FASCINATING
Wicked still looked like a child of barely a few years old, but he didn't move like one at all. Nor did he speak like one.
The last time Leonel met him, he was already 93 years old, an age that didn't mean much in this world and was still considered to be firmly of the younger generation. And yet, he seemed to be able to tell that Leonel was young. At the very least, younger than him.
This tidbit made Leonel even more confused. He knew that Leonel was younger than him and had this strength, but he was still attacking like this?
From Wicked's perspective, he should definitely come from a Bubble World of great power that also easily cleared the Gathering of Kingdoms requirements.
Though attacking Leonel and trying to kill him as quickly as possible still made sense, there was something else about his reactions and temperament that weren't quite... right.
Leonel took a step back, the small figure of Wicked swiping at the air. A line of claw marks appeared in space, the fissures erupting with power.
Wicked attacked like something between a rampaging beast and a younger sibling chasing after his elder brother for bullying him.
The sight made Leonel even more speechless. What the hell was going on here?
Wicked gave him such a weird feeling, but when he actually attacked... he was so weak?
Leonel wasn't fond of not understanding things. The fact his Crafting had lagged behind had annoyed him for a very long time, and now this felt similar.
He didn't feel like his feelings were wrong, but the evidence before him pointed toward that end.
Suddenly, Leonel had a thought.
'Dream Force? Am I sensing something coming from him? Or someone manipulating him in the background?'
The thought was like a bolt of lightning and he seemed to put two and two together.
But there were many layers of oddities.
How had he killed Grimm, then? It should be that there was more than met the eye, certainly. But if he couldn't use that power continuously, why did he waste it on killing Grimm when Grimm was the one who could give him an opportunity to escape?
Even Leonel was slowly whittling Grimm down, wary of his strength to some extent. Was Wicked so stupid?
The more Leonel thought about it, the more he felt that it didn't make any sense.
Suddenly, Wicked's Ethereal Glabella glowed, its pale blue becoming a bright blue in an instant.
His body suddenly expanded and he aged by ten years, becoming a strong man in the prime of his twenties.
His strength explosively increased and suddenly, a spark of raging lightning shot through Leonel's Dreamscape.
'... Wow.'
Leonel accelerated backward, flickering through space and expanding the distance between them more and more.
"Don't run now!" Wicked roared out an almost diabolical laughter. "You made me do this, so you're going to take responsibility for it!"
'That ability just now, it's so much like the Cloud Race's ability to tap into their future potential in exchange for time they've spent slumbering. But it seems mutated and warped somehow, not for the worse... at least not necessarily. If I'm correct, then he's taken a hit on his mind in exchange for real power.'
He faintly understood some things about Wicked's origins. The man was able to incorporate new paths into his own in exchange for becoming a child again. That was why he was 93, and yet looked like a little kid... or at least he used to.
Leonel was fairly certain that among the times Wicked had chosen to regress, he incorporated the abilities of the Cloud Race into his being. But it shouldn't be that simple...
He seemed capable of using the ability more freely than the Cloud Race could, but in return, he acted like a child when he was in his child form, acting without thinking and even doing things that didn't quite benefit him either.
It didn't seem like he managed to shed those weaknesses either after he became an "adult". Rather than just turning and running, he was obsessed with capturing and killing Leonel now.
'This is super interesting...' Leonel thought.
Now, the question he was wondering about was if the Dream Force manipulator he had sensed was Wicked's "future self", or if it was someone else entirely?
'If he has the thought process of a child, he would have definitely participated in the Gathering of Kingdoms, and with this strength, he should have been able to save his Bubble World.
'So why didn't he?'
Leonel's gaze looked toward the corpse. Could it be?
What if the fall of the Bubble was exactly what he wanted?
There were several reasons Leonel could think of for why, but now that he felt he had most of the story, he didn't feel that it was all that necessary to get the exact details. That was...
Until Wicked's body suddenly flashed and his body ballooned, black fur erupting around him until he suddenly became a large panda with black and dark gold fur.
'Aurora Black Panda?' Content (C) Nôv/elDra/ma.Org.
Leonel was speechless. It felt like he was making wild discovery after wild discovery.
How was a non-human using the Lineage Factor that the Human Race was despised for? If every Race could use it, what need would there be to despise humans in specific?
"HAHA! You probably don't know what this is, right?! Take your questions to the grave!"
Leonel shook his head. This would have, under normal circumstances, been a great battle. But this idiot actually exposed such a thing unnecessarily.
The Life Tablet suddenly flashed in Leonel's mind and without being able to resist...
BANG!
Wicked was slammed into the ground with such force that the black lands cracked.
He was suppressed to the point he couldn't even budge a single finger.
Leonel took a step and kneeled by Wicked who was still struggling wildly.
"Fascinating," Leonel muttered.
An anomaly even the God Beasts didn't account for...
Or did they?