I Became a Genius Mage in the Cthulhu Game
chapter-52

“Aaaaargh… this damned…”

He didn’t go down with just one blow. Does he have scales on the back of his head? But he lost his balance completely when he took an unexpected hit from a blind spot and was now crouching by the window with his head thrust forward.

“Watch out, Leo!”

“Grr!”

He tried to adopt an attitude as if to say “I won’t be fooled!” But this time, I was a half-step ahead.

“Watch out for the window!”

[Lock]

This spell really has an incredibly powerful effect.

When activated, it can close any nearby doors or windows.

Impressive, right? It was just a zero-order spell.

Bang!

But when an excessive amount of magical power was infused into such a spell, it could unleash tremendous speed and force.

As the window slammed shut with vigorous force, it struck Leopard on the head.

Had his fingers been carelessly placed, they would have likely been severed.

Struck on the head by the window frame, Leopard couldn’t even scream before he passed out and fell down below the window.

“What is this!”

Crackling!

The sound of Curtain Call’s shout came from below. Hmm, it seems the battle is still raging on.

When I approached the window and looked down, I saw that Leopard’s body was cut in half.

There was no sign of Curtain Call, though. Expanding my detection range, I found her beyond the fence. Why was she there? Ah, I see.

The time had come.

Outside the hospital, a bright blue flash illuminated the surroundings.

Boom!!!

Since the third magic circle was completed, the prepared [Lightning Strike] must have been activated.

The test subjects who were clumsily attempting to pursue Curtain Call and ventured outside were caught in the lightning and burned to a crisp.

“So many have died.”

Though they were all once human, each and every one of them was a despicable murderer.

Leopard too had become an irredeemable pleasure killer due to his inherent cruel nature and the madness he gained from repeatedly working as a fixer.

He had fallen for Helistic’s sweet talk of physical enhancement and a chance for a new identity before ultimately surrendering himself to their deranged modification experiments.

Having dealt with the mid-boss, perhaps now there was only one to be wary of?

That lunatic is more dangerous than all the others here combined.

Defeating the mid-boss meant that the main boss was still out there.

His name was Je Mu-gyeong.

With the exception of him, the rest were just fools with unique appearances that were incapable of doing any real harm.

Surely he hasn’t moved to another location amidst this chaos?

I could feel an ominous and unsettling magical power on the third floor where I stood. He was still here on the third floor.

Let’s see…

This was as good a time as any to get things in order.

I put the invisibility spell on myself again and leaned out the window.

Just then, five test subjects were emerging from the hospital.

The way they each held their weapons and moved in line was quite coordinated.

The snipers on the third floor had been a mess, but these ones seemed to be of a different caliber.

“Where are they off to?”

The test subjects moved in a direction I didn’t expect. I thought they would be moving in the direction of Curtain Call and got ready to provide cover…

But instead, they were moving toward the area where I had set up my magic circles.

“Aha.”

So they were trying to capture the mage while Curtain Call was out of sight. A sound strategy, indeed, if there was actually a mage there.

Regrettably for them, there was no one at the location they were approaching.

Only the two magic circles I had left behind remained.

Whether they approached or not was of no concern to me…

In fact, it was the perfect opportunity.

I reached out through the window and started remotely manipulating the distant magic circles.

They’re a bit far for complex operations, but I can still channel some magical power into them.

What usually happens when a spell fails?

The spell could backfire, injure the mage, or produce a result completely different from what was intended.

Or… The uncontrolled spell might overload and cause a huge explosion.

While it’s difficult to precisely imbue new properties on the magic circles, overloading them with magical power is feasible.

It was a shame to waste two magic circles right here but their pattern had already been deciphered by the enemy.

Better to make a significant impact than to waste them meaninglessly.

I forcibly distorted the shape of the magic circles.

Two magic circles with opposing properties interfered with each other….and that created a deadly repulsive force.

Fizzz, crackle, fizzz!

Now, explode…

Boom!

A blinding flash of light and a tremendous explosion ensued, causing the windows to shudder. Ugh, did I overdo it with the explosion?

The test subjects who had bravely pushed forward all collapsed onto the floor in a near-death state.

Oh, they’re quite the sturdy bunch.

Still, they were tough enough to physically force their way toward where they thought the mage might be.

It seemed their bodies had been robustly modified as they weren’t dead even after the explosion.

They were twitching slightly… With some luck, they might survive.

The regularly triggered spells were now over. Therefore, I began forming a new spell for Curtain Call.

[R’lyeh’s Fog]

Gurglegurgle…

A white fog started to rise from all around. A magically dense fog with surreal density enveloped the entire hospital. The test subjects on the first floor would now be unable to see what was approaching through the fog or know where to direct their attacks.

And such uncertainty would breed fear.

[The unique effect of the L-rank accessory ‘Carcosa’s Mask’, ‘Yellow Dominion’, has been activated.

// Yellow Dominion: Adds the effect ‘Spell Amplification: Instill Fear’ to certain spells.]

“Wh-What is that?!”

“What? What’s going on?!”

“In the fog! That monster! There’s a monster!”

“Aaaaah!”

This should be enough. After all, my role was merely to buy time for Curtain Call. Having provided so much help, she should take care of the rest herself.

The only task remaining was to deal with Je Mu-gyeong, who was holed up in another room. Once that was accomplished, the most difficult part would be over.

“Huuu…”

I held the mask with both hands for a moment and took a deep breath.

Je Mu-gyeong was a fairly strong enemy, but I had faced him several times in the game before.

I roughly knew his weaknesses and understood that communication was possible under certain circumstances.

Therefore, there was no issue.

The real problem was that my body was getting tired really quickly due to the array of penalty traits clinging to me.

Moreover, although my level had somewhat increased, the [Decreased Stamina] trait meant my HP was critically low.

Should I allow even a single clean hit, magic or not, I would suffer irreparable damage.

Well… shall I start moving now?

There were a total of six rooms on the third floor of the hospital.

However, there was no need to check each room one by one.

There were only so many rooms I needed to visit.

First of all, here and now.

A wide room with a sniper present.

Anyway, since I suppressed the sniper here, there was no longer any reason to linger in this room.

Apart from the sniper, it was just a spacious room with nothing much to see.

Ah, of course, if one were to follow the game’s intended path, there would be essential tasks to complete.

In the corner, there was a cabinet filled with documents revealing the hospital’s backstory.

Reading through them would unveil secrets like…. “Ah! So there’s something hidden in this hospital? There’s a strange secret space beneath it? And to access that place, the USB held by the director of the lab is absolutely necessary?” This information would come to light.

Then by interrogating the snipers, it would be discovered that the USB had long since fallen into the hands of the leader of the test subjects, Je Mu-gyeong.

That was the progression of the story.

Since I wasn’t here to enjoy the game’s narrative, there was no need for me to engage in such investigative activities. In other words, once entry and suppression were completed, there was no further business in this room.

“I came in praying that only the snipers would come out, but getting aggro from Leopard ended up draining me unnecessarily…”

I twisted my already frail body around the air and even threw it… bringing Curtain Call seemed hardly worth it.

I massaged the back of my neck as I slowly walked toward the door.

The moment I reached for the doorknob, I let out a sigh.

“Ah, damn. Now that I think about it, this pattern means the hallway out here must be a total mess by now…”

I slowly turned the doorknob, and the door creaked open with an annoying squeak.

As the door opened, the first sensation that hit me was the smell.

The repulsive odor of blood. I had encountered the scent of blood numerous times while roaming through [Cthulhu World] in Paju.

I had been through the zombie-infested [K-3675 Secret Research Facility] and visited the underground parking lot that had become a ghoul’s den, where bodies were piled up like mountains. However, the stench wafting through here was more intense and unpleasant than anything I had previously encountered.

Visually, too, the sight was horrific. The third floor’s hallway was a scene of utter devastation.

The walls were cracked here and there, and pieces of human bodies were scattered all around.

The floor bore clear signs of blood that had flowed like rivers.

It was the aftermath of the armed uprising by the test subjects who had massacred the Helistic researchers present in the hospital.

Lunatics, all of them…

Given that these were researchers involved in human experimentation, they couldn’t exactly be called innocent victims.

Even so, the horrific scene created by the test subjects was truly abnormal.

A vicious slaughter and a party of ruthless madness had unfolded here.

Bodies mutilated in a manner that mocked dignity.

Corpses bearing an excessive number of wounds.

Entrails decorating the walls.

Heads displayed on tables.

There were even traces of a grotesque game resembling bowling with body parts.

The bodies had been toyed with as if they were mere playthings.

While not enough to trigger my [Madness of the Abss] trait, the sight was nauseating. What a bunch of lunatics.

No. Wait a moment.

Was this really not enough to trigger my trait?

No, the atrocity in this place was indeed horrific.

But it wasn’t shocking. My mind did not crumble from psychological shock, nor did my limbs shrivel from overwhelming fear.

Could it be that encountering mythical beings had numbed my emotions?

The notion of losing human emotions felt somewhat disturbing.

No, let’s not dwell on that now. After all, my current state might be more useful for survival.

Don’t think too much, Kim Shin-hwa. Just focus on surviving and returning to your original world.

Aside from that, I felt disgusted. Perhaps this sensation stemmed from memories and habits of my former self, but regardless, I felt revolted.

Je Mu-gyeong, that lunatic leader of the rebel test subjects. I felt like beating him up might improve my mood.

“Huuu…”

Though it wasn’t the best place for a deep breath, I paused and focused on stabilizing my breathing to calm my mind.

It wasn’t a moment for leisure, but rushing wouldn’t help either.

Before encountering Je Mu-gyeong, there was somewhere else I needed to stop by.

Among the four doors lined up along the corridor, it was the second one from the left.

A sign hung on the door reading:

[Pharmaceutical Warehouse]

That’s the place. There’s something I need to pick up there.

Ugh, it’s good to be prepared… but of course, a fuck*ng horror show was waiting in this room too.

The blood, entrails, and gruesomely dismembered bodies displayed in this wretched hallway were just the beginning.

[Cthulhu World] is a game filled with cosmic horror and madness.

This hospital was designed with that theme in mind.

And each room within it awaited with its own unsettling horrors.

And witnessing these horrors was enough to drive one to madness… It was quite the exciting place, in many ways.

But who would have thought I’d be experiencing these delightful elements firsthand.

It’s supposed to be fun because it’s a game, but in reality, it’s not fun at all.

It just makes me angry.

But then again, doing nothing changes nothing…

Ah… I’ve been here often, but it’s always hopeless.

I slowly opened the door.