Chapter 166: Sacrifice Is His Choice |
"Phew!" Fass dodged another round of Spell bombardment, feeling his entire body go weak.
Just a moment ago, the slightest wrong thought would have caused him to blow up alongside these people.
He had no idea if they would die in the blast, but he certainly would have.
His current problem stemmed not just from the external battle, but from the turmoil within his own mind. If anything went slightly awry, his mental state would take a sharp turn and cause him to completely lose control.
'I need pressure, but I can't stay under high pressure forever,' Fass warned himself, attempting to fortify his mental resilience.
Countless thoughts shifted in his mind as he evaded another attack, closing the distance to the Black Masks.
Fass's entire body trembled faintly, as if something had burrowed its way inside him.
His own Peak Limit of the Number had been fully unlocked, and the Attribute Values of others were appending themselves to him.
However, an invisible barrier still obscured the fundamental Number behind those Attribute Values, making it utterly impossible to grasp.
And when he tried to strip those clothes off, he found that no matter what he did, he couldn't figure out how to undo the buttons.
This frustrating sensation acted like a fire propelling Fass, urging him to resort to brute force immediately.
Yet his reason clearly reminded him that using brute force right now and hurting the other party might cause this hard-won opportunity to slip away once again.
All these feelings of anxiety and vexation made Fass feel as though his mind was a lake surface on a rainy day.
Every trace of emotion and every single thought smashed into it like raindrops, creating wave after wave of ripples.
Sometimes, Fass wasn't even sure if he was still lucid.
He constantly alternated between chaos and rationality.
His thoughts and cognition continuously shifted. There were even multiple instances where he suddenly snapped to full lucidity, only then realizing what he was actually doing.
The bizarre part was that, despite this dreamlike and only occasionally lucid mental state, Fass's Mental Power was incredibly resilient right now.
He could clearly perceive the shifting environment around him and formulate accurate responses. Although those Black Masks were elites, their Spells currently had a hard time hitting Fass, barring wide-area attacks.
Or, right before an attack could land, Fass would defend against it by using his Steel Orbs to cast the Starry Sky Force Field.
'Why am I undergoing this kind of change?' Fass snapped back to reality during a brief interlude, pondering the shifts within himself.
He didn't believe he possessed this level of talent. Being able to dodge those attacks so effortlessly was absolutely the result of some other factor.
Consequently, Fass immediately thought of his Trait—Collective Symbiosis.
After he defeated and killed an enemy, a portion of their soul and life essence would be harvested and stored within the Berserk Accessory.
It was essentially the equivalent of possessing the plundering ability of a Demon.
Moreover, these souls retained a certain degree of autonomous consciousness and could make independent judgments.
When Nemus manufactured the Berserk Accessory IV, he had also implemented a certain level of "structural organization" for these souls, ensuring that these consciousnesses wouldn't casually rebel.
'So the reason I can maintain such high-intensity combat while half-asleep and half-awake is that these consciousnesses themselves can also fight automatically.'
'Then, is it possible to make these consciousnesses actively "surrender" to me and unfasten that button, allowing me to obtain the crucial Number?' As soon as this idea surfaced, Fass immediately felt he had grasped something vital.
However, at that moment, Fass couldn't help but wonder what kind of charm he had that could possibly compel these consciousnesses to hand over their Source Origin to the very entity who had killed them.
Even though the main independent selves of these soul consciousnesses had been let go, the residual fragments of their souls still harbored some resentment.
'So... is there really no way?' Fass couldn't help but fall into despair.
But just because his mind plunged into despair didn't mean his movements stopped. On the contrary, his actions grew increasingly frenzied.
After dodging another wave of Spells, the Steel Orbs surrounding Fass all transformed.
The force field shield morphed—Force Field Sword!
Previously, Fass had been able to turn the force field into an "excavation tool" to help him dig a tunnel; right now, he was simply driving the transformation of the Steel Orbs once again to force yet another change in the force field.
The force field abruptly flattened out and rapidly extended forward.
With a single thrust of the sword, he immediately struck the Black Mask who had fired the projectiles earlier.
Sensing his body being pierced through, that Black Mask didn't pause. Instead, his entire body's Mental Power surged at this exact moment.
This Mental Power forcefully injected itself into the force field.
Spell Hijack!
However, using the Mental Power of the weak to forcibly hijack the Mental Power of the strong—especially Fass's currently violent and turbulent Mental Power—was naturally doomed to fail.
Yet, this resolute burst of Mental Power was not so easily eradicated.
Upon entering the force field, this Mental Power caused interference, making the originally stable force field begin to fluctuate.
Even the Steel Orbs generating the force field fluctuated along with it, bouncing mid-air and losing their original "positions."
The force field Spell shattered as a result.
The other Black Masks immediately seized the opportunity their comrade had sacrificed his life to create.
A figure wearing a black mask suddenly sprang from the shadows.
This person had never shown themselves before, making this their very first strike.
The sword in the attacker's hand was dim and lusterless, and their eyes looked like nothing more than a pile of dull, dying embers.
Then, the blade shot forward.
An Ascetic Paladin, who strictly adhered to various Precepts, was an existence even rarer than the Precept Holy Knights that Nemus had forged using the Holy Nails.
The Precepts bound to his body even caused Fass's mental perception to completely ignore him when he remained motionless.
The blade flowed forward, smoothly hacking into Fass's neck.
A massive amount of Dark Aura surged at his neck, forming a corresponding barrier that blocked the sword.
But it was already too late.
The Ascetic Paladin lashed out with a kick. Fass sensed the kick and leaned back and to the right, avoiding being sent flying, but he inevitably lost his balance in the process.
Even though he could use Mental Power to forcefully manipulate his body into rapid adjustments, ignoring physical inertia and kinetic forces.
Right now, however, there was no coordination whatsoever, and there was a limit to what Mental Power manipulation could achieve.
The subsequent movements of his body slowed down further.
It was entirely predictable that the Spells of the other Black Masks would immediately rain down in a blanket bombardment.
The Ascetic Paladin didn't make a single evasive maneuver. Instead, he pressed his attack even further, utterly determined to restrict Fass's movements.
Sacrifice was his choice!