Eldritch Horror Theatre

A violent strike.

It had indeed pierced the body, and it had indeed successfully clawed outward.

Yet at the exact moment the attack triggered, the target seemed to vanish.

To use a specific analogy: it was like preparing to rip out someone's kidney, only to find you had reached into their armpit instead—and it genuinely felt like an armpit.

Halting his assault, Fu Qian studied the spot he had just struck.

The previous impression of a solid mass seemed to have subtly changed.

Earlier, it had looked like rolls of piled subcutaneous fat with no visible boundaries between the scales. Now, those boundaries had appeared.

Right where he had reached in, a distinct gap had actually opened up.

This instantly caused a fundamental shift in its structure.

Consequently, his recent motion no longer met the requirements for Visceral Attack, as his hand was now positioned entirely outside the body.

The final result was merely a few scales falling away. The specialized execution skill, Visceral Attack, had failed to secure an execution.

And throughout this entire transformation, he had remained completely unaware.

"The essence of destiny goes far beyond your imagination. This is why I have never liked the Tyrant... Wielding Calamity, heh... nothing but a vulgar child, blindly destroying without awareness."

As expected, the sharp critique from Excellency Destiny Serpent rang out. It sounded as if even the original King of the Abandoned Prison was being looked down upon along with him.

"Of course, you are even more oblivious... which is why I said earlier that you have absolutely no idea what you are doing."

...

A vulgar child—that was actually a fitting analogy.

It wasn't surprising in the least that the other party knew the honorific name of the King of the Abandoned Prison.

And those few remarks seemed to somewhat answer a previous doubt.

Namely, the authority of Excellency Destiny Serpent seemed to overlap slightly with his own.

Bad luck counted as a form of destiny too, didn't it?

In this situation, how would a clash between them play out?

Judging by that tone, the difference seemed to lie in their level of technical finesse.

Blindly without awareness... Did that mean that although the King of the Abandoned Prison could bring about bad luck, it didn't actually involve understanding the true essence of destiny?

Whereas this being across from him was the essential symbol of destiny, able to arbitrarily tweak a program's code so the calculated results steered in the desired direction?

Like the earlier failure to fire the bullet.

Meanwhile, wielding Calamity, he was effectively just applying violent formatting—no matter what was inside, he simply granted it destruction and an end?

Like directly crushing the hard drive.

He had to admit, that really did sound a bit vulgar.

However, it did explain why he had never discovered any methods to increase his own luck.

The Tyrant's Calamity was very pure. The so-called boon was merely the difference between striking lightly and striking heavily.

"So what is the essence of destiny? A coincidence converging from countless possibilities?"

Even though he had been blatantly despised, Fu Qian didn't feel embarrassed in the least. Instead, he genuinely asked for guidance.

Formatting was clearly very cool, okay.

As for his theory of possibilities and coincidences, it stemmed partly from the earlier bullet misfire, and partly from an old friend—Loretta.

That poor woman's former ability seemed to have been "luck."

He had previously guessed that her subsequent "tragic encounters" were because the corresponding higher power was likely locked within the Nightmare Corridor—and right in front of him was a Serpent of Destiny.

"Yes. There are countless possibilities for the scales, and they just so happened to evolve into the corresponding one."

Surprisingly, Excellency Destiny Serpent didn't rush him. It actually answered his question, even explaining the previous situation.

"Coincidentally being lucky enough to evolve into a targeted form—it can't be that simple, right?

"This evolution didn't even have a process; it appeared directly as a result. In my opinion, simple precognition isn't enough to explain it."

However, Fu Qian wasn't so easily fooled. Frowning, he continued to offer his perspective.

"Your words once again prove my earlier statement. Whether it is precognition or destiny, you lack an essential understanding... and you will never understand, because you are not me."

Regrettably, the other party reacted like a magic instructor encountering a pure-strength warrior. It didn't even want to explain the specific logic, offering only disdain.

Though that final assessment wasn't actually wrong.

Only those who had truly experienced the perspective of an authority could understand the incommunicable sensations within it.

Even if the other party described it to him in words, it would absolutely not be enough to refine his vulgar formatting style.

Despite this, he could still attempt to force a summary from his own perspective—

It was a defense mechanism similar to foreseeing the future and preparing a countermeasure in advance, except this countermeasure didn't need to be manifested beforehand. It was directly inserted into destiny.

Specifically, the scales didn't change in advance; they appeared immediately after the attack occurred.

And even though he had clearly pierced the body, by the time Visceral Attack triggered, his hand had somehow ended up on the outside.

It was truly cheap, especially since the mitigated damage was even sealed, slowly trickling out bit by bit—but there still seemed to be a limit, right?

Fu Qian looked at that slightly mottled body shedding its scales, and slowly took a breath.

Whips, chains, fangs... hundreds, even thousands of tentacles in the exact same style as his earlier claws erupted directly from his body.

Tendril Barrage Devastator!

Brute-forcing the damage? That was actually simple.

Boom!

This time, the tactile feedback had clearly improved.

The opponent still showed no intention of running away, standing stiffly like a wooden dummy as they instantly suffered a massive barrage of strikes.

As the higher-yield damage test concluded, Fu Qian continued to study the Serpent of Destiny, which hadn't even changed position.

Its body was still intact, without a single visible scratch.

Compared to before, however, the peeling scales finally seemed to be falling in a continuous stream.

In the blink of an eye, Excellency Destiny Serpent showed signs of going patchy and bald, which seemed to prove the viability of brute-forcing the damage.

But here was the question: did the target not know this could be done?

Fu Qian glanced at the completely undamaged bar.

He hadn't actually been that careful just now. Everything around them should have been pulverized in the exact same way—Squelch!

A peculiar sound rang out, accompanied by a sharp pain.

Fu Qian looked down beneath his left ribs.

Without any warning, a hideous wound had appeared out of thin air on this theoretical body of a Deity.

Then came another, and another...

The injuries weren't overwhelmingly extreme, but they were by no means light.

The subsequent change was that the rate at which scales peeled from the body opposite him seemed to be slowing down.

Without a doubt, this was a highly ominous sign.

So this was why this entity was doing nothing but standing here like a wooden dummy?

Besides mocking time and sealing destiny... it even shared destiny?

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