On the edge of death.
Maybe it was a final flare of lucidity. Maybe just a split second of clarity before his life force collapsed completely.
Wilbur’s thoughts beca sharper than they had ever been. Sharper than his usual cold calculation.
He had figured it out. The trap. The disguise. The plan that had used his own suspicious nature against him.
But he still had one thought, pressed deep into his soul, that he couldn’t let go of.
And that was—
Drag that damned woman down to hell with him!
Wilbur knew the score. His internal organs were sludge. His heart was paste. He wasn’t walking away from this.
So...
He simply abandoned the pus trying to suppress his injuries. He abandoned his last attempt to cling to life.
He gathered every scrap of strength he had left, along with his lingering Third-Rank will, and poured it all into his chest. He wrapped it around that tiny, hidden life.
Ordering the pus, ever-faithful, to act like a living creature, he madly wrapped it around the Palmfiend hiding beneath his clothes, right against his chest!
RIIIIIP—
A sound that set teeth on edge rang out.
The pus-strengthened Palmfiend, maddened and twisted by the sudden power boost, tore and scratched inside his chest cavity! It ripped through his already-shattered muscles and ribs!
That pus-covered, single-eyed monster swelled, drilling deep into the ruin of his chest.
Its large eye flickered with a crazy, bloodthirsty red light.
Now, controlled by him, the pus monster was only a layer of flesh away from killing the Scarred Woman behind him!
If it tore through the back flesh, sending deadly pus and claws into her body…
He could use this Palmfiend to launch a fatal attack on the person behind him!
Mutual destruction!
Although the Scarred Woman had cut off his path to survival with that strike, a backstab that powerful must have drained her completely. She might have even emptied her entire reservoir of Transcendent power!
Now, if he could just use this last bit of strength before he truly died…
He could…
BANG—!!
A crisp, abrupt, deafening gunshot exploded in the empty courtyard.
Amidst the noisy audio of the movie projector, it was as clear as a thunderclap.
The gunshot echoed, lingering in the air.
That head, filled with stubborn will and the hatred of the dying, blood without warning into a brilliant, tragic flower of red and white.
Wilbur’s body stiffened.
The Palmfiend, which had extended from his back muscles, preparing to launch a fatal blow at the Scarred Woman, lost its source of power. It drooped, shrinking soft and limp back into the bloody ss of his chest.
The red light in its single eye faded rapidly,
returning to the Palmfiend’s usual, confused, helpless state.
..................
“Although I don’t know what you were thinking about in your final mont...”
“But...”
Pandora’s voice drifted over the noise of the movie. It was faint, inconspicuous, and calm, but tinged with the exhaustion of extre weakness.
“I was stalling, too.”
“I didn’t have a shred of strength left. It took so long just to lift the gun and pull the trigger...”
Pandora’s wrist was still trembling uncontrollably from the seemingly simple act of firing the gun.
That ordinary Colt felt exceptionally heavy in her hands.
Through the System’s cold prompt, she could now confirm—
Wilbur, the Third-Rank Corpse-Plague Acolyte codenad “Blighted Hand,” was dead. Truly dead.
If she hadn’t needed to let Elsa absorb so of the other’s blood to help recover from her own severe damage, she would have triggered her “Refine” ability the mont he died.
If she had, Wilbur’s corpse would have vanished into white light, turning the skin sack, the items on his body, and everything else into pure Alchemical Resources flowing into her System.
Any postmortem counterattack he had would have been dealt with by her System.
But this outco wasn’t bad either.
After all, she had to consider Elsa’s terrible state too.
Pandora slowly holstered her gun, her gaze slightly unfocused as she stared at Wilbur’s corpse.
That sword strike just now…
Actually, compared to what Wilbur imagined, it wasn’t just different. It was completely opposite.
You had to understand, she was only Second-Rank, yet the Sloughing Decoction she drank to get rid of the mark was a bona fide Third-Rank potion.
Rank suppression was an objective iron law.
So, after drinking the potion, although she could use its “molting” trait to shed the tracking mark Wilbur had left—even peeling off that layer of severely damaged skin to make a decoy—
She couldn’t use it to heal!
On the contrary.
When that potion reshaped her body, the pain—like her entire skeleton being disassembled and reassembled—combined with the potion’s own violent power, actually made her injuries worse during the molting process!
If it weren’t for the Witch’s blood flowing in her veins, granting her vitality and recovery far beyond ordinary people, she probably wouldn’t have had the strength to stand there, let alone execute that sword strike.
Even with the support of the Witch’s bloodline, this sword strike…
It wasn’t executed by her own strength, either.
In a sense, it was Elsa, forcibly borrowing Pandora’s body, who executed it.
The core ability of the sword ford by Elsa was “Blood Siphon.”
Usually, this ability manifested in battle—drawing blood from enemies to strengthen Pandora’s power, granting her powerful endurance.
It was like the first ti she participated in the conflict for the botanical garden; Pandora had displayed endurance far exceeding her rank, largely because Elsa had drawn the essence of life from those opposing apprentices.
But this ti…
To use a fatal strike capable of piercing Third-Rank defense.
Pandora made an extrely crazy decision.
She chose to use her own blood as the source of power!
When Elsa had siphoned a massive amount of blood from her, sending her into a state of severe blood loss and extre weakness, her own ability to move was already gone. It was difficult for her to even stand steady.
The timing of that sword strike. The angle. The power…
It was basically Elsa, having gained the essence of Pandora’s entire blood supply and possessing a brief burst of power, controlling Pandora’s body—which had almost lost all sensation—at a level near total takeover, to execute that strike.
It was a huge gamble.
And a crazy victory, fed by her own blood.
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