SWNOVELXO Chapter 161
Chapter 161
**Thud, thud.**
Aden descended into the underground, following the lackey sent by the gambling den owner.
“The master is waiting in a place reserved exclusively for VVIP customers. Of course, Lord Remes has also been designated as a VVIP customer.”
“Hah, that’s very kind of him. Let’s see how bold your master’s face is.”
Aden scoffed.
At this, the expressionless lackey’s lips curled up ever so slightly in a meaningful way.
“…If you see him, you might be quite surprised. It will be a very special experience.”
Surprised, huh…
Certainly, he would have been if he hadn’t been warned about the gambling den’s true nature beforehand by the Unnamed Woman.
But a surprise party that has already been exposed is no longer a surprise party.
Soon, he arrived at the ‘VVIP room’ that the lackey had mentioned.
**Creak.**
As soon as Aden stepped inside, the lackey shut the door.
Then, layers of magical barriers formed, completely sealing the door.
He was entirely trapped inside.
“Wow.”
Aden’s lips twisted into a sneer as he took in the scene before him.
“To think everyone would come out to welcome me like this. I’m overwhelmed.”
The gambling den owner.
It seemed that the man had prepared a thorough ‘welcome’ for Aden.
The VVIP room of the casino.
It was an underground area shaped like a circular arena.
A vast underground cavity, with the diameter of the arena exceeding 100 meters.
There were quite a few ‘guests’ waiting to welcome Aden.
Thunderous, evil shouts erupted from all sides.
“The target has entered the ‘trap’!”
“Deploy all the black magic we’ve prepared!”
“We must kill him here and now!”
About a hundred black-robed warlocks of Chaos.
They were all standing in the spectator seats of the circular arena, surrounding Aden.
Their mission this time was singular: the assassination of the youngest Sword Master, ‘Aden Remes’.
Although their opponent was a mere rookie barely past his twenties, it was revealed that he was a Master who had reached the realm of the superhuman and a wielder of a cursed sword.
Moreover, he was the culprit who had destroyed several major undertakings that the organization had long been preparing.
‘He must be eliminated.’
The number of comrades confirmed to have died directly or indirectly due to Aden Remes was over three hundred.
To the lower-tier warlocks, Aden’s existence was nothing short of a living nightmare.
**Sssssss.** The dark energy rising like a haze from them thickly enveloped the arena like black smoke.
They desperately drew on their dark energy to its limits, preparing their incantations to kill the monster.
“Dkffl Dkffl Dkffktud Dkffkfl Diffk…”
“Fhemfhffjekdkdkt!”
“Anekanekanek!”
“Chlrhfh Highgks Rlqnsdlek!”
As they chanted the black magic spells, numerous violet magic circles appeared in midair, all targeting Aden…
“Fire!”
Dark bolts, dark flames, death spears, curses of oblivion, curses of binding, curses of suffocation, curses of death, curses of madness, curses of weakening…
Numerous black magic attacks and more than dozens of lethal curses poured down on Aden like a black rain.
“You must be really scared, huh? Rushing in like a pack of dogs, trying to overwhelm with numbers.”
However, Aden remained unperturbed in the face of the imminent rain of death.
He drew Baalzebul from its sheath.
—
**-Summoning the Spirit Weapon, ‘Cloak of Frozen Winter’.**
—
The remnants of the Banshee Queen, filled with bitter cold, scattered behind Aden.
**Whiiish.** A chill enveloped Baalzebul’s blade.
He imbued his aura with the ice attribute and swung his sword. As he did, the aura carrying the winter queen’s freezing energy spread outward with the slash.
—
**-Accepting the mana of a certain being. This means accepting all of that being’s mana, their entire existence.**
—
The freezing mana of the Winter Queen.
The Banshee Queen’s mana was the winter wind itself, whipping up snowstorms.
Snow falling on the frozen land on a cold winter’s day covers everything.
The will of the Banshee Queen, who wanted to freeze all life and erase the world in a blank canvas of white snow, was infused into Aden’s aura, freezing and engulfing the warlocks’ attacks, swallowing them whole.
**Crash, crackle, crack.** Ice shattered, scattering crystal dust.
All the attacks that the hundred or so warlocks had meticulously prepared were nullified.
“This… this can’t be!”
“To block all the attacks!”
The warlocks were horrified by what they saw.
Was this really the level of skill a young man who had just reached the rank of Master could display?
His aura manipulation was as formidable as that of a seasoned Master who had trained for decades and survived several years on the battlefield.
But this was not the only thing that astonished them.
“This can’t be, this is impossible! All the curses have been broken!”
“Damn it, does he have some sort of mental protection artifact?”
“That can’t be it! We launched over forty curses at him! No artifact could possibly defend against so many curses!”
—
**-Detecting multiple mind-affecting curses.**
**-By the authority of the system, curses are nullified.**
—
The principles behind the warlocks’ curses mostly overlapped with the mental realm.
And the system that Aden possessed protected him from external mental invasions.
The only curse that had ever successfully affected Aden was the ‘Curse of Assimilation’ cast by the Demon Lord.
That was possible because the Demon Lord had mixed his soul, which had touched the ‘threshold of transcendence’, into the curse.
But among the warlocks present, none had reached the realm of transcendence.
Attacking Aden with curses was nothing more than a futile waste of dark energy.
As the warlocks hurriedly attempted to prepare a second wave of attacks…
“Now that I’ve taken one hit, I suppose it’s my turn?”
Aden’s lips curled into a sharp smile.
**Rumble!**
Aden’s overwhelming Master Fear seized control of the entire arena.
**Shiver.** The warlocks felt their bodies stiffen in response to that smile.
“Guh, gugh!”
“Ah, aahh!”
“Ke-kehrk, I… I can’t breathe…!”
The sensation of losing the will to resist, as if standing before a predator.
Some collapsed unconscious, falling to the ground with a thud, some clutched their chests, unable to breathe, and others lost their minds in the face of overwhelming fear.
Master Fear was the concentrated killing intent honed by a Sword Master through countless killings.
And the beings Aden had killed most often in his previous life were warlocks and Talos.
As a result, Aden’s Master Fear was particularly potent against entities dealing with dark energy, such as Talos and warlocks.
The fear the warlocks felt now was several times more intense than what an ordinary person would feel in the presence of Aden’s Master Fear.
Aden recognized the familiar emotion in their eyes.
Fear, terror.
They were afraid of him.
Aden felt a sense of satisfaction at the sight of their familiar expressions.
‘Indeed, the realm of the superhuman is convenient.’
Just by exuding killing intent, he could make most opponents lose their will to fight.
“Monster, that’s a monster…”
“No, it’s the Grim Reaper…!”
“Aahhh, aaahh! Aaaahhh!”
They mumbled incoherently or screamed mindlessly in terror as they crumbled to the ground.
The Grim Reaper of Warlocks.
Aden, who had reached the realm of a Master, showed them the exact image of his old alias from his previous life.
Before the Grim Reaper, the warlocks could only tremble pitifully.
Aden felt no pity as he watched them.
‘You laughed at those who trembled like you do now, played with them like toys, and turned them into sacrifices and experiments.’
Princess Lilith had said that the gambling den took in many citizens of the Holy Kingdom every month.
The fate of humans who fell into the hands of the warlocks was either undeath or death, or, if they survived, becoming a chimera—a fate worse than death.
Knowing full well how ruthless Chaos could be, Aden couldn’t find it in himself to feel any pity.
‘Death is the only thing that would benefit you.’
The Grim Reaper of Warlocks had passed judgment.
Aden raised Baalzebul’s blade high.
The blue aura blade that enveloped his sword spread wide.
The fearsome technique Aden had displayed as a semi-master, Aura Rain. In truth, it was merely a diluted version of the technique he would now unveil.
The widely spread aura transformed into hundreds of swords.
Aden spoke the name of the technique.
**“Sword Rain.”**
Hundreds of sword-like auras rained down upon the warlocks.
**Boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom!**
The air filled with the sounds of screams and gasps. Those who had been paralyzed by Aden’s Master Fear were crushed beneath the downpour of deadly swords.
**Rumble!** The entire underground arena shook as if it might collapse from the impact.
After a few moments, when the rain of swords that had lasted for about ten seconds ceased and the dust cloud settled, the scene Aden had created became clear.
—
**-Kuhaha. Dragon Slayer, your ruthlessness truly hasn’t changed.**
—
Curse laughed as if he were amused.
The warlocks
, pierced through by the aura swords and bloodied beyond recognition, lay strewn about, and the entire area was drenched in blood.
Aden had swung his sword only twice—once to block the warlocks’ attack and once to take their lives.
Just two strikes.
In just two strikes, over a hundred of Chaos’s warlocks had lost their lives.
**Clap, clap, clap.**
Suddenly, the sound of clapping came from somewhere.
“Bravo, bravo! As expected of someone who dares to obstruct our path! Truly impressive prowess.”
A handsome man with white hair, dressed in the same black robes as the other warlocks, appeared from nowhere.
Aden immediately recognized him due to the black star tattoo under his right eye.
“After sacrificing your subordinates, you finally come out, dragging your feet. You’re one nasty bastard, gambling den owner.”
The gambling den owner.
The real power in the Kingdom of Ternian.
The operator of this large-scale casino.
He had finally revealed himself.
“Or should I call you by another name? ‘Somora of Delight’ of Chaos’s top brass.”
“So, you even know about that? You certainly know a lot about us, Aden Remes.”
The man smiled twistedly, as if finding Aden interesting.
“You must already know, but let me introduce myself. I am ‘Somora of Delight’. A loyal servant of the Boss and the ruler of this city of pleasure, my kingdom, Aden Remes.”
Somora of Delight.
Aden had heard that name in his previous life.
It was one of the names of the highest-ranking members of Chaos, obtained after torturing and interrogating numerous middle-ranking officers.
‘A warlock of at least 7-star rank.’
A 7-star warlock was comparable to the threshold of the superhuman realm.
In other words, in terms of pure level, he was roughly on par with Aden.
“You were probably trying to gauge my strength or wear me down to handle me easily, but it seems that didn’t go too well.”
“Indeed, it’s a damn shame. It’s become quite a hassle.”
Somora of Delight, one of the top-ranking members of Chaos, readily admitted Aden’s assessment.
“To think that even after all my subordinates took action, they couldn’t land a single scratch on you. This is a bit of a blow to my pride. It seems there are limits to what those useless trash can do.”
However, he didn’t seem to care at all about the deaths of his subordinates.
He only displayed mild disappointment and a hint of annoyance that things hadn’t been resolved as easily as he had hoped.
‘That’s what these bastards are like. They have no sense of camaraderie.’
Unlike the Florence Flame, which was united under Niketa due to its small size, Chaos viewed their comrades as mere tools.
He glared at Aden with eyes full of hatred.
“Aden Remes, contractor of the Cursed Sword. It’s because of you that several long-prepared undertakings of the Boss have already crumbled.”
“Well, that’s a good thing, isn’t it?”
“…You wretched bug, a nuisance on the path of the Lord. I’ll kill you and turn you into an undead so that you can pay back the damage you’ve done to Chaos by serving as a slave! A Master-level undead should be quite useful!”
Aden didn’t bother listening to the man’s nonsense.
**Whooosh!**
He simply gathered his aura and sent an aura blade flying towards the man.
The sharp blue aura flew toward Somora, emitting a piercing sound, and Somora quickly erected a barrier.
“How ridiculous. To think that such a meager attack could…!”
Somora’s barrier and Aden’s aura blade collided.
But at that moment, Somora of Delight, who had been sneering, suddenly changed his expression.
**Crack, cra-crack!**
The thick barrier he had erected began to crack rapidly the moment Aden’s aura touched it.
Somora’s eyes widened at the sight.
“What is this…?”
Then, the barrier shattered into pieces with a loud ‘crack!’
Unfortunately for him, Somora didn’t know about another alias Aden had in his previous life.
‘The Swordsman Who Cuts Through Even Darkness.’
**Slice.**
The owner of the Ternian gambling den.
A top-ranking member of Chaos, Somora of Delight.
His head was severed in a single stroke.