Around 10 minutes before the battle could start.

It could be said that the party of Ralph was completely in a state of panic.

The NPC which was in front of them had stopped them from moving to the 15th floor, had an AI that was tremendous.

On top of that—it wasn’t sure as to how the opponent was even thinking—even after the 10 minutes fight that they had entered, they weren’t even able to guess the class of the so-called NPC.

‘Wah, this is crazy! What the hell were they even thinking when creating such a character in such a state?’

Ralph nodded to himself, rather thinking about it he had to find a way.

If it went along like this, then in just a few more minutes, the whole party would get wiped out.

‘I need to check for a way.’

Honestly, if the challengers’ information was all present, then the three of them would have given up their plans.

But that wasn’t the problem.

The stats and specs of the challenger; they were the things that the three people had no clue about.

And the damage that kept coming from the deal of the challenger was too much for them to deal with.

‘As high as he can be, the transcendence level seems to be 11 to 12… but what is that thing floating over it?’

The assumption of him having a level of 11 to 12—was the same as the spirit dojo trainees that were on the 12th floor—and also had the same difficulty.

And it meant that it wouldn’t be so hard for the three-member party to clear it.

But that crazy man on the other side wasn’t going to make it so easy for the three-member party.

And with a blood-red sword in his hand for a second, till the bow that had flames all over it.

From the beginning to the end, he even brought out a spear to battle—when such drastic changes were seen in the battle—they couldn’t help but feel nervous.

‘Huh, how are we even supposed to catch such a guy, is that even possible?’

Ralph was now turning to get nervous as the vitality had fallen down to 20%.

Both Inisco and Chesk around 30 to 40% of the vitality left on them, but it still was a very low vitality considering the class and abilities they had.

It sure was a situation where the vitality they had before entering the duel room was strained, but the fight that happened here took down their morale along with the vitality.

Biting on his lip, Ralph once again looked over at the challenger.

The next moment, they gazed at each other.

And from the mouth of the pitch-black challenger, came out some words,

“Tch, three against one is so boring…”

“This, this bastard…!!!”

Ralph got angry.

The challenger spoke those words directed to the US server ranker.

Who would have done such a thing?

And spoke back to the one whom he thought as an NPC.

“Man! You’re dead…!!!”

Ralph who was ready to curse out, exploded out of anger.

And the body of Ralph started to blow out red fumes as he was getting ready.

* * *

“Wah… he really is a crazy one…”

“Surely is very cool too.”

In the monitoring room of LB company.

The ones who were looking at the screen, Park Ki-hoon and Kim So-young, were both looking at the screen with wide eyes.

They were watching the video of the battle from the start again.

“Ha, So-young, when the game isn’t played, feeling such things is impossible.”

“Feel… does it have anything to do?”

“So-young, you like soccer?”

“Huh, my boyfriend is a huge fan of soccer…”

Looking at her, then after a moment, Park Ki-hoon opened his mouth,

“Right now, if you consider the things on the screen with soccer…. They are like Messi, to Park Ji-suk and other top players who think of the three in that manner.”

“Uh…? They are that good?”

“Yeah. Surely Ralph, Chesk, and Inisco aren’t as great as the soccer players, but even then, they are the rankers of the US server.”

And Ian, on the other hand, was someone they had met for a brief period.

He had used three weapons to go against the three users of the US server.

No matter how much of a video it was, it looked like an all-action film from a few angles.

And right then, the last moments of the battle were approaching.

The two people who were looking over at the battle video got up from their seats in excitement.

“Wah!!!”

“Uh, that was dangerous!”

* * *

The moment that Ralph moved to avoid the projectiles, Ian jumped into the air.

And as Ian moved, the three people were trying to follow him.

And the projectiles of the three people who didn’t have a chance started to move in the direction where Ian was moving, and no matter who saw it, it would be a situation one couldn’t get off.

Maybe it would have been different if he was on the ground, but Ian just jumped into the ground and there was no way to avoid projectiles in the air.

An inevitable situation.

But the very moment, something has appeared in the hands of Ian.

‘Should I try it out now…?’

Even as the familiars of Inisco were heading in the direction of Ian, he wasn’t at least a bit shocked or tensed.

Instead, he had a smile on his lips, and that smile went wide further.

Puck- Ping-!

All the projectiles and deal went the direction of Ian from the party of Ralph.

However, the vitality of Ian hadn’t fallen down by much.

No, the vitality of Ian had decreased very less than it was supposed to.

[The ‘Guardian Orb’ has been activated.]

[The ‘Guardian’s Protection’ has been activated.]

[The ‘Guardian’s Protection’ has absorbed 94.5% of the attack from A(Unknown) challenger.]

[The ‘Guardian’s Protection’ has absorbed 82.48% of the attack from C(Unknown) challenger.]

[The ‘Guardian’s Protection’ has absorbed 75.48% of the attack from B(Unknown) challenger.]

[Because of not being able to absorb, your vitality has been reduced by 15,783.]

[For being able to successfully avoid, the vitality has been increased by 33,850.]

The Guardian Orb item which Ian had received from Syarlon.

From that orb, the unique ability of Guardian’s Protection had been used.

“…?!”

“What is this…?!”

The unique ability of the Guardian’s Orb which was being used had the cooldown of 30 seconds when it could be used again.

And for the one second when the ability got activated, there was a heal option that was attached to it.

And Ian had used it knowing very correctly.

Once he knew the exact timing of the attack, then the attack could be met in the very perfect manner as possible.

Then the whole attacks which had come in from the party of Ralph, got recovered in just a span of 1 second?

No, that couldn’t be the case.

Which was why, the moment that the Guardian’s Protection has been activated, Ian added another skill.

[The familiar ‘Elcarix’s’ unique ability, ‘Dragonic Barrier’ has been activated.]

[All the aggro has been absorbed.]

[Attack from ‘???’ has been avoided.]

[The durability of Dragonic Barrier has been decreased by 25.]

[The durability of Dragonic Barrier has been decreased by 17.]

The moment when Ian had activated the Guardian’s Orb, he set the timing when it recovers and used the skill of Dragonic Barrier of Elcarix’s.

This was the skill connect which Ian had used for the purpose of efficiently avoiding the incoming deals.

If Ian would have used the Dragonic Barrier from the very start, maybe the barrier would have ended before it could have even stopped all of the projectiles.

And if that happened, then Ian would have received a minimum 30,000 damage.

And in the Middle-Earth, the transcendence level of Elcarix was still 4, no matter how bright the specs of it were, it would still be lacking when it came to battle.

However, with the activation of the ‘Guardian Orb’ in the beginning, he took in the major damages and the first.

The barrier had to only take down the after damages.

It was effective when it came to absorbing all the other secondary damages which had come with it.

“What kind of skills is he using?”

“This is a bug!!!!”

Ralph was flustered and began speaking to himself, his expression changed in a moment.

And surely what just happened, would have left anyone flustered and confused.

Till now, the casting that he had done with the use of the skills of Elcarix, was something they wouldn’t understand as they didn’t know that Ian was a summoner.

And for those who weren’t able to understand the working and mechanism of Ian and his skills, the situation would surely make them feel bad.

Ian smiled and thought to himself.

‘Bug? Stupid users should die…!’

Ian who jumped into the air came close to the ground for landing.

Ian who had held onto the Judgment of the Spirit King waved his spear.

Kwang-!

That wasn’t the end.

At the top of Ian, right when he had waved his spear, huge shadows had come across and covered him.

Kwaaa-!

With very huge bodies, they all took down the vitality of the party of Ralph in an instant.

[Summon ‘Elcarix’ dragon breath has been triggered.]

[Summon ‘Karceus’ dragon breath has been triggered.]

[Summon ‘Bbookbbook’ dragon breath has been triggered.]

The summons of Ian which hadn’t been summoned for long were summoned and directed all their attacks at the party of Ian.

Ralph and the party members who were just done with the attacking didn’t even have the time to react or to avoid the incoming projectiles.

[The challenger ‘C(Unknown)’ has lost.]

[The challenger ‘A(Unknown)’ has lost.]

[The challenger ‘B(Unknown)’ has lost.]

Without even knowing what hit them, the party of Ralph were out of the challenge.

* * *

“Kyaa…!”

“Kue, this!”

The ones who were watching in the monitoring room were screaming on top of their lungs.

It was the screams that came from watching the video of Ian. And the eyes of all the ones in the room were directed towards the screen.

And the moment the battle ended, their eyes went back to normal.

“Wah, they really were the rankers of the US?”

“Kue… all in one moment. The video highlight was that one moment.”

“What a surprise!”

“Have you gone to the community and saw what happened recently? The rankers are what’s special recently.”

“Ahah.”

“If the video of Ian going against Ralph will be uploaded… this video would go top in the search.”

And among the planning team 3 was the team leader Na Ji-chan and Kim Ji-yeon.

“Wah, surely Ian is Ian.”

“Miss Kim, you seem surprised once again.”

“Everytime I see him, it seems so new. I knew that he was an adventurous one, but didn’t know that he would be able to take down 3 of the US rankers.”

Kim Ji-yeon shook her head as she was trying to regain her composure.

However, Na Ji-chan spoke with a blank expression,

“Uh? The control sure is as great as ever, but wasn’t the battle easy from the start?”

“Sorry?”

“Honestly, Ian surely defined the last moment. But if in the very situation it wasn’t those three idiots and some other user, then the situation wouldn’t be so easy for us to predict.”

“Huh? Why would that be? Then Ian wouldn’t have been waiting till the end to summon his familiars?”

Na Ji-chan and Kim Ji-yeon were talking, the whole of the monitoring room went silent.

In the huge company of LB which made the Kailan, there was no one who was as knowledgable as Na Ji-chan when it came to the game, and everyone wanted to know his thoughts.

“The reason why Ian hadn’t summoned his familiars till the end was, did you think that it was to see the abilities of the opponents?”

“Yeah… is it not?”

“Surely.”

Na Ji-chan shook his head.

He looked over at the screen once again and then spoke,

“Have you seen the level of the summons of Ian?”

“Uh, let’s see… around level 4, level 3, level 5… the average seems to be around 4.”

“Right.”

“Ian is of level 9… why is the level of his summons so low?”

“That, because Ian was trying to grow his spirit so that he would level up, understood?”

“Ah, ha…!”

As she knew the unexpected answer, she shook her head.

At the words of Na Ji-chan, Ms. Kim who wasn’t able to understand the battle strategy of Ian was able to know it.

“The level of Inisco’s summons were of level 6. The Griffin King was of level 7. Both Ralph and Chesk were of level 7.”

“Yeah, sure.”

“This situation, if he opened the up with his summons, how do you think that the situation would be?”

Asked Na Ji-chan after smiling.

And after a moment, Kim Ji-yeon opened her lips slowly,

“The summons would fall down one after the other from the beginning.”

“Right. The level of the tanking summon Bbakbbak was the lowest, so it would be the least.”

“Ahha…!”

“Which is why Ian hadn’t summoned his familiars till the very end.”

As the words of Na Ji-chan explained, all of them looked over at the screen.

And the play of Ian was going on again.

Na Ji-chan and Kim Ji-yeon were done talking and began to monitor again.

After they had talked over about the fight of Ian and the battle strategy, they began to think stuff through.

Once again they looked over at the screen, and with a light expression he looked over at the screen which had Ian in it.

‘Yeah well, Ian, the War of Heroes… the 1st of the world rankings who will that be? I surely will have to see that.’

From the screen where Ian was there, the names of numerous users of the world started to appear.

And for Na Ji-chan who had known the highest information about the game, knew that he would be able to see Ian go against users who were of the same category as Ian.

And the moment when Ian would meet them, thinking of it made Na Ji-chan’s heart flutter.