Three days later

Helial's body was surrounded by needles, which covered every free inch of his skin. Around the boy, strange pitch black Patterns appeared and dissolved continuously, intertwining, merging, kissing. It was those patterns that allowed the needles to act on Helial's body.

The Devil was moving them. Sweat beaded on Iblis's forehead.

That operation required a lot of effort and concentration, but if the Devil had still possessed his body, the chore would have been much easier. Now, however, forced as he was in an ethereal form, he did not have enough Mana to perform the operation and had to borrow it from the planet he was on; still, it was not enough to support the whole process.

Such a huge flow of Mana, as Iblis had said, normally would not have gone unnoticed by the powers of the universe, both among the members of Life and among those of Destruction, but Alexander had dealt with this. In fact, the King of Madonia had ordered Bucephalus to watch over the process, preventing the great monsters of the universe from catching even the faintest glimpse of it with their Divine Sense. The two greatest legends of the universe, the hero and the Devil, were collaborating in silence to transform Helial.

"Incredible, isn't it?" Alexander burst out, pronouncing words that seemed the amusing conclusion of an inner monologue.

Bucephalus did not know what his companion was talking about. "What?"

The horse seemed rather annoyed by the role he had been assigned.

Alexander smiled, still immersed in his thoughts. “It is incredible how, getting older, people change by following one of two paths. On the one hand there are those who would give their last years of life to others just to die; on the other we have those old bastards who would like to bring even slippers to the grave, in order not to give anyone anything that belongs to them. Such people, with the right opportunity, would steal the soul of their grandchildren to live a few more years."

Bucephalus, who had taken his human form and was standing next to Alexander, glanced over his sunglasses. Then he snorted: “You and Iblis have lived so long that it seems strange that you still want to get your hands dirty everywhere. But it is not strange that you no longer want to be the protagonists. After all, sooner or later we all grow old. Our last day will come, be it tomorrow or in another hundred thousand years."

Alexander glared at the horse. Bucephalus was his most faithful companion, but he certainly knew how to ruin his mood in seconds.

Remembering the King that he had once been a young man with golden curls and the most vigorous hero of all and that his times had now come to an end was never a good choice.

Alexander pretended not to have heard the horse's words and began to move his fingers on the strings of an imaginary lyre, playing his favourite melody, remembering when he was a boy and had recently learned to play. His personal concert, deafening music in the silence of his first memories.

The time of the planet seemed to stop and become alien to that of the entire universe. In addition to the barrier created by Bucephalus, a much finer and more refined energy was now protecting the planet.

However, at that moment, Helial could not perceive anything other than pain.

Intense, excruciating, unbearable pain.

Every inch of the boy's body was torn by that destructive sensation.

Helial's body was lying on a marble floor.

Streams of black blood came from the wounds inflicted by the needles.

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“The process will completely destroy what you are now. It will no longer leave room for the Skills that have been given to you. You will receive exactly 720 Stat Points for each Statistic,” said Iblis as his hands formed millions of Seals in series.

The air around him was distorted by the enormous power he was brandishing.

Helial was so suffering that at any moment he felt he could lose consciousness or worse, die. He had barely been able to hear the Devil's words and was not even sure if he had really heard them or they were only in his own head.

Alexander had stopped playing and started watching the purification process again. He was definitely stunned by Iblis's abilities. The King of Madonia had stopped taking care of the outside world to engage in meditation, but Iblis never seemed to have stopped training and learning. Alexander was sure that if Iblis had a material body, he could have destroyed the whole universe with the ease a normal mortal would have used to kill a fly.

“In the short term, you'll feel like you've achieved an incredible improvement. Your basic talent will also surpass Pseudonym's. But only for now." Iblis formed the Seals and spoke simultaneously. Despite the enormous effort, the boy managed to do both without showing the slightest sign of slowing down. “Remember, you will spend ten years without being able to advance beyond the Late stage of the Second Phase. You will only have the Skill Knowledge Level to train. Then, after these ten years or so, you will finally get to the Third Phase. But, even then, you will have to wait to accumulate another 360 Statistical Points for each non-hidden Statistic. Only in this way, from Phase to Phase, in a painfully slow process, can you finally be reborn."

Alexander reflected on the words of the Devil, listening to him in religious silence.

Probably, many people would have accepted such conditions, seduced by the illusion of a sudden improvement. But, having experienced so many things during his very long life, the King of Kings knew that the price to pay would be very high.

For a person like Helial, the most important thing would always have been his current strength, not potential strength. When you have such a talent, when you are so strong, the number of enemies tends to increase exponentially.

If Iblis himself had not climbed the hierarchies of Immortality with terrifying speed, no matter how solid his base might be, he would surely have been killed by the forces of Life.

The same was true for Alexander: if he had not grown at an unusual rate, his army would have been crushed countless times.

The consequences of such a choice for a highly exposed person would have been devastating. Helial had chosen a terribly difficult path. Even after ten years, catching up with others would have been like climbing a mountain of knives with bare hands.

"What is an extremely lucky and at the same time extremely unlucky person called?" Alexander asked, absorbed in his thoughts.

"Your companion for two eons?" Bucephalus said, snorting.

Alexander chuckled. "I'll take that as a compliment."

The King turned his gaze to Helial.

The young man was suffering like never before in his life. It was as if a million sharp swords were tearing at his flesh, his muscles, every part of his body.

The pain was so penetrating that it had seized even the deepest part of Helial's brain, cancelling any possibility of using his senses.

The only thing Helial could feel, along with the pain, was a heat burning on him. He would have liked to tear off his skin, his muscles, break his bones, put an end to his existence, if only he could have used his hands ... His body was a real furnace, his skin completely red. It released a quantity of heat out of the ordinary.

Furthermore, all the nutrients present in Helial's body had been consumed. The boy's silhouette had become so slim that the bones protruded from his pale, fragile skin, about to crack.

Helial was a skeleton soaked in pain and despair.

The needles penetrated more and more into what remained of his body, more and more deeply and more and more violently. The joints emitted chilling screeches, the ligaments of the joints continued to detach with a dry SNAP. The tendons were ending the same painful end.

In the only moment of lucidity that Helial could grasp, he thought that only a corpse would remain of him. He seemed to see the darkness of death going towards him and wrapping him in the safety of the lack of pain.

It was all over.

He had wanted too much and hadn't acquired anything, but he hadn't regretted the choice he had made.

Yet, just as Helial felt that his last breath was about to leave his body, Iblis quickly changed the sequence of the Seals.

By now Helial was practically dead, reduced to shreds. His heart had already stopped beating. The blood moved for a few more seconds, driven by the inertia and poor resistance of his fragile vessels.

“We have just completed the first part of the process, the easy one. Your body has been destroyed, now we can start building."

Alexander looked at Iblis.

Helial's fight would take place in ten days. Alexander had estimated that the trial would take at least a month.

Shrugging and snapping his tongue, the King of Kings expressed his contempt for the passage of time. And, with a snap of the fingers, the Mana around the planet changed radically.

Alexander had already altered the laws of time and space for that planet, but now he had slowed them down to adjust the length of the trial.