D.I.O

significant that they still belatedly sensed the arrows' presence.

“Go.”

Not caring if his actions were noticed, Merlin activated the spell he had applied onto the arrow.

“The Silver Throne of Poseidon!”

Whoosh!

Once the arrow landed, a ripping sound echoed through the air.
Frost and ice began to expand rapidly from the point where the arrow landed.
Like an exploding claymore shell, the freezing effect continued to spread.
It had happened so fast that no one was able to react to it, not the Lich, the Death Knights, or even the Kraken which still had its tentacles raised to lay the final blow on the Dead Man’s Ship.

Sss!

The chaotic movements of the sea halted instantly.
It was as if someone had pressed pause while watching a video.
Soon, the entire area became covered in a silver-light sheen.

The undead weren’t living organisms, so they were mostly unaffected by extreme heat or cold.
Of course, there were some undead that would not be able to operate properly in extreme cold, but there were also some undead who were totally unaffected.
Even if these unaffected undead were thrown into the freezing lands to the north, they would be able to move and operate without an issue.
Moreover, no undead creature could be killed by freezing alone.
There were even undead monsters like the Specter, a spirit monster that would be totally unaffected by any environmental elements.

“It’s not just a freezing effect, though.”

Right.
The spell that Merlin had used wasn’t just a natural freezing effect spell.
He had truly utilized the wider properties of magic this time around.
He had used a malicious type of magic power for this attack spell.
Anyone and anything exposed to the spell was not just frozen solid, but also affected by the magic power that moved within the cold.
Even the Specters flying across the sky, and the Ghost Armor that was immune to heat and cold, were affected by Merlin’s spell.
All these affected beings started to turn black; then, they turned into dust.

Plop!

Merlin went into the water, without fully submerging himself.
Like a dead fish that had risen to the surface with its belly facing upward, Merlin laid down flat on the water.
The entire area was still being frozen over.
It began to look more and more like Siberia.
However, since Merlin had the water-attribute affinity, he was unaffected by the sudden drop in temperature.
Even if he was concerned about it, he wouldn’t have been able to do anything about it anyway.

/Your status has changed to ‘listless’! The status ‘dying’ has also been added!/

“Ugh… it’s not like I’m ordering something… why do they describe it as ‘added’?”

Though he complained, Merlin could sense that he had been greatly weakened.
He was unable to even move his fingers.
All his powers had been drained.
That last spell had tapped almost all of his energy.
This was to be expected, given that he had used a spell with a magic power so much greater than his capacity.

His status window read like this…

His internal energy and magic power were almost fully exhausted.
On top of this, his Golden Pill Immortal Technique’s circulation had paused.
His magic resistance, reaction ability, and magic gathering reinforcement had also stopped operating.

The spell possessed an effect that was much larger than the magic power contained in the spell, which Merlin had coined as ‘Howling Spell’, or [The Silver Throne of Poseidon].
Merlin had used every trick and shortcut he could come up with to execute this spell, so of course, he had now fallen into a thoroughly exhaustive state after casting it.

“My head really aches… damn… why doesn’t the pain controlling system do anything about this?”

There was nothing that could be done, despite his complaints.
A user playing a fighting game doesn’t get hurt when their in-game character sustains damage, but if that user gets a headache from how focused they are on the fight, there was nothing the system could do to relieve that pain.
This was the exact situation Merlin had put himself in.
Of course, if the DIO developers truly wanted to eliminate this pain, they could have done so with ease, but that would likely mean that users’ general skill level would not improve.

“… this is too much.
[Log Out].”

/You are logging out.
You are immobile for the next 25 seconds.
You are susceptible to attack, so please make sure you are attempting to log out in a secure, safe area.
If you are not in a position to log out safely, please cancel your log out.
25, 24, 23…/

Once Merlin initiated the log out, a cylindrical pillar fell over and surrounded him.
And soon…

Poof.

Merlin vanished without a trace.