Debuff Master-Chapter 1191

Boom! Boom! Boom!

Lightning bolts rained down from the Tracking Thundercloud, mercilessly zapping Siegfried.

“Argh...!” Siegfried groaned and staggered.

The lightning bolts locked him in a world of status ailments, ensuring that he couldn't move freely at all.

He had completely lost control over his character; he couldn’t dodge a single lightning bolt, even though he could usually dodge them, even with his eyes closed.

No matter how much stronger he had grown, the Goblin Emperor, Godiac, was a boss monster of an Ancient Dungeon as well as one of the terrifying ancient monsters that was once imprisoned in Purgatory.

In other words, it was no surprise that Siegfried was struggling against Godiac.

“Hey, get a grip! Damn it! Han Tae-Sung!”

Seeing that Siegfried was struggling against the Goblin Emperor, Chae Hyung-Seok shouted while casting heals and magic resistance buffs.

He also tried to dispel the status ailments on Siegfried, but he was unable to do so. Godiac’s level was simply too high for Chae Hyung-Seok to dispel them.

“Damn it! What are you standing around for?! Let’s go help him, you rat!” Chae Hyung-Seok shouted.

“Kyaaaak! Call me a rat again, and I’m going to eat your liver while you’re alive!” Hamchi snarled.

“L-Let’s go!”

“You better watch it, punk! Kyuuu!”

Hamchi and Chae Hyung-Seok rushed at Godiac to buy time for Siegfried to recover.

“Kihit! Foolish!” Godiac scoffed and shook the Golden Skull Staff in his hand.

Clink! Clink! Clink!

The bells chimed, ringing throughout the entire throne room once again.

“Kyuuuu! K-Kyuuuu! Kyuuuuu!” Hamchi shrieked, clutching his ears and rolling on the ground in agony.

His hearing was so sensitive that the sharp bells dug straight into his eardrums and echoed in his brain.

“D-Damn it...! Why is my character—ugh!” Just like Siegfried, Chae Hyung-Seoul also lost control of his body. He hunched into an awkward pose and then started tap-dancing. “What the hell is this?! What the fuck is going on?!”

Bam!

Godiac slammed his Golden Skull Staff straight into Chae Hyung-Seok’s face.

“Ack!”

The blow sent him crashing into the wall, knocking him out cold.

The single hit shaved off thirty percent of his HP.

“Kekeke! Kihit! Kihit! Foolish! You cannot defeat me!” Godiac cackled, shaking his Golden Skull Staff.

As a result, Siegfried, Hamchi, and Chae Hyung-Seok all groaned in agony on the ground.

“K-Kyuuuu! Kyuuuuu!”

“...”

“W-What the hell—argh!”

Hamchi was clutching his ears in pain, Chae Hyung-Seok was knocked out cold, and Siegfried was still stun-locked.

Siegfried tried to make use of that split-second opening created by Hamchi and Chae Hyung-Seok, but his body refused to listen and kept firing random skills or moving left when he tried to move right.

‘Why won’t the Wave of Oppression activate...?!’

His character moved as if it had a will of its own, but Siegfried did not give up and tried to use Wave of Oppression once again, but...

Sseuuu...!

Just like before, Green Hell Magno was activated instead of Wave of Oppression.

“Kihit! Kihit! Diesel!” Godiac shrieked, swinging his Golden Skull Staff down at Siegfried’s head.

Siegfried tried to raise his +10 Sky Piercer to block the attack, but his body refused to listen. He lifted his weapon upward, but just like a while ago, his body refused to listen and swung it left instead.

Bam!

The Golden Skull Staff crashed into the crown of Siegfried’s head.

“Gahk!” Siegfried gasped and coughed up blood.

But that was not all...

Flash! Krwaaaang!

A bolt of lightning erupted from the Tracking Thundercloud, hitting him from above.

“Kihit! Kihit! Die! Die! All foolsh who dare defy me! Only death to all! Kikiki!” Godiac shrieked. Riding the momentum, he went berserk and clobbered Siegfried over and over again with the Golden Skull Staff

Bam! Bam! Bam!

The assault was so vicious that anyone who saw it would say that Godiac was intent on killing Siegfried.

Well, that was exactly his intention.

***

Siegfried tried to fight back. Unfortunately, no matter what skill he used, not a single one activated correctly. He tried to use Transcendent Torrential Flower Rain, but Touch of Death charged up instead. He tried swinging his +10 Sky Piercer charged up with the skill, but his character swung it in the completely opposite direction.

When he tried to use Absolute Zero to freeze the Goblin Emperor up, Elemental Shower was activated instead. The character, Siegfried von Proa, simply refused to listen to the will of the player, Han Tae-Sung.

Due to that, he couldn’t defend against the attacks, leaving him utterly exposed. The only thing Siegfried could do now was to be beaten to a pulp by the Goblin Emperor without being able to put up a proper resistance.

[Siegfried von Proa]

[HP: ■■■■■■□□□□]

If there was any silver lining to his current situation, then it was the fact that the Defense of his new gear, the Invincible Emperor’s Might Armor Set, was at the level of a tank’s gear.

Despite the brutal beating, he was still alive with sixty percent of his HP remaining.

‘What the hell is going on?! Why are the wrong skills the ones activating?!’

Even while being pummeled to death, Siegfried did not give up and tried counterattacking, only to fail yet again.

‘Why won’t it work?! Why?!’

In the midst of that desperate struggle, Siegfried decided to just fire off any skills at random out of frustration. He also flailed his limbs in all directions as if thrashing around.

While this looked like he was trying to figure out what was going on, he was actually just throwing a tantrum of pure frustration.

‘Huh?’

Siegfried noticed something just then.

‘My arms move left when I try to move them up... and when I try to move them left, it moves to the right?’

He noticed that there was a pattern to the strange movements of his character. For example, using Wave of Oppression would trigger Green Hell Magno instead, while using Absolute Zero would trigger Elemental Shower.

‘Is this the pattern?’

Even while being beaten up, he tried activating Absolute Zero and Wave of Oppression again.

Sure enough, Elemental Shower activated, and then Green Hell Magno went off.

‘This... This is it!’

Siegfried finally understood his situation. This was a common pattern that appeared in old video games, where the buttons would be shuffled at random.

For example—pressing A on the controller would actually trigger button C, while pressing button B would trigger button A.

‘Let’s tough it out and try figuring this out.’

Siegfried kept using various skills and moved, trying to learn and memorize the swapped controls.

“Kihit! Kihit! Die, you brat! What a tough fool!” Godiac shrieked.

The Goblin Emperor had no idea that Siegfried was preparing to strike back and simply pummeled the latter with his Golden Skull Staff.

It was then.

Rumble!

The Wave of Oppression was activated for the first time in this battle. While trying to figure out the shuffled controls, Siegfried had figured out the way to activate Wave of Oppression.

He figured out that casting Crushing Tremor would cast Wave of Oppression instead.

Unfortunately, even the Wave of Oppression couldn’t nullify Godiac’s spell.

‘Eh? It wasn’t magic?’

The reason it couldn’t be nullified was simple.

Clink! Clink! Clink!

The mystical spell was not caused by magic at all. Instead, it was caused by the bells hanging from the Golden Skull Staff. In other words, the Goblin Emperor was using sorcery using sound waves—not magic.

‘Doesn’t matter,’ Siegfried did not panic even though Wave of Oppression had failed. He got back on his feet and dodged the lightning bolts unleashed by the Tracking Thundercloud. Then, he raised his +10 Sky Piercer to block the Golden Skull Staff swung by the Goblin Emperor.

Claaaang!

The +10 Sky Piercer and the Golden Skull Staff collided.

“K-Kihit?! H-How did you undo my cursh?!” Godiac shrieked, startled to see that Siegfried was moving normally again.

“Who knows?”

“Kihit! I-Imposshible! Kiiiik!”

Godiac hastily backed away in panic and frantically waved his Golden Skull Staff.

Clink! Clink! Clink!

The bells hanging from the staff rang loudly, sending out that same ear-splitting ringing sound, but...

Thud... Thud... Thud...

Siegfried walked straight toward the Goblin Emperor without missing a single step.

“K-Kihit?! H-How?!”

Shocked, Godiac shook the Golden Skull Staff even harder, but Siegfried was no longer affected by it.

By now, Siegfried had figured out the trick behind the spell. He had memorized exactly how the controls were shuffled while enduring the clobbering from the Goblin Emperor, so it was his turn to go on the offensive.

“It’s time for me to pay you back for the beating—with interest,” Siegfried growled in a low voice.

Whoosh!

Siegfried teleported and appeared right in front of the Goblin Emperor.

And then—

Shwiiiiik!

He unleashed Invincible Spear Art and thrust his spear like a high-powered piston engine.

***

The Goblin Emperor’s curse wasn't lifted, but Siegfried had already regained enough of his normal movements to fight back. His movements were not perfect, as he would every so often miss or make small blunders he would normally not make, but the Goblin Emperor was weak in one-on-one close combat to notice those openings and take advantage of them.

As a shaman-type monster, his close combat ability was absolutely abhorrent.

Godiac was going to pay dearly for his lack of close combat prowess.

Bam! Bam! Bam!

Crack!

Shwiiiik!

Without giving Godiac any breathing room, Siegfried hammered him with a relentless barrage of attacks.

It was time for him to pay the Goblin Emperor back for every single blow he had endured earlier.

While in the middle of the attacks, Siegfried managed to sidestep the lightning bolts crashing down from the Tracking Thundercloud, even though his movement was still being scrambled.

He was slowly adapting to the shuffled controls and getting into a rhythm to fight effectively. Though he wasn't at a hundred percent, it was still more than enough to punish the Goblin Emperor.

“Hey, this is the problem, right?” Siegfried said with a grin. Then, he grabbed the Golden Skull Staff and ripped it from Godiac’s hands.

“K-Kihiiit?!”

[Relic: Staff of Confusion]

[A divine artifact passed down through generations of Goblin Emperors.]

[It possesses potent shamanic magic that casts powerful curses on the user’s enemies.]

[Type: Staff]

[Rating: Relic]

[Level Requirement: 400]

[Attack Power: N/A (Requires Appraisal)]

[Magic Power: N/A (Requires Appraisal)]

[Effect: N/A (Requires Appraisal)]

[Special Effect: N/A (Requires Appraisal)]

Siegfried did not have an appraisal scroll with him, so he couldn’t identify the Relic-rated item’s exact stats, but that was not a problem at all.

‘I just have to shake this, right?’

Mimicking Godiac’s earlier movements, Siegfried gave the Staff of Confusion a hard shake.

Clink! Clink! Clink!

As a result—

“K-Kihit?! M-My body is—!”

Godiac began flailing wildly out of sync, and panic became visible in his eyes. 𝚏𝗿𝗲𝐞𝐰𝚎𝕓𝐧𝚘𝘃𝗲𝐥.𝐜𝚘𝕞

“Oh? It worked?” Siegfried muttered, surprised.

He had only tried it out on a whim, as he had nothing to lose, but the same curse seemed to have taken hold of the Goblin Emperor instantly.

The fact that it worked even though Siegfried was not a shaman meant that the control-shuffling effect was from the item’s ability—not from Godiac’s personal spells.

“K-Kihiiit! My staffsh! Give my staffsh back! Kiiieeee!”

The Goblin Emperor thrashed and screamed, but his movements were jumbled by the curse, making him look absolutely comical.

In contrast, Siegfried’s movements were now smooth and precise again.

[Alert: You are no longer cursed!]

[Alert: Your movements have been restored!]

[Alert: You may now use your skills normally!]

By becoming the new owner of the Staff of Confusion, he was freed from the curse.

What was the meaning of that? It meant that the real beating was just about to start for the Goblin Emperor of the Ancient Goblin Empire, Godiac.