Chapter 1150 Devotee <TOC> Chapter 1152 The Demon's Transformation
Translator: SumTLMan
Angel made a crouching dash, managing to sidestep the demon’s gnashing attempt to tear into him.
Unfazed by its failed attack, the demon turned its head back to Angel, its gaze filled with a hunger that was chillingly palpable.
Drip, drip, drip——
From its gaping maw oozed a fetid saliva, pooling on the ground below.
Angel could clearly see the ground hiss and smoke where the drool landed, and a plume of white vapor curled up from the affected spots.
Corrosive, he realized. The starving demon’s mouth, occupying nearly two-thirds of its face, spread in a snarl and lunged once more towards him.
Angel deftly dodged by springing off the ground multiple times, expertly avoiding the subsequent onslaught.
In the midst of these close-quarters evasions, Angel gleaned some information from the demon. The creature was formidable, but it had suffered grave injuries that severely weakened it and seemed to have impacted its mental faculties.
This was why it hadn’t exerted its oppressive aura from the outset and its movements were so unsteady. Under such circumstances, Angel could temporarily keep it at bay with his speed and agility.
But this wasn’t a sustainable plan.
Dust billowed, and pebbles scattered. Angel had tried to counterattack during his evasive maneuvers but found all his offensive tactics ineffective against the demon.
Throughout this cat-and-mouse chase, Angel noticed a glint of hunger in the demon’s eyes, as if it regarded him as nothing more than a meal. The creature’s desire was glaringly apparent.
If he faltered for even a moment, Angel was certain he would end up as a course in the demon’s ghoulish feast.
Even while dodging, Angel was racking his brain for a plan. Currently trapped in a nearly sealed underground hall, escape was not an option, and he couldn’t face the demon head-on. He was like a turtle in a jar, doomed to be snatched up by the demon as his energy and magic dwindled.
What was he to do?
As Angel’s mind raced, the demon lunged at him again. He prepared to sidestep as before, and he did succeed.
However, just as Angel circumvented the demon, a wave of dizziness hit him, rendering him completely immobile.
His heart dropped into his stomach. As the demon snapped out of its stupor and wheeled around to pounce on him, Angel was thankful that he’d been reciting the Mysterious Soul Whisper incantation under his breath during his evasions. As soon as he realized he couldn’t move, his soul sprang from his body, dragging it to the other end of the hall.
It was in this moment that Angel discovered that the hall he’d been evading the demon in had nearly been overtaken by a white mist.
This mist was all a result of the drool that fell from the demon’s mouth to the ground!
“So, the dizziness before was because of this white mist?” Angel was startled, swiftly using the Path of the Soul Realm to cast a first-level trick on his physical body: Disease Detection.
The result showed he had been poisoned!
“The drool of this demon not only has a corrosive effect, but it’s also toxic?!”
Although he could use the first-level trick ‘Expel Toxin’ to remove this toxin that caused him to be mentally disoriented and physically paralyzed, it was a substantial burden on his magic source that was already on the brink of exhaustion.
Moreover, the demon kept dripping saliva. As long as it continued to chase him, the whole hall would soon be engulfed by poisonous miasma.
At that time, even if he still had the strength to run, escape would be impossible.
“What should I do?” Angel kept questioning himself internally, but still could find no solution.
His gaze slowly moved to the statue of the Cruel Scholar in the middle, contemplating: Is this your punishment?
Trapping him here with the rune, and then awakening this starving demon, making him ultimately the demon’s meal?
If this truly was the Cruel Scholar’s scheme, then his hope of survival was almost nil.
How could he beg for life if a Great Demon God wanted him dead?
In his dazed and despairing state, the demon once again lunged at him with its awkward floating steps, drooling all the way, stirring up more white mist.
“I’m so hungry… so hungry…” the demon lunged towards him.
Listening to its subconscious cries in the Demonic Language, a thought struck Angel. As he evaded, he took out a piece of magic meat from his bracelet and threw it into the demon’s mouth.
The demon paused after consuming the magic meat. It did not continue chasing Angel but sat in place, smacking its lips as it chewed.
The demon did not drool while it was eating.
Only after it had finished the magic meat did the drool start dripping again, and it resumed its pursuit of Angel.
Upon noticing this, Angel understood that this demon was simply famished, and at this point, it would stuff anything into its mouth.
Looking at the loose layers of skin on the demon’s body, Angel wondered: Could it be that this creature, like Bruen, is actually an overweight individual who has merely grown thin due to extreme hunger?
Angel felt as though he had unearthed the truth.
To prevent the production of more white mist, Angel temporarily assumed the role of a feeder. During his Feeding, the demon remained motionless, just waiting for food to be shoved into its mouth.
However, this method was not a long-term solution either.
Though the Magic Nourish Meat could continually proliferate, it still required the nourishment of magic power. Even though the magic energy consumption was relatively minor, if the demon was only depleting without replenishing, the magic source would eventually run dry.
A solution had to be found for this demon.
Observing the demon seemingly relishing its meal, a sudden thought sprang in Angel’s mind, “What if… I tried poisoning it?”
…
This was a spacious room adorned with cryptic blood runes. In the center of the room, a heart was mysteriously levitating in mid-air.
The heart continued to beat, its rhythmic thumps causing a faint glow to pulsate within the eerie blood runes on the walls.
Iadase, looking at this heart, had a gleam of covetousness flashing within his eyes from beneath his bone helmet.
This was the heart of a Lord-level demon.
It had once been found by chance by Baphomet. It originally intended to homogenize the heart by utilizing the blood runes drawn on the wall. Once the frequency aligned with its own, it planned to transplant this heart into its own body.
However, Baphomet had since perished.
Consequently, this heart was now an ownerless object. The reason Iadase left the underground hall in such a hurry was to claim it first.
To shatter the barrier outside, Iadase had expended considerable effort. Now, it was finally time to reap the fruits of his labor.
Iadase extended his hand, slowly reaching for the heart.
The moment Iadase grasped the heart, before he could even feel the pulsating powerful energy, an indistinct howl suddenly echoed in his ears.
He looked towards the source of the sound, puzzled.
The noise originated from the underground hall. To his astonishment, Iadase discovered that the hall was enveloped by a light pattern, preventing him from seeing anything within.
This light pattern was something he recognized — it was a rune!
Surely, the master rune node had been destroyed, so why would a rune appear? Moreover, that previous howl, Iadase found it all too familiar… It unmistakably belonged to Iuppiter!
Iadase had previously discovered that Iuppiter had fainted in the underground hall, and most of its energy had been drained by the uninvited guest.
Due to the various incidents that ensued, Iadase hadn’t paid any more attention to Iuppiter, who had fallen into a deep coma.
Who could have expected that Iuppiter would awaken at this moment?
Even if it awakened, it wouldn’t matter much as its power had now declined to the realm below a Great Demon, hence, it wouldn’t significantly impact the situation. But why did the underground light rune reappear precisely at this time?
Doubts arose within Iadase. He originally planned to continue towards the higher levels of the Void Obelisk to search for the treasures hidden in the room of Minotaur. However, due to the sudden change in the underground hall, he lost interest.
After stowing the heart, Iadase hastily made his way downwards.
Sensing the underground anomaly was not limited to Iadase. When Iadase arrived at the first level, he happened to observe the bulky, grotesque Popoca, who looked as if he had been plucked straight from a horror film, ambling down the hallway.
Iadase, as before, met Popoca’s gaze with a hostile glint in his eyes, though he didn’t take any action.
Popoca, on the other hand, had an enigmatic cocktail of emotions brewing in his eyes, a chilling indifference mingling with rampant insanity. They were opposing sentiments that, against all odds, harmonized flawlessly within him.
He too caught sight of Iadase, but he merely graced Iadase with a sinister smirk before sauntering past him, making a beeline for the underground grand hall.
Iadase hesitated for a moment before deciding to follow him.
Upon descending the staircase, he spotted Popoca quietly standing at the entrance of the grand hall, peering inside through the main door.
Iadase noted that Popoca’s gaze had taken on an additional layer of inexplicable strangeness, a departure from the extreme contradictions that previously marked his demeanor.
Could something out of the ordinary have taken place inside? And why was Popoca lingering at the door without entering?
By the time Iadase descended, he was astonished to find the grand door veiled by a layer of glowing runes, effectively rendering entrance impossible.
Yet, despite the rune-covered barrier, he could still glimpse the interior of the grand hall.
When Iadase looked inside, he was momentarily stunned.
What had he witnessed?
Had the wings of the statue of the Cruel Scholar, located at the center of the hall, spread open?!
The statue was the descent medium of the Cruel Scholar. If the statue stirred, it signified the reemergence of the Scholar’s consciousness!
Why had it made an appearance? Was it planning to intervene in the ongoing contest between the Profound Lord and Gazing Abyssal Eye?
The possibility seemed remote even in Iadase’s own conjecture. What could possibly be the rationale behind the reappearance of the Scholar’s consciousness?
With these questions nagging at him, Iadase slowly shifted his gaze towards the other side of the hall. When he caught sight of the scene unfolding before him, he was dumbstruck.
Why would the shopkeeper of the Phantasmagoria Cabin show up here? And his current actions seemed as if… he was Feeding Iuppiter?!
Chapter 1150 Devotee <TOC> Chapter 1152 The Demon's Transformation