Chapter 708 - 707: What Have I Been Praying For?

Chapter 708: Chapter 707: What Have I Been Praying For?

Paul and the others had no idea just how much danger they were in, nor whether they realized how lucky they were.

Even now, the very person they believed had long since forgotten about them was desperately fighting to prevent their deaths.

Unfortunately, none of them had any way of knowing that.

And with everything that was happening around them, they wouldn’t understand until it was their time to face it.

For now, Paul had finally made it towards Malachi, his hammer gleaming with earth energy as he prepared to immobilize him to force out what he did to Bailey. No matter how much he wanted to kill the man, he atleast wanted to understand if she was truly dead.

But there was a problem, a serious problem.

At first, Malachi resembled an ordinary human as Paul sensed an energy leave him. A deranged man, but still one who could no longer defend himself.

How or why did Malachi end up that way? Paul didn’t care. However, before he could get close, Paul’s skill made him abruptly stop in place.

His ability to sense a being’s threat level was telling him that something was wrong with this man, something worse than his insanity.

And it didn’t take long for Paul to realize that his skill wasn’t mistaken.

Still kneeling on the ground, Malachi began laughing even harder, his hunched shoulders trembling as the sound gradually became deeper and more distorted.

At first, Paul thought the man was choking on his own laughter. But when he noticed something moving underneath Malachi’s clothing, he quickly realized that something else was happening.

Several bulges appeared along Malachi’s back, traveling through his skin as his body began to convulse. His spine twisted unnaturally, accompanied by a series of disturbing cracks that forced his shoulders apart.

Yet Malachi continued laughing.

And then, without warning, his entire upper torso split open.

Paul instinctively stepped backward as the flesh covering Malachi’s chest separated, revealing an enormous mouth lined with several rows of teeth.

His upper body had practically folded in half, with one section hanging grotesquely to the side, held in place by what little flesh still connected it to the rest of him.

And somehow, the man was still laughing.

Only now, the laughter came from somewhere within that enormous opening, each burst accompanied by a horrible grinding sound as rows of teeth scraped against one another and its entire structure shook with the force of it.

But before Paul could even comprehend what he was witnessing, the mouth began to close.

The separated sections of Malachi’s torso pulled themselves together, only for something else to appear beneath its skin, traveling towards its head, dragging the surrounding flesh toward his neck.

His jaw suddenly split apart.

Then his cheeks.

And finally, the upper portion of his skull began to separate, exposing another set of teeth where his face should’ve been.

The laughter that escaped him was almost unbearable.

Several voices seemed to overlap, some shrill enough to make Paul’s ears ache, while others were so deep that he could feel their vibrations beneath his feet.

At that moment, despite the unknown invasive aura in the air, the rest of Paul’s group could no longer bring themselves to stand aside while Paul faced whatever that creature was alone.

It wasn’t as though they hadn’t wanted to intervene before.

After all, they had been forced to watch humans being killed, some of whom they knew personally, while their own mentors struggled against a dragon that seemed more than capable of killing them.

But even with everything they had witnessed, none of them had been able to convince themselves to join the fighting.

And perhaps that was because, unlike most of the humans present, they understood how this conflict had started.

Varkesh had already told them what had happened between Noah and the humans, including the circumstances that had forced Noah to retaliate in the first place.

They knew he hadn’t been the one to initiate the conflict.

If anything, the humans had repeatedly given him reasons to fight back, only to find themselves facing consequences far worse than whatever had provoked his retaliation.

That didn’t make it any easier to watch people they knew suffer.

Some of them still hated Noah, while others feared him far more than they were willing to admit. And even those who understood his actions couldn’t bring themselves to overlook everything that had happened between them.

But knowing who was responsible for the conflict made it difficult to justify taking up arms against him.

Especially when they understood better than most what Noah was capable of.

If anything, they wished there was some way to bring the fighting to an end before anyone else had to die.

Unfortunately, that wasn’t a decision they could make.

But the situation with Malachi was different.

Whatever their feelings toward Noah, the man kneeling before Paul had attacked Bailey, and now he was threatening another one of their friends.

They had a clear enemy this time and one that they could confront without questioning whether they were doing the right thing.

Meanwhile, the rest of Malachi’s body was undergoing an equally disturbing transformation.

His arms lengthened as the bones within them cracked and shifted, stretching his fingers into enormous claws with curved, blackened tips. His skin gradually lost its natural color, becoming a sickly pale gray as dark veins spread across his exposed flesh.

And from those veins, thin black tendrils began emerging.

They twisted around his limbs before extending into the surrounding air, revealing numerous crimson eyes that opened along their lengths.

More eyes appeared directly upon his body, their narrow pupils moving independently as though searching for something.

But what disturbed Paul most were the mouths.

The one occupying Malachi’s head suddenly contracted, allowing his face to partially reform, while another opening emerged along his shoulder.

It didn’t remain there.

Paul watched as the teeth disappeared under Malachi’s skin, only to emerge again farther down his chest. Another mouth opened along his abdomen before shifting toward his side, while a third tore through the flesh of his leg, exposing a mass of writhing tongues between its teeth.

None of them seemed content to remain where they had appeared.

They continued moving, stretching and rearranging Malachi’s flesh until, one by one, they began settling into different parts of his body.

By then, Malachi barely resembled the man Paul had intended to interrogate.

Even so, he remained hunched over on his knees, his distorted frame trembling with laughter as the enormous mouth across his chest opened and closed.

And just when Paul thought the transformation had finally ended, something caught his attention.

Malachi’s shadow.

For the briefest moment, he could’ve sworn he saw something looking back at him from within it.

He couldn’t make out what it was, but the instant their gazes seemed to meet, a fear unlike anything he’d experienced from Malachi washed over him.

It was enough to make him forget about the creature kneeling before him.

Unfortunately, when he looked again, there was nothing there.

Only Malachi’s shadow.

Paul couldn’t understand what he’d seen, but the lingering fear made it impossible for him to believe that he imagined it.

But before he could give it any more thought, Malachi’s laughter suddenly stopped.

"This... this is power..."

Malachi stared at his enormous hands, slowly opening and closing them as though he couldn’t quite believe they belonged to him.

"Hahaha... Look at me! LOOK AT ME! All those years! All those miserable years of praying, begging, doing everything that bitch told me to do! And for what?"

He suddenly slammed one of his hands into the ground.

"NOTHING!"

His expression twisted, only for a smile to creep across his face.

"But this? Hahaha! All I had to do was bathe in that energy, and LOOK WHAT HAPPENED!"

He began examining his body again, his eyes darting between the mouths and tendrils that had emerged from his flesh.

"Wait... wait, wait, wait..."

His smile faltered.

"The Devil is evil. God is all-powerful. That’s what they taught us, isn’t it?"

Malachi tilted his head.

"Then why am I stronger? Why does the power they told us to fear feel so much greater than anything their precious God ever gave me?"

For several seconds, he seemed genuinely confused.

Then his eyes widened.

"Oh..."

A grin slowly spread across his face.

"Oh, you clever little bitch..."

He began chuckling.

"You knew, didn’t you? HAHAHA! YOU KNEW!"

"That’s why you kept telling us to reject temptation! To cleanse our hearts! To kneel and beg for forgiveness whenever we so much as entertain an impure thought!"

Malachi suddenly threw his head back.

"YOU’RE AFRAID!"

His laughter erupted again, loud enough that several of the mouths across his body began opening with it.

"Not of the Devil! Not of evil! You’re afraid of what would happen if we stopped listening to you!"

He leaned forward, his grin stretching unnaturally wide.

"Because what happens when a man discovers he doesn’t need your blessings? When he realizes that everything you’ve forbidden him could make him stronger than the heavens he was taught to worship?"

Malachi’s expression darkened.

"He stops kneeling."

For a moment, he stared at his shadow, or more like what was hidden within it.

Then he began laughing so violently that his entire body shook.

"Oh, I’m going to enjoy this. That arrogant little bitch... I wonder what her face will look like when I rip those wings off her back?"

His claws slowly curled.

"No. No, that would be too easy."

He raised his head, his smile returning.

"I’ll take her power first. Then I’ll make her watch as I tear down everything she’s spent her existence protecting. Her precious followers, her temples, every last symbol of that worthless faith!"

Malachi’s eyes widened with excitement.

"And when there’s nothing left, when she’s crawling at my feet, begging that all-powerful God of hers to save her..."

He began giggling.

"I’ll ask her why he isn’t answering."

His laughter grew louder.

"HAHAHAHA! Oh, I can’t wait! I CAN’T FUCKING WAIT!"