"No... Human!"
"Don't think you'll get any information about Lord Euinri out of me!"
The mental pressure continued to mount.
Through his psychic magic, Kanzaki Rei was guiding the creature, nudging it to act according to his will.
And yet...
The answer he received was still no.
Whoosh!
The spears protruding from the creature's back flared open.
Countless razor-sharp spikes erupted at once and shot toward Kanzaki Rei!
Kanzaki Rei narrowed his eyes slightly.
Its speed was extraordinary.
That much went without saying.
If an ordinary Level 6 class-advanced professional had been standing here, they likely would not even have seen what happened before being killed instantly.
But at this moment, Kanzaki Rei existed within frozen time.
He possessed an infinite amount of time to think and decide.
He could clearly sense the monster's emotions.
It was furious—furious at the possibility of betrayal.
And between betraying its master and attacking him...
It had chosen to attack him.
Kanzaki Rei could feel the complexity of its emotions.
The creature had gone through intense internal deliberation before making that decision.
Boom!
Facing the countless spikes that burst forth in an instant—
Kanzaki Rei merely gathered wind and lightning in his hand at an even greater speed.
BOOM!
In a single instant, violent winds and thunder swept across a vast stretch of ocean.
The explosive roar spread over the sea!
The giant spikes that had erupted from the ocean were all severed in a single sweep.
At the same time, every spike on the gray-masked monster's body was cut away.
This attack had not come solely from the monster's body.
It had caused the sea and the land themselves to erupt with long, needle-like spikes.
As if all those spikes were merging into a giant cage—
One meant to imprison Kanzaki Rei and pierce him full of holes.
[Seventh-Tier Wind-Lightning Fusion Magic — Divine Wind Severing Slash (LV: 601) (10,000x Mana Infusion)]
Splurt!
The monster's eyes were filled with incomprehensible shock!
It had never heard of a human capable of such magic.
It could see the flow of mana.
It could observe the process by which humans cast spells.
This was an innate gift granted to it when it was bred as a mana-devouring monster.
Since the moment of its birth—
It had watched countless humans cast magic.
Frailty mana circuits.
Sparse, pitiful streams of mana.
Cobbling together weak and vulnerable spells.
It could always identify the thinnest point in an enemy's magical structure.
And then, in an instant, pierce that weak point with its sharpened spikes.
But...
The mana within the man before it was an endless ocean.
And the countless currents branching from that sea were so complex and chaotic that they were utterly impossible to comprehend.
Boom!
Its body was cut apart in an instant.
Bang!
A leg descended from above and slammed into its head—
Driving it deep into the earth.
And with that single blow, the entire continent beneath them fractured.
Countless cracks spread outward as the land began to collapse into massive chunks of rock, sinking into the black sea!
"You always resort to violence immediately..."
"Are you really unwilling to have a proper conversation?"
Kanzaki Rei slowly descended to the bottom of the enormous crater he had created.
Standing atop the monster's back, he pressed it firmly into the earth.
"Euinri is an old friend of mine. I imagine he'd be quite interested in seeing me."
"By obstructing our reunion, are you really honoring the Lord Euinri you claim to serve?"
So strong...
Just what level of power did this human possess?
Could he be... a legendary Level 9 class-advanced professional?
"You know Lord Euinri."
The monster radiated fury, still showing no intention of surrendering.
Kanzaki Rei could clearly feel its rage.
And beneath that rage was a savage determination to fight him to the bitter end.
Truly loyal.
In some ways, it was better than certain humans...
And he did not know whether this monster was an exception, or whether all monsters were like this.
If they were all like this...
Creatures with overwhelming numbers, absolute loyalty, and high intelligence.
The thought alone was deeply troubling.
"Of course I know him."
"I should still have a few things he left me."
Kanzaki Rei thought for a moment, then took several books and a handful of blueprints from his storage space.
These were volumes and puzzle scrolls Euinri had once given him.
Back then, Euinri had hoped he would solve them and help increase the influence of the Puzzle Enthusiasts Association.
As for the research that eventually led to monsters gaining intelligence...
Kanzaki Rei had originally intended to participate as well.
If not for the incident involving the Time Ruins.
Who could have expected...
That after ten years apart, everything would have changed.
Changed so completely.
"Heh. Even if you show me these, I have no way of knowing whether what you're saying is true."
"But if you're Lord Euinri's friend, why are you my enemy?"
Kanzaki Rei spoke calmly.
As he did, he gradually began sealing the monster's bloodline and suppressing its vitality.
The powerful eighth-tier monster was steadily losing its ability to resist.
"I already told you... he's an old friend."
"We were separated for a long time. I don't know what's happened to him."
A trace of weariness gradually appeared in Kanzaki Rei's expression.
"If..."
"You truly can't answer my question, then you should die."
A mass of black flame slowly rose in his right hand.
An aura of pure destruction coiled around the fire.
Skyflow Style — Sixth Form: Ruin · Extinction · Flame... Ultimate.
Within the artistic conception of Tsukishin.
The Sixth Form had been imbued with no fewer than ten ultimate principles.
Among them, the principles applied most heavily to this form were December's "Extinction" and "Ruin."
This was an attack of absolute annihilation.
Pinned beneath Kanzaki Rei's foot, the monster twisted its head a full one hundred and eighty degrees.
It stared at him with unhinged madness in its eyes.
"Then... do it!"
As it roared—
Its body suddenly swelled!
BOOM!
But Kanzaki Rei's gaze remained ice-cold.
He drove his fist straight down!
The flames surged into the monster's body, filling every part of it in an instant—
BANG!
The creature exploded completely.
Its body disintegrated into ash of pure destruction and scattered into nothingness.
The battle ended with absurd simplicity.
And yet the slight aftershock alone shattered vast portions of the surrounding land.
After only a minimal exchange, the entire continent was already sinking beneath the sea.
"Loyalty. Obedience."
"And extremely strong resistance to mental interference."
"No... not resistance to the mind. Instinct."
His psychic magic had influenced them.
But what truly determined their actions was not their conscious thoughts.
It was instinct.
They acted according to instinct.
"This level of strength..."
"Weaker than a Level 8 Skin-Stealer wearing a Level 8 skin."
"But compared to late-stage Ansei at Level 8... it also seems somewhat weaker."
Kanzaki Rei touched the remains of the monster, continuously analyzing the information before him and piecing together the answer to the puzzle.
"Breeding. Incubation."
"Can eighth-tier monsters already be cultivated and mass-produced this quickly?"
As he murmured to himself, he also reached up and touched the gray mask that had covered the monster's face.
He removed it.
A face almost identical to a human's was revealed beneath.
"A human-like face... deliberately concealed."
"And it seems they're continuing to evolve toward becoming human."
Kanzaki Rei turned to look across the rest of the sea.
During this brief battle, the range of Absolute Mana Sea had already expanded to nearly ten billion kilometers.