Neo watched the system confirm the transaction. Five million mana stones vanished from his inventory in a single blink. The loss hit him like a physical blow. His chest tightened. A sharp spike of pain flashed behind his eyes before he forced it down. He shook his head once, hard, and locked the shock away.
Torch Man mode flared to life. Heat flooded his veins. Pyro mana ignited across his skin in tight, controlled sheets of flame. Neo dropped back into the aquarium without hesitation. Water hissed and boiled around him the moment he hit the surface. He drove straight at Leviathan.
She tried to slip past him toward the open water beyond the glass. Neo cut her off again and again. Every time she twisted or lunged, he met her with a burning fist or a knee driven into her scaled side. The heat poured off him in constant waves. Acid from earlier wounds still clung to her eyes. She could barely track him. An hour ground past under the pressure. Neo never let her find space. He kept her pinned inside the tank, slamming her against the walls, burning her wherever he could reach.
Her body finally showed the damage. Scales hung loose. Muscle tore under the repeated impacts. Blood clouded the water in thick dark trails. Neo saw the opening. He pulled the Sword of the Beginning from his inventory. The blade settled into his grip like it belonged there. He kicked off the tank floor and closed the last few meters in a single burst. The sword cut clean through her neck. Her head separated and drifted downward.
A system notification flashed across his vision.
[You have slain a 15-star demon.]
Neo swam to the floating body, stored it in his inventory, and pushed upward. He broke the surface and climbed out onto the edge of the swimming room. Steam rose from his skin. He turned back to the massive aquarium and drove a concentrated blast of pyro mana into the glass supports. The structure cracked, then collapsed. Water poured out in a roaring flood that filled the entire room. At the same time the remaining flames from Torch Man mode spread across the spilled water and the walls. Fire climbed the ceiling. The heat became unbearable within seconds. Neo turned and ran for the exit before the room became a furnace.
He sprinted through the corridors toward the control room. Demons appeared in his path. Several of them carried eleven-star ratings. They were fast and coordinated. Neo activated his speed skill and kept Torch Man mode burning. He became a streak of fire and force, slamming through them one after another before they could fully react. Bodies hit the walls. Others simply burned where they stood. He did not slow down.
Further along the hallway a different presence registered. Neo stopped short and pressed himself into a shadowed corner. A thirteen-star demon stood in the open stretch ahead. The system labeled it 2026. The name was strange enough that Neo paused longer than he should have. He studied the demon’s stance, the way it held itself, the dense pressure of its mana. Direct confrontation in his current condition would be stupid.
Wounds covered his body. Cuts, bruises, half-healed burns. Lord of the End mode would demand more than he could safely give right now. Memory surfaced. He had read about the special water spirit and the spring it guarded. The water healed completely when drunk. Tara had used a scroll to speak with that spirit before.
Neo pulled the scroll from his inventory. He wrote quickly:
I am a friend of Tara. I need some of the spring water. Wounds. Now.
The scroll glowed after a short wait. Words formed in return.
Three hundred milliliters. You will pay later.
Neo wrote back his agreement. The scroll vanished. A small potion bottle appeared in its place. Clear liquid glowed faintly inside. He uncorked it and drank in one continuous pull.
The effect hit immediately. Heat different from pyro mana spread through every muscle and bone. Neo closed his eyes and let it work. Torn tissue sealed. Cracked bones knitted. The deep ache in his ribs faded. When he opened his eyes again he clenched one fist and felt raw strength return. The healing had finished.
Time to move.
Lord of the End mode activated. Mana flowed smoother and faster than before. The power he could gather in a single burst sat closer to his true peak. Neo stepped out of the corner and locked onto 2026.
He lunged. His fist crashed into the demon’s face. The impact snapped the head sideways. Neo followed with a low kick aimed at the knee, trying to take the balance. 2026 staggered but recovered. A heavy hand clamped onto Neo’s shoulder and yanked downward with brutal force. Both of them hit the floor hard.
The demon landed on top and began hammering. Each blow shook Neo’s frame. Bones vibrated under the force. Neo realized, cold and clear, that killing Leviathan had been luck and environment more than pure strength. He could not trade blows like this.
He teleported away, putting distance between them in an instant. 2026 rose and started forward. Neo’s eyes narrowed. He pulled three spears from his inventory and charged each one with the Nuclear Reactor technique. Mana condensed along the shafts until they hummed with unstable power. He teleported the spears to separate points around the demon and sent them flying in staggered timing.
2026 blocked the first two with crossed arms. The third slammed into its shoulder and stuck. Neo reached out with a thin thread of mana, slipped it along the embedded spear, and pushed the thread deeper into the demon’s body. The thread found the core. Neo tried to detonate. Nothing happened. The core rejected the connection.
2026 ripped the spear free and charged again. The demon thrust the same spear forward with its full weight behind it. The point punched into Neo’s side. Three ribs shattered on impact. Neo coughed blood onto the floor and staggered. 2026 kept coming. Neo raised both arms in a desperate guard. The next blow landed like a hammer. Neo flew backward and slammed into the ground hard enough to leave a deep dent in the stone.
2026 opened its mouth. The body changed. Flesh expanded and warped. Eyes opened across every surface. A massive mound of muscle and bone rose from the torso, easily sixty inches across. Fangs lined the new maw, some longer than five inches. The demon laughed, the sound wet and deep.
"This is Gluttony," it said. "My racial ability. In this form I can eat anything and absorb its skills."
Neo’s eyes widened. A sharp wave of excitement cut through the pain. He wanted that skill. It was simply good. Not only could it copy skills. From the demon’s own words, it could even absorb skills from fruits and other things.
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