Martial Arts Returnee’s Game Broadcast

Chapter 249

[Story Mode]

[No matter how much you enlarge an empty vessel, it will crumble before true strength.]
[It’s truly just a vessel that can only serve as a pillar.]

Boogeyman, staring up at the massive beast’s image suspended in mid-air, shouted as if to devour the illusion itself.

[Great Demon!]
[That audacious and fierce glow of the soul. No one else in the world should possess such light. The Great Murderer. I never thought you’d still be alive, even without a body.]
[You returned to seek revenge, having braved humiliation. You’ve truly desecrated my body.]

The Great Demon was the worst betrayer.
He’d stabbed a knife in the back of a long-time friendship, defiled the body of his friend, and turned it into a tool for his Daoist Paradise.
There were no regrets in Boogeyman’s heart about trusting in friendship.
If there was any regret, it was simply that Boogeyman had chosen the wrong monster to trust.

[Do not think that a body tarnished with crude flesh can stop me.]
[Once you free my body from that cursed pillar, your turn will come next.]
[Daoist Paradise is an unattainable golden fragrance.]
[Your fate will be the same.]
[I will make you feel the pain of losing everything you have, right before your eyes.]

The darkness that concealed a shape that could never be revealed wrapped around the face woven from hands extending out of the wardrobe.
Through the spread fingers, Boogeyman’s pupils gleamed with a crimson light.
For ordinary monsters, the murderous aura alone would be enough to make them faint, and even boss-level monsters would hesitate and retreat, but the Great Demon remained unfazed.

[Indeed.]

The face of a predator, full of interest as it prepared to feast on its prey.
It licked its lips as if anticipating a sweet delicacy.

[Such spirit, such boldness.]
[Even after losing its body and years passing, the strength of the will that escapes its destined fate remains unbroken.]
[As the next Demon King, this Great Demon could only recognize this as the lover who once stood by him.]

• Lover?
• Lover???
• Boogeyman and the Great Demon were lovers?
• Who’s the girl?
• What’s it matter?
• To hit on her.
• In the wardrobe?
• You might get your head stuck in Boogeyman’s hands.
• Was the Great Demon female?
• Doesn’t seem like it.

The Great Demon’s lover, the Great Murderer.
The shocking revelation that Boogeyman was female sent the chat into chaos.

[Shut up.]
[Even if my body was taken by your dirty betrayal, I will never offer my heart or soul to you again.]

• The way she speaks, Boogeyman was a woman.
• What? How is she a woman with that voice?
• She must have lost her original voice after losing her body.
• Then she’s not a woman now, is she?
• Maybe if she possesses a woman’s body instead of the wardrobe, she becomes a woman?
• What happens if she possesses a man’s body?
• She’d become a man, you idiot.
• Schrödinger’s gender.
• Until the wardrobe door is opened and the real body is revealed, Boogeyman could be either man or woman... hmmm.

[Your ambition and self-righteousness are nothing more than a continuation of ugly betrayal.]
[Just like all the monsters who have made betrayal and usurpation their legacy, you too will fall, bound by your own legacy.]

The conversation spiraled toward a catastrophe.
What was once love, now a past lover, had come to an end.

[Could that really be the case?]
[Do you not think it’s already too late?]

A changed relationship.
Even the faintest memories turned to bitter reality.
The Great Demon declared.

[The Feast of Devourment has already begun.]
[We are only waiting for the day when the feast ends.]
[Your body has become a splendid experiment.]
[What to take.]
[What to abandon.]
[I know everything now.]
[So now, I will declare it here.]
[The Feast of Devourment is finished.]
[Goodbye. My long-time friend and once-lover.]
[Meet your end along with the abandoned banquet.]

The illusion vanished.
At the same time, the Pillar of Ascension screamed.
The massive walls around the pillar fell apart.
The single, most massive hand unfolded.
The capital region of the Lower District.
The hand, 30 km in radius, perfectly filling the land, emerged.

[It’s done.]
[The Feast of Devourment. I never thought the true nature of the feast would be something like this.]

The question from Ha Eung Eung’s gaze.
Boogeyman answered.

[When a feast is held, the table must be set and offerings placed.]
[That monster’s feast was a period of gathering sacrifices, placing them on the banquet table.]
[Now, it has come to an end.]
[All that remains is to collect the offerings.]
[It’s the time of <Devouring>.]

Boogeyman and Ha Eung Eung looked beyond the ceiling.
Above in the sky, the Ascension District rose.
From there, an overwhelming power flooded out.
A red pillar shot up.
Countless deaths and screams scattered.
Beyond the Ascension District, the blood of the sacrifices poured out.
Bloody Fondue.
A cruel banquet made from the blood of sacrifices.
The aftermath poured down toward the Lower District.
As if marking a turning point.
The giant hand that had stood still began to move.
The moment the Feast of Devourment for the Lower District, destined to dispose of even those unworthy to be sacrifices, began.

<Hidden Raid Boss: Pillar of Ascension Raid>
Phase 2 - The End of the Feast

The massive hand moving along with the rotation of the pillar would destroy all buildings in the Lower District and slaughter all life with just one sweep.
This was a fitting end for the phase named "End of the Feast," a grand finale where everything is destroyed.

• Wow, so this is what the feast was?
• I never saw it live, so I thought it was just an event to strengthen the Great Demon, but this is insane.
• How was it usually beaten?
• You go up to the Ascension District, use the strategy item, and force the feast to stop, then enter the Great Demon raid.
• Then you fight the final battle with the raid team.
• If you get White Spirit General on your side, you fight with White Spirit General's subordinates or summon him to fight alongside you.
• Wow, that's crazy.
• White Spirit General is also a boss on the monster route, right?
• Yep.
• Wow, having a route boss as your ally is insane.
• This is the official human route strategy.
• Speedmaster followed that route.
• Only hardcore players who’ve surpassed 100 runs with top-tier streamers can attempt this.

The viewers who were unable to secure the strategy items or means to stop the feast, witnessing it after it had already ended, saw the true nature of the Feast of Devourment revealed.

"Wow... so there was a way to stop it like this."

Speedmaster felt the wall.
His signature speed, slicing through the enemy’s vital spots with overwhelming speed, was effective against human-like creatures with clear weaknesses.

"How did that even land a one-hit kill?"

The body of the Collective of Despair couldn’t be defeated using just the skills provided in the game.
Even if you cut through the flesh and dealt damage, you’d need to attack two or three times to completely neutralize it.
Even with a special forces team, everyone would be swept away, and you’d be overwhelmed if you attempted it alone—this was the terrifying attack pattern of the Collective of Despair.
Yet, the Silent Swordsman and Boogeyman tore through those seemingly unbeatable patterns with devastating precision.
All the attack patterns of the Collective of Despair were merely the first phase of the Pillar of Ascension Raid.
The second phase, however, was far more shocking.

"The real problem is this. The Collective of Despair wasn’t small, but this thing is a super-sized entity that can destroy the entire city in one hit."

If that arm completes a full circle, the capital region of the Lower District will be reduced to rubble.
Without strategy items or methods to counter it, this time, it’s truly an impossible situation to overcome.
Then, a strategy appeared, one that even the Silent Swordsman hadn’t known.

[It’s not the arm. Target the gap in the pillar, human.]
"?!"
[If you widen the gap in the pillar and make contact with the core body that once held my body, I can stop that arm with my will.]
[!!]
[Though it’s frustrating, the Great Demon’s preparations were thorough. Stopping that arm in one strike is impossible, even for you. This is the only way.]

The Collective of Despair, bound to the Pillar of Ascension, with Boogeyman reclaiming control of the body once used by the Great Demon, could now seize the arm's control.
A desperate crisis.
Only Boogeyman, with his special technique, could nullify the deadly attack patterns and save the situation.

[Interaction Choices]
[Boogeyman’s plan: You...]

1. Accept the plan (Pillar of Ascension Raid)
2. Reject the plan (End of the Hand Raid)
3. Abandon the raid and flee.

However, there was a fundamental flaw in that plan.
Speedmaster had caught on.

[? 2. Reject the plan.]

"Silent Swordsman has realized it too. The fundamental flaw in that plan. Do you understand?"

• What?
• Why do you know?
• Again with the teacher act.
• He probably thinks we’re his students now that we call him “Sensei.” Can you explain it slowly so we can take notes?
• Why are you suddenly so polite, lol?

Speedmaster grinned and explained.

"Think about it. Boogeyman said that the Collective of Despair is bound to the Pillar of Ascension by a curse, and to break the curse, we need to destroy the pillar."

• Yeah.
• Yep.

"Boogeyman will enter the Collective of Despair and reclaim control of the body, then stop the End of the Hand."

• Ah, I see.
• So?

"If Boogeyman enters that body, how does he come back out?"

• !
• Oh no.
• You mean he can’t get out?

"It’s not just that he can’t get out."

Speedmaster anticipated an even darker future.

"He was controlled by the Great Demon for so long. This body is different from his original one. Doesn’t this remind you of the assimilation rate?"

• Ah.
• If the body is different, the assimilation rate would be destroyed.
• No way, right? But some people can assimilate even when they’re in a human form.
• Those people were horses in their past lives, though.
• Yeah, lol.
• Just let them mate with a donkey...
• They mate with stallions, too?
• ?
• ?

Ignoring the incomprehensible abyss of chat, Speedmaster mentioned the conclusion he had arrived at.

"Boogeyman is likely to get trapped in that body and be controlled by the Great Demon again. A comrade who sacrifices themselves to save the team becomes the enemy."