Ever since he first became able to use Toxic Liquefaction, he had been convinced that it allowed him to teleport through foreign circulatory systems and his own toxin alike.

  However, traveling through this titanic shithead’s toxic body proved that that had been a misconception on his part. It wasn’t so much teleportation as extremely rapid movement. Well, as far as he know, even theoretical, real-life teleportation was not actually zero time travel either, so what the hell did he know. Maybe this was what teleportation was in reality.

  But it no longer felt like that was what he was doing so in his mind, one of the cool things about him had just been shattered cruelly.

  It took a few seconds of admittedly ridiculously fast travel to reach the serpent’s flat, dumb head, which, if nothing else, just went to show how incredibly swift and powerful it actually was. At S-rank, he could more or less hold his Toxic Liquefaction transformation indefinitely.

  Or rather, he could if external forces weren’t constricting his spirit and trying to force him out. And this was very much one such case. The pressure bearing in on him from all sides didn’t even really have any malice behind it. It felt more like a passive, neutral state, which, given the wight of it, was even more frightening.

  Well, if time was of the essence, then drastic measures first.

  With a mental command, he ordered everything to Accelerate, hoping to take out the noodly jerk quickly and efficiently. Even if the big guy exploded now, it wouldn’t actually destroy the whole world outright… would it? Profound Toxin remained annoyingly silent on the matter.

  In the end, nothing happened whatsoever. The serpent continued its rampage, now wreaking havoc above ground once more, and Eik was beginning to lose his grip on his transformation. For an ability that very specifically allowed him to personally invade and exist within another’s body, it sure was susceptible to instability and unraveling from external forces.

  He could only really maintain it for longer periods of time inside systems of at least slightly weaker opponents, and in such cases he didn’t exactly need it to annihilate every mote of their earthly forms. But one could, perhaps, make the case that it was fair that he couldn’t simply hide out inside the victim itself and quietly wait for its agonizing demise. But it still sucked!

  Eik racked his currently liquid brain for an answer that made sense. With a body made entirely of Toxin, for the first time, Eik was struggling against an opponent against whom his most fearsome weapon did less than nothing.

  His usual tactic of pouring poison over his problem would do less than nothing in this case. What was it going to do? Just, what, make the damned thing even healthier? This was some bullshit!

  Toxic Liquefaction was beginning to come apart and it wasn’t going to be pretty when it did. Something had to happen.

  During a moment of clarity, he tried to connect his mind to the serpent’s, much like how he communicated with his own Living Manifestations. Surprisingly, there was actually a response, and although it could hardly be called sophisticated, that was actually a lot better than the senseless mental barrier he had expected to slap up against.

  Didn’t that mean that, however slim, there was a chance that the bastard could be reasoned with.

  Through the flimsy link he tried relaying everything from stern commands and fiery rebukes to prostrating begging and insistent requests. But nothing worked. Aside from the clear but indifferent signal of reception, there was no reaction from the beast.

  All around Eik and the serpent, cloud-piercing mountains collapsed, continental forests were obliterated, and entire seas drained into the unfathomably vast holes left in the world’s crust in the wake of the passing of the deity of destruction.

  Normally so tight and innate that it might as well have been bound by the chains of their souls, Eik could now practically feel his connection with Profound Toxin tremble and begin to collapse. He was losing his grip on an aspect of his being that had become as natural and important as his own self.

  Without Profound Toxin, he wouldn’t just be a changed man. They were so utterly kindred that he was convinced neither his spirit nor his physical body could survive a severance.

  What his panicked senses were screaming at him wasn’t simply that Profound Toxin and the realm of Toxin itself was drifting away. They were breaking apart like fragments of shattered glass.

  And all of it was because of this fucking serpent.

  As if his entire being was concentrated into a single point—a singularity of desperate existence—he launched a final, wrathful assault on the serpent’s primitive but steel-like consciousness.

  If mental begging and screaming wasn’t working, there was nothing to do but go for absolute domination.

  You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version.

  ***

  “How long has it been?” a nervous Ihasu asked out loud for perhaps the tenth time since Eik’s departure.

  The immense force that had initially crushed them all had long since dissipated and been replaced by a quiet that could best be described as unsettling. After such an utter ridiculous display of spiritual pressure, its absence made the normal heft of gravity feel so light that it was more like weightlessness. It was not right.

  “Still only twenty three minutes, sweetheart,” her grandfather told her and patted her jumpy knee soothingly. Andihar and Molanda’s daughter Thalandi, of all people, sat by her side with an arm around her shoulder. “It is perfectly normal to be comatose for this long during a rank evolution. No, as a matter of fact, if he had already been up and running again this quickly, I would consider it quick.”

  She tried to take a few deep, calming breaths to expel some of her nerves but it only seemed to make her dizzier. “I know, I… I know, grandpa. It’s just that he’s—”

  “A very special young man, I know. Both in the sense of his relationship to you but also in his capacity as an Awakened, but if my memory is not failing me, he has a history of odd and extraordinary evolution experiences. We’re hardly at the point where we have to worry yet, don’t you agree?”

  She leaned back against the back of the chair but immediately felt worse and planted her elbows on her thighs with her hair falling over her face again. “But what if—”

  “Now, Ihasu, you listen to me,” Gul said, his voice suddenly stern. “Look at those two there.” He pointed to her two kids.

  Bin was watching her, clearly holding back tears as she wrung her little fingers at the sight of her mother’s worried face. Goo stood behind his sister, instinctively hiding behind his sister in an attempt to hide his own turmoil. Judging by the fact that his jaw was clenched so tightly that his human transformation was coming apart in globules of blue toxin, he was feeling no better than they were.

  Ihasu swallowed as gasping sob as realization struck her. “Oh, I’m so sorry. Mom’s so sorry,” she cried, voice trembling. She went to her knees and threw out her arms for them. Bin ran into her embrace while Goo followed with short, hesitating steps but eventually let himself be swept up by his mom.

  Ihasu was deathly afraid that the X-ranker that would return from the wilderness would be a person they couldn’t recognize anymore. But even more frightening than that was the thought that it might be a person who no longer recognized them. A being with whom their existence was not compatible.

  Chop was… more or less a normal old man, but Eik was a Worldbreaker. He was someone so deeply coalesced with a primordial entity that it would be stranger if it didn’t cause something to shift in his brain.

  Through sheer will, she forced her breathing under control and hugged her kids tightly. Her features were steady when she looked up at her grandfather again. “How long has he been gone now?”

  He snorted before answering. “Twenty five minu—”

  An earsplitting explosion rocked an already stricken Gimleh.

  In the distance, something was sending entire buildings flying high into the air like toys, destruction literally raining upon the city. Andihar’s Azure Aegis snapped onto his arm even before he had managed to turn around, golden armor and weapon manifesting a moment later.

  After a couple of seconds, another similar blast devastated another district, this time closer to the Dayarunar estate.

  “What’s going on?” someone cried as they scrambled to redeploy the protective barrier.

  Andihar’s armor clanked as he marched to the front protectively. “I’m not sure, but I believe we’ve got company.”

  “But you swept the entire city plus the surrounding regions!” Uja pointed out. “There’s no way you would have missed a monster capable of something like that!”

  “Somehow they made it here to begin with. Another could have used that same path again.”

  A third and then fourth explosion rocked the city. Each one closer to them than the previous. In a disturbingly straight line.

  “It’s hunting us,” Gul concluded grimly and stepped up behind Andihar, his dark power curling around his palms in preparation.

  “But why?” a woman from an estate employee’s family whimpered.

  Gul gestured to the ruined estate grounds. “This is where the strongest of the first wave lost its life. What could be more intriguing to a mindless killing machine?”

  The woman sobbed and fell to her knees as the blood drained from the gathered faces. They all realized how helpless they were without Eik.

  Suddenly, S-ranked Alliance generals Mn’Toakh, P?lse, and A-ranked general Balafo touched down and joined the defensive formation. Two more S-rankers followed immediately after, brandishing their own weapons.

  At least thirty A-rankers, including Kalavax, arrived. All looked ready to lay down their lives for the good of the many.

  “We believe it’s headed here. Its friends died here,” Mn’Toakh explained.

  “We gathered as much ourselves,” Andihar said. “Thank you for coming. What about other S-rankers?”

  Mn’Toakh’s jaw tightened. “Let’s hope they’re on the way…”

  Three ruinous blasts later and something landed no more than a dozen paces away. It was undoubtedly a spawn of the Lord of the Moon. Rotund and squat, it wore the same disgusting grin as the previous specimen. Sickeningly, it nearly reached its tiny ears, revealing far more teeth than there should have been. Ihasu felt queasy just looking at it.

  It looked around, appearing to search for something. “Wh-Where… is he?” it asked.

  “Where’s who?” Mn’Toakh asked apprehensively.

  It focused on her, giggling under its breath. “Where is the… death of my kin?”

  It was asking for Eik.

  Not bothering with words, Andihar charged, the others falling into rhythm instantly. The elf raised his blade while protecting his body with the shield.

  He didn’t get the chance to slash as his arm was severed at the elbow, tumbling to the ground and rolling to a stop at Bin’s feet.

  All was quiet as the warped monster held them all fast with the pressure of its aura. Seeming to not feel it, Bin picked up the arm and looked at it as if not fully comprehending what she was holding.

  Noticing something, she turned it over in her hands while they all watched her, the monster, too, was taken aback by the fact that she was moving. Something was filling her with confidence and a sense of safety.

  “Uncle Andi,” she called. “Uncle Andi, there stuff written on your arm! I can read it aloud!”

  [Relationship with the Court of the Monarch of Toxin altered due to the Monarch’s ascension]

  [Acquired new title]

  [Reached Colossal Royal Guard of the Supreme Divinity of Toxin — XII]

  In the same moment that she uttered those final words, the world was consumed by a cosmic pressure of a magnitude that shouldn’t have been possible.

  Breaths caught in throats and the spawn suddenly seemed to collapse under its own weight.

  Only Bin and Goo remained standing. The little girl giggled at the sensation that was crushing the others.

  “My dad’s coming!”

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