Before dawn, the entire Skeleton Ruins were littered with broken bones.
Victor gently tapped the void with his toe. Without using any floating array, he relied entirely on the surging dark magic within his body to lift himself, moving forward slowly.
With each step he took, a ring of purple-black magical patterns bloomed under his feet. Some fragments of bone and low-level skeleton soldiers, as soon as they touched the edge of the magic imprint, were instantly shaken into a puff of light dust, leaving not even a trace behind.
Behind the broken walls of the ruins, more than a dozen people who studied dark arts were hiding.
Sensing an outsider intruding, they panicked and scattered in all directions. The corners of their black robes scraped against protruding piles of bones, producing a series of sharp rustling sounds.
One of the older wizards gritted his teeth and raised his hand, condensing a half-meter-long bone spear wreathed in thick corpse poison, which shot straight toward Victor in midair.
Victor couldn’t even be bothered to raise his hand.
When the bone spear flew three feet in front of him, it seemed to hit an invisible wall. With a “crack,” it shattered inch by inch starting from the tip. The black poisonous mist also scattered with the wind, not even getting close to his body.
The group of dark mages were completely panicked.
They stumbled and huddled together. Some hugged their bone staffs and trembled incessantly, their teeth chattering. The faint trembling sound was especially clear in the dead silent ruins.
“We’ve thrown all our dark magic at him, and we can’t even break a layer of his skin!”
“W-where did this monster come from?”
“This person’s level of dark magic is completely different from ours. We’re being completely suppressed!”
The lead old wizard suddenly stopped running. His legs went weak, and he heavily knelt on the ground covered in broken bones.
He propped himself up with his hands and kowtowed desperately. Soon, a patch of blood appeared on his forehead. His hoarse voice was almost shouting at its limit.
“Senior, please show mercy!”
“We will offer all the captured souls we have to you, all of them, just spare our lives!”
“We are of the same dark lineage as you, we should look after each other!”
Victor hovered several meters above their heads, looking down at the people kneeling and begging for mercy, his face expressionless.
Two long slender dark purple magic blades materialized in the void. Without any unnecessary movement, they silently pierced the hearts of the two leading wizards.
Warm black blood slowly flowed out along the gaps between bones.
The two fell straight to the ground. The remaining wizards were so frightened they lost their voices and screamed.
Victor spoke indifferently, his tone calm as if he were just correcting an irrelevant statement. There was no killing intent, but it was cold to the bone.
“Who shares the same dark lineage as you.”
“You bunch of garbage who only plunder mortal souls are not worthy of being mentioned in the same breath as me.”
He couldn’t be bothered to look at them again.
In his eyes, these people were extremely stupid. They were already walking on a dead-end path, yet they still tried to drag him down with them. It was laughable.
He raised his hand and waved gently.
Bone storage boxes scattered throughout the ruins all floated into the air. Their lids automatically flipped open. Countless floating transparent souls were pulled by threads of magic, slowly drifting toward the Temple of Holy Light.
That was the remote pulling technique he had set up in advance.
After dealing with those evil wizards, Victor walked slowly into the depths of the ruins.
In a corner, a group of kidnapped border villagers crouched, men, women, old, and young huddled together, covered in dust.
Seeing a strange man in a black robe approaching, everyone instinctively closed their eyes and shrank their bodies, thinking they were doomed.
Victor simply waved his hand gently.
A soft pale golden holy light swept across everyone’s minds, completely erasing the terrifying memories of their imprisonment and the bloody scenes they had witnessed.
He pointed to the exit leading to the mountain path outside the ruins, and his voice softened a bit.
“Before dawn, follow this road back. Don’t come near this valley anymore.”
Those villagers raised their heads in a daze. Their minds were blank, and they felt most of the fear in their bodies had dissipated.
They supported each other and quickly left following the direction, with no one remembering what had just happened.
In fact, they vaguely felt something was wrong, but they couldn’t put their finger on it. They just wanted to escape from this place quickly.
After everyone had completely left, Victor withdrew the surging dark magic around him, took off his black combat robe covered in ashes, and changed into the dark blue soft robe that clergy usually wore.
When passing by a small town at the foot of the mountain, he stopped.
A street jewelry stall had a few thin silver necklaces and two small exquisite engraved silver bangles.
He remembered that Shirley always admired the small trinkets that the maids wore, so he paid for them and casually stuffed them into the inner pocket of his robe.
Then he took a shortcut back to the Temple of Holy Light.
There was still a pot of warm boiled water left in the temple kitchen.
Victor poured a cup to warm his hands and walked lightly toward the Sheng Nu’s personal bedchamber.
The door was not closed tightly, and candlelight seeped through the crack.
He raised his hand and gently knocked on the door.
“Come in.”
Shirley inside heard the knock and immediately looked up.
She was holding parchment for copying prayers, the pen tip resting on the paper.
Seeing Victor standing at the door, the girl’s eyes instantly lit up.
She put down the paper and pen and quickly walked over.
“Victor, where have you been the past two days?”
“I searched all over the Training Ground and the Council Hall, but I couldn’t find you.”
Victor didn’t answer.
He reached into his pocket and shoved the necklace and silver bangles into Shirley’s arms.
Shirley held the cool, shiny silver ornaments. Her fingertips lightly traced the engraved patterns on them. Her eyes gradually reddened, and her nose tingled.
“I thought… you were busy with things again, completely forgetting about me.”
She sniffled and took half a step forward.
Her arms slightly opened, gently reaching toward him.
“Anyway, thank you.”
“I want to hug you, Victor.”
In her heart, she was actually afraid of being pushed away.
After all, Victor had been avoiding her lately.
But she really couldn’t help wanting to get close to him, even if just for a moment.
Victor’s gaze fell on the girl’s reddened eyes under the candlelight.
Her eyelashes trembled slightly with anticipation. Her cheeks were soft and cute in the warm yellow firelight, like freshly baked white bread.
The string in his heart that had been taut for a long time suddenly snapped.
A surge of impulse to hold her welled up in his heart.
But the dark magic hidden deep inside him was still faintly restless.
He didn’t dare get close, afraid that the dark aura on his body would contaminate her.
Before Shirley could react, Victor abruptly turned around, pulled open the door in a rush, dashed out, and then closed it firmly behind him with a “click.”
***
From inside the door, a light, aggrieved sound of feet stomping quickly came.
Victor pressed his back firmly against the wooden door, his palm pressing down on his wildly pounding heart.
His heartbeats in his chest were so heavy they almost shattered his ribs.
‘Want to hold her.’
‘Want to hold her steadily.’
‘No need to hide the darkness all over, no need to bear those plans that can’t see the light.’
But he could no longer turn back.
He collected himself, turned around, and walked toward his own private chamber. He raised his hand to activate the layered shielding arrays in the room, completely cutting off all perception from outside.
After the light curtain of the arrays fully enveloped the room, Victor took out the pure souls he had collected from the dark wizards he had just killed.
Clumps of pitch-black, turbid soul energy floated in his palm.
The moment the first wisp of soul merged into his limbs, a sharp, intense pain instantly swept through his entire body.
The dark origin was far more violent than any magical beast soul he had absorbed in the past.
The meridians inside his body felt as if they were being repeatedly cut by a red-hot blade. The layered shielding arrays around him emitted cracking sounds one after another, and within a few breaths, they all collapsed.
Pure black devoured his vision.
Victor’s consciousness uncontrollably plunged into a bottomless abyss.
At the end of the abyss, countless pale white skeletons were piled into a colossal throne that pierced the sky.
Upon the throne coiled a blurry figure that couldn’t be looked at directly with both eyes.
The moment any light approached the silhouette, it was completely devoured.
The darkness of the entire space trembled and bowed involuntarily.
Victor only glanced at it.
A burning pain struck his eyeballs, and his mind felt as if it were being torn apart.
He instinctively wanted to look away, but his gaze was locked in place by an invisible force.
An ancient, hoarse voice, as if crawling out of every crevice of his soul, slowly echoed in his consciousness.
Every syllable was deeply engraved onto his spiritual origin.
“The Evil God cannot be looked at directly. “
“The Evil God cannot be heard. “
“When you face the Evil God—you will become his servant. “
That one sentence directly shattered all of Victor’s mental defenses.
Just before his consciousness completely collapsed.
In the deepest prison of holy light underground, a maniacal laugh pierced through layer after layer of barriers, clearly entering his broken mind.
“It’s finally begun—hahahaha!”
“Temple Master Victor, I spent years paving the way for you.”
“Lord Evil God, this is the best servant I have chosen for you!”
Victor’s body went limp, crashing heavily onto the cold stone floor of the secret chamber.
The dull thud of his body hitting the ground echoed repeatedly in the empty room.
That distorted, piercing laughter completely engulfed all his senses.
His originally warm brown pupils were now completely black, with not a speck of white.
The phantom of the Evil God on the throne was deeply reflected in his eyes.
He could no longer hear any outside sounds.
Nor could he distinguish light from darkness anymore.
From the first night he stepped into the Underground Forbidden Prison and touched the forbidden dark art.
That mark had already quietly fallen deep in his soul.
Now, he had taken the step of facing the Evil God.
There was no turning back.