“You do know I’m a princess of the Black Dragon Clan.”

“Which is why I’m asking how a princess who’s nothing more than an ornament can be this strong.”

Bellows had everything: an overwhelming level of 97, the cheat-like unique skill 『Rule of Law』, and killing techniques honed in real combat. He was unquestionably powerful. Even among duke-class players, few could take him on.

So why was he being overwhelmed? Hearing the question from Bellows, who frowned as if he simply could not make sense of it, Li Qingyu gave him a strange look.

“You really don’t know anything about our Seven Dragons Society, do you?”

“What are you talking about? 『Health Insurance Act, Enacted』.”

“Exactly what I said.”

Bellows transferred the statute book from his limp right hand to his left, opened it to a page, and began healing his injuries. Qingyu gestured at him again, sending invisible strikes of psionic force his way, and asked calmly, “Even if you know nothing else about the Seven Dragons Society, you must know where psionics came from?”

“It came from those primitive lizards you worship, didn’t it?”

“Primitive lizards... That’s a rather interesting way to refer to our founders.”

“Why? Does it make you angry?”

BANG!

Even injured, Bellows slipped lightly out of the way of the strike and asked with a sneer.

To the Seven Dragons Society, insulting the dragons was blasphemy itself. Most clan members would fly into a rage and vow to wipe out not just the offender’s relatives but their entire extended family.

“No, I have no reason to be angry. The wording is a little crude, but our founders were reptiles who lived before the creation of the world.”

Qingyu, however, did not get angry. She merely sent another invisible strike at him. Her response was so matter-of-fact that both Yu Na-gyeong and Bellows, the one who had insulted them, stared at her in disbelief. Bellows nearly took the strike head-on.

“In any case, it’s as you know. Psionics was originally a power our founders passed on to humans.”

“And what of it? 『Human Rights Protection Act, Enacted』.”

“It’s simple.”

RUMBLE!

Bellows opened another page and blocked Qingyu’s strike with the barrier it produced. Qingyu told him calmly, “Even the warriors of the Seven Dragons Society cannot attain the true essence of psionics.”

Psionics was, by nature, the power of dragons. Humans were not capable of wielding it. That was why the seven dragons had created the Seventy-Two Martial Schools in the first place: through training, humans could “remake” their bodies to be a little more like a dragon’s and acquire psionics, even if only later in life.

But that did not mean they could gain a dragon’s true power.

“However great the Seventy-Two Martial Schools are, they have their limits.”

The Seventy-Two Martial Schools remade the body, and learning even one placed an enormous strain on it. An ordinary human could therefore master only one. But psionics built on a single martial art fell far short of the seven dragons’ power. It was like trying to run a machine built with seventy-two gears using only one: it could never perform as intended.

“The Seven Dragons Society worked to overcome that limit. That’s how so many prominent clans came to be.”

THUD, RUMBLE!

They refined the Seventy-Two Martial Schools, reduced the strain with rare medicines and secret arts, and arranged marriages to strengthen the dragon blood in their descendants. Over the past several centuries, the Society had tried everything to surpass the limits of humanity. Those who achieved some measure of success became known as prominent clans and established themselves at the Society’s center.

“But none of it led to a major breakthrough.”

In the end, the differences were slight. Despite centuries of research and the sacrifice of tens of thousands of people, they had failed to attain the essence of psionics. A grub was still a grub however much it rolled about. Psionics was fundamentally a dragon’s power, and ultimately too much for the human species.

“Even so, in every generation, the Seven Dragons Society has had people capable of attaining its essence.”

SHATTER!

Perhaps the successive invisible strikes had finally taken their toll. The moment the barrier around Bellows broke, Qingyu glided like a ghost over the black mist covering the floor and closed the distance in an instant.

“Seven exceptions who inherited our great founders’ blood and had no reason to be bound by the limits of the human species.”

“『Witness Protection Act, Enacted』.”

Bellows split into five figures that scattered in every direction. Though the illusions had no substance, they looked indistinguishable from the real one. Qingyu did not bother dealing with each of them. Instead, she pursued one Bellows at once, struck at his back with her palm, and smiled.

“Who do you think they are?”

Bellows turned and blocked her palm with the statute book, frowning. It was not because she had instantly picked out the real him, nor because the force transmitted through the book shook his organs. Only now had he grasped the point of her story.

“You don’t mean...”

“Yes, I do.”

The Society’s warriors could not attain the essence of psionics because, in the end, they were human. But there were exceptions: seven descendants born with vast psionic power, who could learn the Seventy-Two Martial Schools without strain when a human risked their life to master just one. From the moment they were born, they grasped the essence of psionics as naturally as breathing. They were called the Heavenly Martial Bodies, or the Heavenly Dragon Bodies.

Unlike other clan members, who carried only a little dragon blood, these heirs of the purest dragon blood were closer in nature to dragons than humans.

“You see, being a princess of the Seven Dragons Society also means being its strongest warrior.”

“...”

At last, Bellows understood. The Society’s seven princesses were not ornaments blessed with good bloodlines. They were why the group once called the Demonic Cult had survived centuries without being wiped out, and how it had come to control the world from the shadows. They bound their clans through strength and ruled over their enemies through fear—the pinnacle of the Seven Dragons Society and its ultimate weapons.

One of those seven rulers was the girl smiling playfully before him now. And her declaration that she would kill him had been no bluff.

“... Well, I’m in trouble.”

* * *

BANG!

“... Old man, didn’t you say you were going to kill me?”

“I did.”

“Then why do you keep playing hide-and-seek?”

Eugene had been thrilled at the prospect of a fight to the death and had thrown herself into it. But the black mist spread all around her meant that, once again, she had smashed some innocent sculpture instead of flesh and blood.

She complained, but Yo U-in, the one who had conjured the mist, was unmoved. Hidden within it alongside the Ink Dragon Unit, he answered calmly, “I haven’t found a way to kill you yet. There’s no need to waste our strength.”

“NO! You fight fair and give it your all, even when the odds are against you! Isn’t that the Sword Master spirit?”

“The Sword Master spirit?”

Yo U-in’s expression turned peculiar. Asking the Black Dragon Clan to fight fair was absurd enough. Unlike the other clans, they made a specialty of schemes and contracts and considered dirty, underhanded tactics virtues. But something else in Eugene’s words bothered him.

“... I’m afraid you misunderstand Sword Masters.”

“Huh? What have I got wrong?”

“Sword Masters do not fight fair even when the odds are against them. They make everyone else the underdog even when they fight fair.”

“Is there a difference?”

“A very large one.”

Yo U-in smiled bitterly. In truth, he could hardly blame Eugene for not knowing. In the Age of Heroes, before players existed, Sword Masters were absolute beings whom no one could oppose. That was why they generally preferred to attack head-on: they could solve most problems simply by smashing through whatever stood before them.

But Yo U-in had a reason for objecting. He knew better.

“The difference is that a Sword Master can resort to assassination, ambushes, and schemes whenever necessary.”

“I can’t imagine a Sword Master like that.”

“No. There is one.”

Yo U-in knew how wrong it was to assume Sword Masters fought only head-on, and how terrifying one could be when willing to use any means at all. He was one of the very few who had faced such a Sword Master during the Seven Dragons Society’s rampage and lived to tell of it.

“At least one—the most cunning and seasoned Sword Master of all,” he said quietly.

“Really?”

Perhaps because the story was new to her, Eugene looked intrigued for a moment. Then she hoisted her guitar again and called out cheerfully, “Doesn’t matter! I’m fighting you head-on!”

WHOOSH!

Her guitar swept fiercely through the spot where Yo U-in’s voice had come from. The swing was so violent that its wind pressure alone sent a gale through the lobby.

“By all means. We’ll fight you our way.”

But the guitar neither hit Yo U-in nor dispersed the mist. Instead, a dagger flew out of the mist and lodged in Eugene’s body, opening a gap in her defenses. With her near-immortal vitality, she paid the wound no mind and kept rampaging, but that was all she could do. Against Yo U-in and the Ink Dragon Unit, who avoided confronting her at every turn, she could only keep swinging at empty air.

“Old man, if you keep this up, I might bring the whole building down. You know that?”

“Try it, if you can.”

Whether she was irritated by the hide-and-seek or simply bored, Eugene had resorted to threatening Leviathan itself. Yo U-in did not so much as raise an eyebrow. He answered evenly, “If you can escape the Great Black Heaven Soul-Lost Formation we’ve deployed.”

Yo U-in was certain she could not. Of the Seven Dragons Society’s seven clans, each born with different psionic abilities, the Black Dragon Clan specialized in telepathy. They excelled at working in the shadows—mind control, illusions, concealment, mind reading—but it would not be an exaggeration to call them the weakest of the seven in a direct fight. That was why schemes and conspiracies had become their specialty in the first place.

Yet they possessed one specialty that surpassed the other clans: formations. This secret art maximized their telepathy, allowing them to move as one body, while resonance amplified their psionics and produced special effects.

The Great Black Heaven Soul-Lost Formation was one such art, a terrifying maze that could leave even an army of tens of thousands wandering in its mist until they died. Here in Leviathan, master-level Yo U-in had deployed it with the Ink Dragon Unit’s support. The ten Monarchs might have been another matter, but even with her immortal body, Eugene could do nothing now but rampage alone inside the formation until she died of thirst.

‘This might actually be dangerous.’

Sensing the sinister killing intent shifting within the black mist, as though her captors were watching prey caught in a spiderweb, Eugene smiled even wider.

But neither Eugene, trapped in the formation, nor Bellows, cornered by Qingyu, knew one thing: someone else had been driven into an even tighter corner by the misfortune of becoming a certain mad dog’s prey.