"Yes, I remember clearly. The meat vendor wore a black hood, with hair hanging down covering half his face, and his left hand was an iron hook..."
The butler described the meat vendor in detail.
"How peculiar!"
"How is the basic
"I've constructed three, but I can't build the fourth rune no matter what! Also, in basic Universal Studies..." the little girl reported obediently.
"Is that so?" Feile rubbed his fingers together.
"Your progress is far too slow. Come to my room tonight—I'm going to give you some personal tutoring!"
"Yes, Master!" the little girl answered softly.
Clang! Clang! Clang!
The tall floor-standing copper clock in the great hall let out a deafening roar, ringing twelve times. Outside, the sky had already darkened, and faint blue stars dotted the expanse.
"It's this late, and Nido still hasn't come!"
Feile slammed the door open, his face showing open irritation.
"Nido! Nido!" Feile began shouting loudly.
His hollow voice echoed through the corridor, reverberating back and forth, rippling far into the distance.
Dead silence surrounded him. Feile could even hear his own breathing and the flow of his blood.
"Butler! Butler! Maid! Where is everyone???"
The expression on Feile's face grew increasingly agitated. He hurriedly threw on his coat and strode toward the front entrance.
Thud! Thud! Thud! The sound of leather boots striking the floor rang out.
A black shadow slowly moved toward Feile.
"Who—who's there?" Feile called out warily, a silver short sword materializing in his hand.
No matter how Feile shouted, the footsteps remained unhurried, advancing at a constant pace.
The shadow drew closer and closer, and Feile finally saw its full form.
It was a middle-aged man wearing a black overcoat, with a leather butcher's apron draped across his chest. A black hood sat atop his head, and half his hair hung down, obscuring most of his face. Most striking was his left hand—the sleeve dangled empty, with only a rusted iron hook protruding from within.
This appearance matched exactly the meat vendor the butler had described.
Hummm!
The silver short sword emitted a piercing glow and shot directly upward. With a shrill whistle, it plunged straight toward the man.
Pfft! As if piercing through an illusion, faint ripples spread across the meat vendor's body and he turned somewhat translucent. The silver short sword passed clean through.
"An illusion?!" Feile's lips curled slightly as he recited a sharp syllable.
Shoo! Shoo!!
The sound resembled a metal flute blown at frantic speed, or a rusted blade scraping continuously against an iron plate, hammering the surrounding air and sending ripples outward in circles.
When the shrieking subsided, the tower remained utterly silent—as though only Feile and the meat vendor existed in the world.
The man in the black overcoat simply raised his hooked left hand and swung it toward Feile!
Pop! A ring of water surged from Feile's body, forming a transparent water shield that blocked the iron hook's attack.
This was an innate talent that Feile had permanently bound to himself, and it finally activated at this critical moment!
Seizing the opportunity, Feile chanted rapidly. Several ice spikes shot directly into the overcoat man's body.
Pfft! Pfft!
The ice spikes pierced flesh, sending up countless drops of blood. The overcoat man seemed utterly unaffected—his expression didn't even change. Like a zombie feeling no pain, he continued swinging the iron hook, sending wave after wave of ripples cascading across the water shield.
"Damn it—what in the world is this thing?"
Feile attacked the overcoat man several more times, and his face finally crumbled into despair.
Whether it was physical attacks or wizard spells, striking this man seemed utterly inconsequential.
In contrast, each of the man's hook attacks continued draining energy from Feile's innate talent. He could clearly feel that just a few more strikes would shatter his defenses completely.
"Run!"
Caught between life and death, Feile seemed to revert to the days when he was a small apprentice who had to bow respectfully upon seeing a wizard. He turned and fled.
Thud! Thud! Thud! Thud!
Hearing the footsteps behind him—the black-coated man pursuing at an unhurried pace—Feile ran even faster.
Twenty meters!
Ten meters!
Five meters!
One meter!
Feile grabbed the tower's main door and yanked it open, bolting outside.
Bang! The door slammed shut behind him. Feile stared in despair to find that he had appeared right in front of his own bedroom—with less than three meters between him and the black-coated man!
"Damn it! Damn it! Damn it! What is going on?!"
Feile gritted his teeth and sprinted frantically, yet every attempt landed him back in front of his bedroom.
Finally, tears and snot streaming down his face, Feile spun around, dashed into the bedroom, and slammed the door shut.
Thump! Thump! The knocking sounded like the footsteps of the reaper, each beat landing squarely on Feile's heart.
"Master! Mom, Dad, save me!!!"
Feile slid down against the door, crying like a child.
As if hearing his plea, the thumping footsteps finally stopped—one step from the doorframe—and vanished...
Face pale, Feile waited a full half hour before opening the door with trembling hands. No one was outside.
"Hah..."
Feile let out a long breath and collapsed to the floor as though every bone in his body had been scooped out.
"He's finally gone. Tomorrow I must write to my master and have him investigate what's going on..."
Feile shut the door.
He turned around—and suddenly a face, most of it hidden behind hanging hair, appeared right before his eyes.
Along with it came a black iron hook!
Pfft! The black iron hook smashed straight through Feile's water shield this time, hooking deep into his right eye!
His eye was pierced instantly, spilling thick fluid of mixed black, white, and red.
The black-coated man wasn't satisfied. He hooked Feile's head and slammed it violently into the ground!!!
Bang! Feile's body was hurled to the floor with tremendous force. The iron hook sank deep into his skull, still twitching unconsciously. In the end, all traces of life vanished.
Swish!
Then the black-coated man drew a grease-stained boning knife from his waist. With practiced ease, he began carving up Feile's corpse.
After the boning knife had done its work, every scrap of flesh had been stripped from Feile's body, its color turning a more vivid red, revealing a texture like beef!
...
The man in the black overcoat knocked on the tower kitchen's back door and revealed a terrifying grin. "Want to buy some meat? I've got prime beef rump here..."
...
Not far from Feile's tower, Leilin gazed at a magical array before him, his expression grave.
At the array's center, a tuft of black flame flickered unsteadily, within which faint images of Feile's ordeal could be seen.
As the visions continued playing out, Leilin watched with rapt attention, strange syllables murmuring from his lips.
Finally, when the black-coated man killed Feile and stripped every last bit of flesh from his body, Leilin's expression relaxed.
Crack! The black magical array collapsed entirely.
Then silence crashed down around him, plunging everything into dead stillness.
Thump! Thump!
The black-coated man from the vision materialized directly before Leilin.
"Here already?" Leilin seemed to have expected this—there was no trace of surprise on his face.
"Shihiohj!" The black-coated man let out several incomprehensible growls and charged straight at Leilin.
Bang!!! The black iron hook was seized by a hand covered in scales.
Leilin and the black-coated man stood face to face—close enough to see the coarse pores on the man's skin.
"Look into my eyes!" Leilin spoke softly, his voice hissing, his tone serpentine.
The black-coated man involuntarily locked eyes with Leilin.
And in that moment, Leilin's eyes underwent a wondrous transformation—his pupils became vertical slits, glowing with a crystalline hue like amber!
Innate talent—Petrifying Gaze!
Crack! Crack! A grey-white color spread across the black-coated man's face, then engulfed his entire body.
Seconds later, the black-coated man had been completely transformed into a grey-white stone statue.
"Now!" Leilin hoisted the grey statue onto his shoulder and hurled it into the center of the collapsed black array!
Crash! The statue shattered, and wisps of grey-white gas rose from within, attempting to coalesce back into human form.
"Dust to dust, earth to earth—from whence you came, return there!"
Leilin chanted the incantation in the Ancient Byron Language.
A circular opening suddenly appeared at the center of the black array, with a black vortex in its midst. It seemed to emit a powerful suction, drawing in every last wisp of the grey-white gas.
Only after the opening vanished did Leilin finally let out a deep, relieved breath, nearly collapsing to the ground.
"Curse-type wizard spells really aren't something just anyone can handle!" A bitter smile lingered at the corners of Leilin's mouth.
After destroying Quilete's body and erasing all traces, Leilin traveled while brewing a Calming Potion, which finally suppressed the warlock's emotional volatility.
After some deliberation, driven by an "in for a penny, in for a pound" mentality, Leilin decided to eliminate Feile before making his escape.
The Liliter Family would inevitably place a bounty on him through the Black Bone Forest Academy—so what if the Violet Flower Family was added to the list? One family's warrant or two, it made no difference.
Moreover, Leilin had found a first-level curse spell in the Book of the Great Serpent that could, in theory, kill Feile without anyone knowing—and without attracting trouble.
But Leilin hadn't expected the spell to be so vicious that it would actively backfire on the caster!
This left him shaken, especially after witnessing the bizarre manner of Feile's death.
This first-level curse had extremely demanding prerequisites.
First, the caster needed a shadow-affinity constitution and had to possess a trace of the target's aura—otherwise, the spell simply could not be cast.
Second, several spirit-related disciplines were required as foundational knowledge. Fortunately, Leilin had accumulated some experience in Polar Night City and picked them up quickly.
Finally, this curse had a distance limitation and could only be used against opponents whose physical parameters were entirely inferior to the caster's own.