The ruins on the island were remnants of destruction that had almost turned to dust now, illustrating the intensity of the battle.
Billerie’s current tactics made an ordinarily calm sorcerer lose control.
“Billerie, I will make you know the taste of a soul burning on flames for a hundred years.”
By this point in the battle, Toyennes had lost his earlier composure, staring at his once proud apprentice with deep-seated hatred.
Initially, Toyennes was prepared with potions, magicalized items, and scrolls, ready for a full-proof battle plan; even if the opponent had a runes array for support, he could find and exploit any weakness to kill him.
As time went on, Toyennes discovered that his opponent was playing dirty—no matter the damage incurred, be it frost, lightning, flame, or toxin, he could easily recover using the runes array.
Beyond making his opponent suffer a bit, he had no other accomplishments to speak of.
He thought about tactically retreating, but Billerie had taken control of the island’s grand array, had tainted the castle’s defenses, and summoned a multitude of Cloud Fog servants. Even if he escaped a considerable distance, Billerie could still harness the curse’s power to target him, as if tracking him with an anchored mark.
This was what Toyennes couldn’t understand, as if someone had silently infiltrated the castle.
Billerie was cunning—once he dared to move away, he would drive a mass of curse energy onto him, targeting him accurately and forcing him to stay and entangle with Billerie.
To think that he, a dignified official sorcerer, was being toyed with by an apprentice. All his composure and calm were thrown out of his mind.
Toyennes knew that today he must kill Billerie; otherwise, there would be no end to this, nor could he ever look himself in the mirror again.
“I’m different; I only need you to die in despair and horror.”
Billerie also looked at his erstwhile mentor with hateful eyes. Even with pain piercing deep into his bones, it did little to alleviate the hatred in his heart.
Today, in these ruins, only one person was destined to live.
In this moment, both held the same belief.
Neither rushed to engage in battle with the other. Toyennes needed to suppress the surging curse’s power, while Billerie needed to adapt to his new strength.
‘There are bugs!’
Billerie suddenly noticed something; he gazed into the distance, as if seeing a ship heading into the mist with three people at its bow, one of them a green-haired girl.
Who would dare to try to escape from his grasp?
Fury rising, Billerie prepared to command his Cloud Fog servants to hunt them down.
At that moment, many images uncontrollably surfaced in his mind—the boy arriving at the island full of hope, the joy of testing and achieving 5th Class talent, the girl’s defiance and occasional admiration and reliance, the boy’s promise to take the girl away from the island—
Forget it, they are just a few bugs, no need to waste energy.
In the end, Billerie did not send the Cloud Fog servants to chase them, nor did he sever that slight force that was tampering with the grand array.
“Thunderbolt!”
As Billerie was slightly distracted, a bolt of lightning struck him down.
His massive body had nowhere to dodge.
Amidst screams, Billerie was enveloped in dense smoke, his charred skin quickly regenerating.
This time, Toyennes decided to engage in a direct combat, taking advantage of Billerie’s distraction to charge at his massive body. Getting close did not slow his momentum, as he climbed up the inclined serpent body.
With a burst of energy, his sword chopped down on the serpent’s head.
Behind him, the remaining blast potions fell, igniting fierce flames that clung to the serpent’s tail.
Billere, still suffering from old wounds, now adjoined with new pains, truly faced great calamity.
The agony brought by the flames was indeed severe; he lowered his head and exhaled a breath of Frosty Cloud Fog towards the ground, attempting to extinguish the blazing fire at his tail, and the result was as he expected.
This was also the result Toyennes wanted; he grasped a patterned Longsword, entwined with brilliant lightning, and seized the opportunity when Billere lowered his head to strike with his sword.
At the critical moment, Billere moved his sword to block, managing to parry only a fraction of the blade’s edge. Continuously, his arms came up in defense, ultimately allowing the sword to sever both arms and strike into the shoulder scales, with the blade slicing through scales and flesh.
“Hahaha, got you.”
It seemed that Billere was also waiting for this moment; having six arms, losing two still left him with four. Among these, three grabbed Toyennes’ wrist and one clutched the front of Toyennes’ sorcerer robe.
“Are you still getting used to your hands? Do you remember you had a more perfect hand, yet you cruelly chopped it off and discarded it in the boundless ocean? Now it has come back with the hatred of being abandoned.”
With Billere’s words, the arm that grabbed the front of Toyennes revealed its true form, showing familiar green patterns that allowed Toyennes to recognize it instantly as his own arm, albeit with an unnaturally added vitality, like that of a living creature.
“Could it be—-” Toyennes looked horrified; he remembered that to break the Curse of Demon’s Resentment, he had once touched an unknown power, ending up unfortunately contaminated with another similar curse, the two curses bizarrely merging.
The left arm exhibited mutations, and desperately, he had no choice but to replace it.
Toyennes finally understood who had broken into his castle twice, who had made it possible for attacks to consistently hit him. It was clearly himself.
I had originally lost to myself!
‘Go ahead, I said I’d give you the chance to take revenge with your own hands.’
Billere didn’t give him any further chance to think, stretching his arm suddenly to penetrate Toyennes’ chest.
There was no bloodied mess, no splatter of flesh and blood, just merging into Toyennes’ body, becoming one with him, while still connected to Billere.
“Then let’s go to hell together.”
Toyennes felt his lifeforce drastically decreasing and abruptly awoke, realizing there was no chance for recovery.
He would not simply watch himself being drained, deciding not to suppress the power of the Curse of Demon’s Resentment within him anymore. New and old curse powers were accepted by his body, and his flesh reached a peak of vitality at that moment.
In the final moment, his flesh burst apart, and a vast energy surged outwards, engulfing Billere’s massive body and a large nearby area, including the little green winged snake and many Cloud Fog servants engaged in battle nearby.
…
Outside the island, a black ship pierced through dense fog and emerged under the sunlight, the light bathing the three people at the bow and bringing them a long-missed warmth.
“The sunlight is so beautiful!”
Pearney voiced what all three were feeling.
She thought of something and quickly ran to the stern, looking silently at the trailing cloud fog.
“What’s wrong with her?” Justine, being a woman, felt she was reminiscing about someone.
“Who knows.” Ivan wasn’t too concerned about Pearney’s issues; he was more worried if Toyennes would eventually follow them to Flying Fish Port, hoping Billere could kill that old fellow.
As the ship continued forward, the fog faded into the sea level, and Pearney, putting her emotions in order, returned to the bow.
Ivan uncertainly asked, “Are you sure the Iron Ridge Giant Turtle knows the way back to Flying Fish Port?”
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Pearney glanced at him, “Do you know the way?”
“Let’s trust it then.”
Of course, he did not know, reluctantly relying on the Iron Ridge Giant Turtle for direction, and whether it was reliable or not only the giant turtle knew.
