The sky flashed as Lethe’s stars fell. Five silver spheres plummeted, leaving white trails in their wake, and the members of the Secret Society threw off their cloaks. A deafening roar and a cloud of explosive smoke erupted as the stars smashed into the ground. Lethe narrowed her eyes, the distinct star shapes in her pupils gleaming.
’These guys.’
The figures of the Secret Society emerged from the thick smoke. Some had their clothes tear away as their modified bodies swelled, others transformed into the shapes of monsters or snakes, and some spewed poison from their skin. Every single one of them had either dodged the stars or neutralized them mid-air.
’Every single person here is a force to be reckoned with.’
The long-haired Secret Society member who leaped to the front brought their hands together. The empty space between their palms distorted as air rapidly rushed in. They created and launched a vortex in the blink of an eye. Taking that as a signal, the rest of the Secret Society unleashed their ranged attacks.
"Hmph." Lethe calmly deployed a divine wall manifested through her authority, blocking their counterattack. Dark magic, deadly poison, and curses were all meaningless before the wall created by the Saintess. However, a single arrow pierced through the white wall, flying straight at Lethe’s face. She caught the projectile directly with her fingertips.
"Hah, what’s this?" Lethe chuckled and squeezed her hand, snapping the arrow in two.
"You even have a Priest?"
One of the Secret Society members stood with an arm raised, having just fired divine magic. Lethe roughly swung both of her arms. As if reacting to her power, stars flashed in the sky with a deep thrum, even though it wasn’t yet night.
"To think the Secret Society managed the difficult task of uniting the two factions."
Lethe brought down countless stars once more, and the members of the Secret Society threw themselves out of the way.
While their fierce battle unfolded, Simon headed toward Bleta, the culprit behind all of this. Bleta calmly welcomed him, having summoned spirits of darkness around himself.
"I was curious about who you were," Bleta said. "You, who came from the same future as me."
He paused before asking, "Why are you helping the Witch of Death?"
Before helping Nephthys, Simon had been trying to help his father and mother. Since there was no need to explicitly state that, Simon maintained his silence and drew up his power, dark energy hissing around him. His opponent was a heavyweight, a leader-level figure in the Secret Society. There was no chance of winning without using the power of the Legion.
Pier wasn’t here, but fortunately, Simon had brought along a commander-class undead of the Legion. It was his own original creation, one that did not exist in this era. When he opened his palm, a staff with eyes, a nose, and a mouth zipped right into his grasp.
"Let’s go, Herseva."
[Alright!]
The surroundings flashed as a golden aura wrapped around Simon’s body. Gripping Herseva, Simon kicked off the ground with all his might and leaped into the air.
"Are you not going to reveal your identity?" Bleta asked. "Though I have a guess, seeing that power."
He slightly tugged at the tips of his gloves before slipping them back on.
"My name is Bleta. The only surviving dark elementalist on the continent, and the strongest elementalist in the world."
The spirits of darkness tilted their heads back in unison and spewed black flames. The power was incomparable to what Simon had seen at the orphanage. Each flame was as large as a human torso.
"Strongest on the continent?"
Simon slammed Herseva into the ground as he ran. The authority of Goldenification activated, and the earth in front of him rose up like a golden fortress wall. The wall shook violently from the force of the explosions. Each flame must have carried immense destructive power, leaving massive scars on the gold before vanishing.
Simon spoke while leaning his back against the wall. "Introducing yourself as the strongest seems a bit arrogant."
"Hardly. I am the only supreme-tier elementalist in this world." Bleta moved his arm. "And I am the only one who can fight by corrupting spirits with jet-black while keeping my core open."
About twenty spirits of darkness unleashed a fierce onslaught. Simon continuously struck the ground with Herseva, endlessly expanding the golden wall.
’I can definitely feel jet-black from the spirits.’
It was fascinating. They said there were all sorts of necromancers in this world, and that corrupted elementalist was proof of it.
[Are you really marveling at mere spirits of darkness?] Herseva suddenly spoke up, as if reading his thoughts. [When you have me, who wields the authority of gold and controls mummies, right in front of you?]
"Of course you’re the best, Herseva."
[Darn right I am!]
Joy and motivation transmitted through Herseva’s telepathy. Sensing and drawing out the emotions of an Ancient-class undead was also the duty of the Legion Commander. Simon raised Herseva with all his might and struck the ground.
"Let’s go with our usual combo!"
[Okay!]
Small sewer-like holes formed in the golden ground, and mummies popped out. Zombies sprang out from Simon’s subspace. The mummies quickly wrapped the zombies’ bodies in bandages, then smoothly hurled them over the golden wall in one fluid motion. The zombies flew in an arc, soaring through the air like shot puts.
"Useless."
Bleta’s response was swift. He halted the spirits’ attacks, making the incoming zombies their new targets. Just as the spirits were about to spew black fire to shoot them down...
[Corpse Explosion]
Behind the wall, Simon clenched his fist. Before they could be intercepted, the zombies detonated in mid-air. A fierce shockwave swept through, pushing back the spirits, and Bleta hastily deployed a jet-black shield in front of himself.
’What kind of trick...’
Bleta’s scowl deepened. Piercing through the thick smoke of the corpse explosion, a monster of pure white light suddenly thrust its head forward out of nowhere.
"Die!" Lethe laughed brightly as she swung her arm down.
A drop of sweat rolled down Bleta’s forehead.
’She had the leeway to spare an attack on me while fighting my subordinates all by herself?!’
Lethe’s stars bombarded Bleta’s position one after another. The spirits of darkness faded away the moment they touched the light, and Bleta hurriedly dodged while wrapping his body in jet-black. As the divine power directly touched Bleta’s body, his jet-black was shaved away in chunks.
’The loss of jet-black is too great.’
Looking up at the sky, Bleta predicted the timing of the falling stars, then dug into the center just as two exploded on his left and right. But abruptly, from within that blast, which should have been fatal to a necromancer, a blue-haired boy dashed out.
’How?!’
There was no time to question it. Simon closed the distance in an instant and threw a punch. Bleta urgently crossed his arms to block it. The moment his body was pushed back, a golden wall rose from the ground to block his retreat.
’Damn it!’
’The timing is perfect!’
Herseva flew through the air and landed right in Simon’s hand. He wouldn’t miss this chance. Simon executed his trump card.
[Herseva Original – World of Sand]
Sand rose from the empty air and swallowed the bodies of both Simon and Bleta.
His momentarily severed consciousness returned. Bleta opened his eyes and looked around. Before he knew it, he was standing in the middle of a desolate desert, the wind howling around him. It was a world where intermittent sandstorms were the only phenomena.
Everything around him was sand, and the sky was a clear, vivid blue.
’A personally owned dungeon. Impressive.’
He turned his head. A short distance away, Simon was approaching.
"You have a confident look on your face," Bleta said. "Do you think you can win just because you dragged me to a place like this?"
"Of course—" Simon’s gaze hardened.
At the same time, Herseva’s massive eyelids appeared in the clear sky, looking down upon Bleta.
"I will win!"
[We will win!]
Simon pressed his middle and index fingers together and pointed them toward the sky. The world of sand trembled, and golden structures began to rise from all over. Towers, plazas, fountains, mansions. A city of sand formed around Simon and Bleta.
And the residents of death living within it, the mummies, flashed their eyes through the gaps in the windows.
"Magnificent." Bleta pulled a syringe filled with chemicals from his belt and plunged it into his own neck without hesitation. His eyes grew murky.
"Grab him!"
At Simon’s command, mummies launched bandages from all over the structures. With staggering movements, Bleta lowered his head and bent his waist. The bandages grazed past him by a hair’s breadth, leaving cuts on his skin.
Bleta stomped his foot hard. A pool of jet-black spread out beneath him, and the enlarged spirits of darkness leaped out once more. It was like watching a fleet’s bombardment. The spirits of darkness fired dark magic in all directions, toppling towers, destroying plazas, and incinerating the mummies within them.
[That Secret Society bastard is no pushover,] Herseva’s voice echoed in his head. [Kid, you’ve finished analyzing his combat power, right?]
"Of course."
Simon had faced the unfamiliar enemy known as spirits of darkness at the orphanage. Certain that the man’s true identity was tied to the Secret Society, he had sought Richard’s advice.
—"Spirits of darkness are rare even among elementalists. Strictly speaking, their source is not an element, but negative energy. In other words, human mental power."
Spirits of darkness were beings born from all sorts of negative emotions like human anger, sorrow, and hatred. Naturally, the dark elementalists who wielded them would have their minds broken and be swallowed up by those emotions. Of course, if one were attacked by these spirits, the opponent would also suffer severe mental corruption.
’The point is to not even let them graze me. I can’t take a single hit.’
It would be fine to strengthen Herseva’s mummies into a Royal Guard and push forward with a relentless offensive, but the opponent was a dark elementalist who corrupted minds. Under those conditions, there was a perfect suit for the job. While the fierce battle between Bleta and Herseva was still raging in the city streets, Simon prepared the magic of the dragon.
As the magic was finally ready, the drake bones firmly attached themselves to Simon’s body, forming a sleek suit of armor.
[Simon Original – Dragonian]
The moment the suit was complete, Simon kicked off the ground and charged forward. Purple sparks crackled from the effect of chaos, and his body instantly entered the center of the battlefield.
"Hmm." Bleta, who was fighting the mummies, spotted Simon and extended his arm. The spirits of darkness fired negative magic.
’Block it!’
As if waiting for this, scales spread out in a honeycomb pattern in front of Simon with a resonant hum. The spirits’ attacks failed to pierce this barrier and were neutralized midway, vanishing into nothing.
"You’re using bizarre techniques one after another."
This time, Bleta raised his left arm. Half of the total spirits of darkness gathered and were crushed together, forming a new shape of darkness. Upon seeing that, Herseva’s urgent shout rang out.
[Kid! That’s dangerous!]
’Then I just have to make him unable to use it!’
Simon calmly scattered the scales around him.
[Dragonian Combo – Magic-Sealing Barrier]
The surrounding scales spun around, enclosing both Simon and Bleta. Bleta’s expression twisted in shock.
’The spirits!’
They were disappearing. The negative energy wrapped around his body vanished, and the powerful dark magic he had formed in his left hand also dissipated. A stage where only dark martial arts could be used had unfolded, and Simon charged forward in the Dragonian suit.
A brisk straight punch, enhanced by the armor, lashed out. Bleta hastily abandoned his dark magic and raised his arms to block. This time, Bleta lifted his foot and delivered a kick, but Simon tilted his head to dodge and dug even deeper into his guard.
The two men’s fists clashed in the center several times. Soon, they were exchanging a flurry of blows with both arms and legs, continuing their fierce assault. Even without his spirit magic, Bleta excelled at dark martial arts. He wasn’t being pushed back at all against Simon, even with the power of the Dragonian suit.
In fact, Bleta landed a counterblow on Simon’s drake helmet. Simon staggered, and seizing the advantage, Bleta lunged at him fiercely. Refusing to give him a single moment to counterattack, Bleta frantically pushed Simon back.
Then, Bleta realized a strange sense of incongruity. A heavy kick slammed into the back of his head. As Bleta stumbled and looked back, Simon was standing there with his leg extended.
’When did he slip out of the suit?’
What Bleta had been hitting was just an empty, masterless suit. The unarmored Simon and Bleta clashed again, but this time, that very same empty suit struck Bleta’s face with its fist. Fresh blood splattered from his mouth, and a few teeth flew into the air.
"What kind of trick is this?!" he spat.
Surprisingly, the bone armor suit was maintaining its form and moving on its own, without a user inside. It was a new technique learned from the Richard of the future and the past. The pinnacle of Bone Armor Control, Imago.
Simon and the Dragonian suit stood side-by-side, raining down punches and kicks. With four pairs of limbs pouring down like crazy, Bleta had no choice but to continuously take hits and retreat. It was as if Simon had split into two.
"Agh!"
Blood spurted from Bleta’s nose after allowing a clean hit. Even now, he kept trying to summon his spirits of darkness, but for some reason, the magic circle itself wouldn’t deploy.
[Hongfeng Original – Drunken Strike]
Simon’s jet-black-wrapped fist rushed in, scattering smoke. The moment Bleta took a defensive stance to absorb the attack, the Dragonian suit dug into his opening and thrust its palm upward.
[Hongfeng Original – Impact Wave]
’A masterless suit is using dark martial arts!’
Before Bleta could even process that realization, his body soared into the air. Simon leaped up right after him, caught up, spun his body around, and brought his leg crashing down. Bleta’s fallen body dug into the sandy ground with a deafening boom, causing a massive geyser of sand to erupt.
Simon looked down, panting, sweat dripping from his body.
’I thought that was a decisive blow.’
He could still feel Bleta’s jet-black. The moment the dark energy spread in all directions, Simon’s pupils trembled.
’Ugh!’
Suddenly, his chest ached as if it were going to burst. Sorrow welled up, anger surged, and an even greater sense of guilt crushed his lungs.
’If I had known the future, I could have saved them.’
’Why didn’t you tell me?’
"Standing by and watching when you know it’s wrong is a sin."
All sorts of unidentifiable voices corrupted Simon’s mind. Of all times, it was at this moment that the scales forming the Magic-Sealing Barrier lost their power and fell to the ground. As expected, compared to the Chaos Dullahan, the Dragonian’s Magic-Sealing Barrier had far too short of a duration.
"Die," Bleta rasped.
Black dogs rose from the body of Bleta, who was now able to use spirit magic again. The dogs opened their jaws wide and poured out magic of death. It was a moment of absolute desperation.
The empty Dragonian suit, devoid of its user, trudged forward on its own and blocked the path in front of Simon. It even moved the scales to its front to deploy a defensive barrier.
"What in the...!" Bleta exclaimed.
In the meantime, Simon, who had withstood the mental corruption, stood up, and the Dragonian suit stepped back, overlapping with his body. The bones clicked and clacked, connecting to fit his physique and returning to the form of Simon wearing the Dragonian suit.
"I’ve been surprised in many ways, but playtime is over now," Bleta said. He lowered his arms and prepared a new dark magic.
Countless spirits popped out from his surroundings and began to latch onto his body with sickening gurgles. His size began to grow grotesquely large.
"Then I will do the same," Simon replied.
He would use his trump card. There was no one watching here, and there would be no casualties or property damage.
"You were sad you couldn’t come out all this time, right? Swordmaster."
From within the pitch-black subspace Simon threw open...
A pair of vicious eyes flashed.

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