Eldritch Horror Theatre

’A truly excellent attack. I have received your resolve.’

In a fleeting flash, the Greatsword, the white radiance, and the headless swordsman all vanished into nothingness.

Along with them went one of Fu Qian’s arms.

He hadn’t been making an empty show of strength, but burning himself away.

In the end, the White-Hot Knight’s attack had been fully unleashed.

As a result, Fu Qian’s entire right arm and shoulder had instantly vaporized, leaving a wound that could not be repaired anytime soon.

Just like the previous stab wound to his chest, the destruction ran far deeper than superficial flesh and blood.

The knight’s final act of severing his own head had indeed rendered that white radiance purer and far harder to resist.

’Truly worthy of a Tier 2 combatant,’ Fu Qian mused. ’It has been a long time since this seat suffered a wound like this.’

Examining his mangled body and the seemingly familiar sensation of crystallization at the wound, Fu Qian turned sideways and offered a slight bow to the empty air to express his gratitude.Even though the knight’s state of existence had resembled a somewhat unstable projection, his Combat Power had been vastly superior to that of the emotionally erratic Dragon of Pestilence.

Furthermore, although they had only managed to exchange a few fleeting words, the amount of information revealed had been quite substantial.

Seedbed, uncleanness, blasphemy... These words faintly confirmed his earlier theory—that this knight had indeed been locked in a death struggle with something, which had ultimately fractured his mind.

That was why his earlier words had finally succeeded in provoking a reaction—or rather, sheer revulsion—driving the knight to try to kill him at any cost.

He just didn’t know what exact relationship this so-called seedbed had with the prison.

Given the circumstances, it was certainly easy to assume they were one and the same—that the seedbed was the prison itself, which he had guarded as a knight before ultimately falling to an evil Tyrant.

Though, of course, his heroic spirit had lingered on.

Deep in thought, Fu Qian didn’t even need to look up to confirm that the ambient grayish-green glow had fundamentally changed, as if a smattering of twinkling stars had been sprinkled through it.

...

Another transformation integrated into the entire prison. This all but proved that he had indeed encountered two of the Knights of the Apocalypse so far.

The arrival of the first one could still be attributed to Ann giving up her struggle and actively embracing it to draw it in.

But the White-Hot Knight who had just fallen had made such a highly targeted appearance. It was incredibly unlikely that the knight’s arrival had nothing to do with Fu Qian’s own destructive actions.

The two of them also shared one common trait, which was the worst news of all: just as he had feared earlier, even in death, they had brought permanent changes to this place.

The fall of the Dragon of Pestilence had left behind an omnipresent field effect, causing a transcendent plague to infect everything.

As for the White-Hot Knight, the irregularly twinkling stars he left behind did far more than simply brighten the space.

Whenever their brightness climbed to its peak, glowing with an incandescent white, an imperceptible ripple would occur between the two closest stars.

As for the effect—

Fu Qian extended his left index finger, placing it on the line segment between two such points.

There was no spray of blood, nor was there a wound, but he had been cut.

The instant the two stars vanished, Fu Qian withdrew his finger and silently savored the sensation.

It felt very similar to the White-Hot Knight’s ultimate space-time severing attack from earlier, which turned everything into shattered crystals.

With that brief touch just now, his finger seemed to have shifted a fraction closer to that crystallized state.

Of course, the effect was significantly weaker and wouldn’t impact him much, but the survival prospects for Brother Scholar and the other two had suddenly worsened considerably.

Aside from this, there was another unique discovery—crystallization, but not ice crystals.

Although it was easy to confuse the two, and the shards of crystal in the crater on the ground had quickly begun radiating a chill, the changes to his own body right now proved once again that his earlier observation hadn’t been an illusion.

The power upon the White-Hot Knight, as well as the internal sensation of crystallization mentioned earlier, could not simply be described as being imbued with a freezing power.

The relationship between crystallization and the chill seemed inverted. It appeared that the former gave rise to the latter, making one genuinely curious about the true nature of the Frozen Sea enveloping the entire prison.

Beyond that, it seemed he had already encountered this crystallization power once before—back at the tomb of the Divine Entity guarded by the Ye Island Kamakura Tomb Keeper Clan.

Deep within that ancient structure, there had not only been swift, hard crystal bugs, but also an entire pool of crystals capable of freely imitating and transforming.

Judging from the description of the Mark of Old Days skill he had acquired afterward, that place belonged to an ancient Divine Entity whose very name was simply ”Nameless.”

Could there be a connection between them?

...

The core reason this question even arose was that Fu Qian had always been curious about where exactly these descending Knights of the Apocalypse came from.

The Pestilence Knight had obviously possessed a sound mind. He could communicate, and had even deliberately tried to mislead him.

The White-Hot Knight had possessed an even more unbreakable conviction, making it hard to believe they were mere puppets spawned out of nowhere.

For them, what exactly did it mean to be dragged into this place?

Before their Descent here, who had they been?

If the ”seedbed” didn’t refer to this place, then where could it be?

Although his conversations with the first two hadn’t gone that deep, the good news was that the White-Hot Knight’s appearance was highly distinctive. He could try searching for clues through the Night Watchers later.

Of course, that was a matter for later. Theoretically, if two more of them popped out, his mission would directly fail and require a restart.

Under this continuous accumulation, the disturbance caused by the Resplendent Tyrant had become increasingly obvious. He had every reason to believe the next one would soon arrive to stop him.

Tap!

Still deep in thought, Fu Qian lightly tapped his bare foot against the smooth floor and darted forward.

There was nothing more beautiful than a mutual pursuit. He possessed a considerable amount of curiosity regarding the Third Knight as well.

Of course, he hadn’t forgotten public decency either. Under the strain of unleashing consecutive ultimate attacks, even his oversized prison garb had been unable to bear the burden, leaving only a few shreds to cover his body.

To deal with this, Fu Qian’s solution was to grow a layer of fish-like scales over his entire body, covering everything from his limbs to his torso.

To avoid being an eyesore, he even deliberately chose a dark cyan-black hue to match his clawed fists.

Unfortunately, as he traveled onward, he found that despite the towering and solemn architecture down here, there was truly no actual prison to be seen. Clearly, not much modification had been done.

There were quite a few ice crystal curtains similar to the ones from earlier, but no new White-Hot Knight stepped out from them.

Let alone his suspected target, Virgo La Nina.

In short, not only were there no living humans, but he couldn’t even spot a living Scarlet Angel. It was completely dead and silent.

But it didn’t matter. If they weren’t on this layer, there was always the layer above.

Without even pausing, Fu Qian smoothly activated his Blood Crusade the next moment, darting straight upward.