Chapter Ten

  Karsu spat blood.

  Red droplets struck the earthen ground—but they did not remain red. At the edges, they blackened. They crept beneath his skin in fine threads, as though searching for a path.

  He looked at his hand.

  The wound in his chest bled slowly… yet the pain did not behave like the pain of a wound.

  He drew his aura toward his chest.

  Pressed it.

  Once.

  Twice—

  Nothing.

  More blood flowed.

  His eyes narrowed slightly.

  So it is real poison… not Qaz poison.

  A cold sting slipped into his shoulder. Immediately after came a searing heat deep within his chest. A contradictory sensation, as though his body could not decide whether to freeze or burn.

  He breathed slowly.

  Tried to steady his pulse.

  Failed.

  —

  The ground trembled.

  Not a gradual warning. No prelude.

  A sudden quake that severed thought.

  He leapt back without conscious intent.

  The earth exploded where he had stood. Rocks scattered, soil split, and something massive surged from below.

  A glossy black body, thick rings contracting and expanding. A circular maw agape, rows of rotating teeth grinding stone as if it were crumbs.

  The Shatter Worm.

  Karsu landed several meters away, his left palm touching the ground to regain balance. The pain in his chest flared upon impact. He did not allow it to linger.

  He raised his gaze.

  On a distant rooftop, two hands moved in wide gestures.

  The Lord of Subjugation.

  So… the eagle was merely a prelude.

  The worm turned toward him. Its rings compressed. The earth beneath it cracked as it crawled a single step.

  Then it stopped.

  Waiting.

  For a single command.

  The few remaining white threads coiled around Karsu's right fingers. Far fewer than he needed. He did not release them yet.

  His eyes swept the surroundings.

  Rubble behind him. A fractured wall to his right. Interwoven shadows to his left.

  Empty space… too much of it.

  Where are the others?

  —

  "Yo? How are you? Hahaha!"

  The voice came from behind.

  He did not turn.

  His body tilted sideways before the decision formed.

  A massive fist crashed into the space he had occupied. The ground shattered beneath it. Cracks branched rapidly, quivering under his feet.

  He turned.

  A huge bald man grinned broadly, as though the battle were an entertaining spectacle. His hand remained buried in the crater he had made. A necklace of fangs hung from his neck, and the tattoos on his chest pulsed faintly.

  One.

  —

  Heat.

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  A fleeting sensation brushed past his ear.

  He tilted his head.

  A red beam lashed forward like a whip, grazing his face. The air burned around it. The tip curved suddenly mid-swing—not like a rigid weapon, but like a living thing pursuing prey.

  It came again, aiming for his neck.

  A short leap backward. The pain in his chest flared with the motion. He ignored it.

  The whip cleaved the ground where he had stood moments before. The scent of burning rose.

  A few steps away stood a slender woman raising her arm. Her hair burned like frozen flame. Her eyes fixed upon him without blinking.

  Two.

  —

  The ground beneath his feet… changed.

  Not mere trembling. His weight suddenly grew heavier. Then lighter. Then heavier again, as though gravity itself staggered.

  Three.

  He lifted his eyes. A thin man stood atop ruined masonry, arms extended, the air around him wavering like a mirage.

  —

  A shadow passed to his left.

  He did not see it—he heard it.

  The sound of metal slicing air.

  He bent without thought.

  Three knives embedded into the earth beside his foot. The spacing between them was precise. Had he not bent, the first would have taken his neck, the second his heart, the third his abdomen.

  No scent. No sound.

  Transparency.

  —

  Coordination.

  Training.

  A calculated group assault.

  The worm behind him moved slowly, narrowing the distance. The earth trembled with each contracting ring.

  A thin mist began seeping between the rubble. Half-transparent. Moving against the wind.

  On a distant rooftop, radiant eyes glimmered. Not attacking. Analyzing.

  And at the entrance to the area… a man in a brown jacket stood steadily. He did not move. He only watched.

  The white threads around Karsu's fingers quivered.

  The poison spread further beneath his skin. His shoulder grew heavier. His breathing slowed more than it should.

  He did not have enough to repel all this.

  The worm behind him.

  Three attacking from the front.

  Knives from the left.

  Stones from above.

  Mist crawling from behind.

  Gravity playing with his feet.

  No gap.

  No blind angle.

  Every corner calculated. Every exit sealed.

  He lifted his gaze to the sky for a brief moment—not in appeal. In calculation.

  He closed the space within his mind.

  … Finished.

  They had arrived.

  —

  He looked around slowly.

  The Lord of Flame. The Lord of Sand. The Lord of Shadow. The Lord of Subjugation—the Shatter Worm. The Lord of Gravity. The Lord of Transparency. The Lord of Steam. The Lady of Radiance. And the brown-jacketed man at the entrance.

  He counted them in his head.

  Nine.

  Nine.

  Ten were coming.

  Where—

  —

  He counted again mentally, making certain.

  He had not erred.

  Ten were coming.

  Where is the tenth?

  He found no time for an answer.

  —

  The worm lunged.

  Its black body shot like an arrow, its circular maw opening wide, rows of teeth spinning like a colossal mill.

  Karsu leapt sideways. The pain in his chest flared, the poison coursing faster through his veins with the motion. He landed upon wooden debris, his balance wavering briefly.

  The huge bald man was there. His wide grin had not left his face.

  "Welcome, my friend!"

  A second punch. This time he could not evade entirely. The edge of the fist grazed his left shoulder. He felt the bones there fracture from the mere glancing touch.

  He rolled across the ground and rose quickly.

  The red whip lashed again—not at him, but at the scattered white threads. It coiled around them and pulled. The threads snapped easily beneath the power of the beams.

  She is cutting my threads, Karsu noted. This lady… her whip—her hands—are designed to sever metallic Qaz threads.

  —

  The ground beneath him shifted—not shaking, but a sudden loss of weight. For an instant he felt he would float.

  The Lord of Gravity.

  He seized the moment and leapt higher than he should have, making himself an exposed target.

  Knives came from nothing.

  Three, four, five—he did not see their source, only felt them cutting the air toward him.

  In the air, no escape.

  Yet he did not need one.

  Something wrapped around his waist and yanked him downward with force before the knives could strike by mere centimeters.

  His white thread. The only one left. He had anchored it to a protruding stone before the leap.

  He slammed into the ground hard, air driven from his lungs.

  The poison climbed to his shoulder. His right hand began to numb.

  He looked around.

  The worm returning. The whip coiling. Stones aligning midair like arrows. Gravity distorting his footing. Knives appearing from nothing. Mist advancing.

  All within seconds.

  —

  No time.

  No energy.

  No choice.

  He breathed.

  He felt the Mother Aura within his depths. That distant source he did not use except in utmost necessity—at least for now.

  He had used it moments ago to scatter them. Now…

  I will use it to finish them.

  —

  Karsu stood upright, his face smeared with dirt and dust mixed with blood.

  He looked around, assessing every possibility.

  His expression changed… it grew heavier.

  He fixed his current positioning: the Lord of Flame and the Lord of Sand to his left; the newly arrived Qaz Lords to his right; and in the center stood the bald man alone before him.

  Further back stood the Lord of Subjugation.

  And at the entrance, the brown-jacketed man remained—the same one who had not moved since the beginning.

  Behind him? An iron wall.

  Excellent.

  —

  As Karsu's expression shifted, the surrounding atmosphere shifted as well. If before he had seemed like a lone wolf surrounded by hyenas, now the perspective altered—a wounded beast before mere scavengers…

  Rashid noticed this change, as did a few others among the Qaz Lords—namely the Lords of Steam and Shadow.

  —

  "Hahaha!" The bald man laughed, eyes brimming with confidence as he stared at Karsu.

  He began advancing in quickened strides: one, two, four, ten—and faster still.

  As his speed increased, so did his build change. His muscle mass swelled, his body enlarged, and his jacket tore and shredded as he advanced proudly, activating the Qaz of Strength.

  "Wait!" Rashid shouted, sensing something wrong in the stranger before them. The stranger's emotions had shifted strangely.

  No longer turbulent… they had stilled completely and transformed into… confidence? How could that be? Ten Qaz Lords, nearly all second rank, and he alone!

  With evident doubt and tension, Rashid said slowly, "Is he truly confident of victory…"

  Thus he shouted to halt the Lord of Strength before he rushed into a lone, uncoordinated assault.

  But before Rashid could act, he was stopped. Not by the Lord of Strength—but by a hand touching his shoulder. When Rashid saw the hand, he immediately knew its owner: the Lord of Steam.

  "What? Why stop me? Do you not see the danger?!" Rashid shouted, brushing the hand away.

  But the reply came swiftly: "We have not yet seen all the enemy's abilities. It would be better if we force him to use a powerful technique for merely one of us, rather than all of us being affected. Think rationally."

  Rashid was utterly shocked by those words. He was literally using his comrade as a test subject!

  But it was too late. He could no longer stop the Lord of Strength at this distance.

  "Hahaha, come!" he roared in wild excitement as he charged at insane speed toward Karsu, shattering the ground beneath him.

  At that moment, had someone observed from afar, they would have sworn that for an instant the silhouette of a predatory orange tiger appeared, synchronized with the emergence of fangs along the surface of the Lord of Strength's palm. Savage fangs, powerful, long, and sharp.

  Yet that was not the only noticeable thing here… for from the stranger emanated an ominous and far greater sense of danger than the predator before him.

  Karsu's eyes were exceedingly cold, dark black, his face composed despite fatigue, blood, and wounds. He closed his eyes briefly. Contemplating?

  He opened them.

  He vanished!

  Again, as before, he was no longer in his place.

  But this time black threads appeared where he had stood. Perhaps he had grown slower from exhaustion? It did not matter.

  What mattered was that one thing became certain: he did not possess instantaneous teleportation—only insane speed!

  That was the analysis of the sole observer who noticed—the Lord of Steam.

  —

  With a faint yet resounding sound—and in a manner that astonished, no, shocked them all—

  Karsu appeared atop the back of the Lord of Strength, driving his sword into the back of his neck until the blade reached its hilt…

  "Ahh…" Eyes filled with shock, disbelief, doubt, and rage!

  He tried to lift his gaze to see what had happened, but he could not.

  He spat blood. His nose began to bleed.

  In that moment, he heard nothing but his own breathing and the droplets of blood falling onto the wooden ground beneath him.

  He attempted to resist or move—but to no avail.

  Within seconds, his body—which had equaled two grown men or more—began to weaken and shrink, his muscles fading little by little.

  At the same time, Karsu withdrew his sword from his back with perfect smoothness, as though pulling it not from flesh and bone and muscle—but from dough.

  Karsu descended calmly, unperturbed, looking around and saying in a toneless voice—as if counting numbers, not killing men:

  "First."

  —

  For a moment, his left foot faltered—the poison had reached his knee—but he steadied himself quickly. No time to show weakness.

  —

  Across from him, the Qaz Lords stood in shock, their emotions varied: some disturbed, some saddened, some pleased, others indifferent.

  The only one who truly grieved the death of the Lord of Strength was Rashid, who cast a murderous glare at both Karsu and the Lord of Steam beside him.

  Disgusted with them, he said angrily, "Had you not stopped me, this would not have happened and he would not have died!"

  Contrary to expectation—or perhaps exactly as expected—the Lord of Steam looked indifferent and said:

  "Not my problem. Even if you had tried to stop him, he would have ignored you and continued the attack. I knew him. His personality was the same: savage. Though I do not deny the influence of Qaz upon the mind—sometimes it makes the upright incline toward killing, or the calm flare with anger—yet the Qaz of Strength, though it increases recklessness and savagery, does not make you a fool. He chose to attack. He bears his responsibility. Do not place another's burden upon me."

  Those words only increased Rashid's fury.

  Before he could respond, the Lord of Steam interrupted:

  "Let us focus on our mission now. Any conflict that arises between us will make that Thread Lord there the happiest man here. So postpone the discussion until after."

  —

  Rashid looked at Karsu, then at the shrinking corpse of the Lord of Strength, then at the cold Lord of Steam. His teeth ground together—but he fell silent.

  On the battlefield, Karsu stood alone, poison creeping through his veins, the few remaining white threads coiling around his fingers.

  And the tenth… was still unseen.