Chapter 334: Bizarre
[Lilith] gasped for breath, her heart pounding uncontrollably. She felt a splitting headache as Mercenary Tao increased the pressure. She felt that at any moment, her skull would be crushed.
No, I must struggle! I can't die like this!
Like most Reincarnators, Lilith didn't enter this Space by choice. She was chosen unintentionally and inexplicably arrived in this purgatory-like place.
She had a happy family and loving parents. She absolutely couldn't accept dying like this.
"I... I have spellcasting abilities! My Spirit attribute is almost reaching the limit! I also have Dimensional Points..."
Even at this moment, she didn't choose to fight to the death. Instead, she kept emphasizing her value.
This made Kaito despise her even more. It was hard to imagine such a person surviving for long. Rather, being alive until now made her an extremely lucky person.
The earring on Kaito's earlobe shook twice. He raised his index finger, preparing to tap on her skull.
"I know Dowsing! I'm very good at finding people..."
By now, this woman had finished listing her various elemental spellcasting abilities and started mentioning some special abilities close to parlor tricks.
Kaito lifted the woman. Her weight of around a hundred pounds felt excessively light to him now.
He lifted her face to his eye level, their gazes locking.
"How good are you at finding people? Can you find plot characters?"
Lilith was still reciting her specialties like chanting scriptures. In the next moment, bone-chilling killing intent soaked into her body. She shivered and quieted down.
Nodding repeatedly.
"Yes, I can! As long as I know the information, there's a high probability I can find them!"
Thud!
Kaito let go. The woman fell to the ground. Ignoring the pain, she felt unbelievable joy in her heart.
She was about to thank Mercenary Tao for sparing her life, but her face turned pale. She saw the white-clothed, black-haired female ghost appear from the hallway again. Like blinking, it appeared instantly behind Mercenary Tao, as if lying on his back.
She knew that as long as Mercenary Tao turned around and made eye contact with that thing, he would likely stiffen instantly and then have his neck snapped.
Their team had encountered this attack earlier and lost a member.
"Careful! You..."
Before she could finish, she saw Mercenary Tao had already turned his head and met the gaze of that dirty thing.
Kaito looked into those dead, silent eyes and sneered. The chill on his body couldn't affect him at all.
He had realized that the origin of these Yin Spirits in this world was likely Vengeful Spirits from Mob Psycho 100 or Ghosts and Youkai from Dandadan.
Although these things had various special abilities and rules, they weren't completely [Rule-type] existences.
They were completely different from those terrifying 'Mechanism Kill' dungeons in traditional infinite flow works.
In other words, he wouldn't be directly killed just because he triggered some 'Instant Death' plot. While these monsters' attacks on Reincarnators seemed to have similar effects, fundamentally, it was still a matter of special abilities and numerical values.
It could also be understood as the mechanism's priority not being high enough.
For example, this curse named [Grudge of the Dead] possessed a mechanism triggered by eye contact, which could completely freeze a Reincarnator's mobility.
But since its priority wasn't high enough to completely ignore a Reincarnator's various abilities, in Kaito's view, this became a contest of 'numerical values.'
And he had always been a 'Stat Monster.'
Under Lilith's terrified gaze, Kaito reached out and grabbed the ghost's neck directly. The ghost wanted to flee, but Kaito held it down and forcefully pressed it into his own body.
The ghost began to struggle violently, but it had no effect at all. Before long, it disappeared inside Kaito's body.
[You have accommodated Yin Spirit · Cursed Asylum Sub-body]
Kaito then kicked open the elevator door. A big fire was already burning at the bottom of the elevator shaft, likely because those Reincarnators used some high-explosive, high-incendiary weapons in the elevator.
There were no traces of living people in the elevator anymore.
Kaito 'listened' carefully for a moment but heard absolutely no sound.
It seemed that after hearing the voice claiming to be Ayase Seiko, those Reincarnators encountered some unexpected situation and were no longer within this space.
At least, they were not in the same physical space as him.
After possessing the electromagnetic power of the [Heart of Thunder God], Kaito also completed learning the [Mantra] (Heart Net) extracted from Enel's Drop Card.
This special Observation Haki essentially utilized electromagnetic force as an extension, greatly enhancing the effects of Observation Haki.
Whether in range or the additional mind-reading ability, it far surpassed ordinary Observation Haki users.
Although when Observation Haki was cultivated to a high level, the user could achieve short-term future sight and see things tens, hundreds, or even further kilometers away...
Mantra could achieve such things in the early stages.
Only now did Kaito re-examine the surrounding environment.
Previously, due to the level of the curse and the strength of those Yin Spirits, he thought this Side Mission was nothing special.
But now, with the disappearance of those Reincarnators, he sensed something abnormal.
The Yin Spirit he accommodated was named [Cursed Asylum Sub-body] by the Space. In other words, there must be a main body for this thing. And since this Side Mission had no penalty, it meant failure likely resulted in death.
Kaito turned around, walked to the wall, and kicked it fiercely.
Bang!
The wall shattered. An entire exterior wall collapsed completely. But after the exterior wall collapsed, Kaito saw another corridor with another elevator, just like a mirror image.
What terrified Lilith even more was that in the corridor behind that wall, there was also a Mercenary Tao and herself. At this moment, both were looking at her and smiling sinisterly.
Hum~
Golden Qi broke through the air in an instant, like a laser, slicing through the bodies of the two Yin Spirits. The two Yin Spirits, which looked like ghosts from classic horror scenes just a moment ago, turned into corpses and fell to the ground in the next second.
"Mercenary Tao, what do we do? We can't get out even by breaking these walls. We've tried many times before."
Lilith was scared to death of Mercenary Tao just now, but upon realizing he didn't intend to kill her immediately, Mercenary Tao instantly became her source of security.
Kaito finally understood why those Reincarnators hadn't noticed the Yin Spirits standing in their team earlier.
Presumably, those people had been infiltrated by Yin Spirits while smashing walls and moving through repeatedly.
They had been cursed long ago without knowing it.
The difficulty of this Side Mission was higher than imagined.
From this, one could also infer the difficulty of this world. It definitely didn't lie solely in individuals beyond imagination like Saitama, Tatsumaki, and Mob.
Something must have changed in this world for it to become so dangerous.
Kaito had no mind to solve this kind of spatial supernatural puzzle right now. According to the duration of the Side Mission, there must be a hidden space here.
If the main body of the Yin Spirit realized he could harm it and focused on hiding, it could waste a considerable amount of time.
Kaito thought for a moment, lifted Lilith by her neck, turned around, and jumped down from the stairwell.
Even carrying a person and jumping from the third floor, Kaito landed lightly and silently.
"Mercenary Tao... what do we do now?"
Lilith tried to actively communicate with this 'beast' Mercenary Tao, attempting to prevent him from killing her later.
Kaito didn't explain. He carried her and jumped directly into the underground area where he was initially.
After seeing the new space revealed by breaking the wall, Kaito realized that his previous act of breaking the floor to enter here was unusual behavior.
This meant that the sewer full of corpses, Yin Spirits, and snakes was indeed unusual.
Kaito landed in the pitch-black sewer, completely ignoring the bites of the snakes. Amidst the blue-white light emitted by Lilith's terrified barrier, he walked all the way to the end of the sewer, where turbid foul water flowed out bit by bit.
Kaito tapped twice with his hand. Through the transmission of force, he detected a wall about a dozen meters thick. More importantly, outside was flat ground.
Kaito withdrew his left arm. Muscles bulged inch by inch. Then, amidst creaking sounds, he suddenly punched out.
Boom!
Amidst terrifying vibrations, the wall cracked bit by bit, then began to collapse.
Accompanied by some sharp roar, sunlight appeared from outside the shattered wall.
Seeing the light, Lilith instinctively felt joy. In the next moment, she was lifted by Mercenary Tao and quickly disappeared from the cold, gloomy waterway.
[You have completed Side Mission · Cursed Asylum]
[You obtained Material · Mask of the Corpse Demon x1]
~~~
Get early access to 50+ advanced chapters on Patreon!
https://www.pat-reon.co-m/c/Hollowborn
~~~
Every 5 new reviews = 2 extra chapters
Every 100 Power Stones = 1 extra chapter