That barely audible murmur,paired with the utterly bizarre smile at the corner of the fake Mo Fan's mouth,yanked Mo Fan's guard to its absolute peak in an instant.
He sensed it keenly.
I've been played!
In that moment,he instinctively wanted to sever the[Soul Shock]he'd just blasted out.
But it was already too late.
An attack already launched couldn't be recalled in an instant,and Mo Fan could only watch,wide-eyed,as that invisible shock sank into the fake Mo Fan's brow.
And in the split second the attack slammed into the other's soul,the anticipated devastating shattering of the soul never came.
On the contrary,it was like driving a fist hard into a lump of extremely viscous silt.
Like a clay ox sinking into the sea.
Soundless.
Without a trace.tnir
Mo Fan discovered with horror that the soul power he'd blasted out had not only failed to destroy his opponent,it had been firmly sucked in and held fast by the fake Mo Fan!
BREAK!
Mo Fan roared in the depths of his heart,straining desperately to yank his Soul Shock back.
But it wouldn't tear free at all!
Because only at this moment did Mo Fan truly see the real face of that monster hidden beneath the false hide,now fully formed.
It was no longer the chaotic storm of countless remnant souls forcibly kneaded together.
Through countless points of contact over all this time,the synchronization of the flesh,and even the"hammering"and"tempering"of Mo Fan's own earlier Soul Shocks...
By now,this monster had,without anyone noticing,adjusted its soul into something...
Identical to Mo Fan's own!
Same root.
Same origin.
A perfect fit!
It was like a single droplet of water willingly falling into a vast ocean.
The two instantly blended together.
You within me.
Me within you.
How could either be told apart anymore?
How could it possibly be"severed"?!
This animal...
Mo Fan grasped the whole scheme in an instant,and cold sweat soaked him from head to toe.
But he'd been left no more time.
In the instant the two souls made full contact,that once passive monster soul suddenly turned into a maggot in the marrow!
Following Mo Fan's spiritual link,like a greedy viper opening its gaping maw,it surged madly back toward Mo Fan's own body!
Possession?
No...this was even more terrifying than possession!
Possession was forcible erasure.
What this thing was doing was...
Assimilation!
GET OUT!
Mo Fan tried to mobilize his remaining soul power to strangle this invading foreign thing.
But he found,in despair,that his soul defenses were having no effect whatsoever.
Because this invading force carried a soul aura completely identical to his own,his soul was actually treating this"invader"as a part of itself.
No defenses were raised at all!
And then,a sense of dislocation Mo Fan had never experienced before flooded his senses.
The fake Mo Fan opposite him slowly raised its right hand.
And Mo Fan,standing where he was,went abruptly rigid.
To his utter horror,he discovered that although he clearly hadn't moved,his brain had"felt"the lifting of that hand with perfect clarity.
The fake Mo Fan tilted its head slightly,those hollow eyes staring straight at Mo Fan.
Hummm!
Mo Fan's field of vision split in an instant.
But this time,he was entirely passive.
Two images appeared before his eyes with utter abruptness.
One image was his own perspective,looking at the fake Mo Fan across from him.
And the other image was,astonishingly,from the opposite angle...
Looking at his own face,covered in cold sweat!
The two sides were undergoing some kind of deep soul overlap!
Stop...Stop it right now...
Mo Fan bit clean through the tip of his tongue,trying to use searing pain to wrest back control of his body.
But he discovered in despair that he couldn't produce a single motion of resistance.
Just like that monster clumsily imitating him down at the cliff bottom before...
Now he was the one being pulled around like a puppet on strings!
The fake Mo Fan opposite split its mouth into an exaggerated arc.
The corner of Mo Fan's mouth also tugged upward uncontrollably,with extreme stiffness.
The fake Mo Fan opposite took a step forward.
Mo Fan's legs,too,took a step forward like machinery,refusing to obey him.
No...It can't be like this...
Mo Fan's inner self was howling madly,but his throat couldn't produce half a syllable.
He was being devoured.
He didn't even have a way to purge this force.
Because you cannot use your left hand to chop off your own left hand.
And you cannot use your own soul to erase your own soul!
As time went on,the consciousness belonging to Mo Fan himself grew fainter and fainter,like a candle flame being nibbled away bit by bit by boundless darkness.
Assimilation was merely a matter of time.
In the final instant before his consciousness sank entirely into that bottomless abyss...
Mo Fan spent the very last scrap of strength in the depths of his soul and,with enormous difficulty,shifted his gaze.
He looked around him.
Not far off,Mo Yan gripped his cold-iron longsword.
Unit 004 stood vast as a mountain.
Unit 003 crouched off to the side.
And WTF held up the[Pale Bone Scepter].
This undead legion,which had fought shoulder to shoulder with him and never known defeat,was now standing blankly in place.
The soul-fires in their eye sockets swayed violently,flickering madly,yet they didn't step forward to help at all.
Because in their soul perception,standing here at this moment were two"masters"bearing completely identical soul imprints.
Their simple logic couldn't distinguish at all which one was the real enemy.
Mo Fan looked at them,a final flicker of helpless bitterness passing through his eyes.
The next second...
The light in his vision was snuffed out entirely.
Boundless darkness swallowed everything.
The top of Abandoned Sword Cliff.
Cold wind swept across the abyss,kicking up broken stone and dust from the ground.
At the cliff's edge,two figures stood facing one another in silence.
Suddenly.
Splat.
That cobbled-together"fake Mo Fan's"body convulsed violently.
The last sliver of eerie light in its eyes scattered in an instant,as though everything sustaining it had been drained away at once.
Its body still remained.
But it had already crumpled to the ground like a dead man.
Meanwhile,the one standing opposite it...
The body that truly belonged to Mo Fan...
Still stood quietly where he was.
His head remained lowered,arms hanging at his sides,motionless as a lifeless statue.
The undead legion around him still held their standby postures,staring dimly at this familiar body.
Krk...krk...krk...
A moment later...
Mo Fan's stiff neck lifted.
Exceedingly slowly.
Bit by bit.
He slowly raised both hands and held them before his eyes,examining the fronts and backs over and over.
Then he clenched them tightly into fists,feeling the vigorous beat of the heart within his chest.
On that handsome face,the original terror and despair had long since vanished without a trace.
In the depths of his eyes,a dark gleam entirely unlike the real Mo Fan's flashed past.
The corner of Mo Fan's mouth curled upward,bit by bit.
That arc grew wider.
More exaggerated.
Until at last,it froze into an exceedingly eerie,hair-raising smile.
He turned his head and glanced at the fake Mo Fan's corpse on the ground.
Then shook his head,seemingly considerably more satisfied with this body.
In the night wind,he slowly opened his mouth.
In Mo Fan's voice,even carrying a trace of intoxication,he murmured to himself:
"It's done."
"Now..."
"I am Mo Fan."