Within a few short seconds.
The entire carriage had been reduced to a heap of wreckage emitting white smoke. The black liquid churned atop the remains for a moment before seeping back into the gaps between the stone slabs.
The street was thick with the acrid, corrosive scent of acid.
Lu Yuan rolled to his feet. The Nightwatcher driving the carriage had been thrown against the base of a wall; he let out a muffled groan and pushed himself up, one hand already gripping the hilt of the blade at his waist.
Lu Yuan looked ahead.
Three figures appeared.
Directly in front, a form flickered into existence within the shadow of a streetlamp. Half of her face was covered by a greyish-white mask, and her lips were curled into a cold, mirthless smile.
It hadn't even been fifteen minutes since they left the Count's Mansion. She was already here.
It was Jie.
A man dropped silently from the top of the high wall to the right. He looked to be in his thirties with an unremarkable face—the kind of face one wouldn't look at twice in a crowd.
However, the black liquid on his body betrayed everything. It constantly oozed out from his skin and retreated back in, flowing in a slow, rhythmic cycle.
Grey-white text flickered into view.
【Target Detected: Grey Covenant Member (Eerie Transcendent) (Polluted)】
【A strange eerie existence, a pilgrim who has discarded his human identity.】
When Lu Yuan saw this, he immediately realized that this man was most likely J.
A third figure stepped out from the alleyway to the left.
His chitinous skin was covered in a dense network of old scars, each one a mark left by the gnawing of insects. Yet his pace was steady and his aura deep and heavy, a stark contrast to the half-dead state he had been in when he was being devoured by the insect tide underground.
【Target Detected: Grey Covenant Member ‘9’ (Mutation Transcendent)】
【A human who borrowed His power; seems to have recovered significantly.】
It was ‘9’, nearly back to full strength.
Three rank 4s, coming from three directions, sealing off all avenues of retreat.
Kraus had already stood up.
The bone ring on his ring finger began to deform, the bone-colored material extending slowly along his finger.
Halfway through the transformation, his movements faltered slightly.
Lu Yuan noticed it; Kraus’s shoulders slumped a fraction, and his breathing rhythm slowed.
On the stone walls of the high fences on either side, inscription patterns lit up. A ghostly blue light spread across the stone surfaces, extending all the way to the end of the street.
The moment Kraus utilized his eerie power, Bronze City was alerted.
That layer of light pressed down upon Kraus.
The three opponents, however, felt nothing.
Jie tilted her head as she looked at Kraus, the curve of her lips narrowing slightly but not vanishing entirely.
“I didn't expect the injured Vice Director to still have such sharp reflexes.”
Her tone still held that coquettish lilt, but this time it was layered with a vein of hatred.
She paused, her gaze sweeping over the bandages on Kraus’s body before returning to his face.
“But how much strength do you truly have left now?”
J, on the right, said nothing; the black liquid flowed silently over his body.
‘9’, on the left, remained equally silent. No expression showed on his chitinous face, but his aura surged constantly, as if he were prepared to settle all past scores on Kraus’s body.
Jie smiled again, but the expression was different now—less playful, more cold.
“We’ll settle the debt for ‘8’ today as well. Bronze City makes a fitting tomb for you.”
Kraus’s hand tightened on his bone blade.
The bone ring finished its transformation; his right hand now held a bone-colored short-blade.
It was a section shorter than its normal form.
Lu Yuan retreated two steps, pulling the Nightwatcher driver toward the base of the wall as he lowered his voice.
“Don't move. This isn't something you or I can get involved in.”
The driver gripped his sword, his face deathly pale and his lips trembling.
“But the Vice Director is in danger... I...”
“Don't speak,” Lu Yuan said, pressing a hand onto the man's shoulder.
Kraus glanced back at Lu Yuan.
“Take him and leave.”
Lu Yuan didn't move. All three directions were sealed; there was nowhere to go.
Kraus didn't say it a second time. He turned, facing the encroaching auras from three sides simultaneously.
“Rest in peace,” Jie’s voice fell.
Then, the three of them moved at once.
‘9’ was the fastest. At the same moment his chitinous arm hacked down from the left, J’s black liquid surged up from the ground on the right, condensing into three blade-like spikes that thrust toward Kraus’s back from different angles.
Jie’s form flickered twice, appearing five paces behind Kraus and three paces directly in front of him, sealing both directions simultaneously.
Three lines of attack converged and fell at the same moment.
Kraus’s bone blade parried ‘9’s chitinous arm. The sound of metal clashing against carapace echoed through the narrow street, dull yet piercing. He was forced back a step, his heel grinding a white mark into the stone slabs.
When J’s three liquid blades thrust from his flank, Kraus managed to twist his body to avoid two of them; the third grazed his coat, scorching a charred line through the fabric.
Jie did not strike yet, but a dangerous aura constantly radiated from her. She was clearly preparing something as she held her position, calmly watching the scene unfold.
‘9’s chitinous arm did not pause for a second.
After the first strike was parried, the second followed immediately, hacking down in a continuous barrage. Simultaneously, J’s liquid surged from the ground again, spreading out like a net beneath Kraus’s feet in an attempt to ensnare his shins.
Kraus leaped to avoid the liquid net, but ‘9’s second strike changed angle mid-air, shifting from a hack to a horizontal sweep. The edge of the chitinous arm grazed his ribs.
Kraus stumbled upon landing, his knee nearly buckling; he only stabilized himself by bracing his bone blade against the ground.
Lu Yuan’s hands clenched. He knew that Kraus only had one chance to strike.
Currently, Kraus was like a dancer on the edge of a cliff, hiding a sharpened knife while seeking the opportunity for a single, lethal blow.
The frequency of ‘9’s attacks began to accelerate. Each strike from his chitinous arm was heavier than the last, shaking Kraus back half a step with every blow.
J’s coordination was flawless. Every time Kraus parried ‘9’s frontal assault, the liquid would sprout blades from the side or beneath him, forcing him to divert his energy to a second line of attack in the gaps of his defense.
Kraus remained calm, green light flashing across his body as he appeared to be struggling with all his might to cope.
Jie remained on the periphery. The aura surrounding her grew increasingly dense as her form flickered between positions, blocking every possible path of escape for Kraus.
Though Lu Yuan didn't know exactly what Jie was doing, he knew Kraus was running out of time.
Lu Yuan stayed pressed against the wall, watching the battle.
The Grey Covenant ignored him and the driver; two low-level Nightwatchers weren't worth the distraction. Their entire focus was on Kraus.
At that moment, the aura gathering around Jie finally condensed. She spoke again.
Her form flickered to Kraus’s flank, and she spoke airily.
“How does it feel? Having Bronze City suppress you is quite unpleasant, isn't it?”
Kraus didn't answer. His bone blade blocked another frontal hack from ‘9’; his arms were numb from the vibration, and he was forced back another half step.
Jie tilted her head, her smile vanishing.
“Now you can die.”
The moment the words fell, the aura Jie had been accumulating for so long exploded.
An invisible wave rippled outward from her, carrying the corrosive mental erosion unique to the Grey Covenant, striking directly at Kraus’s consciousness.
Even from over a dozen paces away, Lu Yuan felt it. It felt as if someone had swung a sledgehammer into his brain. Two lines of grey-white text jumped frantically.
【Warning: Mental erosion wave detected... Please move away immediately!】
At the same instant, J moved.
Black liquid poured out from his body in a volume far exceeding any of his previous attacks.
The liquid no longer condensed into blades. Instead, it erupted from the ground in all directions like a black tide surging from the cracks in the stone, closing in on Kraus’s position and blotting out the sky.
From above, below, left, and right, the black water converged in the air, intent on completely swallowing Kraus.
‘9’ charged from the front, his chitinous arm laden with power and the patterns across his body glowing at their maximum intensity as he hacked toward Kraus’s head.
Three lines of attack fell simultaneously.
This was the culmination of everything the Grey Covenant had been building toward throughout the entire fight.
Lu Yuan saw it.
At this moment, Kraus finally made his move.
He finally stopped hiding. He had finally waited for the only opportunity to get close to Jie.
His body lunged forward violently. The bone blade in his hand surged an inch in length as green light exploded from the edge.
He chose to ignore ‘9’s frontal hack. He ignored the closing tide of black water. He threw his entire being into a charge toward Jie.
He was going to kill Jie first.
No one expected him to dare to charge, let alone that Kraus could still erupt with such power.
Lu Yuan’s hand was already inside his inner pocket.
The Inscription Silver Plate Bolen had given him. Bolen had said this item could briefly mobilize the inscription power of Bronze City.
If he could use the power of the inscriptions to suppress the Grey Covenant—even for just a fraction of a second.
Lu Yuan gripped one and activated the silver plate.
The inscriptions on the silver plate lit up, and a silver-white wave rippled out from Lu Yuan’s hand.
The wave struck the ghostly blue inscription light on the walls, and the two types of inscriptions caused a momentary interference.
Nothing happened to the three members of the Grey Covenant.
But everything changed for Kraus.
The invisible shackles pressing down on him suddenly snapped the moment the silver-white wave washed over him.
The suppression of Bronze City vanished in that instant.
Kraus was mid-charge toward Jie.
The moment the suppression vanished, his speed exploded.
A dark green light surfaced in his eyes. His form blurred into afterimages—two, three, four Krauses stacked together, staggered by less than a heartbeat.
The bone blade swelled during the charge, the bone-colored material expanding and extending until it became a bone sword the height of a man. Green light surged along the spine of the blade, covering every inch of the bone surface.
The bandages on his wrist snapped as the bone ring extended, the fragments fluttering down onto the stone slabs.
Jie’s mental erosion wave slammed into Kraus.
However, a rank 4 eerie transcendent at full strength possessed mental defenses on an entirely different level compared to when he was suppressed. The corrosive wave washed over him, causing his pace to falter for only a mere fraction of a second.
Jie’s expression changed drastically.
The killing move she had prepared throughout the entire battle had almost zero effect on a full-strength Kraus!
Her form flickered as she tried to retreat.
But it was already too late.
Rate on N.U.
