The instant the magnesium-aluminum flash bomb detonated at the mine bottom, Del showed no trace of exhilaration. Almost by reflex, he twisted sideways, pressing his shoulder firmly against his father Garay’s chest while using his wide sleeve to shield the old man’s eyes.

  This blinding white light was crafted from high-purity metal powder Del had extracted from alchemical residues. Crude though it was, in this sunless mine bottom, it was the deadliest blinding weapon.

  “Chip, take over visual compensation,” he commanded deep in his mind.

  On his retina, the blinding light was swiftly filtered, replaced by a grayscale world built from infrared heat signatures and sonic detection. In this world, Kuhn’s twisted mutated limbs and the blindly swinging guards were nothing more than moving geometric targets.

  Del felt his right hand trembling violently. His previous injuries hadn’t healed; forcing it caused his recently reset shoulder to grind with a teeth-gritting screech.

  “Bad timing for injuries,” he muttered self-mockingly.

  “Damn it! Who did that!” Garay roared in the darkness. Though his eyes burned, he still swung his broken blade by instinct, trying to protect the son behind him.

  At that moment, the bronze chest at the altar’s center shattered completely. Garay had believed it contained pure essence to break his bottleneck, but as the chains broke, a cold, slimy, foul-smelling dark-purple energy surged out like a tide.

  “Alert: Extreme negative-attribute energy wave detected. This energy possesses strong corrosive and parasitic logic—not restorative,” the chip’s voice flashed urgently in Del’s mind.

  Del’s pupils contracted slightly. He watched the purple mist instantly coil around nearby corpses, rapidly reassembling into a withered corpse clad in tattered silver armor. Garay clearly sensed something wrong too—the cold aura caused intense rejection in his battle-qi.

  “This isn’t what I wanted… Kuhn! What monster did you unleash!” Garay roared in shock and fury, yet paralyzed by the spinal poison.

  Kuhn had gone completely mad. Stimulated by the flash bomb and flooded with negative energy, the “Blood Seed” in his body entered pathological overload. His black-furred claws whistled sharply through the darkness, striking precisely at Del’s throat.

  “Basic apprentice reaction logic…”

  Del’s mind raced. During his time nominally under Ian, he hadn’t just idled by the furnace. He had recorded countless basic apprentice defensive footwork patterns for sudden threats.

  Del’s body suddenly leaned back at a minimal angle—light and rigid, exactly like a spellcaster’s standard evasion from close threats. Kuhn’s claws grazed past his nose, shattering the rock behind him.

  “Is that all you’ve got? Scurrying like a rat!” Kuhn roared.

  “In alchemy, if a catalyst overloads, the result is an explosion—you know that?” Del calmly evaded Kuhn’s three consecutive claw strikes. To outsiders, his movements seemed sluggish from injury, each dodge perilously close.

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  But this was exactly what he wanted. He was using apprentice evasion logic to lure Kuhn toward the altar’s edge—the node of greatest energy instability.

  “Warning: Body load at 85%.”

  “I know. One last step.”

  Del suddenly halted. At that moment, the ancient withered corpse had fully formed; purple mist began stripping life from the living nearby.

  Kuhn seized the moment, claws thrusting toward Del’s chest. Del’s left hand, hanging at his side, suddenly rose—two pitch-black ore fragments clamped between his fingers.

  “In the wizard’s introductory manual, this is called ‘energy disruption.’”

  Del’s figure twisted eerily, using the hunter’s sidestep his father had taught him, crashing straight into Kuhn’s embrace.

  Pfft.

  The two ore fragments were precisely slapped into Kuhn’s axillary lymph nodes. Kuhn’s movements froze instantly; the rampaging negative energy within him clashed violently. This highly professional alchemical pharmacological trap rendered him completely unable to resist.

  “You… you’re not a fighter… this technique…” Kuhn’s eyes widened in terror.

  Del’s right hand finally gripped the nicked cross-shaped sword. The black “qi” in his dantian no longer lurked but flooded the blade like a breached dam. From overload, his right arm’s skin split again, blood mixing with black qi to form a dust-like smokescreen.

  “Black Sand… Fills the Sky.”

  This sword was an explosive release at point-blank range. Black sword qi, accompanied by a piercing crack, pierced straight through Kuhn’s chest. Before that domineering black energy, the mutated flesh was shredded like paper.

  The withered corpse let out a shrill screech. It sensed a threat from the same source—yet far more domineering.

  Del dropped to one knee, gasping heavily, sweat and blood dripping from his chin. He looked up at the monster preparing its final charge, then at his father lying in a pool of blood, desperately trying to rise and protect him.

  Baron Garay stared at his son’s back in shock. “Del… that technique just now… did you learn sorcery from Ian?”

  Del leaned on his sword, rising slowly but firmly. His body trembled from severe wounds, but his detached, icy aura grew even stronger.

  The withered corpse’s purple mist tentacles were already before him.

  Del showed no panic. Right hand on sword, his left hand traced the standard starting gesture for a “Mage Shield” in the air. This highly deceptive motion instinctively caused the withered corpse a moment’s hesitation.

  Yet in the instant the purple mist contracted, Del shot forward like an arrow from a bow, using the explosive power of “Black Sand” to crash straight into the withered corpse’s defenses.

  The blade like ink instantly severed the withered corpse’s throat. Del leaned close to its ear, whispering with cold humor only they could hear:

  “Actually, I don’t know Mage Shield at all.”

  He twisted the blade violently, detonating the last trace of black qi within him.

  “If you must know something—I just read the introductory manual three days ago,” Del said slowly, watching the fire in the withered corpse’s eye sockets fade. “You could say I haven’t even turned to the first page.”

  He paused, then yanked the blade back, completely dismantling the withered corpse.

  “…Sorry—I’m a close-combat wizard who just read the manual.”

  The entire mine-bottom altar collapsed after this strike.

  The purple mist dispersed. Del leaned against the shattered altar, his right hand completely numb. Yet he still smiled, though the smile looked weary.

  Through this battle, the chip issued a more proactive alert—regarding the withered corpse in this sacrificial site.

  “Father, I think I arrived just in time.” He turned to Garay, whose face was a mix of emotions.

  “Or perhaps… I really think virility tonics are quite effective.” Del gave a sincere smile.

  Garay stared at this familiar yet unfamiliar son, hearing such evasive nonsense, and for a moment didn’t know how to respond.

  Then Del closed his eyes, calmly saying to himself in his mind:

  “Chip, deactivate combat mode. Begin damage repair. Also—

  can we stop using injury-trading sword moves as tactics next time?”