The corners of Rhys Finch’s eyes were tinged red, his gaze captivating.
The High Priest squinted, asking suspiciously, "Female, what did you just feed him?"
Evangeline chuckled, her beady eyes curving like two crescent moons.
Her smile made the High Priest’s brow furrow. He took a step back, overco by a strange sense of fear, as if the little maiden before him concealed so evil power.
Evangeline stepped forward, shielding Rhys Finch behind her.
With a flick of her wrist, her Frost Cold Whip CRACKED in a vicious arc. It kicked up a cloud of sand and dust, its tip swirling with biting cold that condensed into fine ice crystals in the air.
Evangeline tilted her head and smiled faintly, a cold glint in her eyes. "How interesting. I haven’t even had a chance to ask about the dicine you so graciously provided, High Priest, and yet you’re already concerned about ? Why don’t you bring that dicine over here and let have a look?"
The High Priest’s pupils contracted sharply, and his withered fingers unconsciously tightened around his Bone Staff.
He stared at the Ice Frost Long Whip that had materialized in Evangeline’s hand. His Adam’s apple bobbed, and his voice was heavy with a poorly concealed gravity and tremor. "You... Who in the world are you?"
"Isn’t it obvious?" A sharp curve ford on Evangeline’s lips. Her long whip suddenly transford into a streak of frigid light, lashing toward the High Priest’s head with a bone-chilling frost.
But the High Priest’s withered fra was surprisingly agile. He slamd his Bone Staff hard against the ground.
In an instant, rings of eerie black light exploded outward like ripples. Wherever the dark light passed, the sand and stones twisted and squird as if they were alive, transforming in a flash into nacing black vines that writhed toward Evangeline.
A cold gleam flashed in Evangeline’s eyes as her long whip split the surging black mist like a sharp blade.
Tapping her toes lightly on the ground, she shot upward against the tide like a streak of light!
Wherever the whip’s shadow passed, the air cracked with a sharp bang. The violent Spiritual Power kicked up a hurricane, and the dry leaves on the ground were pulverized into dust before the whip’s shadow even touched them. It all surged toward the High Priest’s face, thick with murderous intent—
Rhys Finch stared at Evangeline’s back, his thin lips pressed into a tight line.
Her graceful figure danced and flipped amidst the sand and dust, every move shockingly vicious.
’Even if I hadn’t been suffering from the backlash, I doubt I could have escaped such an assault unscathed. She can heal, she can fight... is she really just a Witch?’
Repeatedly stunned by Evangeline, Rhys Finch suddenly realized he had never truly understood this female at all.
’She would jump off Thorncliff just to find a Beast Crystal for her Beast Husband. She would stay by my side to achieve her goals. But why would a female like her be willing to bear my cubs?’
"ROAR—!"
With a deafening roar, the High Priest’s body suddenly twisted and swelled.
The black robe covering his body burst apart, and in an instant, he transford into a colossal, monstrous four-legged lizard. Its thick, cyan-black scaled tail swept out, carving deep furrows into the ground.
With a flick of her wrist, Evangeline’s long whip vanished, and a three-foot-long cold blade materialized in her hand.
Her figure was as nimble as a swallow as she leaped into the air, landing atop the Monitor Lizard’s head a mont later.
"Clumsy," she sneered, her dagger striking like a silver flash of lightning.
The Monitor Lizard’s cyan-black Scale Armor was as fragile as thin paper before the cold blade. The mont the tip plunged in, it drew a spray of blood. The Monitor Lizard thrashed and roared on the sandy ground, but it couldn’t dislodge the dagger that had pinned it down.
"A re Six-star Pattern High Priest can control so many tribes below Thorncliff?" Evangeline’s gaze fell on the center of the Monitor Lizard’s forehead. There was only a single six-pointed Star Pattern there.
The surroundings suddenly fell into an eerie silence.
The Beastn accompanying the High Priest first sucked in a sharp breath. Then, a bloodthirsty, savage glint appeared in their eyes. Most of them had a Seven-star Pattern, and the male leading them even had an Eight-Star Pattern, all possessing terrifying combat strength.
Evangeline glanced at them, pulled out her dagger, and casually flicked off the beads of blood. A mocking curve played on her lips. "What? Thinking of making a move?"
As she spoke, the High Priest pinned beneath her foot suddenly let out a miserable cry and shrank back into his human form.
His withered body was a pathetic sight, and his throat was full of wails. "Fe-female, let go..."
Evangeline blinked and beckoned to the High Priest with her finger. "Let you go? Fine. Give the dicine."
The High Priest’s expression changed, but seeing the smile on Evangeline’s face, he gritted his teeth. "I’ll... I’ll give it to you!"
Evangeline’s gaze sharpened, keenly catching the subtle tensing of the Beastman henchn’s muscles.
A chilling, grim smile touched her lips, and the dagger between her fingers suddenly beca a flash of cold light.
"SHINK!"
The sharp blade plunged precisely into the High Priest’s abdon, the hilt still trembling.
"AHH—" The High Priest let out a bloodcurdling scream, his entire body trembling in pain.
"Trying to pull sothing?" Her fingertip traced the trembling hilt, her voice so soft it was terrifying. "I don’t mind pushing this blade another three inches deeper."
"N-no, I wouldn’t dare... I really wouldn’t..." The High Priest’s face was ashen, and he was in too much pain to speak a complete sentence.
The High Priest clutched his bleeding abdon, his face contorted as he roared at his Beastman henchn, blood frothing between his teeth. "What are you... what are you still standing there for! Give the Holy Tube... to the Witch!"
Even a fool could see it now. The little maiden before him was a Beast God’s Envoy, a Witch.
’Thorncliff is a place of exile for the Beast God,’ he cursed silently in his heart. ’What is a Witch like you doing here?’
The Beastman henchn exchanged glances, but in the end, they held out the bamboo tube they carried and offered it to Evangeline.
Evangeline took it. She half-closed her eyes, her tone rising slightly at the end. "This is the dicine?"
Rhys Finch walked over just then. He placed a slender hand on the bamboo tube, lowered his head to sniff it, and the silvery-white strands of his bangs cast fine shadows on the bridge of his nose. His pale lips parted. "That’s right."
Evangeline opened the bamboo tube’s lid and took a whiff. She froze, surprised. "Alcohol?"
The High Priest trembled, looking at Evangeline in confusion. "What is alcohol?"
Evangeline looked down at the High Priest. "Then what do you call this? And how did you discover it could suppress a Fallen Beastman’s backlash?"
The High Priest sat slumped in a pool of his own blood, his trembling hands pressed tightly against the wound in his abdon.
Not a trace of arrogance remained in his cloudy eyes, only the terror of a man desperate to survive.
It turned out that this "High Priest" was once just a wandering Beastman many years ago.
While fleeing a Wild Beast, he had stumbled into an abandoned cave of the Ape Clan. Starving and thirsty, he ate so moldy fruit the Ape Clan had stored there, only to find that the backlash within his body unexpectedly subsided.
He later discovered that a few flower seeds had settled in the liquid produced by the rotting fruit.
For all these years, he had been using this thod to earn Beast Crystals. Unfortunately, limited by his own talent, he hadn’t made much progress with it.
Evangeline looked coldly at the opportunist and asked, "What are these flower seeds you’re talking about?"
The High Priest said hurriedly, "I-I don’t know! The flower is beautiful, but it only grows near the Ape Clan’s caves. No one knows its na, and I didn’t dare let anyone else find out..."
The High Priest was shaking like a leaf, his voice broken and uneven. With every word he spoke, flecks of blood foad at the corner of his mouth. "N-Noble Witch, I swear by the Beast God, I will never trick Beastn out of their Beast Crystals again! Never again... I won’t dare... I beg you, please let go..."
By the end, he was choking on his words, and his turbid tears washed clean streaks through the bloodstains on his face.
Evangeline looked down at him and suddenly let out a soft laugh. "Oh? Then why don’t you tell where you’ve hidden all those Beast Crystals you’ve scamd from the various tribes over the years?"
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