The Ultimate Evolution

A sword blade so breathtaking that it felt as if it was condensed from the blood, the life essence, of a million people….

A power so terrifying that even the Realms were wary of and had to repress….

A power so formidable that it could ignore the rules of the Realms….

The shine on the blade, albeit soft, made those who laid eyes on it gasp for air!!

That’s Apophis. Evil Sword, Apophis!

Sheyan wrapped his fingers one by one around Apophis’ hilt. His palm that was grasping Apophis became red and translucent. A sharp thorn slowly grew out of the sword’s hilt. When Sheyan wrapped his hand around the hilt, the thorn penetrated through his skin and pierced deep into his blood vessel. After that, Apophis started to absorb Sheyan’s blood to bring out its terrifying power! A power that would make even the gods tremble!

Sheyan could now display the full power of Apophis, because he now had the Offensive Awakening Reward, ‘Gifted’

[ Offensive Awakening Reward: ‘Gifted’ – Because you have a negative condition which renders you unable to use any kind of shield, ‘Gifted’ will enable you to skillfully use all kinds of melee weapons. Even if you do not have the relevant mastery, you can still display the strength of a melee weapon. ]

(TL: From ch. 1213 “Awakener No. 1018”)

More importantly, when Evil Sword Apophis was devoured, it had already been strengthened to +4. Do not underestimate this +4 strengthening, because just strengthening this sword to +4 already required a terrible price.

But that also means….the Apophis in Sheyan’s hand right now was a monstrous +10 Evil Sword Apophis!!

Apart from the dramatic increase in attack power, the +10 Apophis had two other major enhancements. First, the negative effect of the active ability ‘Apophis’ Sneer’ had been greatly weakened – after the end of the effect duration, the probability of turning into Apophis’ slave had decreased from 33% to 7%.

(TL: The details of ‘Apophis’ Sneer’ can be found in ch. 1229 “Devoured”. The details are too long to copy and paste here.)

Second, ‘Extinction’ had also been strengthened. Initially, there was a certain chance of triggering ‘Extinction’ after each successful attack on the enemy, but now, ‘Extinction’ would definitely trigger after the first successful hit on the enemy. The subsequent hit on the enemy would have a 2% chance to trigger ‘Extinction’, the hit after that would have a 4% chance, followed by 8%, 16%, 32%, 64%, and 100%! Each time after triggering ‘Extinction’, the trigger rate would be forcibly reduced to 2%, and the cycle would begin anew.

This way, the triggering of ‘Extinction’ had basically become a controllable factor. Apart from the first hit, no matter how bad Sheyan’s luck was, ‘Extinction’ would definitely trigger within 8 successful strikes!

***

Blood dripped down, one drop at a time.

It dripped onto the soil of the death zone and was instantly absorbed by the land.

Sheyan first endured the enemy’s direct attack with his body!

The Messenger of Pain fully demonstrated his advantage in having long limbs. His right hand swelled up and hardened in the blink of an eye; his fingers even becoming fang-like neoplasms. The right hand struck the right side of Sheyan’s chest. Even Sheyan’s formidable defence could not resist the powerful attack. Sheyan right chest was thoroughly pierced through, leaving behind a huge bloody hole!

Not only that, he was once again struck by the bizarre, invisible attack on his neck, where he lost a large chunk of his flesh. A part of his skull and pulsating carotid arteries showed through the terrible wound.

The signature skill of a Temperer was the ability to transform a part of their body into a perfect combat weapon… while the Messenger of Pain had clearly achieved a perfect transformation, able to transform at will. Every time he raised his hand, he would display terrifying power, exceeding the level of a Temperer!

“This idiot is actually two orders higher than me. Two!” Sheyan thought with gnashing teeth.

And at this instant, the patiently waiting Sheyan finally saw a chance. Having just successfully struck the enemy, there was a large opening in the Messenger of Pain’s defence. Furthermore, the source of his power was pain, so his did not place much importance on defence to begin with. The flaw in his defence beckoned at Sheyan like a wide open door!

Sheyan tightly clenched the sword hilt. The sharp pain from the thorn stimulated his nerves, making him more focused. He could feel his blood and life essence being greedily absorbed by Apophis.

He slashed down with the sword.

The whole world suddenly turned into a sea of blood. His nose was assaulted by the sickening smell of boiling fresh blood. All he could hear was the sound of the air being split apart!

There was also a ray of light – a terrifying ray of light which looked like it was formed by millions of vengeful spirits exploding at the same time!

The ray of light slashed downwards like an unstoppable blood-red waterfall!

When Apophis was about a metre away from the Messenger of Pain, it suddenly met with some kind of resistance, as if it had cut into something thick and sticky. However, there was a dark crimson glow around Apophis’ blade which was very faint but extremely sharp. Nothing could resist its slice, and nothing could last a second in front of it!

That was the might of Apophis. That was the terrible power of the Mutated Lieutenant General Blood Sword!

Such speed.

Such power!

A hard-to-describe scream filled the air, but Sheyan was not done yet. He cut deeper into the hip of the Messenger of Pain, trying to sever his thigh bone from his pelvis. But in the end, the Messenger of Pain’s strong body, personally forged by the Queen of Blades, foiled his plan. The muscles near the wound twisted wildly and gripped Apophis’ blade, stopping it from cutting in any further. The force Sheyan exerted on Apophis slowly depleted until the sword came to a complete halt.

Although the chop was unsuccessful, the Messenger of Pain’s right thigh was now only connected to his pelvis by a layer of muscles and calluses less than three centimeters thick. Thick yellow fluid gushed out of the wound in large quantity. The fluid turned into foam as soon as it came into contact with the air, trying to plug the wound.

Before Sheyan could even react after the slash, the Messenger of Pain already slapped him more than a dozen meters away. When he lifted his body off the ground, he found that half his cheekbones had shattered and he could no longer speak. Blood was seeping through the orifices on his face.

The Messenger of Pain laughed.

“What a powerful attack! Such terrifying damage! Ah, I’m getting addicted to this overwhelming pain! It’s fueling my strength, awakening it from my body. You will soon taste double the amount of pain you inflicted on me, fool! You have no idea how great Her Majesty the Queen of Blades is. A wound like this may have been fatal to the previous me, but my powerful recovery speed will make you understand that all kinds of attacks – and I mean all kinds – are totally futile against me! YOU! ARE! WORTHLESS!”

“Oh, really?” Sheyan’s eyes suddenly sparkled with a mysterious and sinister blood-red glint.

In this instant, he could still clearly see the trail left behind by his previous sword slash. The blood-red colour was rich, clear, and shockingly sharp!

On the Messenger of Pain’s back floated a twisted, deformed, transparent phantom which seemed to be able to change into various shapes. Sheyan’s bizarre injuries previously were evidently the work of this thing.

But a crack had appeared on the transparent phantom. The energy around the crack seemed to be trying hard to repair it. Strangely, a lot of “0’s” and “1’s” would occasionally pop up on the wound. And when the crack was finally completely repaired, a weird thing happened.

A strange blood-red trace which looked like the mosaic commonly seen in certain movies was left on the wound. The moment the wound closed completely, a blood-red light immediately flashed, and the wound was inexplicably restored to its previous state. During the restoration process, a large amount of illusory 0’s and 1’s kept popping up. The mosaic-like blood-red glow also turned into something like an electric current which charged back on forth on the wound!

After several failed attempts to heal itself, the transparent phantom let out a scream of horror and despair!

The same thing was also happening at the top of the Messenger of Pain’s right thigh. His muscles kept folding and twisting, trying to heal themselves, but every attempt was in vain. The moment the wound healed, the horrible power left by Evil Sword Apophis would turn into a series of code and data which forcefully prevented the wound from healing!

This was the horror of Apophis’ powerful trademark skill: ‘Extinction’!

***

Sheyan cut a sorry figure at the moment. He had bruises and wounds all over his body. And the enemy he was facing was a special messenger sent by the Queen of Blades, a monster two whole orders above him.

No one should be able to relax or feel joy under such circumstances.

However, a smile actually broke on Sheyan’s face. He dusted off his body, then bowed politely at the furiously howling Messenger of Pain who was trying hard to stand up but keep falling back down.

Sheyan said in a relaxed manner, “It’s very rude and presumptuous of me to say this, sir, but it’s time for us to part ways. I wish you good health and a pleasant journey.”

After that, Sheyan left the scene and strode deeper into the criss-crossing fang-like mountains with relaxed steps, like he was a backpacker.