Saul hadnāt even finished speaking when Monte on the opposite side suddenly leapt up.
A pair of fleshy wings burst out from his back, their span instantly exceeding the diameter of the circular platform!
With a fierce snap, those wings slammed together, propelling him straight across the platform to attack Saul directly.
Saulās expression grew solemn.
He knew that pulling a Second Rank wizard into his own mental battlefield was an extremely dangerous move.
Because there was no way for him to determine whether his enemy also possessed extraordinary spiritual power.
Monte before him was clearly skilled in this domaināhe not only immediately grasped the situation he was in but also turned the tables in the very next moment, launching a proactive assault.
As the massive flesh-wings neared Saul, they transformed again, the tips becoming as sharp as blades.
Saul raised his arms, which instantly morphed into two round shields at the moment of impact.
Seeing Saul actually attempt to block his attack head-on, a trace of disdain flashed in Monteās eyes.
But in the next instant, blade met shield, and the entire mental space let out a heavy, mournful wail.
The flesh-wings were blasted back, while the steel shields were merely dented.
āImpossible!ā This time, Monte was truly shocked. āA First Rank wizardāhow could he possibly possess spiritual power on par with a Second Rank?!ā
He could no longer maintain his composure. Another pair of wings sprouted from his back.
But this pair was not as perfectly shaped as the firstāit was as though a mutation had occurred, resulting in a pair of malformed wings.
The twisted flesh-wings were covered in tiny branching protrusions, like infant hands that extended and retracted with eerie motion.
The two pairs of wings swept toward Saul again, the gusts they stirred up reeking with a foul stench.
This time, Saul didnāt try to take the hit.
The moment he saw those malformed wings, he immediately sensed the dreadful, warping contagion emanating from them.
It was like a plague.
He hurriedly flew into the air to evade them.
However, the twisted power on those wings didnāt seem to require direct contact to spread. Just a few glances at them made Saulās eyes sting and waterāas if a dozen eyelashes had embedded themselves into his eyes, impossible to remove.
Saul shut his eyes tightly, and instantly lost all visual perception of the outside world.
Monteās heart leapt with delight. With a pair of normal flesh-wings, he launched relentless attacks at the airborne Saul, pinning him down and blinding him to the changes around him.
At the same time, a long, thin tail sprouted from his back and crept silently through the storm-like assault, inching closer and closer to the back of Saulās neck.
But a silver butterfly, appearing to be made of twisted metal threads, floated gently onto the sneaking tail.
Then came the crisp voice of a young girl.
āBrother Saul, heās trying to sneak up on you!ā
Still focused on blocking the flesh-wing assaults, Saul instantly became alert. He jerked backward just in time, causing Monteās sharp tail to strike nothing but air.
āYou actually dare to cultivate another consciousness within your mental form?ā Monte was both astonished and enviousāthen his surprise twisted into resentment.
How could this be something a First Rank wizard was capable of? Even Third Rank wizards didnāt have such a setup!
āI have to finish off this brat quickly. If not, my body outside really might get killed by those termites.ā
Monte was growing desperate.
He no longer concealed his murderous intent, and relying on Saulās temporary blindness, launched a fierce, high-speed barrage of attacks.
Even with Pennyās reminders from above and Saulās efforts to defend himself, wounds gradually began to appear on his mental form.
Losing his sight was just too much of a handicap!
āEven if I grow eyes on other parts of my body, it wonāt help. Monteās warped corruption targets visual perception itself. Unless I somehow had a second set of visionā¦ā
At this thought, a sudden spark lit up in Saulās mind.
But just then, he was once again blasted backward by the wings. After retreating a few steps, he was suddenly caughtātrapped between the waiting flesh-wings from behind.
The wings curled inward, instantly sealing off all movement in front, behind, below, and to the sides.
And from aboveāa sharp tail came plummeting like a spear from the heavens!
That tail moved with such speed that it let out a screeching whistle as it tore through the air within Saulās mental space!
It seemed utterly impossible for Saul to dodge this fatal strike. But at the very last moment, he suddenly looked upāseemingly intending to take the attack head-on with his face.
And in that instant he raised his head, his cheeks, forehead, neck, the backs of his handsā¦
All the skin exposed outside his clothes began to boil like scalding water, erupting with one eerie eye after another.
As these eyes emerged, they all snapped openāstaring directly at Monte.
Each of them had multicolored pupils, and the moment they appeared, Monteās entire body went rigid.
Monte stared into those colorful eyes, his mind going completely blank, forgetting his situation.
And those eyes on Saulās skin were still multiplyingāsplitting, enlarging, splitting again, expanding againā¦
Saulās entire body was suddenly covered in a dense layer of eyes.
Monte, frozen in place, was struck by a fear that pierced straight to his soul.
And it wasnāt just MonteāPenny, upon seeing the eyes all over Saulās body, let out a shriek and scrambled back into the diary, tumbling and flailing as she went. She didnāt dare show herself again!
Only Saul seemed unaware of his own abnormal state.
He noticed Monteās sharp tail was just half a meter away from him, and immediately twisted and turned, slipping out through a narrow crevice.
As he moved, the eyeballs on his body rubbed against each other, producing a strange āglug-glugā sound.
But the situation was urgent, and Saul didnāt notice.
He had merely tried to imitate the feeling of twinkling stars in the night sky, attempting to add a layer of vision to himself. He hadnāt expected it to succeed on the first try.
However, the sensation of this new vision was rather strangeālike switching to a godās-eye view.
He could see in all directionsāabove, below, left, right, front, and back.
And yet, his own figure was absent from all these perspectives, as if the eyes themselves were avoiding something.
Saul didnāt have time to adjust. He could only force himself to focus on Monte.
āWhy did Monte suddenly stop moving?ā
The thought flickered through his mind, but was quickly replaced by another:
I need to buy time.
Monteās mental strength was formidable. He finally broke free from the frozen state.
Even though he had never seen anything like Saulās current form, he knew very well that the young wizard before him had entered an extremely dangerous state.
He couldnāt allow the transformation to continue.
Screw it!
Monte thought. His body began to shift form again.
Freely changing the form of a soul body was extremely dangerous. At first, Monte only dared to make changes he was confident in.
But seeing Saul practically becoming something inhumanāand with no idea what state the Second Rank humpback termite outside was ināMonte could no longer afford to hesitate if he wanted to survive.
His fleshy wings and tail trembled twice, the surface becoming smooth and hard. His movements grew even faster.
Saul had just escaped the assault of the wings when he saw the tail lash toward him from behind, a mere blur.
DangerāI have to block it!
All the eyeballs on his back swiveled to focus on the incoming sharp tail. The eyeballs on his arms contracted and squeezed, bending his limbs backward.
With a stretch of his hand, he actually managed to catch the tail, its trajectory nearly impossible to trace.
Only then did Saul notice something strange about the hand gripping the tail.
But before he could get a good look, the tail in his hand suddenly shattered into dozens of fragments.
Saulās first instinct was that Monte had once again changed the form of his attackābut just as he went on alert, he noticed that Monteās entire body was beginning to fracture and disintegrate.
The eyeballs in front of Saul clearly saw Monteās expression shift from confusion⦠to panic⦠and finally, to hatred.
But at that point, Monte could do nothing.
With a
crash
, he shattered into countless fragments, drifting through the air.
His body in the outside world⦠was dead.
And so, the soul body within the platform could no longer exist either.
Perhaps some lingering obsession remained, because the fragments in front of Saul paused brieflyāthen began to drift toward him.
But before they could reach Saul, the red hardcover book above his head slowly opened, drawing in all the fragments completely.
Then the book shrank, dropping gently into Saulās hand.
Saul noticed that the book now contained⦠half a black page.
āWhy only half a page?ā
(End of chapter.)
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