Giant fireballs were fired in an arc, rushing toward them.
Whoosh!
Realizing he couldn't dodge, Baz slashed two sword qi beams crossing each other in an X shape.
The sword qi rushed forward, piercing through the arc and opening a path for Baz to rush through. Baz understood that this couldn't continue. A swordsman's mana could never compare to a priest's.
[Life and Death Battle: Effect; Remove all of one's own defense stats in exchange for a skyrocketing increase in speed and strength. Locks onto an enemy; if that enemy doesn't die within 5 minutes, the caster dies.]
Canis's background was certainly terrifying, but so what? Having evil intentions towards the Lady was a crime worthy of death. Moreover, there were no witnesses here. Riven was an accomplice, so he was unlikely to report Baz.
His muscles twitched uncontrollably. The air around Baz seemed compressed as his aura continued to skyrocket. Suddenly, a red thread connecting Baz and Canis appeared.
Although Canis didn't understand what the red thread meant, he felt a chill down his spine as he couldn't remove it no matter how hard he tried.
Baz took a leap, appearing in front of Canis in the blink of an eye. Two sword qi slashes, fast as lightning, rushed forward almost simultaneously at close range.
Reflexively, Canis created a Wind Wall, but the sword qi pierced through, destroying the Wind Wall and flying forward to cleanly slice off his right leg and three fingers.
At the same time, the clone's three fingers and right leg also turned to dust. With only two fingers left, the already predictable puppet moved even more clumsily and slowly.
Canis regretted his misjudgment due to panic; the Wind Wall completely failed to block the sword qi. Partially, maintaining the Parallel Processing overloaded his brain with a massive amount of information.
Realizing the battle was lost, he immediately withdrew the clone. His life was the most important thing.
The puppet immediately put all its strength into a powerful punch towards Riven, but Riven, in the state of Flawless Perfection, had already noticed.
Canis was too hasty, withdrawing the puppet without realizing how full of openings this thrust was.
Riven took a leap onto the puppet's arm, throwing 2 magic stones with [Snatch], smashing the clone's remaining two fingers. The connection shattered, and the puppet stopped abruptly.
[Flawless Perfection Ended]
A feeling of exhaustion and pain rushed straight to Riven's brain, making him seem immobile. Seeing this, Canis's clone, although nearly crippled, did not attack; to him, the safety of the original body must be prioritized.
Using wind magic to hover low with difficulty, he rushed toward the original body.
The clone's remaining arm also suddenly vanished, causing him to collapse in mid-air because all his magic required hand casting to execute. He looked helplessly toward the real Canis.
There, Canis lay on the cold stone floor, struggling. This stone floor might be very cold, but it couldn't be colder than Canis's heart at this moment. He understood that with a muscle-brained person like Baz, threatening with family background was no different from provocation.
Retracting the Parallel Processing caused the clone to vanish. Both thought processes in his head arranged words. In the instant Baz was about to swing his sword at his head...
"Baz, you have to understand, the one who wants to kill Sylvie is Caesar. I'm just a tool. I can testify against him."
This made Baz pause to reflect, suddenly realizing Canis had a point. Killing him wouldn't solve anything. Suddenly hearing footsteps behind him, he turned to see Riven running over.
Baz instinctively gripped his sword tightly out of wariness. He had clearly seen the speed Riven displayed while fighting the puppet. If Riven wanted to kill him with that speed, he feared he wouldn't even know how he died.
Riven had just lost consciousness for 12 seconds due to the backlash of Flawless Perfection. Luckily, when this happened, the battle had already ended, and Canis's clone prioritized saving its master.
Seeing Riven arrive, Canis also quickly explained what he had just said to Baz, as if afraid Riven was too far away to hear clearly.
"If you want to protect Sylvie, what you should do now is not kill me but..."
Before he could finish his sentence, a cold saber enhanced by [Snatch] swung down, splitting Canis's head into two halves. His corpse fell.
Thud!! It hit the ground.
Seeing this scene, Baz turned and shouted at Riven's face.
"What the hell are you doing, pretty boy? He could have been evidence for us to use against Caesar!"
Hearing this, Riven still only frowned and said nothing. This silence made Baz retreat in fear, gripping his sword in a defensive stance, afraid Riven wanted to kill the witness.
In front of Riven, the quest board was still there, which was the reason he frowned.
[Generated Quest: Eliminate the person endangering you. Reward: Choose 1 of 3 Ultimate Skills | Progress 0/1]
Looking at the corpse with the head split in two before his eyes, Riven couldn't believe he was still alive. The RPG Dungeon had no latency; completing previous quests had proven that.
Riven raised his Saber, making Baz scream.
"Pretty boy, are you planning to burn the bridge after crossing it?"
But contrary to what Baz thought was about to happen, Riven just frantically hacked at Canis's corpse.
"Pretty boy, calm down! I know you're very angry because this guy wanted to harm Sylvie, but venting on a dead body won't solve anything!"
"Shut up, you simp! He's not dead yet! Don't you see the red link on you two is still there?"
Looking down at his chest, Baz realized the link of the [Life and Death Battle] skill hadn't ended, making him startle in panic, forgetting to question how Riven knew the effect of his skill.
He quickly picked up his sword and joined Riven, hacking frantically at Canis's corpse. Flesh and blood splattered all over the ground. The link still didn't disappear, making him anxious, but suddenly the earring on Canis's right ear glowed.
Before Baz could think anything, Riven snatched the earring from Canis's ear. At the same time, the quest progress board updated, and the red thread connecting Baz and Canis disappeared.
[Generated Quest: Eliminate the person endangering you. Reward: Choose 1 of 3 Ultimate Skills | Progress 1/1]
Riven immediately received a massive amount of EXP and jumped straight to Level 15.
At the same time, a red beam of light shot from Canis's corpse toward Riven, scaring him, but the speed was too fast to dodge. Strangely, nothing happened.
However, a mysterious status named [Tracing Mark] appeared on his status bar. Riven understood clearly that this was definitely not a good effect, and the level of this status was too high compared to himself for the dungeon to display details.
Please choose your reward. Every skill has a default balance stat of 10000. The higher this stat, the more balanced the skill is. When a skill levels up by 1, the balance stat decreases by 1, meaning the higher the skill level, the stronger it becomes and the less balanced it is.
The maximum level any skill can reach is 9999, meaning the lowest theoretical balance attainable is 1. But Ultimate Skills are different from normal skills; they have no level, and their balance is always 0 by default.
Don't look at just a difference of 1 unit; that is the distance between heaven and earth. Each time a skill levels up in the units digit, it strengthens linearly. Leveling up in the tens digit strengthens exponentially. Leveling up in the hundreds digit strengthens by powers.
The flow of information into Riven's head made him roughly understand just how broken the hack he was about to receive was.
Divine Multi-Body Technique: Capable of turning corpses into another version of yourself. That corpse possesses the entire personality of the old owner with absolute loyalty to the original body. There is no price to pay, and it has independent thinking ability. Unlike normal cloning techniques, this is truly another version of you. You have the right to possess and control the thoughts of that clone. That is also another you; you are you, and that clone is also you, not merely a clone. You will possess the class of the person turned into a clone. The number of clones is limited by your level. If the original body dies, the other bodies will die too.
World-Severing Slash: Unleash a slash costing 100% of your current lifespan? No, 10% of your own lifespan. It has 100% armor penetration with destructive power, and it cannot be dodged because the slash will reverse causality from missing to hitting.
Stat Plunder: Steal enemy stats without contact; just need to remember the face, even if it's a mask. Each time steals 20% of any stat of the chosen target. Cooldown: 1 time/1 day.
After reading everything, a depraved smile gradually appeared on Riven's face.
Milea Vanesa Cathedral.
"You are the light that guides us. Your commandments are the unquestionable truth."
"Your loyal servant, the slave of freedom Lucifer, was blinded by the devil's whispers and betrayed you."
"He was banished to Hell, reigning at the very bottom of Hell. He is chained there, looking up at Heaven."
Bishop Cellis was speaking when he suddenly stopped completely. He felt he had lost something. The skill [Tracing Mark has been activated].
What this meant, Cellis knew best. He quietly announced the end of the sermon and silently went down to the basement.
He didn't say a word, but the atmosphere was so heavy that no one dared to breathe loudly. Looking from afar, he seemed like the loneliest person in the world. When he entered his private soundproof room...
"My soooooooon!!!!"
A heart-wrenching scream rang out in the space. Others might think Canis was just his adopted son, but Cellis knew better than anyone that Canis was his biological son.
When he was young, he loved a woman, but at that time, it was the opportunity to choose the successor pope. Between love and fame, he chose the latter.
After achieving success and fame, he couldn't help but remember her, and he wished, "If only I had a chance to do it again." After many years of searching, he finally found the woman from years ago.
But she had died of illness. She only left behind a son. Through some special methods, he soon realized this was his biological son.
Due to guilt towards Canis, but his position prevented him from accepting a blood relative as a successor, he had to accept Canis as an adopted son to nurture him.
"The Tracing Mark has been imprinted on the soul of the one who harmed my son. Even if he hides down to the 18th level of Hell, I will avenge you."
He screamed through gritted teeth, his fingernails digging deep into his flesh. Tears and mucus flowed uncontrollably, making him look more like a furious old man than a noble priest.