The Chain Throne (1)
A chilling metallic sound echoed through the air, accompanied by the sharp scent of iron.
Chains covered the ground and wrapped around the trees, their dull, ominous sheen soaking into the surroundings.
Sienna let out a small sigh, her breath visible in the cold air.
“So, it’s come to this.”
The hellscape of Kalkas, the Chain Throne.
How long had it been since she last saw the shadows of this hell?
“Not since I was ten, that winter.”
Sienna delved into her memories.
Three years after she had stood alone, controlling her witch’s power became increasingly difficult.
Even the simplest spells would trigger her powers, and sometimes, a mere surge of emotion would cause them to explode.
She feared the silent observers of the Golden Palace might discover her.
Faced with this, she made a drastic decision.
“The power of a demon was the only answer.”
The ancient witch’s power, passed down for millennia, couldn’t be suppressed by mere spells.
Seeking refuge in a temple would be like walking into the hands of the Golden Palace.
So, she turned to a back-alley dark sorcerer, the best choice she had at the time.
“What the—! Kid, what are you doing?!”
“Shut up and summon the demon. Even if you can’t summon it, you can at least convey my intent to make a pact, right?”
Using her witch’s power, she subdued the dark sorcerer and coerced him into mediating a contract with a demon.
Kalkas of the Chain Throne responded, despite the meager offerings.
Unbeknownst to her then, Kalkas had long coveted the power of witches.
With the Chain Throne’s authority, she sealed her witch’s power, thinking her worries were over.
Until last winter.
“A great upheaval is coming.”
It started about a year ago.
The continent’s political landscape grew increasingly unstable.
Monsters began to roam freely, and the once-dormant war drums echoed across the land.
In the north, barbarians, bewitched by an evil god, pressured the Tsar’s kingdom.
The southern empire seized the chaos to slowly devour the lands of smaller nations.
Rumors of a civil war among the Holy Knights included tales of a dragon of the rift being hunted, and in the east, whispers spread of elves bringing warships instead of merchant vessels for the first time in two hundred years.
Within a year, the continent’s future became utterly unpredictable.
Though a precarious balance was maintained, how long could it last?
“Five years at most. Maybe even less.”
The comfortable life of an informant in the back alleys was over. It was time to hone her skills to survive.
Thus, she accepted a commission from the Tsar’s kingdom and descended into the labyrinth.
To reclaim the power of her lineage, sealed for so long, even if it meant confronting the demon.
A surge of power erupted, accompanied by the sound of wings flapping.
The oppressive authority of Kalkas, the curse of binding chains, was torn apart in the vortex of magic.
In her dark eyes, thousands of feathers fluttered, cold chains lurking to seize them.
With a swift motion of her hand, Sienna shouted,
“Reveal yourself, Kalkas!”
With a mere gesture, the jungle split apart.
The ground crumbled like tofu, and the trees of hell shattered like burnt twigs.
The hundreds of chains that covered them scattered as countless shards of scrap metal.
The witch’s power, awakened after so many years, reduced the shadows of hell, summoned by the demon to test challengers, to tatters.
The hellish landscape receded. The massive chamber, where the magic circle had lost its light, reappeared before her.
“Others must be wandering in these shadows of hell too. I wonder if Dalen will make it through.”
The thought of a warrior’s safety briefly crossed her mind, but Sienna quickly shook her head.
Now was the time to focus on her own battle.
Her original plan to negotiate through the magic circle or face a mere avatar was already in ruins.
Unexpectedly, she had to confront the demon’s true form.
A moment’s lapse could mean death.
As she steeled herself, the shadows of hell vanished completely.
A metallic clinking sound echoed.
The demon revealed itself.
[Oh, you noticed my gaze. And you were the fastest among them all. I thought the warrior under Enaxagus’s watch would be first.]
With each step, the sound of chains reverberated.
Another step, and chains sprouted from the ground like vines.
Kalkas, now unshrouded by the chain veil, appeared as a massive shaman cloaked in robes.
Standing over ten meters tall, his form was imposing.
Frosty air seeped from beneath the robe woven with thick and thin chains.
[Using that power was quite a bold move. Or should I say, as bold as it was foolish.]
From beneath the hood of chains, the demon’s blue eyes gleamed.
[Have you forgotten the terms of our contract from fifteen years ago? You could break the seal and use your witch’s power once at your will, but in return, you vowed to offer your very existence to me.]
The demon licked its lips, a pale tongue flicking out from cracked lips.
Sienna maintained a nonchalant expression. She pulled a small wooden doll from her pocket.
A doll bound tightly with thin chains, adorned with raven feathers.
It was the symbol of the contract that had bound her for fifteen years.
“Our contract clearly states that if you directly harm me, the contract is void, and my power becomes mine alone.”
Her dark eyes blazed with magical light. She poured her magic into the doll in her hand.
“The moment your curse touched me, our contract was nullified, Kalkas. My power is now mine.”
With her declaration, the doll shattered.
In the realm of transcendent beings, a rightful declaration and the loss of a symbol signified the end of a contract.
Dozens of Sienna’s intangible chains snapped back, returning to their master, free of their binding.
The massive shaman extended a hand to reclaim the remnants of the contract. The smirk on its lips faded.
[…You were clever, witch. Even as a child, you were astute. So astute and exceptional that I wanted to make you my subordinate, unscathed and whole.]
“Dream on. If you want to make a deal with me, think carefully. I’m not one to fall for your shallow tricks…”
[However.]
A staff with a shattered crystal struck the ground. Thousands of chains unfurled anew.
Chains surged from the floor to the ceiling of the chamber.
Like a giant spider’s trap for its prey, the chain web covered the chamber without a gap.
[With the world’s end approaching, I’ve had a change of heart. As long as your soul doesn’t perish, Enaxagus will find a way to save you in the cauldron.]
The demon’s lips curled back into a grin. It spoke.
[Let’s see how long you can hold out with your newly reclaimed power, witch of the feathers.]
“I can hold out for a while.”
Walking slowly through the chain-laden jungle, Dalen thought.
Kalkas’s second phase unfolded within the shadows of hell where it resided.
In the vast shadows of hell.
Everyone was scattered, each facing their own trial in the second phase.
And having Sienna as an ally in this boss fight wasn’t a first.
For her to truly shine in the later stages, she needed to reclaim her witch’s power, sealed by her contract with Kalkas.
And if Sienna was in the party, Kalkas would target only her in the second phase.
The demon had long coveted the witch’s power, so it made sense.
“But she won’t just sit back and take it.”
A high-ranking demon.
Far stronger than Golakap, the demon who once stole the holy sword.
The power of her lineage, inherited from the primordial witch, was formidable enough to challenge such a demon.
Of course, Sienna, having just regained her power, couldn’t fully wield her lineage’s abilities.
Yet, there was a sliver of hope because Kalkas was among the weaker high-ranking demons.
“The further from its throne, the less than half its original power.”
Fighting on home ground is always advantageous.
Summoned to the lower levels of the labyrinth, close to the surface, its power was naturally restricted.
“The problem is, we can’t kill it because of that.”
Unlike wanderers like Golakap, a demon with its own hell could only be truly killed by invading that hell.
But that’s a distant future concern.
Facing the demon’s true form now was something unimaginable at this point in the original game.
A clinking sound echoed.
As Dalen navigated through the tangled chains strewn across the ground, he came to a halt in front of a peculiar tree. It was as black as charred coal, its bark bristling with dense thorns—a hellish tree if ever there was one.
Carved into the bark was a small symbol, one that only he could inscribe and recognize.
[Where I Came From]
Seeing the three Korean characters, Dalen scratched his head instead of his chin for a change. “Looks like I’m lost,” he muttered.
Being lost was actually a good sign.
In the boss battle against Calcas, the Chain Throne’s master, the second phase was divided into three distinct trials.
‘The Trial of Destruction, the Trial of Endurance, and the Trial of Spells.’
On the surface, all three trials appeared identical. Each took place in a forest of hellish trees, draped in icy chains—a shadowy replica of Calcas’s own hell.
‘But even if the shadows of hell look similar, the way to overcome them is different.’
The Trial of Destruction required a single, devastating blow to overturn the surroundings. The Trial of Endurance demanded surviving against hundreds of Calcas’s hunting hounds for a set period. And the Trial of Spells involved navigating a labyrinthine forest to find the exit using exceptional magical sensitivity.
Dalen was certain and smiled to himself. ‘This is the Trial of Spells.’
Even his keen senses were rendered useless here, lost in a place where the very laws of the world were twisted, not just simple illusions or hallucinations.
There was one more crucial clue. Each trial in Calcas’s hell was tailored to exploit the challenger’s weakest abilities.
‘If your strength and agility are low, you face the Trial of Destruction. If your stamina and senses are lacking, it’s the Trial of Endurance.’
Dalen opened his status window.
――――――――
Name: Dalen
Level: 22
[Strength: 34] [Dexterity: 30] [Stamina: 31]
[Senses: 27] [Intelligence: 28] [Magic: 29]
Skills: Dehama’s Armored Combat (D), Night Vision (E), Leap (E), Flame Arrow (D), Rapantella’s Crushing Sword (C), Hegaleus’s Rain of Fire (C), Shooting Lightning (D), Curse Ward’s Seal (D), Leredonara’s Secret Blade (B), Sacred Flame’s Ember (C), Crimson Dragon’s Blood (A), Key to the Gates of Hell (C)
――――――――
The combined total of his stamina and senses was 58. Intelligence and magic added up to 57. A precarious difference of just one point. It was no coincidence.
‘I figured if my intelligence and magic were even slightly lower, I’d end up here in the second phase. I wasn’t sure about the one-point difference, but it worked out.’
After realizing he would face Calcas’s true form, Dalen had saved the attribute points he gained from leveling up by defeating swamp wraiths and their progenitors.
The reason for coming here was simple. Two of the most crucial mid-game items could be retrieved from the corpses scattered in this place.
“Alright,” he sighed, investing his saved attribute points into magic.
His magic stat now stood at 30. Soon, a magical gleam flickered in his dark eyes.
Suddenly, things that had been invisible and inaudible before began to reveal themselves to his senses.