Chapter 251: Under Attack by a Bug Swarm

The air shimmered from the unbelievable heat, making Magna’s vision slightly blurry.

Through it, he could see the surface of the Bleeding Desolation’s body bubbling. Strange black spheres occasionally appeared within the crimson blood, looking like blind eyeballs and making its appearance even more disturbing.

Drops sometimes splashed from its body, but they never reached the ground. They rose as though gravity were working backward, drifting upward before scattering around the creature.

On top of that, the noises coming from its body sounded like millions of voices screaming and groaning over one another. Hearing them would make anyone think twice, even 3 or 4 times, before approaching it.

Yet Magna was standing in front of that creature, talking about its mother.

Even his heart began beating a little faster as he waited to see how it would respond.

Then, fortunately or unfortunately, he wasn’t sure yet, the creature actually reacted.

It stopped where it stood. Slowly, its head began to turn toward him.

The movement was so painfully slow that every second seemed to stretch while Magna waited for it to finish.

’What kind of horror movie scene is this?’

His thoughts began growing chaotic again, his usual habit whenever he was nervous or tense.

There were no eyes on that face made of blood, but he could feel it staring at him.

For a while, neither moved. Only the constantly flowing blood across its body and the cold mist rising from his clothes showed that time was still passing.

Under that stare, Magna quickly checked his mana.

198%.

Renna had given him exactly 108 mana-replenishing pills. That uneven number made it seem obvious she had handed over everything she had.

He had planned to return them when he came back, but he hadn’t felt confident enough to leave his mana reserve low. Before approaching the monster, he had eaten enough to fill it, preparing for whatever might happen.

Now he was glad he had come prepared, just as any Witch or Magus should.

The Bleeding Desolation hadn’t started moving again, but Magna wasn’t going to wait for it. He began casting a spell while its attention was still on him.

A whistle rose from beneath his mask as the mana inside him formed the pattern for Phoenix Wings.

Not the original version, but the one he had modified.

2 streams of blue cold fire burst outward behind his back, rapidly taking the shape of enormous wings with shiny blue feathers.

They weren’t directly attached to his body. They didn’t even touch his clothes, but mana connected them to his muscles. Moving the muscles in his back let him control the wings as though they were his own limbs.

Without another thought, he beat them hard and pushed off the ground with his feet.

He had wanted to get the creature’s attention, and he had succeeded.

Now it was time to run.

His cold wings cut through the hot air, leaving thick mist behind as he shot into the sky like a missile.

He didn’t even look back. His instincts and senses, especially his presence-sensing trait, were enough to tell him something was coming from behind.

Actually, it wasn’t just something. Countless things were following him, all registering within his senses.

If he had stopped for a second to look, he would have seen hundreds, even thousands, of black worms breaking through the ground and rising after him.

They were the same sluggish, ordinary-looking worms he had seen before. This time, however, they had 2 pairs of flimsy wings on their backs.

Fortunately, they weren’t that fast. At least, they weren’t faster than Magna.

He kept climbing until he had put a considerable distance between them. Only then did he pause and turn to see what was chasing him.

’You’ve got to be kidding me.’

A whole swarm of black dots was rising toward him.

He immediately beat his wings again, though seeing the worms had at least confirmed one of his earlier guesses.

They really were connected to the Bleeding Desolation. Now they were attacking him for their mother.

The creature itself was still standing in the same spot, its head raised toward the sky as it watched.

It wasn’t following him, but at least he managed to stop its advance for now.

Keeping it that way would have to wait until he dealt with the swarm. Magna continued flying as he thought about how to attack the worms without letting them surround him.

They were certainly dangerous. Their strange secretions had dissolved the Shadow’s body, even eating through most of his bones.

His new outfit covered all his skin, so he was fairly confident it could withstand their corrosive attacks for a while.

But there were too many of them to rely on that protection for long.

’They don’t seem to have sharp teeth or claws.’

He pictured their bodies in his mind, going over what he had seen. If heat and corrosion were their only means of attack, that was good.

The next thing he needed to find out was how much damage they could withstand.

Black shells covered their bodies, but he couldn’t tell how tough they were just by looking.

He still remembered seeing Crackhead, the Stoneman, easily pierce one with a stone spear and kill it in a single strike. Still, that didn’t tell him how much force it took to break through their shells. He needed to hit one himself to find out.

Unfortunately, casting an attack spell wasn’t so simple while Phoenix Wings was active.

Its pattern occupied most of his mana channels, leaving little room to form another one.

That was another drawback of high-tier spells besides their mana cost. Witches could usually only maintain 1 at a time because they didn’t have enough free channels for another pattern.

Still, most of his channels being occupied didn’t mean all of them were.

Magna quickly pictured the thousands running through his body like veins, searching for the ones he wasn’t using.

Phoenix Wings mainly occupied his chest, back, and shoulders. The channels in his arms and legs were mostly free.

Now he needed a spell whose pattern would fit into those spaces.

He went through the spells he remembered from Renna’s book, comparing their patterns with the channels he had available. His excellent memory helped tremendously, along with his enhanced thinking speed.

Soon, he found a suitable low-tier fire spell. It only needed the channels in his arms and a few in his abdomen.

It was a simple fireball spell with low power and a small mana cost. That wouldn’t be much against the Desolation, but he only wanted to test a worm’s defenses.

Magna began whistling again.

This time, he guided mana from his abdomen into the free channels toward his arms. The second pattern gradually took shape without disturbing the one keeping his wings active.

Once it was complete, he directed its exit point to his right index finger.

He stopped retreating and turned toward the swarm, pointing at the worm flying in front.

Fire gathered at his fingertip. When it formed a sphere the size of a bowling ball, it shot through the air like a cannonball, striking the flying worm directly.