Those slave creatures that hadn’t had time to escape couldn’t even scream before their bodies melted instantly under the sweep of the light.
The Wizards’ defensive magic was meaningless before that palm; the Magic Shield of a Level 1 Mage couldn’t hold for even 0.1 seconds in the tricolored light, while the Level 2 Mage held on for less than a second before disappearing as well.
The last scene Duke saw was that palm covering the entire sky above the fortress.
Four colors of light intertwined beautifully yet heartbreakingly, like an overwhelming aurora.
Then the four-colored light swallowed everything.
But Duke did not die.
After the light dissipated, he knelt in the center of a charred wasteland.
The Longsword he had never been without was now just a half sword handle, its blade part transformed into molten iron under the energy impact.
His dark blue military uniform was burned with numerous holes, exposing skin covered in burns and lacerations deep enough to see bone; his left arm hung weakly at his side, bent at an abnormal angle, bones broken in more than one place.
Blood flowed from a wound on his forehead, covering half his face.
In the palm of his left hand, he grasped a handful of straw.
To be precise, it was once a straw man, palm-sized, woven from golden straw, with limbs and a head tied with red thread, its face drawn sloppily with a charcoal pencil in a crooked smile.
That was his Life Substitution Item, a one-time life-saving Witchcraft Artifact of Level 3 quality, capable of enduring one fatal attack of Level 3 Life for its holder.
At this moment, the straw man was smoking.
The straw turned from golden yellow to charred black, breaking and falling apart, cascading from between his fingers.
The red thread’s color faded to ashen gray, that crooked smile burned beyond recognition; it had died once for Duke.
But substitution does not equal nullification. The power of that palm far exceeded the straw man’s threshold, and the overflow still exerted its effect fully upon him.
The fleshly strength of a Level 3 Mage saved his life but could not preserve his complete combat capability; he now didn’t even have the strength to stand.
Duke struggled to lift his head, and through blood-clouded vision, saw the figure walking from the edge of the wasteland.
Jin Mo walked on the charred rubble, his steps unhurried.
The dark golden skin under the dim sky exuded a ghostly cold sheen, his dark linen clothes without even a wrinkle, as if the world-destroying palm had nothing to do with him.
He stopped three steps away from Duke, slightly lowering his head, an unexpected glint flashing in his differently-colored pupils.
"Not dead?" His voice was not loud, with a tone of pure curiosity, like observing a bug that should be dead yet was still twitching.
His gaze fell on the remnants of the shattered straw man in Duke’s palm, the crooked smile still barely discernible on the charred straw.
"...Life Substitution Item." Jin Mo murmured to himself, nodding in realization.
He was no stranger to a Wizard’s methods, having seen myriad tricks on the battlefield during this time.
But a Level 3 Mage using a Life Substitution Item to survive his palm, at the least, indicated that the item’s quality was not low, and the luck was quite favorable.
Duke lacked the strength to move, and could scarcely summon any power for a counterattack, nor was there any need.
He merely stared at Jin Mo, with the one eye yet able to perceive.
In his gaze there was no fear, nor anger, only a calmness so near indifference.
He was a soldier who had survived too long on the battlefield, already prepared for this day.
As an invader, the Wizards naturally had to be prepared to die in a foreign land.
And Spirit, at this moment, transformed into a stream of Fire Elemental darkness, rapidly traversing within the depths of the lava lake.
The terrifying energy waves from behind caused the entire lava lake to violently tremble; even having entered Fire Elementalization, he still sensed the world-ending power transmitted through the lava.
The turbulent Fire Attribute Elemental Particles regarded him as kin, swirling around, even providing him with propulsion forward.
Yet that four-colored energy aftermath descending from the heavens penetrated the hundreds of meters of lava layer, repeatedly striking against his Elementalized body like a heavy hammer beating an unseen drum.
He didn’t look back. From the moment he dove into the lava lake, he hadn’t looked back once.
Curiosity was a luxury on the battlefield, and Spirit never indulged in what he couldn’t afford.
His Spiritual Power extended forward, probing a relatively stable path with weaker energy impact in the lava.
His Fire Elementalized body sped along this path, the blistering lava trailing a thin, dark red wake behind him.
Occasionally, natural lava caverns and subterranean fissures appeared around, but he had no intention of stopping to hide.
That presence was too powerful; stopping meant awaiting death, distancing himself was the only reassurance.
About forty minutes after traversing, the lava’s temperature began to gradually drop, the surrounding molten rock’s viscosity slowly increasing.
This was no accidental temperature change but the lava lake becoming shallower; he was nearing the edge of this subterranean lava area.
Further ahead, the lava would completely cool and solidify into a basalt layer, losing the advantage of Fire Elementalization.
Spirit hesitated not. Upon sensing the interface between lava and rock, his body commenced a second transformation.
The dark red body of flame rapidly contracted and solidified, the flame’s light retreating from within outward, replaced by a weighty and steady tawny glow.
The Six-Element High-Level Affinity endowed him not merely with single-attribute Elementalization, but the talent to seamlessly switch among six forms.
The instant Fire Elementalization receded, Earth Element Transformation completed, his body blended into the rock wall at the lava lake bottom, like a drop of water melding into another larger body of water.
The subterranean rock layer was darker and quieter than the lava lake.
No surging lava or scorching bubbles, only endless darkness and suffocating pressure.
Spirit continued his traversal through the rock layers; his Earth Elementalized body merged perfectly with the surrounding rock, without a trace of energy fluctuation leaking.
This mode of movement was much slower than in lava, but much safer.
The crust, thick by thousands of meters, was the best cover; any Spiritual Power probe reaching this depth would be greatly weakened.
Behind lay dead silence, no signs of pursuit.
Yet that oppressive force still hovered at the edge of his perception, neither dissipating nor moving away.
Like a sky after a storm, though the thunder had ceased, the clouds remained.
And before Spirit escaped here, above the fortress wasteland.
Jin Mo stood at the center of the charred rubble, his differently-colored pupils under the dim sky glimmering with ghostly sheen.
His gaze moved away from Duke’s thoroughly deceased corpse to the Earth beneath.
Through hundreds of meters of rock layers and lava, he sensed two signals.
One was the Demigod-level Mage active deep within the lava, who had clearly sensed the power of that palm and was now moving swiftly within the lava.
The other signal lay further away, within the rock layers, rapidly distanced; Level 2 Life.
Two targets, two directions.
Demigod level in the depths, Level 2 further away.
Jin Mo hesitated for a moment before making a choice.
He snorted coldly, stepping forward.
Dark red halo surfaced thinly across his dark golden skin, not flame or lava, but a purer transformation akin to the essence of Fire Element.
The charred rubble underfoot melted into a small pool of lava at his step and then cooled down and hardened.
His body, like a heated knife cutting into butter, silently sank into the Earth, lava and rock parting before him, forming a straight downward passage.
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