The runes representing energy continuously fused with Sophien, as if tailor-made for her.
The vast magical fluctuations that originally emanated from her gradually disappeared, replaced by a strange fluctuation that was even more violent and awe-inspiring than before.
Her delicate scales became broad and thick. A jet-black cloak slowly formed. The dragon horns on her helmet grew massive, and at a glance, she looked like a king on the battlefield.
She merely turned her head and glanced at Man En, and that magic barrier was strengthened several times over.
After confirming that he was safe, the next moment, Sophien’s figure disappeared from where she stood, and the immense force generated by her charge caused the entire ground to fissure.
The power of time bestowed by Lord Mann was too weak—it probably wouldn’t last long.
She calculated in her mind and finally settled on a strategy of swift victory.
“At the very least, I need to seize this opportunity and catch him off guard.”
Kris watched Sophien charging at him, and his expression grew more and more excited.
“Yes, sister, that’s it. Come a little closer…”
However, because his gaze was fixed on Sophien, he didn’t notice that the Evil God’s Arm on his body had begun to tremble.
He held a long spear, gathered mana at its tip, mustered all his strength, and thrust it toward Sophien’s forehead.
Sophien did not dodge or evade.
“Self Time Acceleration: Dragon!”
Her movements seemed to fast-forward; in the blink of an eye, she evaded the Holy Spear’s attack and appeared before Kris.
“…Kris. I will fight with the intention of killing you.”
Sophien firmly grasped the Holy Spear. On her right hand, golden energy continuously gathered until her entire arm began to tremble slightly. Even Kris felt himself being drawn by this power, and the attraction grew stronger and stronger.
Realizing something was wrong, Kris immediately tried to revert the Holy Spear into armor, but it was too late.
Before the armor could even be worn, Sophien’s attack had already arrived.
‘How is it so fast? Did that guy give some of his power to my sister?’
In an instant, an immense amount of energy blasted into Kris. With a loud bang, a violent shockwave even distorted the surrounding space.
“Uwaa!”
He immediately spat out a mouthful of blood, like a kite caught in a storm, completely unable to control his body as he flew backward rapidly.
Sophien looked at the black liquid on her knuckles and immediately chased after the flying Kris.
Just now, an instant before her attack landed, that eerie arm had suddenly moved.
And the black blood on her hand was clearly not Kris’s.
‘I’m afraid the battle is far from over.’
Realizing this, Sophien couldn’t help but speed up her pursuit.
But the closer she got to Kris, the more clearly she could hear a certain sound.
It was an eerie heartbeat, mixed with someone’s emotions and ancient, strange language. It seemed able to freely stir emotions, causing an instinctive creepiness.
As if responding to this sound, the Evil God’s Arm on Kris began to change. It enveloped him entirely, and from its shell extended a large number of tentacle-like black substances, forcibly halting his momentum.
‘Is that a… cocoon?’
The scene before her reminded Sophien of when Man En had been trapped in a cocoon back in Matthews Territory, and the eerie head that appeared afterward.
‘No, I must stop it immediately!’
She didn’t know what would come out of this cocoon; she only knew that nothing good would come of continuing.
Sophien leaped up, and before her, a massive phantom dragon head slowly materialized.
It opened its huge maw and bit down on the pitch-black cocoon.
Immediately, black blood sprayed out in all directions.
‘…Did it succeed?’
The next moment, the dragon head’s movements began to seem abnormal.
Several deformed cyan-black fingers stretched out from the dragon’s mouth and fiercely gripped its upper jaw.
Almost simultaneously, Sophien felt her control over the dragon head continuously weakening.
She instinctively sensed danger and voluntarily terminated the skill.
The phantom dragon head was also corroded, turning into something like yellow earth, spreading rapidly from the gripped spot.
And as it crumbled, the appearance of the monster in its mouth was revealed.
The entire arm had become incredibly huge, with large amounts of black liquid dripping from it.
At the fracture, some of Kris’s torso and limbs that hadn’t been absorbed yet dangled limply, clearly incomplete in the fusion.
The arm faced Sophien, and its rage almost materialized, gushing from its deformed eyes.
“…Polu…Tini!…”
Before it could continue, Sophien’s attack had already struck.
The immense power poured into the eerie arm, causing it to crash into the ground like a meteor.
But Sophien didn’t intend to give it a chance to catch its breath and immediately pursued it.
The one person and one arm fought from the surface into the underground, then from underground up into the sky.
But it was suppressed by Sophien the entire time. Even using the ability of the Armor of Time, it could only affect her for an instant, and the longer it dragged on, the weaker the effect became.
Moreover, Sophien’s output now far surpassed its recovery ability, so its previous wounds hadn’t even healed before it was heavily damaged again.
‘No problem. As long as we keep this up.’
Sophien thought to herself.
Since she had dealt with that eerie head before, she needed to reserve some strength in case it had unknown abilities—especially now that the power of time within her was nearly depleted.
After some consideration, Sophien made the safest choice.
If it had no more trump cards, it would be ground down to death.
And if it couldn’t endure and chose to reveal its hand, then she still had room to respond.
Events developed in an orderly fashion as Sophien expected.
‘Ever since I knocked it down just now, this thing suddenly got a lot weaker…’
‘Probably due to the incomplete fusion, it’s nearing its limit.’
Sophien continued her pursuit, but also became more cautious. She had no intention of giving that thing even the slightest chance.
Not long after, after taking a heavy blow from her, the arm stopped moving and visibly shriveled up.
Sensing that something was wrong, Sophien became even more alert. She slowly approached to inspect the situation.
She used mana to move the remaining outer skin and discovered that underneath, extremely thin threads had been laid.
Following the threads, she saw that they were pointing toward Man En.
In an instant, Sophien realized something. She immediately turned and rushed toward Man En.
But it was too late.
The ground in front of Man En cracked open violently, and an arm-like monster burst out. Its five fingers spread wide as it grasped at Man En. The barrier around him held for only a moment before shattering.
But just as it was about to succeed, it suddenly stopped.
Behind Man En, footsteps began to become clear.
An old man draped in a black robe slowly walked over.