Ghost completed his leap backwards and landed on the floor but the damage had already been done. The hole in his stomach that was about the width of an arm taunted him as it brought back memories of all the previous times that he had suffered the same injury, and a mixture of rage and fear cascaded him.
After having barely survived the assault of Envy and the weird Blood Tree in the South Continent, the 1 thing that scared him the most was power that he could not understand. The ability to attack him whilst not being detectable definitely classified as such, and on top of that, the attack just had to be similar to the one that had nearly destroyed him in the past. The one that constantly replayed in his mind over and over whenever he rested his head to sleep. It came as no surprise when he felt the increasingly familiar feeling of fear.
But at the same time…He was furious. Bone-shakingly and hair-raisingly furious.
‘Again and again and again and again and again! WHY?! Why must I suffer so much?! Why must I always be met with such foes?! All I ever wanted to do was eat! All I ever wanted was to become so powerful that nobody could deny me anymore! Is that so much to ask for?! WHY?!’ Ghost gritted his teeth with anguish as madness began to sink his mind.
“BEYOND!!!” He roared out loud, no longer having the willingness to keep up the facade of control. Not that there was much need for it. Everybody had already seen the humiliating attack and knew that his bravado was a lie.
“BEYOOONND!!!” He roared out once more. “IS THIS YOU AGAIN?! ARE YOU SO USELESS THAT YOU CANNOT FORGET ABOUT A SINGLE MORTAL LIKE ME?! ARE YOU HONESTLY THAT WORTHLESS?! WHY DO YOU CONTINUE TO TORMENT ME LIKE THIS! WHY?!?!”
“Umm… This ‘Beyond’ that you keep speaking about. Do you mind elaborating?” Spoke out the female voice.
Ghost’s attention snapped to the branch that he had just been standing on, where, standing like an Empress of the highest plane of existence, was the most beautiful female he had ever laid eyes on. In fact, she was so visually attractive that for a brief moment, the cloud of rage pulsing through his brain cleared and a feeling of utter bafflement clutched his mind.
She had perfectly unblemished white skin, a potently feminine figure to tantalise all eyes, hair of literal light that spilled to her hips, irises that resembled the sun itself, a height of 190 or some centimetres, and a autocratic yet gentle demeanour that dazzled the senses. Her right hand was also covered by red liquid.
‘...What is that? How could a mortal look like that?’ Ghost thought. ‘…Wait. Wait! She isn’t a mortal, is she! She must be another creature of the Beyond sent to destroy me!’
The woman dropped her raised arm to her side and it was then that Ghost identified the red liquid coating the entirety of her lower arm and hand to be his blood. It dripped to the ground with perfect fluidity and pierced the silence of the atmosphere with each drop.
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Evidently, it was that very hand that was responsible for the hole in his stomach, and just like that, his rage returned with crackling vengeance.
“GHASTLY CREATURE THAT DOESN’T BELONG ON THIS PLANET; DIIIIE!!!” Ghost roared, but although his cognitive abilities had seen much better days, he still wasn’t foolish enough to challenge that creature alone.
“FIENDS! THE BEYOND REFUSES TO LET US GO AND HAS SENT US ANOTHER CHALLENGE! BUT THIS TIME IT IS ALONE AND CANNOT DEFEND AGAINST THE LOT OF US! PRESENTED WITH THIS OPPORTUNITY, LET US SHOW THE BEYOND EXACTLY WHAT WE FEEL ABOUT IT! SUBDUE HER! BREED HER! TORTURE HER! SLAUGHTER HER!!!” Ghost bellowed with all his might, infusing his Larynx with so much mana that his voice travelled across the entire Forest, including the city within.
It was a small tactic that had the dual purposes of shocking his people into action and striking fear into the heart of his enemy, but although the former goal had successfully been achieved, the latter seemed to have completely failed.
The sight of every crimson eyed Fiend converging onto the lone woman had to be an intimidating one, but she stood there undaunted, never looking away from his own eyes until the endless bodies in between them left no more room.
The fear in his heart that had been suppressed by his rage jerked, threatening to break free from its imprisonment as the mounting undeniable facts leading to one truth threatened to dominate him into cowardice.
But he refused!
Gathering mana into his legs, he leapt straight towards the woman that he knew was still standing in the same place (thanks to his Spirit Sense, which he was now realising had not helped him for a second when she was hiding). He ignored the bodies that were being battered to the side by his stunt, intending to use them to hide his own body till the very last moment, even if she was very well using the same Spirit Sense, and gathered the majority of his Mana to his arms using a specific set of Mana Circuits that would have created a pattern if they were visible, but the concentration of Mana increased the closer it got to his hands and was at the peak of concentration at his fingertips.
This was the best ratio of Mana distribution for his fighting style when he was going on the offensive, and the result caused his arms to glow red, his fingertips emitting red light like they had been replaced by carmine stars and almost vibrated with the power they withheld.
Unlike other Blood Fiends, he had not been blessed by an Element and had no affinity for them. He didn’t even have an affinity for the Blood Element like the Devils did. Of course, that was not to be confused with Blood and Blood Essence. His affinity for those were perfect and unparalleled. But that affinity only assisted him in the syphoning of the power they held, meaning that if a Human or other lifeform that had no affinity with Blood Essence tried to absorb it, they could probably only harness 5% of it, whereas he, with his perfect affinity, would obtain the entire 100%. Something that had resulted in his rise to the 7th Stage of the 4th Realm.
However, that did not disprove the fact that he could not shoot lightning bolts or fire balls like those with Elements. It was a pity, but other than the times that he wasn’t trying to forcefully change that through his many experiments, he didn’t dwell too much on it.
Instead, he focused on perfecting his martial arts. Martial arts that this woman was about to hold the full brunt of.