Chapter 215: The Kidnapping [5]
Chapter 215: The Kidnapping [5]
***
Amon broke the arrow, his amethyst eyes glaring at the hooded figure before him.
A long red robe covered his body partly while a hood was pulled over his face, concealing his facial features.
Golden lines and engravings ran along the length of the robe, giving it a cult-like appearance.
The hooded figure didn't move, but his body stuttered for a second, seemingly taken aback by what Amon had just done.
"Spacial affinity?" His voice came out, glitched and surprised.
'Hmmm, didn't the news of my affinities spread throughout the kingdom? And how can he move under the influence of my skill?' Amon observed.
Amon deactivated [Void Eyes], seeing that he was still fine.
'Something is protecting him from my skill.' Amon noticed.
It was probably the robe or another artifact.
Or maybe he was stronger than his skill. Amon didn't know.
The man was too mysterious.
'Whatever, I'll just force everything out of him.' Amon brought down his arm, turning his complete body to him.
He wasted no time springing into action again.
The longer he would stay idle, it was to his disadvantage.
Without any word, Amon shot forward, summoning his nodachi.
No announcement came from above, giving him any warning or disqualification.
'Did they disable the camera artifact and sensors?' Amon noticed.
In any case, he didn't care about the battle royale anymore.
It was obvious that other cadets would be getting attacked right now as well.
Which meant that the rules were gone to shit now.
Looping a mixture of blood and void threads around his hand, Amon launched them forward.
"Wait, it's that kid!?" The member exclaimed.
So they did know about him. But they didn't seem to have seen his face or something.
It was too fishy.
The man gritted his teeth, quickly nocking an arrow in his bow while jumping back to create distance.
But his balance was disrupted when Amon summoned a crystal structure from the ground.
It latched to his legs, bringing him back down.
But Amon was suddenly surprised when he retrieved two daggers and slashed them at the crystal, breaking them.
Amon was taken aback.
To break such a strong crystal, there were two possibilities.
One, the daggers had to be decently powerful which didn't seem to be the case as they looked only like a normal tier 1 artifact.
Or, they had to be imbued with Anti-mana powder.
It was something that was only introduced a decade ago.
It was an invention by the Royal Family to even train the non-awakened and give them a chance to fight.
There were anti-mana weapons which were very expensive to be in the hands of a normal member.
Then there was a very cheap alternative called anti-mana powder.
It could be applied to any weapon to give it nullification properties. However, [Reality] type elements were unaffected by this nullification technique.
However, applying anti-mana powder was not only a temporary solution.
But with continuous use, it also ate away at the material of the weapon, destroying it.
'It's gonna be destroyed soon.'
Amon saw the member slash his daggers at the threads.
The blood threads were cleanly cut but...
The void threads latched at his limbs, shocking him.
Looking at his reaction, Amon wasn't surprised. Even though he knew about him having [Space] now, spatial threads weren't something heard of.
As the threads looped around his arm and seeped into his skin, drawing blood, Amon pulled
hard.
The man was thrown toward him.
That was all that Amon needed.
But mid-air, the air around the man suddenly swirled, halting his motion.
'Oh no you don't.'
Amon used [Voidstep] appearing right in front of the man.
Before the man could comprehend what happened, Amon clenched his fist, manipulating his blood.
His face suddenly moved toward, heading towards Amon's hand.
And in the next second...
Amon performed a clean slash with his lightning-coated nodachi, severing the man's head.
It flew in the air, leaving a trail of blood in its wake that landed on Amon's face.
Amon and the headless body landed on the ground, and the former gasped hard as he lay down on the ground.
"Huff...Huff...Huff...Huff..fuck." Amon cursed, panting hard.
'I'm wasting too much mana on these fights.'
He barely had half of his mana left now. And there were lots of fights to come.
Using too many elements at the same time was also a big headache.
And to think that this was just a simple member.
Catching his breath, Amon quickly stood up, making a dome of blood around him.
He examined the man's body.
Taking off the man's robe, Amon examined it and immediately, a status window opened in
front of him.
Amon's eyes widened as he stared at it.
It was a Tier-3 anti-mana artifact that could save the wearer from any attacks of that equivalent rank and below it.
It also saved you from any detection abilities and heightened your camouflage ability.
'So this was why I couldn't sense him huh.'
[And to think they gave it to just a nobody.] Vain said.
[Whoever they are, they are a strong group.]
Amon nodded.
Even though they appeared in the novel, nothing had ever been revealed about that.
Except for their name and some other things.
At that time in the novel, the war with the ghouls had started so no one could focus on them
much.
It was probably to be resolved after the main story ended but...
Amon had a gnawing feeling that they were even more if not equally dangerous to the ghouls.
Their name though. It was Decimated Abyss.
The reason or lore behind this name had also never been revealed.
In any case, Amon examined the member's body further.
The clothes on him were just a normal bodysuit, which also explained why his attacks could
get through on that.
Then, Amon pulled off his hood, revealing the man's face.
It wasn't anything special. They had brown hair and brown eyes.
Just an average face.
But as Amon was about to take his gaze off, he was suddenly halted by Vain.
[Stop.]
'Hmm?' He and Zephyra looked at him on his arm.
Vain traveled down on the man's body. Or more precisely his face.
And suddenly, his facial features started to mold and shape into something else.
A small chip suddenly separated from his skin, landing on the ground.
Amon picked it up and Vain spoke.
[It was an illusion artifact made to deform the face and hide it.] He explained.
'I see.'
Amon stared at the chip and another interface opened in front of him.
The chip was a tier 3 artifact that could deform a person's face to anything they imagined.
As long as no one touched their face for 5 seconds or more, the illusion could not be seen
through.
And if someone was higher ranked than the artifact, they could see through the illusion. Destroying the chip would also destroy the illusion.
Since Amon was a 3rd order, he had been unable to see through any illusion.
[You saw through it?] Zephyra asked with surprise.
Even her, as a goddess and a tier 9 familiar wasn't able to see through it.
But Vain hissed proudly.
[Of course, no illusion escapes my eyes.] It said.
Amon nodded.
"Makes sense."
Amon looked at the man's new face.
And his eyes instantly widened.
It was because...
Although his hair was still brown. His eyes were pure red.
It wasn't a color like Michael or Alya, who had a fiery crimson color. It was like the color of
pure blood.
But what took him by even more surprise was...
The small pointy horn on the man's head.
It wasn't protruding by a large amount but...
One could still not ignore the horns. Because there was only one species in the whole world that had horns on their head.
They were...
Ghouls.
'The fuck?' Amon exclaimed, falling on his back.
'The Decimated Heavens is a ghoul organization!?'
He couldn't believe it. The organization had been working in the human domain since
decades now.
And to think nobody had noticed it. Not even Arthur...
But there was another thing that took Amon by complete surprise.
He quickly turned over the man's head, looking for another horn but...
He found nothing.
'No, wait. Huh? The fuck?' He cursed again.
His thoughts were thrown into complete chaos.
A ghoul, no matter how weak or strong or anything, always had 2 horns on their head.
It was a sign of their identity, a sign of their race. The lone thing that could instantly
differentiate them from a human.
There were also the eyes but the horns were their most important feature.
It was also the thing that they took the most pride in, comparing the length of their horns that
signified their strength.
But...
The human before him only had one horn on his head.
And there was only a single explanation for this...
The member of the Decimated Heavens he was seeing before him...
Or this man...
Was a half-ghoul.
He was a cross breed between a ghoul and a human. Something never proved possible.