Prime Originator

"Hmph! I underestimated you, little brat! To think you were able to deal with my people so quickly! But don't think for a second that I am going to let you off easy! I may have failed, and I may very well die today! But I will at least take down one Crawford Royalty with me if it's the last thing I do!"

"Careful, Leon boy!"

Don quickly warned.

Balthazar all the lost blood back into his body and shot towards Leon with the blood sword in his hand, aiming for his waist. 

Leon was prepared for Balthazar's attack and attempted to parry it upwards with the rising dragon stance.

Peng!

Leon was sent flying by the excess force of 50 thousand jins! Evidently, the strength of a severely injured Transcendent was still powerful! 

He had learned his lesson from their previous exchanges. Against overwhelming strength, tackling it head-on would only hurt himself significantly from the excess force.

The philosophy of military arts was to use the opponent's strength to their advantage, fighting hard with soft. 

Recalling this, Leon immediately applied it by launching himself back during the moment he was struck. Thus, rather than being attacked by the 50 thousand jin of excess force, it was more like being pushed back by it. 

Leon was able to reduce the damage to a minimum and come out unscathed.

Balthazar flashed Don at the side a cold look and said, "Busybody, go die!"

Balthazar aimed to finish Don off before the person could recover, but Leon would not allow that to happen, not on his watch. 

While he was still flying back, Leon twisted his body midair and threw the black spear with all his might. The black spear shot towards Balthazar's exposed head filled scathing burns. 

Balthazar Blood Armament armor had been destroyed by Don's last attack. Various parts were missing on his body. 

His armor's remaining parts include half a helmet, one shoulder pad, a pair of gauntlets, and most of the lower half intact, except for one boot. The rest were destroyed. 

Balthazar readily deflected Leon's spear. His eyes shrank when he saw the spearhead laced with a black substance.

"Poison?! Sneaky brat! So, this is how you dealt with my men! Hmph! Too bad, you threw away your best weapon! Don't think about getting it back!"

Before Leon could recall his weapon with Divine Will, it was grasped tightly by Balthazar's free hand. 

Leon frowned.

He had been using Divine Will to control his spear ever since it was enchanted by runes. This was because the power of runes interfered with his metal control. 

Just like how Awakeners could not freely control the elements of another person due to their individual will, the primal law that gives powers to runes had a similar effect to a sentient will that render elemental manipulation of Awakeners useless on it.

If Leon wanted to use metal manipulation on his Tier 3 spirit artifact, he would first need to advance to the first stage of the Transcendent realm, the Preliminary Accession level. But even at this level, the extent of his metal manipulation would still be limited. 

Once a spirit artifact develops its own sentience and gives birth to the artifact spirit, it would become entirely impossible to manipulate it with an Awakener's abilities.

However, Divine practitioners did not have Awakeners' abilities, to begin with, but they were still able to control their spirit artifacts freely back in the Divine Realm.

This is because artifact spirits of spirit artifacts can be spiritually connected to Divine practitioners after being bound by blood. Through the spiritual connection, the artifact spirit would freely follow the will of their master.

As such, Leon would no longer need to use Divine Will nor stronger awakening power to control the black spear once its sentience develops.

That being said, Leon did not have time to think about all this. He only frowned for a short moment before shrugging his shoulders. 

"If you like it so much, I will let you hold onto it for now. I still have other weapons I can use. Watch my needles!"

Having said that, Leon shot several steel needles laced with blood-eroding poison. These needles were all aimed at Balthazar's vitals.

That being said, whether the needles landed on these vitals or not was not important. What is important is whether any of these needles landed. 

No matter how strong Balthazar was, his body would still succumb to the overbearingly vicious poison if it was allowed to pierce his skin and enter his system.

Balthazar narrowed his eyes into slits as he could barely follow the trajectory of the silver needles. Not only was it currently dark at night, but the silver needles were also small and fast.

Even for someone like him, it was difficult to deflect all these needles with just his sword alone under these conditions. Nevertheless, grunted, "Hmph! Paltry tricks!"

A simple blood iron shield was used to block all the needles. The needles were quick, a testimony to Leon's adeptness in throwing weapons, but it still lacked power. Balthazar did not have to exert much effort to defend himself.

Balthazar pulled out the incredibly thin silver needles and inspected them before glaring at Leon.

"Acupuncture needles? First, you use poison, now you use them with hidden weapons?! Hmph! You're pretty insidious, huh?!"

The deformed steel needles were thrown back.

Balthazar was not adept at throwing. Thus, his strength was not correctly distributed into the needles, causing the already deformed needles to stray further from their intended target. 

The accuracy and speed were terrible. 

The deformed needles found their way back to Leon's hands effortlessly before they straightened back into shape under the manipulation of Leon's metal ability. 

Balthazar's expression darkened. That would be the last time he would try using hidden weapons.

"I don't want to hear that coming from someone like you." Leon said with a frown before shouting, "Watch my needles!"

Balthazar immediately defended himself with another blood iron shield, large enough to block his own vision.

Ding! Ding! Ding!

Leon did not stay in one spot and began circling around Balthazar and shoot from better angles where the blood iron shield did not cover. 

He had given up on close combat.

"Watch my needles!"

Ding! Ding!

As expected, Balthazar was able to shift his blood iron shield and defend against it in time. 

With Leon's call exposing his own location, it only served to make it easier for Balthazar. But even without his call, Balthazar would still have been able to defend against his attack.

"I don't know what you are trying to do, but you are making this too easy for me, brat! Did that last hit make you go stupid?" Balthazar mocked before coughing violently.

Leon did not seem to have heard him, or rather he had completely ignored it and continued to repeat the same move.

"Watch my needles!"

Ding! Ding!

"It's useless, brat! Try something else!" Balthazar sneered, but he did not lower his guard and continued to block each needle attack solemnly. 

A few beads of sweat trickled down his temples. It only takes one of these smeared needles to kill him in his current condition.

"Watch my needles!"

"Watch my needles!"

"Watch my…!"

…

At some point, Balthazar could still hear Leon's cry, but he no longer felt the impact of the needle attack. After figuring out why, he became livid in the next moment.

"You dare to trick me?!"

"Watch my needles!" Leon shouted once more.

Balthazar immediately hid behind his shield again, but nothing happened. Popping his head back out from behind the shield, he was met with Leon's cynical smile.

Balthazar fell for Leon's trick again! He was so incensed he coughed up more blood. After wiping his mouth, he glared at Leon coldly.

If looks could kill, Leon would have died thousands of times over. 

"It seems you are out of needles!" Balthazar stated with a deep voice. 

As if to confirm his guess, he saw Leon taking out a sword. His eyes glinted with a greedy light. If he lives through this, he definitely had to find out where the brat was hiding all his weapons!

"Come!" 

Balthazar gave a cruel smile. 

Leon immediately lunged forward with his sword at his call. As Leon closed the distance and hacked out with his sword, he shouted, "Watch my needles!"

"Do you think I will still believe that?!"

Balthazar roared loudly and hacked out with his own sword to receive the attack. 

He did not notice that Leon made a flicking gesture with his other hand shot out multiple needles and retreated abrupted before their swords made contact.

Poof! Poof! Poof!

The needles shot through Balthazar's left knee, right thigh, one straight through the stomach. 

"Y-Y-You! You trick me!" 

Balthazar pointed at Leon with trembling fingers. He was so angry he could not be any angrier. He was the Sect Master of the Bloodfiend Sect! When had he ever been played like this?!

"That's right, I tricked you! So what?" Leon said nonchalantly while giving Balthazar an impassive look. Once his attack succeeded, there was no saving the Blood Transcendent. 

The poison spread quickly.

"You're despicable and shameless to the extreme!" Balthazar roared indignantly as his body grew weaker by the moment. He was unwilling to accept this type of outcome.

"All is fair in war." Leon shrugged, before adding. "I do not mind getting my hands dirty if ridding the world of one evil means saving countless innocent lives."

"Hahaha…" 

Balthazar laughed with resignation while shaking his head like he heard something ridiculous. He became so weak that he could no longer stand. No matter how unwilling he was, death was inevitable. 

"Trying to be a hero, eh? No matter how much evil you eradicate, this world is already doomed to perish. I am just the beginning, but they? They will be the end."

With that, Balthazar's eyes dimmed and quietly passed away.