If I had to pick the most challenging boss in the Brightest Darkness series, it would definitely be one that changes its concept and patterns completely with each phase.

After dying dozens of times in the 1st Phase, when you finally get to the 2nd Phase, you end up dying another dozen times trying to adapt to the completely different concept. Just as you think you’ve adapted to the 2nd Phase, you forget everything about the 1st Phase, and it becomes a loop.

A prime example of this is the final boss of Brightest Darkness 4, the Creature that Devours the World. With four phases and a pattern that changes with each one, adapting perfectly is an absolute pain.

“Fallen Priestess Lucia,” or “Priestess of the Sun Lucia,” also falls into this category.

In the 1st Phase, she fights like a monster, losing her reason with a gruesomely mutated body, while in the 2nd Phase, she tears off her transformed right arm and fights like a human.

With four installments of the Brightest Darkness series, the number of bosses that change their concepts with each phase has naturally increased, but Lucia’s popularity is primarily due to her touching story.

A priestess who lost her reason due to the Abyss regains her sanity through her faith and meets a human-like end—that is the essence of Lucia’s boss fight.

It’s a process that is worthy of being called a hymn to humanity, so it’s no wonder many people like it.

Of course, those who were stuck in a never-ending cycle of getting blasted by Lucia’s attacks, no matter how touching the story was, were tearing their hair out.

Crash!

The vertical slash of the radiant sword created a massive shockwave. The golden light of the Holy Sword originated from the Sacred Catalyst held in Lucia’s left hand.

The sword plunged down and disappeared in a burst of bright light, gathering divine power once again at the catalyst. I contemplated closing the distance, but not knowing what might come next, I decided to wait patiently.

The light mass transformed into a giant spear. Lucia raised her arm, adopting a javelin throw stance. This was a pattern where I could stay close. I quickly moved my feet.

As I circled around Lucia clockwise, the clear tinkling sound echoed, and at the moment her left arm moved to throw the spear, I rolled in deep from the side.

The holy spear lodged itself precisely where I had just been standing before exploding. Having already escaped the explosion range, I ignored it and swung my blood-stained sword at Lucia.

Since I no longer needed to cast a blessing enchantment with the Sacred Catalyst, it was time to utilize the special ability of the blood-stained sword: the attack power buff.

Having been steadily using potions since the 1st Phase, it was impossible to replenish my health, and the buff I had was the last.

“Ugh!”

Lucia, struck by the blood-stained sword, let out an ugh and staggered significantly.

In the 2nd Phase, while all other damage reduction stats dropped to the level of a normal human boss, Lucia’s resistance to holy-type attacks increased tremendously. It was the complete opposite of the 1st Phase.

If a cleric character could easily breeze through the 1st Phase, the 2nd Phase would make you scratch your head unless you had prepared other means of attack.

Lucia was unable to fight back properly, letting out ugh sounds as she was beaten. This happened because she had a very low toughness for a boss.

But I couldn’t just keep hammering away until she died. After precisely hitting her four times, I rolled back to escape. Just then, a golden divine explosion erupted near Lucia.

This pattern was aimed at those who thought they could just stand there mashing left-click, thinking the boss had low toughness.

In the vanilla version, there was at least a slight delay, but in the Darkest Light Mod, it felt almost like a no-casting instant attack, making it nearly impossible to react and dodge.

It was a sign for players to hit appropriately and then get out.

“The sun watches over me…”

Lucia murmured a prayer.

Her knees were brought to the ground in submission, as if to worship God, as she lowered her head, palm facing up.

The Sacred Catalyst placed before her kneeling form began to radiate. Divine power flowed over me, blocking my approach, and a golden spherical light appeared at the ceiling of the boss room.

A small sun rose high. Accordingly, Lucia rose her body. Whenever she had picked it up, the Sacred Catalyst in her left hand continued to shine.

The light transformed into the shape of a flail. Step, step—Lucia took a step forward. This time, the self-splitting sphere shot toward me.

‘…It’s too late to turn counterclockwise now.’

I glanced up at the blazing sun and quickly calculated which direction to dodge. This was a pattern similar to the last-ditch effort of the Human Butcher, the boss from the tutorial area.

That is, if there wasn’t a charging Lucia right in front.

In an instant, Lucia closed the distance to me. Unlike the immovable 1st Phase, in the 2nd Phase she unabashedly used leaps, teleportation, and dashes to try and kill the player.

Ignoring the falling sun on the right, I dashed forward to widen the distance from Lucia and rolled just before the small sun impacted. A brutal explosion sound echoed behind me.

As the light came crashing down a second time, Lucia swung the flail created from the Sacred Catalyst. A Holy Sword, a spear, and now a flail.

In the vanilla version, she had only swung the flail because of the defined settings, but upon entering the Darkest Light Mod, she had somehow become a weapon master, summoning all sorts of weapons.

‘This game is ridiculously hard.’

After mentally praising Lucia, I deflected the flail coming down toward my head. The swing of the flail wasn’t particularly difficult since it shared movesets with Stella.

Boom!

Just beside me, a light mass exploded, but since I was already out of the range, I ignored it and focused solely on deflecting the flail.

Once I deflected the last strike of the three-hit combo, I stopped my body from being pushed back. Then, I checked the location of the falling sphere and rolled away in the opposite direction.

That attack, which explodes the sun-like sphere, was spell-based, and a parry wouldn’t work properly. Even if I could perfectly deflect it, the spell damage would still pierce through.

If I got unlucky, the combat fatigue from deflecting the flail could prevent me from rolling, leading to a certain death afterward.

In fact, it was generally better to roll out of the way rather than deflecting the weapons Lucia swung. But given the situation, there was no other choice.

‘I wonder how much of the purification gauge has accumulated. I can’t afford to parry the next attack.’

I estimated that if I used deflect only once or twice more, I would likely be hit by purification. To perfectly negate status ailments, I must raise my resistance with a 100% shield.

If I was without an attack power buff, I could just run around and stall the time even if I got hit by purification. But I still had a buff applied, so I couldn’t afford to act recklessly.

The little sun that had worked so hard began to flicker and slowly faded. A thick darkness enveloped the boss room. Only the Sacred Catalyst in Lucia’s hand served as my lone source of light.

At that moment, the blood-stained blade started to flicker and tremble. It was a signal that the attack power buff was nearing its end.

‘So soon?’

I glanced back at Lucia. Her walking seemed steady, and there were no visible injuries, so I had no idea how much health she had left.

‘Isn’t it about time to catch her?’

Every time I thought of that HUD, it brought me grief.

During the entire duration of the attack power buff, aside from the cases when the patterns weren’t helping, I had kept hitting her fiercely, yet I couldn’t check how much health she had left.

The 2nd Phase Lucia made it nearly impossible to drag the fight into a long term. That was because the holy spells she cast included recovery options, restoring her health by a percentage.

If I couldn’t inflict stun to cut off her recovery, it was common for her to go from near death back to full health. And for me now, as soon as the attack power buff ended, I wouldn’t have any means to inflict pin on Lucia.

‘Sigh. Guess there’s no doing about it.’

According to my calculations, if I hit her a few more times, I felt that I could take her down before the attack power buff faded. I could consider this my last chance.

I dashed at Lucia, concentrating all my mind on the Sacred Catalyst. I deflected the flail and evaded the holy spear, closing in directly. Basic strike, basic strike, and yet another basic strike.

‘…Now.’

And the moment I sensed she was about to unleash a sacred explosion, I rolled to the side.

Having avoided the exploding divine power unscathed, I dashed back toward Lucia and swung my sword. Lucia staggered with ugh sounds every time she got hit.

That was such a high-risk action that I was trying my best to avoid, but as my damage calculations went awry, I had no choice but to make that desperate decision.

‘If it weren’t for this situation, I wouldn’t have even looked at her, seriously.’

Even though the expression hinted at ‘practically’ being no-casting instant spells, if my reaction speed was sufficient, dodging was not completely impossible.

Though the difficulty of dodging was through the roof, as almost all of her skills were close to being purely predictive.

In any case, I had successfully passed the first trial, and now all I had to do was pray that I could maintain my focus until I cleared Lucia.

“Ahhh…!”

Lucia let out her final death cry. The golden light infused in the Sacred Catalyst began to flicker and slowly dim.

‘Wow, I can’t do this twice.’

It seemed that Lucia really had little health left, as she couldn’t hold on much longer when I charged in. Honestly, when she initiated the healing pattern at the end, I thought my heart would drop.

Fortunately, her health ran out before she could finish the healing cast, or else I would have never cleared her.

I heard the thud of a human body collapsing. Or rather, it was something so mangled it was ambiguous to even call it a human body. It had almost completely melted away, rotting thoroughly.

The divine power that had been suppressing her mutations had entirely vanished, and the flames that had been burning from her right shoulder had died down. Something strange twitched on the surface as if an arm was trying to grow back.

Lucia was gasping heavily, spewing black liquid from all holes in her face. Huff, huff—the half-sobbing breaths escaped continuously.

With that, the Lucia boss fight was cleared. I felt all the tension release from my body as I sank to the ground.

It felt absurd why I was fighting a DLC boss at this level, as if I hadn’t participated in some grand undead tournament. If this were a game, then perhaps it would make sense.

‘Damn Holy Kingdom.’

I wondered why the Pope had chosen this moment to spout DLC story dialogue, making people uneasy.

As if to prove I had defeated Lucia, the black sludge washed away, revealing the rune stele embedded in the wall. Subtle green light emanated from the characters inscribed on the stone.

I could choose to acquire the rune and head straight back to the surface, but before that, I had unfinished business here. Rising from my spot, I walked over to the wheezing, half-melted Lucia.

Having used the acquired Sacred Catalyst more than three times, I had met the event condition. In fact, there wouldn’t be any rewards from proceeding, but it wasn’t an event one would expect to get a price for.

Noticing my footsteps, Lucia’s squishy head awkwardly turned toward me. With her eyes smeared with black liquid, it was surprising that she aligned her direction accurately.

“…Is someone there with me?”

Her lips trembled.