Nemi was kneeling behind the dome, her eyes fixed on Lian, and every time more blood spilled from his body, her face would tighten.
Sera, despite her weakness, kept her hand on her sister’s shoulder.
But she herself was also trembling.
Ravian said nothing.
He only watched the battle, and every time Lian took a hit, his fingers around his spear turned whiter.
He had understood that Lian was no longer fighting for himself. If he was alone, maybe he could still find a way to escape.
But now, every second he stayed on the field was to keep them alive.
This truth created something heavy in Ravian’s chest.
Not just shame, but a commitment. If they got out of here alive, this debt would not end with a simple thank you.
For all three of them, Lian was no longer just a simple Otherworldly, but like a real older brother.
On the other hand, Lian was completely unaware of their thoughts, and if he knew, he would only think they were overthinking. He was fighting because there was no way to escape.
If there was a way to escape, they would have escaped by now.
Then he opened the skill panel.
Paralytic Bloodmist was not enough. The Queen could change the army, she could close the ways the poison entered.
Great Rank against an enemy that was rewriting the colony’s biology itself only created a delay.
This skill was a great help to him, and he didn’t want to let it become useless. If it became useless, he would lose one of the advantages that allowed him to control the battle’s flow.
So he had only one choice.
[Available Skill Fragments: 46]
[Would you like to consume 40 Skill Fragments to evolve Paralytic Bloodmist?]
Lian kept his gaze fixed on the Queen.
"Yes."
Forty Fragments lit up.
[Paralytic Bloodmist has evolved.]
[Divine-Rank Skill Acquired.]
[Bloodborne Calamity Domain]
[Rank: Divine Rank]
The user’s blood, breath, and mana transform into a living calamity. By consuming blood and mana, the user creates a poisonous domain in which the poison bonds with the air, ground, moisture, and the surrounding mana flow. All creatures inside the domain become poisoned through contact with mana and the environment, without needing to breathe or have wounds.
Covers a radius of up to 1 kilometer, and any target weaker than the user has all its stats suppressed by up to 35%.
Any target with power equal to or stronger than the host has all its stats suppressed by up to 5%.
Consumes 60 units of mana per minute.
[Remaining Skill Fragments: 6.]
Lian took a quiet breath, but it was not really quiet. The result of the upgrade was much, much better than what he had expected.
Now with this skill, he could once again take full control of the battle’s flow, and with just one look, he could say that this skill from now on would be among his top 3 skills.
But this skill could not stay active for long, its mana consumption was very high, one of the highest mana costs of all his skills.
And it didn’t need to stay active for long, it only needed to break the wave and open a path between himself and the Queen.
He placed his wounded palm on the ground, blood flowed from between his fingers.
But instead of sinking into the soil, it spread in all directions in the form of red veins.
The moss took color from below, the air’s moisture turned red, and a heavy red mist rose from the ground.
[Bloodborne Calamity Domain]
[Excluded Targets: Ravian, Sera, Nemi.]
The domain opened.
The first row of Workers entered it, this time there was no delay.
Their legs trembled at that same moment, their antennae fell, the weak mana flow in their bodies was disrupted.
The first ant took three steps and fell on the ground, the second was still trying to move when all its joints locked up.
The third died while running, its body swelled and then exploded, not a large explosion, but a dense cloud of red poison burst from its body and sprayed over the surrounding ants.
They also became infected.
The second wave began.
Every corpse became a carrier, every death created dozens of new contaminations, a chain effect spread through the colony.
Dozens of Workers fell.
Then hundreds, the stronger Soldiers resisted, but their speed was halved, and their legs were no longer coordinated, their stingers deviated in the middle of their movement.
For the first time, the sea of ants was pushed back.
"The mist... is it from his blood?" Nemi was looking at the field with wide eyes.
Sera said nothing.
Her face was caught between horror and awe, what she was seeing no longer looked like the power of a human, this was power that only gods should have!
Lian’s blood was contaminating the ground, the air was turning to poison by his command, and the monsters were falling one after another without even reaching him.
"This power..." Ravian said under his breath, and his body trembled in fear, just looking at it was enough to make the hairs on his body stand on end.
He had no words to describe it.
The Queen sent Black Assimilation threads toward the corpses, hundreds of black strands connected to the dead ants’ bodies.
The biomass started moving, but this time, the poison was also with it, the black threads turned red for a moment.
The Queen trembled, and her vertical slit opened violently, a black liquid spilled from inside it.
A few threads burst in the middle of absorption, and finally, the creature stepped back!
Lian saw it, the poison had entered the main body through the colony, the path to victory was this!
The Queen was poisoning herself by absorbing the infected ants.
[Black Brood Matriarch has been afflicted by Bloodborne Calamity.]
[Neural coordination reduced.]
[Assimilation efficiency reduced.]
Now was the best time for a major counterattack.
Lian activated Thunder Step, lightning gathered around his legs, and he disappeared in an instant.
A thunder explosion occurred among the paralyzed ants, their bodies were thrown into the air.
Lian, at the landing point, punched a Soldier’s head and sank it into the soil.
Second Dash.
Another explosion and three paralyzed Workers were crushed.
Third Dash.
The skin on his shins cracked more, blood ran down, but Warrior’s Madness responded to every damage.
[Additional damage detected.]
[Power increased.]
[Speed increased.]
[Mental Corruption: 18%]
[Current Mana: 319/815]
[Bloodborne Calamity Domain remains active.]
A short laugh came from Lian’s throat, this time he heard it himself, the sound of the laugh was strange.
Harsher, deeper, and for a moment, he had the urge to fill the entire domain with corpses.
He chose the direct path... the Queen and only the Queen!
Lian covered hundreds of meters in an instant with another Dash, a thunder explosion occurred in front of the creature, the guard ants were paralyzed.
He appeared among them, his fist hit one of the Queen’s bony legs, and the sound of breaking was heard.
The leg bent from the middle, black liquid sprayed out, and the Queen stepped back.
Lian sent his second fist toward her vertical slit, but suddenly hundreds of Soldiers rose from all sides.
Their bodies piled on top of each other, a living layer formed between his fist and the main body, Lian’s strike crushed dozens of ants, but did not reach the parasite.
More Soldiers climbed from the ground.
They stuck to the Queen’s body, their legs locked together, their jaws connected to each other’s shells, thousands of armored bodies gathered on top of each other.
"What the hell are they doing?" Lian said in disbelief upon seeing that scene.
[Black Brood Matriarch has activated Brood Carapace.]
[Assimilation Progress: 41%]
The Queen’s body grew, five meters, eight meters, and then over fifteen meters!
A massive mass of fused ants rose like living armor in front of Lian.
Six armored arms protruded from its sides, each arm made of hundreds of bodies whose legs and jaws were still moving.
In the center of the mass, a black vertical slit opened, and several hundred ant mouths produced sound at the same time.
The Queen’s voice did not come from one throat, it came from the entire colony.
"HOST... FOUND."
"What the fuck?" Lian remained motionless for a moment.
Black threads came out from the living armor, and thousands of thin strands twisted in the air, some as thick as hair, some like veins.
And all of them were aimed at him.
At the same time, the system panel appeared with red light!
[Warning!]
[The Black Brood Matriarch has selected you as its Prime Host.]
[If Parasite Thread reaches your heart, assimilation will become irreversible.]
Behind the shield, Nemi let out a muffled scream of terror, Sera unconsciously stepped forward and placed her hand on the golden surface of the dome.
"Lian... come back." Her voice was so quiet that he could not hear it.
Ravian stared at the fifteen-meter mass, the color had drained from his face.
He could feel that if those threads entered Lian’s body, none of them would be able to save him.
[Estimated duration under current assault: 01:26]
On the other hand, little time remained until the shield’s end!
Lian raised his fists, lightning gathered around his legs, blood dripped from his mouth, fingers, and the cracks on his shins onto the ground.
Bloodborne Calamity Domain was still swirling around him, and Warrior’s Madness was roaring in his veins.
In front of him, thousands of black threads opened in the air like a wave of snakes.
The pressure of madness increased in his mind, but this time he did not push it back, he only held its leash.
"You want my body? Then come and try." A cold and bloody smile settled on his face.