novelraw Chapter 200: You Look Like Shit
Chapter 200: You Look Like Shit
Lykos’s world spun, the taste of copper filled his mouth, and his vision swam with black spots. His ribs were powder. His stomach was a mess of cauterized flesh and frozen blood from where his own ice had been driven through him.
He was barely alive.
[DEMON HUNTERS!]
But that didn’t stop him; he was of the Demon Hunters.
Whether it was that Soul Glyph, his stubborn pride, his Divine lineage, or just the sheer refusal to die like a rat, he had one last thing to show.
He wouldn’t uselessly bow out of the fight with nothing to show for it.
"Ghh..."
With trembling hands, Lykos reached into his dimensional pocket and pulled out a small glass vial filled with glowing green liquid.
A high-grade healing potion, courtesy of Mary, their Alchemist.
He smashed the top off with his thumb and downed it in one go.
Steam rose from his stomach wound. The pain was blinding as flesh knitted itself back together, forcing the magma-coated ice shard out of his body inch by agonizing inch.
Lykos barely suppressed the scream through gritted teeth and stood up.
He looked across the cavern.
Wit was holding Merlin by the neck, having just picked her up.
The Demon looked bored, his hand tight around her throat while her feet kicked uselessly in the air in a last-ditch effort to get free.
"Let... her... go!"
Lykos roared just as the Demon turned to him.
Reaching deep into his Soul, he grabbed that dense knot of Divinity once more.
His Synaxis returned, and the area’s temperature dropped to near zero.
Frost exploded outward from Lykos’s body.
His skin turned pale blue, and his hair turned white as snow.
A crown of crystalline ice reformed above his head, floating with grace.
His eyes lost their pupils, becoming swirling pools of blizzard white.
This was a much bigger transformation...
Lykos didn’t plan to stand after this.
Wit turned around, raising an eyebrow.
"Oh? Are you finally getting serious?"
Lykos didn’t answer; instead, he glided forward.
The ground froze beneath his feet, creating a frictionless path.
His [Twin Frostblades] shattered and reformed into four.
A moment after, they became eight, then sixteen.
In a moment, a storm of blades surrounded him.
"DIE!"
Lykos thrust his staff forward.
The sixteen blades shot toward Wit like cannons.
Wit sighed and raised its free hand—the one not choking Merlin—summoning a wall of Hellfire.
BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!
The ice blades slammed into the fire wall, exploding into steam.
But Lykos didn’t stop. Using the steam as cover, he burst through the cloud and aimed his glowing staff straight at Wit’s face.
"Predictable."
Scoffing, the Demon simply tightened its grip on Merlin and moved her body into the path of Lykos’s strike, using her as a human shield.
Lykos’s eyes widened as he halted his strike midair, the momentum nearly tearing his arm out of its socket.
"I’ve got you."
Grinning, Wit kicked Lykos in the chest, sending him flying back.
But just as he was kicked, Lykos’s left hand had grabbed Merlin.
Using its own strength against it, Lykos tried to pull Merlin away.
Though unable to hold on due to the strike, Merlin fell to the ground.
Meanwhile, Lykos managed to twist in the air and land on his feet, skidding across the ice.
He looked at Merlin, whose eyes were rolling back.
She was dying.
Lykos felt a cold, white frenzy take over his mind.
He couldn’t beat Wit in a contest of power, that he knew.
The Demon was too strong, and the environment was too hot.
But, despite not seeming like it, Lykos was smart, and he wasn’t stubborn.
Giving up on direct combat, he looked at the ceiling, at the floor, and at the magma vein running along the wall.
Wit was feeding on this heat, absorbing the Corruption to fuel its devastating attacks.
’If I can’t beat it...’
So that led to only one conclusion.
’I have to starve it.’
Lykos took a deep breath and channeled every remaining drop of his Divinity into one spell. ’Glacial Domain... may you create a Frosted Coffin.’
He slammed his staff into the ground.
The ice didn’t shoot at Wit but shot around him.
Four massive spikes of ice erupted from the floor, boxing the Demon and, subsequently, Merlin in.
Wit looked around at the walls rising up.
"A cage? Really?"
It raised its hand to blast through it.
But then, Lykos did the unexpected.
"Merlin! NOW!"
Indeed, he called upon the almost dead girl.
And Merlin, barely conscious beside Wit, heard him.
She didn’t have enough consciousness for an attack, but she had something else.
Synaxis!
Merlin activated it to implode.
Instead of releasing heat, she sucked it in with her transformation.
She pulled every scrap of fire, every wisp of heat inside the ice cage into her own body.
Wit’s eyes widened.
"What—"
The fire in its hand flickered and died.
The ambient heat vanished, and for a split second, the inside of the ice cage was absolutely devoid of any thermal energy.
That was the opening Lykos wanted.
Dropping his staff, he clasped his hands together.
The ice walls slammed inward, not only crashing into each other but also fusing, sealing Wit and Merlin inside a solid block of ice.
But just before they closed, Lykos saw a flash of light.
Merlin had used the absorbed heat to blast herself upward, shooting out of the cage through a tiny gap just before it completely sealed shut.
She hit the rocky floor and then crashed into the floor, coughing violently, her neck bruised and purple.
Lykos collapsed to his knees, his Synaxis faded, leaving him shivering and drained.
The block of ice silently sat there, a coffin for the Demon.
Did they do it? Did they finally end Wit?
CRACK.
’...ah.’
A spiderweb fracture appeared on the surface of the ice.
Then another... and another... and another.
Eventually, the whole block glowed red.
BOOM!
The coffin exploded; its shards turned into shrapnel.
"You little..."
Wit stepped out, furious, its cloak torn, and skin steaming.
It wasn’t dead, but it was hurt badly, many frozen gashes running down its chest where the cold had bitten deep.
"You annoying little pests!"
It looked at Lykos, who was too weak to stand.
It looked at Mer, who was wheezing on the floor.
"I was going to give you the honor of weakening the Great One, but now? Now I’m just going to kill you."
Wit raised both hands, and a massive, swirling sphere of black lava formed above its head, the size of a boulder.
"Die."
It hurled it.
Lykos watched the death ball coming.
He couldn’t move, never mind dodge.
And so... he closed his eyes.
’Sorry, Ignotus. I tried.’
The boulder descended.
But it never hit.
Schwing!
A sword’s swing echoed through the cavern.
Lykos opened his eyes, seeing that the lava boulder had been cut in half.
The two halves flew past them, crashing into the walls and exploding harmlessly.
Standing in front of Lykos, holding a pitch-black sword that seemed to drink the light, was a tall figure.
This figure’s white hair reached his back, rounding a face covered by a terrifying mask.
He wore simple black clothes, now stained with soot and monster blood.
On his shoulder sat a small black cat with glowing red eyes.
There was no mistaking this figure.
It was Ignotus.
He looked back at Lykos; his eyes were cold as death.
"You look like shit, wolf."