The black flames, carrying a potent corrosive power, spread like an impassable chasm, keeping Torlan at bay in the distance.
As for the other third-rank wizard? The flames had struck him down even more severely in a single instant, and he screamed as he scrambled to the side.
"What... what are you doing?"
The tiger-headed wizard was truly terrified now. He could feel the increasingly horrifying power building in both of Leilin's hands, along with the savage spiritual power that had sealed off his sea of consciousness. For the first time, genuine fear took root in his heart.
He deeply regretted not fleeing the moment Leilin had arrived, instead trapping himself in this hopeless situation.
"What do I want to do?"
The smile on Leilin's lips grew wider and wider. Shadow arms sprouted from his back like bamboo shoots after rain, massive muscle groups faintly visible upon them, all funneling their power into his hands.
*Crack!* *Crack!* First the skin split, then the muscles, then bone.
The tiger-headed wizard's face twisted in agony so extreme he couldn't even produce a scream. His entire body seemed to be slowly stretched apart by Leilin.
"Let him go! Oh! No—"
Finally, amid Torlan's cries, the tiger-headed wizard was torn in half by Leilin. A torrential spray of blood rained down, mixed with intestines and organs.
"Isn't it a bit late to say that now?"
Leilin sidestepped the blood spray with practiced ease, not letting a single speck land on himself.
He tossed the two halves of the corpse aside like garbage and regarded Torlan with an expression devoid of any emotion: "When you first resisted our Ouroboros Ring, you should have been prepared for this!"
"Yes! You will die here today — that is my guarantee to Borkin!" Torlan's expression instantly turned calm.
But Leilin could clearly see the hatred burning in her eyes.
It wasn't just because of what had just happened, but even more because of the earlier pursuit and massacres.
Many of her friends and relatives had presumably died during the Ouroboros Ring's earlier crackdowns, and Leilin's actions had completely ignited Torlan's fury!
"At this rate, your resolve still isn't enough!"
Leilin shook his head.
"You don't seem qualified to be my opponent yet. Let me give you another push!"
Almost the instant his words fell, another black-robed wizard — one who looked identical to Leilin — suddenly materialized in front of the third-rank wizard from the Hand of Vengeance, who had just been heavily wounded.
Several colorful potion vials were flung out expressionlessly by "Leilin."
The numerous potions collided in midair, and terrifying waves of energy erupted outward.
"Third-rank Potion Combination Spell — Heavenly Fire Prairie!"
An enormous sea of flames instantly swallowed the third-rank wizard, with even the duplicate Leilin caught within the blast radius.
Surrounded by waves of searing heat, "Leilin" suddenly smiled eerily, then dissolved into a tangle of shadow chains that locked the third-rank wizard firmly within the inferno.
"Lord Torlan! Save me!"
The third-rank wizard's face was painted with absolute desperation as he cried out with every ounce of strength he had left. At this moment, Torlan was his final lifeline.
But Leilin, standing squarely in Torlan's path, mercilessly snapped that lifeline in two.
"You high-ranking wizards in this stronghold — you're the last one remaining, aren't you?" Once the third-rank wizard's life force had been completely extinguished in the sea of flames, Leilin looked at Torlan before him.
"If you can't buy enough time to make this fight enjoyable for me, I'm afraid I'll go after those other wizards down below!"
"That female wizard — she's your apprentice, isn't she? Even has a bit of blood relation to you. Don't bother lying. The similar bloodline fluctuations and the matching spiritual power frequencies have completely given you away..."
Leilin suddenly glanced at a specific spot among the rubble on the ground, and his words caused Torlan's expression to change dramatically.
In that instant when Leilin's gaze swept past, the baby-faced female witch hiding behind the ruined walls felt as though she had been locked onto by some primordial predator. Her limbs began trembling uncontrollably.
"T-too terrifying!"
Realizing she had been discovered, the witch immediately began to flee.
Pale cyan air currents surged continuously from her body, carrying her deep into the Duolo Forest.
"Not only Nina — even Lord Borkin..."
Tears streamed down the witch's face like broken beads as she ran.
The instant Leilin had unleashed his venomous attack, the low-ranking wizards in this stronghold had been devastated. Aside from the three third-rank wizards, nearly everyone else had died in a single moment.
Antidote potions, defensive spells — nothing had made the slightest difference.
Before the terrifying venom of the Comoin Giant Serpent, all such measures were as flimsy as paper.
Her innate defensive spell had proven utterly useless against Leilin's attack. Had it not been for a guardian item her teacher had given her, she too would not have survived.
The witch who had narrowly escaped hid behind the wall, and what she witnessed only deepened her horror. Two supremely prestigious third-rank wizards had fallen one after another at Leilin's hands, and he showed no sign of having used his full strength. In the end, he had even threatened her life to coerce her teacher!
Remembering her teacher's final desperate mental transmission, the witch finally broke down and sobbed aloud.
Even so, the energy particles beneath her feet never stopped flickering. Fleeing had already become pure instinct.
Deep in her subconscious, she never wanted to go back and face that terrifying demon again.
"A very convincing mental impression — it seems you care about her!"
Watching the first-rank witch flee, Leilin showed not the slightest intention of giving chase.
On the contrary, he looked at Torlan with a mocking expression. "However, you'd better buy enough time, because if you don't, she won't get very far..."
"Madman! Demon!"
Torlan cursed. Warlocks were by nature prone to emotional volatility, and in the heat of battle, this tendency became even more pronounced.
Compared to wizards, warlocks preferred to torment their enemies — even to indulge their own darkness.
Torlan had witnessed several such scenes before. The dead wizards had been left in states too horrible to look at, and the female wizards had suffered even worse atrocities.
Now, she had written Leilin off as one of those mad warlocks.
"Even if I have to stake everything I am as Torlan, I will stop you!" Torlan's expression was resolute as she tore a silver necklace from her neck, her eyes blazing with determination.
"...Haha! Excellent! That's the kind of resolve I want to see!"
Leilin felt that at this moment, he must have looked exactly like the great villain from the movies of his previous life.
"Shadow Erosion Seal — release!"
Torlan formed strange hand seals, and the silver necklace shattered in an instant.
A powerful surge of energy erupted from Torlan's body, and tiny beads of blood began seeping from her pores.
Fine, dark runes crawled rapidly across Torlan's body, and combined with the scar on her face, she looked more terrifying than ever.
In Leilin's perception, her spiritual power — which had already reached the peak of liquefaction — was compressing on its own with increasing intensity. A trace of crystallization had even begun to appear!
Once her spiritual power fully crystallized, Torlan would advance to the rank of Crystallization
Of course, forcing it like this would kill her first. But before her body completely collapsed, she would have one foot planted in the Crystallization Wizard realm!
This had to be her trump card — some kind of life-burning secret technique!
"Haha... wonderful! You actually have a secret technique like this — you haven't disappointed me!"
Strangely, Leilin made no attempt to stop her. Watching Torlan's aura gradually surge, he let out a delighted laugh.
His reason for adopting such brutal methods from the very start had been to force Torlan into using a life-consuming secret technique to boost her strength!
He had accepted this mission partly because it was the organization's orders, but also because he wanted to test his newly developed third-rank spell — the Finger of
Although he had already used the spell to break through their defensive array, demonstrating its terrifying power, the lack of combat data — especially against Crystallization Wizards — still left Leilin unsatisfied.
Furthermore, he had come to realize that even among liquefied wizards, his own strength was at the very top. Apart from Crystallization Wizards, even Torlan at peak liquefaction couldn't pose the slightest difficulty for him.
And the Chip lacked data on Crystallization Wizards. Given that this outing would inevitably involve confronting wizards of that tier, Leilin urgently needed a benchmark to measure his own combat power.
Now, Torlan had become that benchmark.
During the earlier battle reconnaissance, the Chip had detected that not only was her strength in a weakened state, but she had apparently been injured before, forcing her to seal away a portion of her own power.
Leilin's plan had been to use brutality to force her into continuously burning her life force, driving her to fight him at full strength!
Now it appeared the results were quite promising!
Originally at peak liquefaction, after desperately unleashing her secret technique, Torlan had indeed gained some of the power of crystallization — at the cost of her own life!
Combat experience against Crystallization Wizards was extremely rare. After all, most of the people Leilin had encountered before were his seniors — he couldn't exactly ask them to fight him to the death on a whim.
And an opportunity like Torlan, who could barely touch crystallization while the danger remained manageable, was rarer still.
Leilin immediately issued a command: "Chip, record all detailed combat data!"
"Command received. Initiating scan." The Chip's emotionless voice rang out.
A pale blue screen projected itself before Leilin's eyes, and upon it, Torlan's body was enveloped in powerful radiation.
The mysteries of spiritual power crystallization were being captured and analyzed by the Chip, displayed in real-time before Leilin.
"The madmen of the Ouroboros Ring have no right to exist in this world!"
Having entered crystallization, the current Torlan was vastly different from before.
The oppressive aura she radiated, condensing the very air around her, was enough to make Leilin feel distinctly uncomfortable.