As I made my way to the cornfield, I could sense that someone else entered the wheat field behind me, it was most likely those two who finally put two and two together and found the first bandit hideout, but it was a little bit late for them to showcase their ability in that location.I shook my head. Gathering information and finding the base of the enemy should also be a test that they were failing right now.Coming second after everything had been taken care of couldn't be considered an accomplishment.Well, they were on their own.I made my way towards the cornfield, which was rather obvious to spot, even from a distance.This time around, I decided against sneaking around since the bandits must have put something in the fields that would notify them if anyone entered.I listened closely, using my improved hearing before I started to make my way through the cornfield until I found them.They were in a similar formation to the previous ones. However, if I could deal with the others
Those two attacked with no tact or plan.I knew they were urchins, but they should have gotten some memories from when they ate those corpses with me.It didn't make sense to do such a frontal attack...What were they up to?I was pretty curious about what their plan could be.They weren't suicidal, were they?From what could I see, their attacks were rather sloppy, and even through the darkness, the head honcho of the bandits didn't have any trouble keeping up with their attacks.He was still very wary of me attacking, after all, he knew that there were three people here, knowing that I was the one that killed all of his subordinates before the other two showed up.He kept his guard up for any sudden attack from his blindside, and he easily kept Miwa and Zerath at bay with his martial abilities.He knew how to swing his fist, his stance was airtight, and besides his sloppy looks, he knew where to hit and when to hit.His ability to block all of Miwa's crazed attacks combined with Zer
After the headache subsided, I finally got ahold of the new information in my brain.It was the technique that the sloppy bandit leader used against Miwa and Zerath.It was a straightforward knife technique that consisted of two moves, one was a counter, and the other one was a set of movements that complemented the short reach of the knife.That's how the bandit was able to keep both Miwa and Zerath at bay, even though they had similar strengths.It was a rather good technique, not inferior to the 12 moves of the fire god church basic swordsmanship. Of course, that was compared to my incomplete swordsmanship.I wasn't sure I would be able to master this swordsmanship unless I ate a master swordsman of this style after I completed all 12 moves beforehand.And I was pretty sure Aratas wouldn't give me such an opportunity.It was better to stick with something simpler that I now had more proficiency in unless I became lucky enough to encounter a situation where I could eat a master swor
Soon enough, I found myself back in the dungeons where Aratas was leading Zerath and Miwa further in as he let me stay near the cage of the martial matters that I first saw when we entered the dungeon for the first time.If I guessed correctly, my meal would be the six people chained to the walls that stood almost near each other in the jail.They all had a refined aura around them, regardless of how raggedy and weak they looked, and even though their bodies had lost a great deal of strength, I could still feel somewhat pressured by the pure power they previously wielded at their peak. It was ingrained in their bones, even though they might have lost it now.As I waited, Aratas came back and said:"Those two weren't able to eat six people, and they stopped at 4 and a half, but you should be able to, right? I don't want the cardinal to be disappointed with the efficiency of the squad that I raised personally, especially since we fed you so many prisoners."I looked at Aratas and said w
We made our way out of the city as Aratas lead us.There was something different about Miwa and Zerath, but I couldn't put my finger on it. However, they seemed to be a little more serious compared to the last time I saw them.Maybe they wouldn't be dead weight after all.Or at least, they wouldn't be extreme liabilities that would die in seconds on the battlefield.Aratas looked back at us as we exited the city and made our way toward a small clear stone path that lead to the open fields near the city."There is no quick path to the battlefield. This was an agreement made between the five Churches so we wouldn't overwhelm it with continuous and quick reinforcements."He slowly walked as we followed behind him, but as we increased our pace, the fields around us started to disappear as the surroundings started to change. I could feel that my body and the other two's were being enshrouded by Aratas's aura as we somehow were able to keep up with his speed.I looked at Aratas, and I was s
After getting rid of the corpses, I patted my stomach and looked around.From what I could see, I was at the outer skirts of the battlefield where most of the weaklings resided, trying to hide and avoid conflict.Those two I killed were relatively weak, barely out of the squire level.They were cannon fodder.After I relaxed, I could recall that the person I dropped onto looked somewhat scared, not expecting someone to drop out of the sky.As for the second one, I'm pretty sure he only attacked because I killed his companion, before I slashed his neck open, I could see his trembling hands.I cracked my knuckles as I could feel my strength increasing a little after I finished digesting the duo's corpses.Now that I reached another step in my devouring, my ability to withstand energy from multiple corpses has increased considerably. However, the increases in strength became less and less, of course, this most likely happened because I ate only weaklings!I wouldn't get any good meals at
The further I went, the bloodier the ground became, and the skies above me became darker and darker.I could smell the iron in the air to the point that it became toxic.There was too much blood in the air.A lot of people died in these parts.I wasn't sure if I could even count the number of corpses that should be buried under these decrepit lands.After I fought that Water God Church woman, I was unable to find any more prey, and it looked like they were either hiding or simply waiting in an ambush.However, I didn't want to trouble myself with ambushes, and the like, so I made sure to avoid suspect places.Walking further into the battlefield finally led me to the inner place, where all of the battles were going on!I didn't even arrive properly when an arrow was launched directly towards my head, which I dodged by slightly tilting my head to the side before throwing myself away from a gigantic water ball that almost hit me after I had dodged the arrow.I glanced towards three peop
My head was numb, I could feel my vision swimming, and my blood was pumping through my veins at an alarming rate.Both of my hearts were beating so fast I couldn't believe what was happening, was I excited about this fight?After we separated from the headbutt, I could feel some blood dripping from my forehead as I glanced at my enemy, only to find out that he was ok!But that didn't last for long as he clenched his hands around his head and groaned. It looked like he got some internal damage inside.It was a good time to attack, so I rushed toward him, taking out my knife in the process and stabbing directly towards his neck!But would it be that easy to kill a fellow cannibal with a lot of combat experience?With lightning reflexes he dodged the knife stab and grabbed me by the arm before he struck my elbow, making my whole skeleton shake as I dropped my knife to the ground!I took two steps backward as he claimed my knife for his own and covered it in lightning!The lightning spark
(WARNING, VERY LONG CHAPTER AHEAD!) The devil's red eyes were hypnotizingly horrid as they taunted me insidiously. The way he raised his eyebrow as he kept the leaders of the alliance bay e made me know that he was slowly getting his strength back. Sooner or later, he would be able to push both of them back and kill them! His body language told it so, the facts told it so, and the two alliance leaders knew it as well, it was obvious from the perspiration that was flowing down from their foreheads that things weren't as good as they seemed on the surface. Was death that close to me? I could feel blood gurgling in my throat as the devil sent a claw through space to immediately appear in front of my throat and pierce it. However, my instincts were still as sharp as ever, so I was able to barely take a step back before the claw would fully penetrate my throat and tear it out. I glared at the offending appendage that almost ripped my throat out, but a finger snap made the insides of
The devil didn't have enough time to retrieve all of his fragments, thus stopping at the strength of around 24 mastered laws. However, this amount of strength was still too high for me to deal with. The two alliance leaders nodded at each other before looking at me and saying: "You have done your best, but your incompetent allies dragged you down, you can go now, there is nothing you could do in this type of fight anymore." I wanted to leave since I was given permission, but could I? The devil's red eyes targeted me immediately after he regained his bearings from being hit by the dual uppercut. "You... yes, the fragments told me about you." "You have interfered with me countless times, do you think that I will let you go that easily?!" The devil opened his mouth and started to spit flames at me, his gigantic body immediately shrunk to a smaller human-sized form as he fought back and forth with the two alliance leaders, he knew that he wouldn't be able to recover all of his frag
I could feel my hearts jump into my throat as I looked at the recovering magic circle, I failed?I clutched my chest as I growled at the encircling demons, making them take a few steps back as they understood that they were way over their heads by attempting to attack me, even though I haven't fully recovered my energy after I launched that nuke at the immobile devil fragments, the 17 laws that flowed around my body created an impenetrable shield that not many people would be able to break.The demons may be scared by me, but they were all emboldened by the fact that one of the fragments had survived and melded with the magic circle!I wasn't entirely sure what the circle was supposed to do, but it was certainly nothing good.I wanted to fly towards it and break it apart now that there was no one to protect it, but the demons that were previously scared of me started to create a wall of bodies as they tightened the encirclement around me, the morale of the alliance had already dropped
The distance between the two black difficulty planets was quite far away, so it took me ten hours of traveling at my quickest speed to reach it.This time around, this new planet was on full defensive mode, the fragment I killed must have told the other nearby awakened pieces about what I had done to him before his death.But at this point, where my strength had reached a whooping 17 laws, 4 of them being a specialization law, how could the flimsy barrier around this planet even withstand my strength?I punched forward, making the barrier crack and break without even having to find its weak spots.The demons that were on standby for defense crumbled along with the barrier from the shockwaves of my initial attack...Most of them were weaklings that didn't even learn one law, it looked like the devil only left behind cannon fodder...There were no ambushes as I dropped down on the planet, the weaklings that were dumb enough to get near me were squashed to death by my aura as I didn't ev
The organs of the devil fragment were certainly quite larger compared to the demons or other races that I have encountered up till now.They had a certain heavy weight to them, and I could feel that they were hard to the touch, almost like a rock.They were also in different shapes compared to the average human, or even the average humanoid specie.The heart was in a triangle shape, the lungs were square, and the liver was just like a small ball.The intestines were quite short as they seemed to have evolved for utmost efficiency in energy conversion from the stomach to the whole body.I continued to analyze the shapes of the organs before I couldn't help but be curious about their taste.I took the triangle heart with both hands since it was quite heavy and big, and I started munching on it, splattering some blood on my face.The taste was very bland, toxic even, the organs of the devil were filled with a certain poisonous substance that even bypassed the poison-proof constitution th
After comforting Shira for a bit, I could feel my hands becoming quite itchy as I felt the need to test my newly gained strength.Even though the seven laws I have plundered could be considered inferior, quantity could still be used to crush the quality opposition when it was in a high enough number.As long as my opponent had eight or below laws, I should be able to easily deal with them, as for nine and above. I had to fight someone at that level to understand my place on the strength scales a little better.I wasn't sure about the powers of the top dogs of the universe, so I had to slowly find out while messing with the devil's plans in passing.A fully awakened devil fragment who was able to get his hands on the seven sins would be equal to a normal being that had learned and mastered seven laws.He would be the perfect test partner.Fortunately, I could easily infer the location of such heavily infected planets through the alliance's medal.I was able to find out about the locati
After we left the vacation planet, we started to attack low-level corrupted planets that had a few law-wielding demons.The experimentation started from there.I started by dissecting the demons and seeing how the laws were embedded in their bodies after they have mastered them.I have attempted to learn from introspection, but I could not properly see all angles inside my body, and some places were obscured for some reason.Now, by dissecting these weaker demons, I was able to infer how the laws would settle in the body, and by extension, I might be able to learn how I could apply the devouring ability to strip them of their laws and make them mine.From what I found out, the first law would settle near the heart in the form of the element that was comprehended.The second would go onto one lung, the third on the other...Atleast that's what I thought it would go like considering that I was only able to slay and dissect demons that wielded up to 2 laws.I was able to somewhat see the
With the usage of a few bribes and some 'honeyed words' I was able to immediately regain control over the organization.I sat in the control room of the barrier as I made some adjustments to it, slowly incorporating the runes and other features that I have been able to master during the time I have been controlling the Ice Palace's barrier.This place needed an upgrade, and all I had to do was change a few things on the medium to make those changes, no extra materials were needed! Quite convenient.I had to fill my time with something while my underlings were doing their best to find out the things that I inquired about.Surprisingly, this academy had a library with quite a lot of books filled with neat tidbits of information. However, during my time in the academy, I didn't seem to be able to find such a library, even though I had visited most of the corridors and other important rooms of the academy...Quite strange...I even asked Shira if she knew that the academy had a library, b
Shira seemed to be the same, but also quite different at the same time, almost as if she was a familiar person that I haven't seen in a long while that changed so much that she was almost unrecognizable, but I would still know her because of small things, like her voice, her face, etc...Shira took my hand into hers, it was cold, very cold, it looked like she had entirely changed from her previous fire-based nature to an ice one, such a drastic shift... it should have been really painful and deadly for her.And she didn't even come to me even once when she thought about doing such a thing, was she thinking for my sake, or did she think that I would dissuade her from doing such a perilous experiment?I hugged her tightly, and she hugged me back, while her appearance and demeanor had small changes, her personality seemed to be the same.Shira giggled lightly as she broke off the hug and said:"Oww, you were worried about me?"I nodded lightly at her question and asked with a little worr