Ethan Cruz had to make preparations on two fronts in order to lure in and kill Lee Shin-Woo.

First, he needed to make sure the battle progressed a certain way so that Retadane and the other heroes wouldn't be able to easily escape the battlefield. This part wasn't very difficult. All he needed to do was wait for the right moment.

Second, he had to create the right environment. He would have to go through a lot of trouble to hide what he was doing from the other heroes. Ethan Cruz had formed a sort of visual barrier that would prevent any outsiders from seeing them while also weakening the goddess’s authority within, thus denying access to chatroom and private chat.

This was all done in advance so that no matter how much Lee Shin-Woo screamed, no one would be able to hear him. With the secret activation of a magical device as well as his own magic, the space was cut off from the outside, forming a complete barrier.

Unfortunately, the effects would apply to him as well.

"How did you summon so many undead..."

"I told you, I have no idea what you're talking about. Why do you keep asking me?"

Lee Shin-Woo acted innocent, while Ethan Cruz broke into a cold sweat. He'd never been this uneasy before, not even when he met one of the twelve generals face-to-face!

"How can you, a human, control so many undead!?"

"Ha. You're one to talk."

[Annihilation of airborne troops, complete. Awaiting new orders.]

[We have annihilated both of the level 7 undead heroes. We await your next order, Paul Zero!]

The Golems’ presence was so faint it was as if they would vanish into thin air any moment. However, they possessed unimaginable power. Following their entrance into the battlefield, a great number of level 7 elites rapidly emerged.

Their types were varied, including the Titans and a wolf, but they were all ridiculously strong. Furthermore, they had pledged their loyalty to Lee Shin-Woo alone. Seeing that, Ethan Cruz gritted his teeth.

"If the other heroes knew about this..."

"They wouldn't. You made sure of it, didn’t you?"

Lee Shin-Woo ridiculed him coldly. Right. Because Ethan Cruz had activated the magical device, this entire area was isolated by a barrier. Ethan Cruz finally thought of a possibility that he hadn't even considered before.

"Did you want this to happen...? You knew that I had prepared a barrier and deliberately let me activate it!"

"I'm the type of guy who prepares a lot of ways to kill someone."

Lee Shin-Woo didn't actually want things to progress this way, but he knew it was his wishful thinking deluding him, and had prepared for the worst. If he were the type of person to put all his eggs in a single basket, he wouldn’t have survived in the Empire.

"With these troops...you could've attacked me without going through the hassle of coming up with a plan."

"You're misunderstanding something here."

Lee Shin-Woo glanced at the airborne troops and shrugged. By hurling boulders after boulders, the Titans and Golems had made many of the airborne troops crash to the ground.

Yasunori Akira tried to attack Lee Shin-Woo, but Bisher Moon and Shino Rendu were there to block him together. Both of them were stronger than Yasunori Akira, and he wasn't able to keep up with the fight for long. Lee Shin-Woo could foresee his death the moment Yasunori Akira decided to attack him and step away from Ethan Cruz's protection.

"The reason I intervened wasn't to kill you, but to protect my other seniors. Ah, and to get the rewards of killing a couple of the twelve generals. I got to kill two of them because of you. Thanks a lot."

"...Ha, hahaha."

Who had been manipulating whom? Ethan Cruz felt like a rug had been pulled from underneath his feet.

He'd lost. It was a total defeat. Not only had he lost his eight undead heroes, but his spies had either been exposed or killed, leaving him with only himself. He had lost everything in just a day.

"You hid those sharp fangs of yours...quite well thus far."

"Would you believe me if I said that wasn't all I have been hiding?"

"Keuk, kuhaha!"

Ethan Cruz couldn't help but laugh at the taunt. Perhaps the younger man wasn't joking. Lee Shin-Woo was monstrous enough for him to think that way. However, there was one thing he had left. One weapon he could still use. It was himself.

With a rueful smile, he muttered, "You defeated me thoroughly. That I acknowledge. I didn't know how strong you were, nor did I know about your hidden forces, so it's only natural that I would be beaten so badly… But if I get you, my loss today means absolutely nothing."

"You're probably right."

"Yeah. Let me tell you what your biggest mistake was. You underestimate what it means to be level 8!"

Ethan Cruz infused mana into his wrist bracelet. Jet-black mana rose up like mist and surrounded him. The high concentration of darkness steadily dyed the once pure and bright plot of land black. This was a level 8's authority.

[Keuk...]

[Ethan Cruz, how can he have such immense power...!?]

The undead looked on and instinctively shuddered, as darkness mana was the root of their existence. Although they knew that Ethan Cruz was a danger to their master, they had trouble advancing towards the man. His level and power were far too great! Even the level 7 elites froze before the darkness that threatened to overwhelm everything, including their very existence.

"None of your undead can use their full strength here. High Rank Darkness... You have no idea what I went through to acquire this power."

Lee Shin-Woo didn’t reveal that he could use it too; in fact, he could use High Rank Darkness as soon as the goddess awakened his latent potential.

"A level 8 possesses power that surpasses the limitations of mankind. You must've prepared a lot, but in the end, if you can't overcome me with your own power, you won't be able to kill me. That goes for your subordinates as well… Die."

A lump of darkness shot towards him. As expected, Lee Shin-Woo thought and nodded to himself. Ethan Cruz’s darkness was incredibly powerful even when compared to a fellow level 8, like Retadane.

While Retadane was a frontline fighter, and Ethan Cruz a specialized mage fighting in the backline, the difference in power between their magic was still striking. Perhaps his bracelet strengthens darkness magic. Lee Shin-Woo thought as he reached out with his staff.

[Absorbing level 4 High Rank Darkness. Because of how powerful the magic is, strengthening and reversing the element will take some time.]

The serpent opened its eyes.

"What!?"

Ethan Cruz's darkness magic was powerful enough to instantly kill a level 7 hero, and yet the high rank magic intended to kill Lee Shin-Woo ended up being absorbed by Lee Shin-Woo's staff.

The staff was creaking from the sheer power of the darkness, but then Lee Shin-Woo's max level Darkness Resistance activated, allowing his staff to absorb all the darkness magic—while the staff itself was able to absorb and reverse magic, it wasn't invincible. It couldn't absorb any and all magic without any repercussions. The Bone Winged Serpent required the user to possess high resistances, which Lee Shin-Woo had in spades.

"H-How...?"

"Who told you that I could only nullify curses?"

"...!"

Lee Shin-Woo answered the question with a question of his own, affecting an innocent tone. Ethan Cruz couldn't even muster a retort. No one had ever said something like that to him. He made the assumption himself.

However, he was being proven wrong thoroughly! Although Ethan Cruz had figured out that Lee Shin-Woo wasn't afraid of the curse and was planning on using that curse to attack him, he'd come to the natural conclusion that he specialized in curses alone...

"Could it be..."

Ethan Cruz's lips shook at that train of thought. He wanted to cancel his spell immediately, but he had pushed all his mana into the spell; canceling it would mean bearing the brunt of the resulting explosion with his own body. He’d blow up without being able to kill Lee Shin-Woo.

"Were you...manipulating me all along?"

"Good answer. I'll give you a passing mark."

Lee Shin-Woo had been wary of Ethan Cruz from the very beginning. His darkness magic hadn't been a cause for alarm; Lee Shin-Woo was actually worried about Ethan Cruz using his immense magic in a different way. He knew that the man was strong enough to hurt him should he use anything other than darkness.

"Ha, haha..."

Therefore, Lee Shin-Woo had manipulated Ethan Cruz so that he wouldn't hesitate to use his darkness magic, pouring all of his mana into a single spell.

That was why he'd discussed countermeasures for 'curses' rather than for 'darkness' with Yasunori Akira. He'd made Ethan Cruz think that he was entirely focused on the former. He'd also made it look like he was afraid of darkness magic. The reason he'd brought his undead here was to push Ethan Cruz to use his darkness magic without hesitation as well.

Ethan Cruz was afraid. He wasn't afraid of Lee Shin-Woo’s magic, strength, or forces. He was afraid of his intelligence.

"Lee Shin-Woo, how far ahead did you plan...?"

"I wonder. Probably around one or two steps worth?"

Ethan Cruz had cast his spell, and that spell had been absorbed by the serpent. Its wings began to flutter. Ethan Cruz could feel his immense magic being converted into something unimaginable. Something he was most wary of.

Ethan Cruz knew the moment the power was turned onto him, he'd be dead.

"Are you...really human?"

"Of course I am, Senior."

Lee Shin-Woo smiled sweetly and replied, lying til the very end like the Joker he was. Unfortunately, Ethan Cruz didn't have the time to even realize he was lying. The staff shot out a ray of light, devouring Ethan Cruz whole.

"Spatial magic!?"

[Paul Zero!]

However, the moment he believed he’d killed Ethan Cruz, spatial magic activated with Ethan Cruz as its target. Lee Shin-Woo realized immediately that it was the Archmage's doing.

He obviously couldn't just sit by and let the spell activate. Lee Shin-Woo immediately expelled all his mana in all directions. If he had fought Ethan Cruz, he wouldn't have this much strength left, but because he'd utilized his strongest suit against the man, he was still almost at 100%!

"Nice. I blocked it!"

"You blocked it!?"

Lee Shin-Woo had succeeded in stopping the Archmage's spatial magic from activating! He had dispersed the Archmage's mana with his own, and nullified the source of the spell.

It would be nigh impossible for any other hero to do, yet Lee Shin-Woo had done it so nonchalantly. Of course, he wouldn’t have been able to do it if he hadn’t experienced the Archmage's mana firsthand and gone to the Giants' domain!

"Nullifying spatial magic... I'm speechless."

"Ah. I desperately stopped it because I thought the Archmage was coming, but I guess it was the opposite. The Archmage was trying to bring Ethan Cruz to him."

[Kak, Guha...]

Lee Shin-Woo looked at Ethan Cruz, who was turning into an undead, and muttered in realization. As he thought, Ethan Cruz had been connected to the Archmage.

In exchange for the Archamge’s support, Ethan Cruz probably had to pledge his allegiance to the Archmage after death, or something to that effect. A spatial magic must have been implanted in him, which would activate the moment he died. Or maybe he had some kind of magical device that would do the same to him. There was a high chance that this barrier was created with a magical device the Archmage had given him.

[Do we kill him?]

"Ah, it'll be a pain in the ass when he wakes up, so make sure to restrain him, and then kill him as soon as he becomes an undead."

[Understood!]

The Paul Zero Corps replied enthusiastically with their gazes fixed on their master, who had killed the level 8 hero responsible for the darkness magic.

Thirty seconds later, Ethan Cruz died for the second time.