Infinite Dendrogram - Volume 21 - Chapter 1

Chapter One: Tournament Day Three

Gideon the City of Duels, Central Arena

The results of the first and second days of The Tournaments were, to put it bluntly, within the realm of expectation.

The person who had won the right to challenge Stern Face-Tender Heart, Sasage, on the first day was a Superior, Lei-Lei the Prodigal of Feasts, who had gone on to fight it right away and won the MVP reward with little effort on her part.

On day two, the right to challenge Fortcrushing Mawdragon, No Mercy, had just been decided in a heated battle between two of the kingdom’s strongest PKs. Ultimately, the combatant who’d managed to eke out a victory was Barbaroy Bad Burn.

In the UBM fight after that, she fought alongside her clan leader, Ray Starling the Unbreakable, and four other Masters who seemed to be newbies. They went on to win and acquire the MVP reward.

Indeed, there had been two UBM battles so far, and both of their MVP rewards had been claimed by Death Period.

Because of this, not to mention the way Lei-Lei and Barbaroy had fought, the power and fearsomeness of the clan became known across the kingdom. On account of the name and their combat style, though, a lot of people mistakenly assumed they must be a pretty shady group.

But despite all of that, common opinion held that there was no chance of Death Period winning on the third day too. After all, the Master they’d sent to fight on that third day was nothing like the two who claimed victory in the others.

He was neither a Superior nor a well-known PK—merely a Master who could still be called a newbie. He may have won the four preliminary battles and made it to the finals, but most thought that he wouldn’t go beyond that.

The third day’s final lineup boasted names like AT WIKI, holder of the magic-focused Superior Job King of Glaciers, as well as Adham “The Thousand and One Night,” and Bolhead “The Mythbeast Circus.”

Because of this, the odds of this nameless Death Period member winning were believed to be low—and the possible payout for anyone who bet on him was so high that he could have been considered a potential dark horse.

However, almost nobody thought he was capable of defeating anyone else in the finals.

Interestingly, though, a few people were still placing large bets on this nameless member of Death Period.

One of them was the clan’s leader who’d won big on the previous day—Ray Starling.

The others were four Masters who had no connection to Death Period.

All of them had been defeated by this same nameless Master in the preliminaries.

◇◆

A caster clad in a white robe panted with ragged breath, deeply drained by his battle against the opponent before him.

But it wasn’t his body or his magic that had been down the most—it was his mind.

The white-robed man was King of Glaciers, AT WIKI.

He was the leader of the fifth-ranking clan—Wiki Editors: Kingdom of Altar Branch. Just as the name suggested, this was a branch of the clan that had set up shop in many countries for the purpose of editing Infinite Dendrogram’s wiki. As someone who’d reached as high as sixth in the kill rankings, AT WIKI was no doubt a force to be reckoned with.

He had also managed the impressive feat of forming a party that went all the way down to the 45th floor of the Tomb Labyrinth—and recently, after the throne of King of Glaciers was suddenly vacated, he’d taken up the mantle and acquired the power of a Superior Job.

AT WIKI possessed a wealth of combat experience and knowledge, and thanks to his status as an SJ and an impressive set of gear, he was a combatant who could rival any common vanguard. In today’s Tournament, he was undoubtedly the favorite to win.

And yet, here he was, at a loss for how to proceed against a nameless newbie.

Nine attempts, all of them failed, he thought. Trying to affect his vision did nothing.

He knew that he was up against a member of a high-ranking clan, Death Period. But according to his investigations, Death Period was a clan that was so high up because it was made up of—no, because it just had a few elite members.

Four Superiors. Famous PKs. And the Unbreakable, who stumbled across unusual incidents and had so far been lucky enough to deal with them.

The other members were either excess baggage or simply there to inflate the member count—newbies who only joined the clan because they simply happened to be accompanying the leader during Franklin’s Game.

However, this particular member—the one AT was fighting right now—was nothing like that.

“White Field.” The moment AT prepared to use a spell, his opponent snapped his fingers.

That single action made the ultimate skill of the high-rank Cryomancer job vanish like mist.

“I’m sorry,” said AT’s opponent—a boy so beautiful you could mistake him for some kind of snow fairy. “I’m not very fond of ice.”

Clad in brass-colored clothing, accompanied by his Embryo—a succubus Sentinel—and commanding a landdragon called Hexahorn Grand Dragon, the boy was smiling.

“It reminds me of a rather unpleasant person...and more importantly, if you used that on me, I would lose.”

He maintained that likable smile even as he said that, but it made AT’s insides freeze.

He has no trouble shutting down even a high-rank job ult, huh? This wasn’t the first time the boy had canceled AT’s magic. He’d done this a total of ten times now.

AT knew that he was capable of this feat because of the MVP reward on his hands. He couldn’t read any details of the item with Identification, but it was clear that it canceled magic whenever he just snapped his fingers.

If that was all it was, though, AT would be able to counter it. The move didn’t cancel magic automatically—instead, the user had to deliberately perform an action to use it. This meant that AT could circumvent it simply by casting magic when his opponent didn’t expect it.

The gap between their stats was obvious, and a single spell that connected would be enough to snowball into complete victory.

However, that one single spell AT needed to connect hadn’t done so even once.

His opponent somehow grasped when he was using magic even if AT didn’t say a word—even when he cast after using an item skill that hid him from sight, the boy still snapped his fingers at the most optimal time to make the magic scatter.

He was reading AT like a book, forcing him to waste MP over and over. How does he know exactly how I’m playing my cards...?!

“I knew you would climb up the ladder of this third Tournament, so I watched every single one of your matches up until this point,” the beautiful boy replied as though he read AT’s mind. “Unless you use something you haven’t used in any match so far, don’t think you can outsmart me.”

AT was silent. It was clearly a provocation, but he knew he couldn’t act on it.

After all, AT had also seen his opponent’s matches—and in all of them, this boy was the one who negated the enemy’s attacks and emerged victorious. The boy’s combat style could be described as “antioffensive.”

In competitive card game terms, he played with what was called a “lock deck” or “permission deck.” That was how much he restricted his opponents’ freedom in combat.

AT could clearly see that in the three battles he’d witnessed, starting with the boy’s fifth. In that battle, the boy’s opponent was Bolhead the Mythbeast Circus, a High Tamer who commanded monsters, just like he did. The monsters Bolhead had were slightly stronger than the boy’s, and he also had an Embryo that enhanced tamed creatures.

Everyone felt Bolhead would come out on top if they clashed directly...but they never did.

The boy made the first move and Charmed Bolhead’s own monsters into killing him.

His opponent in the quarterfinal was Pyromancer Adham the Thousand and One Night.

After seeing the previous battle, Adham entered the arena equipped with gear that countered Charm. However, he had his magic negated, just as AT was experiencing right now, and was trampled when the boy’s succubus and landdragon closed the distance between them.

In the semifinal, he fought Pound Boxer Hellmask, who’d been a nobody before this Tournament, but showed great prowess as he clawed his way up the ranks. He had a fighting style focused on closing distance with nimble footwork and pulverizing the opponent’s head. Like Adham, Hellmask had also equipped something to counter Charm, and it was widely believed that the boy would certainly lose this time.

Clad in body-enhancing Type Arms armor, Hellmask flanked the boy and threw a single punch that could kill him instantly.

However, the fist was stopped by the boy’s brass-colored coat—or, rather, the Orichalcum Armory Slime that was disguised as an ordinary coat.

The liquid metal slime negated physical attacks completely and stopped Hellmask’s hand. It couldn’t be destroyed even by this deadly fist.

That was when the succubus showered Hellmask in a multitude of debuffs besides Charm—and when they had all affected him, the slime sliced him apart.

Thus, the boy reached the finals.

And now that he was actually facing him, AT clearly understood...

It’s better not to think of this as fighting a newbie. This boy read his opponent’s moves ahead of time, stole the pawns his opponent brought to the field, canceled magic, blocked physical attacks, showered his enemies in debuffs, and finally finished them off.

He was a monstrous being who crushed his enemies before they could even show a fifth of their power.

He was a monstrosity who might not have had a Superior Job, but had truly taken his place in the realm of pre-Superiors.

In a way, he might’ve been even less like a newbie than the Unbreakable.

I need to carefully look for a way to win, AT thought. I still have the stat advantage.

There was no need to respond to the boy’s provocations, and the debuffs that he’d used on the previous opponents wouldn’t work on AT.

AT’s Embryo was called Pale Night’s Falling Light, Tianren Wushuai.

It was based on the five signs of a heavenly being’s decay described in Buddhist scriptures, and its core trait was countering debuffs. A Type World Embryo, Tianren Wushuai negated all debuffs afflicting AT himself and five nearby targets selected by him. Additionally, it built up the debuffs and returned stronger versions to the ones who sent them.

Tianren Wushuai was debuff-focused retribution-type Embryo in its sixth form. This Embryo was what had allowed his party to make it so far down in the Tomb Labyrinth, which was full of fearsome debuffs.

And because AT had this Embryo, using debuffs on him was a mistake that would ensure the aggressor’s defeat. The main reason he’d even gone after the Orb offered on day three was because he thought he could win against the monster contained within it, which used curse-based debuffs.

However, it was because the boy knew AT had this power that he didn’t use any actual debuffs. You couldn’t fall into someone’s trap if you knew what they were capable of.

Thus, the battle between Masters had turned into a repetitive exercise. AT used magic in the hopes of finally landing a blow, while the boy prevented him from doing so.

The only thing that could break this equilibrium were their monsters, aiming straight for them.

“MHOOOOOO!” One creature let out a bellow, while the other was silent. The landdragon tried to charge toward AT, but a giant lump of ice stopped it.

The ice was actually a Permafrost Golem AT built using a skill. Golem creation as an art was the forte of jobs practicing earth magic, and this was the ice version of that. This golem was on the higher end of Pure-Dragon tier in stats and was specialized in endurance, making it capable of acting as a wall against the landdragon’s attacks.

AT WIKI’s magical attacks were negated, but so were the physical assaults of the boy’s landdragon.

One could say that this battle was a stalemate, and that they were equally matched.

The succubus, the landdragon, the slime... I see that their stats are enhanced, but even with the buffs, they don’t surpass Permafrost.

Just like the boy’s passive skills enhanced his creatures, so too was AT’s ice golem, Permafrost, enhanced by AT’s passives as King of Glaciers, and he could heal it by transferring some of his own magic to him.

Additionally, Wallvisage Mind, Banwall, an MVP reward he’d acquired a while ago, had a skill that enhanced the defense of anything defending him.

AT silently looked at his opponent. AT was the head of the fifth-ranking clan and specialized in group battles, but even as a solo unit he was a jack-of-all-trades who could fulfill the roles of tank, attacker, and healer.

And that was exactly why the boy, who could fight him as an equal, was so menacing.

Based on what Identification tells me, he’s not hiding much in terms of gear. Besides the antimagic MVP reward and that slime, every item just gives a bonus to his minion capacity. Makes sense—without those, it would be difficult for him to field two Pure-Dragon-tier monsters.

Duel rules prevented using party slots for monsters—any creatures used in duels had to fit within one’s minion capacity. With The Tournaments being no different in that regard, the boy’s gear was heavily focused on increasing minion capacity to overcome this problem.

If you take away what they got from buffs, the two monsters have stats that are below average for their species, AT thought. They must’ve only recently evolved into a higher form.

During the stalemate, he used Reveal to read the boy’s cards as thoroughly as he could.

I know about his jobs. The only mystery...is that Embryo.

The succubus standing at the boy’s side—she could fly, but didn’t seem to be using that ability to fly over Permafrost to attack AT. She was only casting healing magic on the landdragon.

But she was wary of AT and would be prepared if he came close.

She used Charm, healing magic, and a bunch of other skills, didn’t she? Her core trait isn’t clear. Maybe she has a learning or stocking skill? That would make their power pretty low, though...

Embryos had a tendency to lose output strength in compensation as they became able to do more things. And if they didn’t become weaker, they began demanding higher costs from their Masters.

So far, it didn’t look like the boy was paying much of an external cost, which made it safe to assume that the skills themselves had a weak output.

Is he hiding something? The Embryo hadn’t done much in the matches so far, but that was exactly why AT suspected she was holding something back. This was the final, so AT also expected the boy would play some trump card related to her—perhaps a skill that required time before it could be used.

In that case, I should probably act first. This means responding to his provocation...but I have no choice.

AT extended his hands toward Permafrost’s back—as well as the landdragon and the boy behind it.

The boy prepared to snap his fingers, but then stopped.

He realized that AT wasn’t casting a spell.

A moment later, something scattered before the boy’s eyes.

It was the slime that the boy wore as clothes. It had moved to protect him, and a part of the creature had been blown away.

“...I see,” the boy said in sudden understanding, looking at AT’s hands—and the things that were clutched in them.

AT had used Instant Equip to take out two guns.

They were not normal guns, however—they were magic guns.

The job that had focused on crafting these kinds of weapons had been lost to time, so they were in limited supply—a treasure that could only be unearthed as archaeological finds from ancient ruins.

And AT was now holding such a rarity in each hand.

The one on the right fired light magic—lasers—while the one on the left fired wind magic—invisible bullets.

He’d acquired these magic guns using the money he’d earned from countless quests and kills, and there were two reasons why he’d gone for weapons imbued with elements that weren’t ice, his usual speciality.

The first reason was that he wanted to be prepared against anyone his element didn’t work on. Second, he wanted to have a means of attacking in situations where magic itself was unusable.

And as had just been proven, the boy wasn’t able to stop these magic guns from firing.

This meant that AT now had a means of attacking him.

It was worth keeping these a secret until now. Even this won’t be enough to finish him off, though.

The gunfire had basically taken the boy by surprise, but he’d remained unharmed himself by getting his slime to protect him. This meant that even if he couldn’t negate the actual firing, he was still able to read what AT would do.

AT kept firing, but with the slime going all in on the defensive, his attacks seemed to have little effect. It was a metal slime that carried the Orichalcum name, so it must’ve had a high resistance to magic attacks—or maybe the MVP reward with the magic-negating skill also came with a bonus effect that increased the boy’s magic resistance.

AT could keep firing like this, but it didn’t seem to be nearly enough firepower to take the boy down.

Which was why...

I guess I’ll try something else. The technique is still in the experimental stages, but...

...AT fixed his eyes on the boy and began circulating his magic.

The boy responded by snapping his fingers, but nothing happened.

Magic overflowed from AT’s body, quickly reducing the temperature within the dueling barrier. It was as though he’d managed to actually use the White Field spell that the boy had canceled earlier.

“This is...” The boy’s expression became puzzled. Of course it would. After all, unlike the guns, this was clearly cryomancy.

And yet, he couldn’t cancel it. The temperature continued to drop.

This was because it was magic, but it wasn’t a magic skill.

After spending lots of time experimenting with various things here in Infinite Dendrogram, AT arrived upon a certain bit of info. Job skills were basically guided processes that were automatically activated when you chose to use them. The job system provided assistance so that everything would occur as directed.

However, he knew that it was possible to achieve effects without that guidance—to use your MP, the magic in your body, without using a job skill.

It was said to be the pinnacle of technique, arrived upon by tians who took jobs from the The One series—the modification and creation of magic.

At the end of his testing and information gathering, AT had been able to take a step into that realm and craft an awfully simple original spell. What he was doing right now was the equivalent of a “Hello, World!” script—the most basic of all basics.

He merely converted MP into cold.

It had no amplification, no fixed direction, and not even a form. And it wasn’t even worth comparing its efficiency to using magic through a job-assisted skill—it was outrageously expensive.

It was too primitive to really be called magic at all, and so simple it didn’t even have a name.

But that was exactly why those gloves couldn’t break it apart.

Perhaps they could negate a magical effect at the moment the boy snapped his fingers, but AT was continuously turning magic into cold. It could be said that he was essentially using an extremely primitive spell with a short recast time over and over. There was no point in stopping just one of them.

That MVP reward likely targets and cancels individual skills. That means that it can’t prevent this quick, repeating casting!

AT WIKI was entirely correct.

Cold filled the barrier, but the boy didn’t snap his fingers again. He also understood that it wouldn’t work against this new strategy.

And so...frost began forming on the landdragon and the face of the boy protected by the slime.

The boy was silent. As he began to freeze, the beautiful young man looked even more like an ethereal snow fairy.

However, the cold was bringing him closer to death. He wasn’t like AT, who had a passive skill for cold resistance as King of Glaciers, or an Embryo that made him immune to the Freeze debuff.

If the temperature continued to plummet like this, AT’s victory would be guaranteed.

“I see that top rankers really aren’t people to be trifled with. I’ll admit—I didn’t expect this.”

In this enclosed world, now so cold it felt like his very breath might freeze, the boy still spoke the same way as he had before.

“You have a lot of cards in your hand. I thought the same about King of Beasts when we recently fought, but those on the top really do have a huge variety of options at their disposal. How enlightening.”

The boy smiled...

“I myself haven’t shown everything I’ve got either.”

...and the succubus followed up his words with a skill activation.

“Union Jack—Dragon-Devil-Man.” At that moment, the boy disappeared.

In his place, there now stood the imposing figure of a man. He had devilish wings, and in his right hand he held a lance that looked like a tangle of dragons’ horns.

His species and build did not resemble the boy’s at all, but he still wore the golden clothing, the MVP reward was still equipped on his hands, and his beauty had not changed even though he seemed to have aged in the blink of an eye.

A Sentinel fusion skill! He, the landdragon, and the Embryo had become one.

AT instantly understood that the three’s stats were combined to create a single entity stronger than the base.

This is bad! The moment that thought crossed his head, an intense clang rang out.

Permafrost, which had been able to withstand the landdragon’s attacks, began to crack from just a single hit from the fused Dragon-Devil-Man.

It combines their stats—and even their skills! That includes his passives as a tamer and the Sentinel’s self buffs! No, it’s not just that... The Enchanter single-unit buffs are there too! Normally it was pointless for anyone with a job in the tamer grouping to have Enchanter among their sub-jobs. Skills from the enchanter grouping couldn’t be used when you had a tamer grouping job set as your main. That was because they weren’t generic skills, but instead specific to different groupings.

However, if this fusion skill had the effect of joining the stats of the fused creatures and making all their skills usable...it would enable the use of job skills from different groupings too. That would mean that he’d be buffed by his passives as a tamer, the Sentinel’s self buffs, and Enchanter single-unit buffs...

This is bad. He’s completely surpassed my golem! The Dragon-Devil-Man’s stats were overwhelming Permafrost. AT was still releasing magical cold, but with the Dragon-Devil-Man being as powerful as he was, it would take some time to freeze him to death.

There was no doubt that he would destroy Permafrost and kill AT before that happened.

AT tried firing the magic guns to keep him away, but the Dragon-Devil-Man defended against the shots by just turning the handle of his lance without even looking at him.

Neither the guns nor the cold could kill him.

AT might’ve been able to stop him in place and eventually destroy him if he could use his cryomancy as King of Glaciers, but that was a bad move as long as his opponent still had that MVP reward.

But then, AT’s eyes widened as he realized something.

The Dragon-Devil-Man was holding the handle and swinging the lance with both of his hands.

I could do it now! At this moment, AT WIKI realized he might be able to make an early move and cast a spell before he was defeated.

Ice Age—the job ult of King of Glaciers—was still unavailable to him due to his lower level, but with some enhancement from another skill, White Field should be able to deliver a similar amount of power.

“Magic Power Magnification...!” AT put away the gun he held in his left hand and began focusing magic in that hand instead. At the same time, he fired a volley of lasers using the gun in his right to keep his opponent busy.

If the spell went through, that would be fine by him. And even if the opponent canceled it, he’d be forced to free his left hand and snap his fingers to do so—an obvious opening. AT would use that to allow Permafrost to recover and restabilize the battle.

With that in mind, he cast the spell.

“White Field!” AT’s voice rang out.

Hm...? But the moment he activated the skill, he noticed the state of the Dragon-Devil-Man’s left hand.

He’d let go of the lance—AT had expected that much.

However, the hand was in a different shape. Instead of snapping his fingers, the Dragon-Devil-Man was spreading his left hand open wide.

And then...he grasped it shut.

At that moment, AT’s body exploded from within.

“Wh-What...?” AT instantly suffered a fatal amount of damage that scattered his entire body, immediately reducing his HP to 0. He was defeated without even knowing what had happened in the end.

There was, however, one thing he did understand.

His opponent had been laying a trap for him from the moment he started using the lance with both hands.

And as though to prove this point the victorious enemy was smiling.

◇◆

Tournament Day Three

Reward: Name Unknown (Presumed Type: Undead).

Core Traits: Poltergeist, Curse-Based Debuffs.

Winner: Lost Heart Rook Holmes.