"What's happening to me?" Mahn Li muttered, holding his head.

He had been making mistakes repeatedly in the fight just now. In the second round, he missed its tell for firing the Alter Terrain spell. In the third round, he fell victim to the quicksand trap. In the fourth round, he missed a crucial attack, put himself into an awkward position and allowed the Corruptor to execute its instant-kill move.

The last round was especially worrying. He had victory in his grasp, yet forgot to re-apply the holy water to the dagger before the final blow.

It was uncharacteristic of him to make so many blunders in such a short time frame!

Mahn Li went into the bathroom and opened the mirrored medicine cabinet above the sink. Grabbing the bottle of painkiller, he took out a pill. Putting back the bottle, he closed the cabinet...

...and saw Manco staring back at him from inside the mirror!

"AAhhhh?!" Startled, he dropped the pill down the sink.

Mahn Li rubbed his eyes and looked into the mirror again. Short black hair, a thin pale face, and eyes with dark spots under them. No scars. It was his own face.

Taking a step back, he inspected himself. He was 175 cm tall, but very thin. It was the result of several years spent pulling all-nighters playing games and subsisting on cheap street food, plus plenty of times going down with random colds and illnesses.

Mahn Li sighed, he had figured out the cause for his poor performance.

He was suffering from mental fatigue.

In the last 24 hours, he had spent at least 18 hours on the game. The frequent breaks he took were not enough for him to recover.

He could still handle higher levels mobs with relative ease. However, the boss fight was something else. It was a lot more intense, requiring unbroken concentration for prolonged periods of time with little room for errors. By comparison, in the old timeline, his first months in EoL were spent stumbling around fighting easy mobs and completing simple quests.

Mahn Li was - or would be - a lot healthier and fitter ten years from now. He would have a team of nutritionists and personal trainers, who monitored his calories intake and physical exercises on a daily basis. That was the treatment reserved for the guild's top players, especially those who constantly engaged in important PvP battles.

It was easy to dismiss the importance of physical fitness in the context of virtual reality. However, he had read and also verified through experience that besides attributes and equipment, the characters' prowess also largely depended on the controllers. Players with a clear mind and a healthy body inherently had the advantage, everything else being equal.

Although he had ten years worth of knowledge and experience, he did not yet have the physical and mental fortitude he would possess ten years from now. It was quite frustrating knowing he was capable of doing something yet, in actuality, being incapable of doing it.

'No wonder!'

Mahn Li smiled bitterly.

Obsessed with trying to recall the in-game knowledge, he had neglected the requirements for players. It was good that he remembered it now when it was still early. He would have to slowly train himself back to the old level.

'Now what should I do?' Jotting down a quick reminder to get in shape, he turned back to the subject of the boss fight.

He was still set to respawn in the Cave of Lament. If he failed to log back in within 20 minutes, the game would still spawn him in the preparation room, and push him into the boss' chamber after another five minutes. One more death and most of his armor and weapon would break, making it impossible to win the fight. Several deaths after, he would be back to the village, sans armor and weapon and have to work for them all over again.

"I can't waste another few days for this! Rust's quest will come soon!"

Wracking his brain, Mahn Li remembered the "emergency cure" for mental fatigue. It would delay the symptoms for another hour or two, then he would have to sleep to recover completely.

For this, he would need this brand of energy drink, some caffeine, and some over-the-counter medicine.

His mind made up, Mahn Li left his apartment and bought everything he needed from the 24/7 convenience store as well as the pharmacy on the ground floor.

Back in his apartment, he made the drink following the instructions that had been drilled into his head for years.

"This'd better be the last time I have to drink this!" he sighed, held his breath and drown the glass in one gulp.

~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~

〔--- Welcome to the Epoch of Liberty ---〕

〔--- Please select your character ---〕

Back in the menu room, Mahn Li inspected Manco's inventory.

The crossbow had been broken, replaced by some scrap wood, scrap metal, and strings.

The supply of holy water was almost up, only half a vial is left. He needed at least a quarter vial to apply on his dagger, leaving only a quarter to force the Corruptor to reveal its core.

"I might be able to trick it to swallow the water again, but is that enough?" Mahn Li muttered, furrowing his brow.

On the raised platform, Manco did not respond, only cycled through his various idle animations. He unsheathed his dagger and used it to clean his fingernails.

Noting the countdown until forced respawn, which was 15 minutes, Mahn Li reviewed the recordings for the previous rounds.

Eventually, he noticed a bright spot on the ground. Previously he had not paid attention to it, but as he watched through the recordings, the spot seemed to grow brighter with time and move toward the cottage at the center of the chamber.

"It was sunlight!" He exclaimed.

Indeed, the top of the chamber seemed to have a hole through which sunlight could shine in.

Mahn Li checked the in-game time: 11:35 a.m. This could work!

He selected Manco and was sent to the preparation room.

After sorting out his inventory, Manco chanted.

「Arcane Surge」!

Leaving the preparation area, Manco quickly located the hole on the ceiling. The sun was shining through it, illuminating the swirling dust.

「Mana Blast」

He unleashed a mana blast at the hole and immediately charged another one.

*Bam! *Crash!

The blast knocked loose some rocks, and the hole widened a little. The fragments felt like rain onto the cottage's thatched roof.

「Mana Blast」

"Back again? I thought you were scared off already?" The Corruptor approached him.

Keeping an eye on it, he shot one blast after another at the hole.

Enraged at being ignored, the Corruptor took out its wand and began firing off spells at him.

Dodging whatever spells he could and quaffing heal potions when his health was too low, Manco concentrated on widening the hole on the ceiling.

His effort paid off, eventually, the hole was widened to about one square meter. The spot illuminated by sunlight was slowly approaching the cottage.

Unsheathing his knife, he timed his movement right after the Corruptor had unleashed the long-cooldown spells, and rushed toward it.

Taken by surprise, the half-specter swung its back limbs in preparation.

Having learned the Corruptor's attack pattern in the previous fights, he quickly and located the relative "blind spot" that the back limbs could not attack as effectively. Weaving between the two deadly appendages, he darted to the Corruptor's side. Swinging his dagger he caught it on the neck.

-21!

-5!

-5!

"Graaaggggh!"

Hurt by the holy water, it darted away from him, leaving a clear path.

Darting left and right to avoid being hit by its spells, Manco jumped through the window into the cottage.

"Get away from there!" With a scream, the mini-boss rushed in after him.

This time, the close quarter fight was tipped in Manco's favor. There were moments when he felt like time slowed down as his reflexes were pushed to the limit. Dodging, blocking, parrying, slashing, stabbing, he executed each move with near perfection, chipping away the Corruptor's health in chunks while taking only minimal damage. Instead of just slashing at its limbs, this time Manco got a lot of good hits on its neck or face.

As more holy water are pumped into its body, the Corruptor's movements gradually became slower and more sluggish.

10%!

The thing's back limbs opened up, revealing a stinger and a mandible. Together, they aimed at Manco.

Unblinking, he held the knife between his teeth and took out two split-head bolts, each was tied to a length of silver-woven rope.

-13!

-1!

...

-14!

-1!

Dodging the two limbs, he stabbed each of them with a bolt, feeling powerful clicks as the bolt heads split and secure themselves in the limbs.

Wasting no time, he tied the lengths of ropes to a support column, praying it would hold for long enough.

Screeching in pain, the Corruptor whirled around, but it hesitated to remove the bolts. Manco had stabbed them near the limbs' tips so that forcibly pulling them out would nearly sever the tips and disable its instant-kill attack.

Taking advantage of its indecisiveness, Manco circled to its back. Taking out two another split-head bolts, he stabbed them at the base of the back limbs and tied the ropes to the columns again.

Now tangled in the mass of ropes, the Corruptor screamed painfully and flailed its limbs ineffectively.

Glancing at the in-game clock, which showed 12:00, he clenched his fist. It's time!

「Mana Blast」!

He shot the blast straight up. With a muffled "Bang," half of the cottage's roof was blown off, letting sunlight shine on the Corruptor.

*SCREEEEECCCH!!

Ignoring its agonized shriek, Manco produced another length of silver-woven rope and tied it around the Corruptor's body, further impeding its movement.

Unlike the early morning gentle light, the mid-noon sunlight was much more powerful. In seconds, most of the Corruptor's flesh and skin burned up and flaked off. As it shook and convulsed, big patches of charred flesh fell off its ribcage, revealing the core once more. The air was thick with the smell of charred flesh mixed with sulfur.

Removing the holy water vial from the slot on his belt, Manco applied the last bit on the dagger. Keeping an eye on the back limbs, he plunged the dagger into the core. With a sickening squelch, the dagger sank to the hilt.

All of a sudden, the screeching stopped.

The only sound filling the cottage was sizzling and crackling of burned flesh.

Then without warning, the Corruptor crumbled onto the floor into a heap of black ash.

Manco could hear a faint voice, barely a whisper.

"Thank you!"

Then there was complete silence.

He was alone.

"Finally!" Manco said with a tired smile. Mentally exhausted, he sprawled onto the ground.

He felt his whole body aching. His body was virtual and could not possibly be tired, yet the sensation was too real to ignore.

It was now 12:25 in-game. He was dragged into the cave at about 6 am. This meant he has spent almost 3 hours on this boss. Minus the time when he logged out and took a rest, he had spent two hours fighting. Yet it felt much more exhausting than the entire previous day.

With tired eyes, Mahn Li gestured at the notification icon, which filled his vision with messages.

〔Enemy "Corruptor - Unique variant: Gwendala the Spellweaver" (lv 30) killed〕

〔Enemy information added to Beastiary〕

...