SETH: The Blind Architect

Agatha’s eyes widened in disbelief. Seth?

Besides Seth, the two hovering drones instantly projected a web of bright grid lights. They scanned the shattered gothic floor, the disintegrated vines, and the bleeding Dungeon Lord in a single second. The detailed data analysis streamed straight into Seth’s linked metallic blindfold, feeding the information directly into his brain.

A long, suffocating pause stretched over the ruins as Seth absorbed the catastrophic report.

"WHAT!!!

SERIOUSLY!!!!!" he suddenly yelled out in pure frustration. "Agatha, what happened here? What did you do?!" Agatha slyly glanced aside. Beaumont stood completely stunned by the sudden outburst, his pale face twisting in confusion. “Who is this guy supposed to be?” he murmured under his breath.

"Agatha? I know you can hear me!" Seth barked, ignoring the adventurer. "How come everything is leveled? The whole floor is worse than the last time! Do you even know the cost of all this? I’m certain you took it lightly, but this is completely beyond repair! You know that?!"

Agatha looked away, her mind reluctant. As expected, this is going to be incredibly annoying, she thought, her internal voice dripping with a sly, exasperated tone. Beaumont watched the interaction, desperately wondering about the stranger's identity.

"There’s someone else down there with you," Seth stated, his voice suddenly dropping into a calm, chillingly analytical tone. "Is that the intruder? He’s the cause of this as well. Then why is he still alive? Are you messing around with him? That’s really not your style."

Beaumont braced his weak frame, refusing to be ignored. "I am Beaumont, the Earth-born," he called out toward the far end of the hall, matching Seth's volume. "Who are you?"

"I’m Seth!" the man replied with the exact same intense energy Beaumont gave out. "...And you’re in my territory!"

Territory? Beaumont thought. He briefly looked down at the bleeding Agatha, then snapped his gaze back to Seth. She’s not really the Dungeon Lord? So... it must be him. The hovering drones continued to translate the battlefield into raw data, sending a fresh feed to Seth's metallic blindfold. "Why are you sitting on the floor, Agatha?" Seth muttered. "Tell me you're just messing around."

Beaumont tilted his body slightly toward Seth's direction, a smug grin fighting its way onto his bloodied face. "You're right on that. I have officially defeated the sorceress Agatha." He paused internally as the realization of her identity finally clicked. Agatha, huh? It reads like THE Agatha. Agatha the grand witch... one of the first calamity-class entities since the millennium. He stole a side glance at her, then looked back at Seth. No, it can't be her. It’s not possible.

Seth tilted his head, his thoughts twisting. Agatha lost to this...? He sniffed the air, deeply picking up the scent, body frame, and faint mana radiating from the adventurer. From this wimp? He’s thin and smells awful, aside from his erratic mana. But that alone can't be enough to beat Agatha. Something is definitely fishy here."You must be the Dungeon Lord?" Beaumont demanded.

"Dungeon who?" Seth said bluntly.

"Don't play a fool's game with me," Beaumont snapped. "You are, since you explicitly said this was your territory."

"So what about it?" Seth countered, entirely unbothered.

"It's simple. Step aside and bring forth your treasury," Beaumont commanded, his eyes critically appraising Seth and the devices around him. He must be an alchemist, or at best a mechanical engineer. Those flying things... I don't sense a single drop of mana from them. He must be the one who built those high-tech turrets back on the third floor and the traps on the first floor. He paused, his confidence surging. Those machines must be his primary weapons. He looks like an ordinary person; I sense absolutely no mana from his body either. He could be a physical fighter, but definitely not at a mastery level. And he’s blind, which gives me an immediate advantage. I can take him myself.

Beaumont raised his voice, gesturing dismissively toward the fallen witch. "Don't you agree? Do as I command and you won't have to experience the same agonizing pain as this woman here."

Seth’s expression went completely stoic. "What did you say again?"

"Is he deaf as well?" Beaumont muttered bitterly. "I said surrender and bring out your valuables! Once I take what I came for, I'll simply leave. You don't have to get hurt. Trust me, it's the easy way out."

Seth casually raised his right hand and began cleaning his ear with his forefinger. "I'm sorry, I can't let that happen. My treasures belong to me and no one else." He blew a piece of debris off the tip of his finger. "If you want to take my stuff, you'll have to go through me!" His face hardened into a dead serious expression.

Beaumont sighed, shaking his head. "You really don't seem to understand. Acting tough isn't going to do you any good." He stretched his left arm forward, pointing the dark Relic directly at Seth. "Let me show you a brief glimpse of what I am truly capable of."

The hover drones immediately scanned the item in Beaumont’s hand, instantly broadcasting the foreign data to Seth. "What is that?" Seth asked slowly, his blindfold translating the unreadable feedback.

Beaumont tapped into the Relic of Nullification.

THUD! THUD!

Instantly, the two hovering drones fell straight out of the sky, slamming into the jagged stone floor with a heavy, dead impact. Seth froze, completely stunned. For a second, nothing made physical sense. He desperately tried to recall the drones through his neural link, but nothing happened. They were completely lifeless. Even his metallic blindfold flickered and shuts down entirely.The polished alloy sphere in his left hand began to violently hiss and smoke. Seth brought the metallic disc up to his nose and sniffed it. It was completely fried.

Did he just fry the energy reactor I've been working on for hours?! Seth’s mind raced in a sudden panic. The drones aren't responding, did he completely kill their power cores? I can't even communicate with Aid down on the sixth floor anymore. Did he sever that too? With just that single item in his hand?

Seth slowly shifted his head toward Beaumont, his voice dripping with a terrifying, menacing tone. "What the hell did you just do?"

"I did warn you," Beaumont said. He had grown even paler, his body thinning out drastically like a starving man, but a triumphant smirk remained on his face. "I destroyed your items' power sources. That was just a fraction of my power. Failure to do as I say next will lead directly to your death."

"I have been building..." Seth took a heavy step forward, his fingers tightening until he violently crushed the smoking reactor sphere into scrap metal inside his bare palm, "...this reactor for several hours." He took three more calculated steps, the stone crunching beneath his boots. "...And you just fried it?"

Cold sweat poured down the side of Beaumont's face. Just surrender already, his mind screamed in sheer desperation. I can't keep this up much longer. You're walking straight to your own death, you bastard! He gritted his teeth. You leave me no choice.

Desperate to end the threat, Beaumont reacted, tapping into the dark Relic once more to finish Seth off for good. But before he could even direct the attack, Seth vanished with impossible, supersonic velocity, Seth completely erased the distance between them. Shock gripped Beaumont's soul as the world blurred. How the hell did he move that fast without magic...

Before the thought could finish, Seth’s hand clamped onto the Relic with a vice-like grip, completely locking Beaumont’s left hand. Using his forward momentum, Seth unleashed a brutal sidekick directly into Beaumont's upper torso.

BOOM!

The pure physical force sent Beaumont hauling backward through the air at terrifying speed. He rocketed across the room and smashed violently through a pile of collapsed ceiling tiles. A massive explosion of soundwaves and dust erupted from the impact, clouding the entire area in a thick grey mist. Seth eased his physical frame, tilting his head down to look at the dark, faceted object now resting in his right hand. This thing... "What do we have here?" he muttered.

"That's a Relic," Agatha wheezed from the floor.

"A Relic?" Seth turned his head sharply toward her angle.

"Yes," Agatha answered, coughing up blood. Seth paused, his voice turning dead serious. "Wait. The RELIC?"

"YES!" Agatha answered, agonizingly trying to pull the diamond drills out of her flesh.

"The one from the ancient myth?" Seth asked, tilting the object under his blindfold.

"YES!" Agatha yelled out in frustration. "That is the Relic of Nullification!"

"How do I use it?" he asked, turning it over.

"Don't!" Agatha begged, bearing the white-hot pain as she finally ripped a diamond drill out of her left chest. "You might die if you try to wield it.

"Seth shrugged casually. “you're no fun, you know that?"

Far across the ruined hall, buried deep beneath the shattered ceiling tiles, a helpless, broken voice cried out from the dirt.

"Oh God, Ploy! The One of Plot! Your humble servant seeks ye!"

In that exact vicinity, the space began to warp.

Both Agatha and Seth snapped their heads toward the far end where Beaumont was sent flying. Through the thick dust and smoke, Beaumont’s eyes and shattered frame began to gleam with a blinding, terrifyingly divine light as he desperately continued the prayer, forcing the narrative to rewrite itself once more.

###Author note###

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