"He was getting better, you know?"
"And you fuckers decided to increase the corruption."
Kuro who had transferred into her shadow instantly understood what she was talking about, but even the spirit was also surprised at Eliza's current attitude.
"Eighth Finger Dominik Velak; even in death, you're still a Menace."
Uttering such words, she created a Divergent Ward in front of her feet and stepped on it, generating more and using them as platforms to descend to the ground.
As she did this, she remembered the conversation she had with Artemisia on the day they first entered the Tower of Trials.
'Thought guidance, huh?
I don't appreciate the fact that she used it to prevent Evan from looking at his status before he passed out after killing the Eighth Finger…'
She flipped her staff and activated her life energy draining prison again, while Kuro used his shadows to restrain the Demonic Hand members who tried to attack her after seeing that she was seemingly lost in her thoughts.
'…but if she didn't, Evan would have noticed the effects of the Spell that the Necromancer had used on him.'
Landing on the floor, glanced up to the skies and muttered.
"Speaking of which, where is that goddess? She should inform me of how much 'Corruption' is left."
The girl heaved a light sigh before using the energy she drained away and generating dozens of water spears in the air, each one having a green ribbon of energy attached to it.
She then disabled the skill once more as she had reached her life energy limit and redirected the excess energy directly into the ground.
'I think Pride may have noticed what's wrong due to her contract with him, and being a demon, Greed probably did too.'
Thinking that to herself, the girl used the life energy she had drained to activate flower cannon against the opponents.
Now then, Eliza's thoughts and words hinted that there was something wrong with Evan, something that even the young hero himself was unaware of.
And it was something that the deceased Eighth Finger, Dominik Velak had done to him.
Some sort of "Corruption".
It wasn't like what Xakon had used the Arachne Yaqash to do in the Spider Nest dungeon. This one was quite different, done with the aid of Demonic energy and the Essence of the law of death.
And it was also part of the reasons for that scene that Artemisia had been shown by the ETOD.
Eliza had been dealing with it over the past year while Artemisia was making sure it didn't show up on his status and its negative effects weren't affecting Evan 'physically'.
[Refer to Chapter 421 for the Scene where Dominik Sucked out part of Evan's life force and used the spell 'Delusion of the Nether' on him.]
◇ ◇ ◇
Meanwhile, the unsuspecting Hero was busy riddling the bodies of the Demonic Hand members with holes, courtesy of his elemental projected swords of ice that perforated their bodies with ease.
The boy had pulled out the Unforged and was now using the sword against them, intending on ending things quickly.
"Plaguebringer's Grasp!"
One of the Demonic Fused members shouted out as he used a disease inducement skill to send a cloud of eerie acid-green mist that engulfed Evan's body whole.
The skill was one Evan recognized from the game, as it could unleash a torrent of contiguous afflictions on its victims, causing their bodies to wither and weaken rapidly.
As for the types of diseases inflicted? The weakest were magical plagues that one only had a 30% chance to recover from, and the user could make the diseases progress to their late stages almost instantly.
By using this skill, he was sure that Evan was definitely going to succumb to at least one of them, and that the young hero was going to emerge from the fog with a cascade of agonizing ailments inflicted on him and a body wasting away.
Unfortunately for him, he was ill-matched with Evan.
**SWISH!! **PUK!
The obsidian black blade of the Unforged cut through the acid green mist at sonic speed, severing his still outstretched arm before stabbing right into his chest while coated in the essence of destruction's red.
"H-how…?"
"I'm 'Loved By Nature'."
Such were the last words the man heard before Evan punched his head with fracture, blasting his skull to bits.
However, Evan was not faced with just one or two opponents, so he didn't waste time pulling out the sword from his chest and raising it to block the incoming axe swing.
He tilted his blade and parried the axe but its wielder didn't lose his footing as expected and instead readjusted themselves quickly and struck out once more with sonic speed.
"Disarm!"
The demonic fused man activated his skill; one that had a 50% chance to disarm the opponent of their weapon regardless of how powerful the weapon was and forced the Unforged out of Evan's hands and sent him flying.
Evan quickly reacted, using a barrier of ice to block the next Axe swing and releasing a burst of energy to knock the wielder back.
He then stretched his hand to call his sword back but one of the Demonic fused members sensed his intentions and used her wings, swooping down and grabbing the sword to prevent it from coming back into his arms.
Another one activated a paralysis skill on Evan while a third used darkness magic to restrain his right arm and legs.
"Now!"
The others all activated magic and skills and sent them flying towards Evan, but the young hero only heaved a light sigh and rose his left arm.
A surge of aura coalesced around his arm, forming a radiant golden blade that crackled with lightning.
With a swift motion, he swung his arm forward like a sword, activating blade cannon and releasing more than two dozen bullets of aura, preceding the slashes that tore through the incoming attacks and the Demonic Hand member using the darkness magic.
**BOOOMM!!!
The sheer force of the resultant explosion knocked them all back while the one using darkness magic to restrain Evan had his head blown to pieces and his body perforated by three fist-sized bullets of aura, one of which, went straight through the heart.
Blood and intestines splattered all over the ground as Evan released the energy blade around his arm and spoke.
"Taking away my sword doesn't mean I'm weaponless. You should have realised this by now"
Snapping his fingers, he activated Elemental Weapon projection and generated dozens of spears, swords, daggers, knives and other piercing weapons.
"As far as elemental energy exists, I can never be truly 'Disarmed'."
While talking, he conjured a bow of rainbow flames, pulled back the bowstring, and released an arrow of iridescent light that zipped through the air at a breakneck pace, smashing through the skull of the woman holding his sword.
When the arrow hit its mark, her upper body simply 'disappeared' owing to the power behind it, leaving the Unforged to tumble to the ground while the others were shredded to pieces by the other elemental projected weaponry.
***BOOOOMMM!!!!!
A thunderous explosion resonated through the battlefield as each weapon detonated upon contact, reducing their targets to unrecognizable shreds with overwhelming force as each one had no less than five weapons targeting exploding on them at the same time.
As the battle against the Demonic Hand Assailants came to a close, Evan thought about the other Heroes who were no doubt under assault from equal or larger foes at this moment.
'Hopefully, they're strong enough to deal with the Fake Heroes sent to them, and hopefully, the Legendary Level one wasn't dispatched yet.'
? ?
Ogrein City Outskirts
Whaijan Country
Beta Continent
February 3rd
Year 1053
At the exact same instant Evan was wondering about the fates of the other Heroes, the new generation First Hero, Abigail Lowe, was holding the severed head of another Fake Hero in her hands.
"Really? Fakes?
The Demonic Hand is quite creative, don't you think?"
She remarked lightly as she tossed the body part onto the ground before setting it ablaze, heaving an exhausted sigh as she looked at her clothes which were stained with blood.
"And of all people, they had to use 'his' face."
"The former Second Hero, huh?
Why don't you call him by his name?"
The questioning voice of her companion nearby rang out, prompting the young hero to turn her gaze towards the tall woman with pale white skin and red hair that sat beside her.
As for what they were sitting on? Well, it just so happened to be the pile of the corpses of the Demonic Hand members who had attacked Abigail.
"Saying his name irritates me for some reason.
My guess is probably because you hated his guts. Your memories must have influenced me."
Abigail replied as she released an optical blast of destructive essence towards the pile of fake hero corpses in front of her, blowing the nine bodies to smithereens.
Evan had guessed the Demonic Hand sent five fake heroes with each attack squad but his calculations were slightly off.
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