mana Control 9✪ | Elemental Magic 9✪ | Time Stop 9✪ | Magic Resistance 9✪ (Click to show the complete list.)]

[Unique Skill:

A Regressor's Perk (Mythic)

It allows the user to retain every skill from her past regressions.]

[Stigma: Regressor (Unique)

It allows the user to regress infinitely; however, the condition is that the user has to die.]

Tap...!

Curious, Lucius tapped the button to expand Alaine's list of skills. As he scrolled through the list, his eyes widened in disbelief.

There were more than one thousand skills, and as Lucius checked the ranks of every single one of them...

He was speechless.

From the most basic quality to the highest quality, she had almost every type of skill, no matter what it was.

Swordsmanship, spearmanship, martial arts, space magic...

No matter what it was, she had it all.

"Ah... fuck it..." Lucius clenched his fists tightly.

"Haaaa..."

A cloud of frosty air escaped his lips as he closed his eyes and focused deeply, sensing every bit of mana flowing through his body.

He redirected the flow of mana, guiding it meticulously through all of his meridians.

When he opened his eyes, they intensely gleamed with a frozen icicle.

"Frost Expansion..."

A massive icicle of ice, easily over a thousand meters long, materialized above the green house.

As Lucius concentrated, beads of sweat trickled down his face. He clenched his teeth and forcefully moved his hand downward.

"Die!"

FREEZE!

CRASH!

The enormous icicle slammed down onto the green house with a thunderous crash, shattering into countless icy fragments that spread across the area.

The force of the impact obliterated the house, turning it into a pile of icy rubble.

As the dust settled, silence fell over the scene.

The destruction was complete and absolute—no part of the green house remained standing.

[You have killed 70 players...!]

[You have received 14.590 coins!]

[You have received 35.9 Dexterity, 21 Constitution, 23.4 Strength, and 9.5 Magic.]

[The host has killed over 100 players; the effects of the title are going to be on hold until the host reaches level 25. The next limit is 1000.]

[Remaining Green House Players...]

[2]

'Ah...god damn it.' Lucius cursed inwardly with disappointment.

'Even their attributes were lower... did they directly send their stronger players to try and steal my flag?'

[The constellation "Demon Queen" is smiling upon you.]

"Ah... fuck you, seriously..." Lucius covered his eyes with his arm as he panted heavily.

His fatigue had increased by a ton just after that same spell.

'Fuck this...' Lucius's anger only increased as he opened Alaine's attribute panel to see the description of one of her skills.

[Time Stop 9✪

Rarity: Mythical

Allows the user to stop the time for a whole hour.

Cooldown: 24 hours.]

'The fuck did I even expect? She has repeated this damned apocalypse 998 times; she has the most powerful skills already!'

'How the fuck did she even die!?'

'And what's this fucking title?'

[Hopeless Lover

Rarity: N/A

This title has been granted to "Alaine Woods" due to her dying over and over by her lover and still loving him after each regression.

It allows the user to increase the favorability of her lover depending on how many times she has already regressed.

Regressed Times: 998]

"..."

[Quote: This is the last time I'll ever love you, except that I'll kill you with my own two hands.]

"...."

Sigh...

Lucius' lips curled into a thoughtful smile as he covered his eyes with his arm, chuckling softly to himself. "I really am trash, aren't I?"

Now, everything about Alaine made sense to him.

The reason why she has only a bit of red on her waist as a weakness...

The reason why she could easily explode a giant rat just at the beginning of this apocalypse...

And the reason why she kissed him under the label of a "good morning kiss"...

"Ahah... hahah..." His laughter was tinged with bitterness.

His eyes suddenly changed as he laughed, turning a deeper, malevolent black. They were already black, but now they looked sharper and much more sinister.

Only one phrase could describe them...

"If you stare at the abyss, the abyss will stare back at you."

He silently stood up, as if a surge of vitality had spread through his body, and slowly walked towards the yellow house.

"Embrace what you already are..."

"Embrace the demon deep inside you..."

Voices whispered in his ear, sounding almost like a sweet lullaby.

Or rather... a devil's lullaby.

[The constellation "Frost Queen" frowns at your condition.]

[The constellation "Demon Queen" smiles deeply with enlarged eyes at your "perfect" condition.]

Normally...

People often show their true selves when they face death, not wanting to leave any regrets behind, or maybe because of the surge of negative energy accumulating in their bodies.

As for Lucius... he's not close to even dying, yet the bad energy that was deeply sealed inside his body has burst.

Not because he has any regrets, but because he's tired of holding them in.

Just like when someone is about to die...

He just needed a small push, a trigger to let it all out...

And seeing Alaine's "Hopeless Lover" title was more than enough to push him over the edge.

If he's already a demon in the later rounds... it doesn't matter if he becomes a demon right now...

Right?