Chapter 662 Agnes Ivloh
HOW?
That was the single word that popped up in Evan's mind at that moment.
"I'm very curious how you managed to completely replicate this man's appearance, Evan Eris."
Agnes' words echoed in his ears over and over, like a song on repeat.
It was one thing if she knew that the person in front of her was an impostor, after all, she may have personally known the assassin whom Evan was impersonating and noticed something off since Evan could not fully replicate his behaviour.
'But she called my name.'
This was where Evan's confusion stemmed from. The fact that Agnes knew it was him who was right in front of her.
All these thoughts of his, however, took no more than a second in reality due to his Time Difference.
"Huh? Evan Eris? Isn't that the Hero who interfered with our plans in Lacertilia?! Where is he?!"
Evan acted all surprised and confused, silently preparing his Inventory Skill's Apport feature as he got up to his feet and looked around the room.
"Wow…impressive."
Agnes clapped with an amused smile on her face, as if she had just been treated to a top-notch performance.
"Your acting is quite good, magnificent, even.
It would have certainly fooled anyone."
With a calm smile on her face, Agnes continued.
"Anyone who isn't me, that is."
"…"
The room turned silent at that moment, and Evan slowly moved his right hand towards his side.
'Unforged? No…the distance and my stance would make it hard to get a clean swing. In that case…'
His Inventory skill was activated and the poisoned dagger he had gotten from the assassin he killed manifested in his hand.
Concealment activated and blanketed the entire room, preventing any energy fluctuations from leaking out as he swung the dagger at supersonic speed, aiming for the side of Agnes' head.
**WHOOSH!
However, his hand slashed through empty air, with the tip slicing the blindfold on her eyes and causing the piece of cloth to fall to the ground.
Agnes landed on the floor a few metres away, an expression of what appeared to be surprise on her face as she held up her hands to her face, trying to see if the blindfold was still there.
With that piece of cloth gone, Evan could now see Agnes' full facial features, and once again, the boy felt that she was truly beautiful.
But even though the blindfold was not there anymore, he could not see her eyes as they remained covered by her eyelids.
"Wow…you're faster than I remember.
I guess I can't read your 'Soul Metadata' properly in this body…I misjudged your speed, after all."
"…"
Evan narrowed his eyes when he heard her speak of his 'Soul Metadata'. Once again, the question of 'HOW?' crossed his mind for more reasons than once.
'She was able to bypass my Soul/Spiritual Resistance?
More importantly, her eyes are closed so how can she do this?'
As soon as he thought this, Agnes tilted her head to the side with a finger on her lips as she spoke.
"You seem…surprised?
It's small, but it's certainly there. Just heavily overshadowed by your calm.
You're impressing me once again; most people would not be able to stay as calm as you in such a situation."
The teenage girl placed her hands behind her back as she turned her head around the room, as if 'looking' at the veil of Evan's concealment skill around it.
"About your surprise, am I right in saying it's because you didn't expect me to read your Soul Metadata?
There does seem to be something obscuring my 'sight', preventing me from reading everything.
It does not appear to be coming from inside you, so it's not your Soul's base resistance…perhaps an artifact? Your right arm and chest area are very blurry to me so I assume the artifact is somewhere there.
It's very good, where did you get it? I'd like to get one for myself too."
She was quite…talkative, more so than Evan recalled from the game.
Nevertheless, her chatty attitude wasn't his main concern, but the fact that she had clearly admitted to having read his soul just now.
"What's wrong? I was told that you had a lot of information about the Demonic Hand. I assume that extended to me as well, given my current affiliation with them.
Still, you seem surprised that I was able to read your Soul's Metadata."
Agnes placed a hand on her chin and sunk into her thoughts for a moment, before coming to a realisation as she looked to where Evan was standing and asked.
"Perhaps…did you also fall for my bluff that I needed to 'open my eyes' to be able to see Souls?"
The instant she said that, Evan's eyes widened lightly, and despite not being able to physically see him as her eyes were closed, Agnes noticed this.
"Ah, your surprise just increased. So, you did fall for that bluff as well."
Evan's expression turned dark upon hearing this. No one needed to tell him that he was encountering something that wasn't in 'Aidos Online'.
Agnes Ivloh was born blind.
But in return for lacking conventional sight, she gained the ability to see people's Souls; the roots of their existences.
There was a constant flow of energy from her energy core to her eyes that allowed her to see people's souls.
However, this ability came with severe strain; Physical, Mental and Spiritual.
Hence, the reason why she began closing her eyelids to 'shut and Spiritual.
Hence, the reason why she began closing her eyelids to 'shut off' this ability. This served as a solution until she began levelling up and getting stronger.
The ability also got stronger, to the point where she could still see Souls even though her eyes were closed.
Naturally, her sight was a lot less 'blurry' when her eyes were open, but it was still there.
Agnes didn't tell anyone about this upgrade in her ability and instead chose to begin using the blindfold that Evan had just cut off.
The blindfolds she used all had special enchantments affixed, via the diamonds on them.
The reason she had for getting them was that 'making a conscious effort to close her eyes at all times was taxing on her mentally', so no one found out she could still see souls even with her eyes closed.
She, a 'Living Legend' Arcane Enchanter and another Priestess of the Barbarians combined efforts to create these enchanted blindfolds, so as to prevent her from seeing Souls.
Finally, with this combination, her 'sight' was blocked off—
—Until she became a grandmaster, that is.
Her eyes grew stronger, such that she could still see the outlines of souls even as her blindfold was on.
But as the power increased, she gained increased control.
Agnes believed that the reason she could see souls was due to the fact that her 'Special Eyes' were constantly infused with magic power 24/7.
She had no way of shutting off the flow, and could only reduce it to the bare minimum, unlike Evan and the other Heroes who could shut off the energy flow to their eyes and deactivate their Mystic Eyes completely.
Upon reaching the Grandmaster Level of existence, she realised she had been going about things the wrong way.
Evan could use magic power and aura to power his eyes, David did the same with Ether and Aura, since he did not possess magic power.
Agnes believed that her ability ran on magic power, so she was so focused on trying to restrict that magic power flow—not realising that all the magic power did, was augment the real energy that powered her eyes.
Soul Power.
The reason why she could never shut off her eyes, was because she tried to shut off the magic power and not the Soul Power.
This was why it was taxing on her Spiritually, to see other people's souls. Because she expended her Soul Power to do this.
Being able to convert the power of your soul into tangible energy to manipulate was something only an abysmally low percentage of people could do.
Agnes' ability did this for her by default, but she was not able to manipulate the energy herself.
It was only after gaining grandmaster-level status and discovering the existence of this extra energy in her body, that she was finally able to shut off her ability.
But like before, she told no other soul about this.
The Blindfold she had on wasn't really necessary, but she kept it up.
When she was younger and first gained this ability, she had revealed too much about it and it caused people to fear her.
"Even my own parents were wary of me. Couldn't blame them though, it was an instinctive human reaction. Or would I say 'High-Human' reaction?"
Agnes could tell from the fluctuations of energy around one's soul, what they were feeling.
Love, Hatred, Desire, Greed, and many more.
People wouldn't really like the fact that their emotions could be read, after all.
She kept up the blindfolds to allow people to keep believing she could only use the power when she had taken off the blindfold and her eyelids were opened.
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