"Cough, cough!"
Silas covered his mouth, bent over, and coughed uncontrollably. A few seconds later, his forehead began to burn, and his consciousness grew hazy.
It was "Disease"! If he didn't quickly distance himself, the illness would rapidly worsen!
After the battle at Port Enmat, he already knew which abilities Ma'am M had "grazed."
He had therefore consulted the relevant internal materials beforehand. According to the documentation, the disease ability came from the Demoness Pathway.
If one couldn't increase the distance from the source, the condition would escalate within minutes from a cold to a stroke or heart attack, resulting in death.
"Swish, swish!"
Relying on his exceptional physical abilities, Silas rapidly jumped backward, charging straight toward the window, preparing to temporarily escape.
"Boom!"
But crimson flames quickly blazed up in front of the window, and Ma'am M blocked his path.
He had no choice but to dodge again, attempting to flee from another direction.
However, though his movements were swift, Ma'am M always used flame flash to appear before him, preventing him from leaving the room.
The two remained locked in a stalemate for over ten seconds as Silas's condition rapidly deteriorated.
His coughing grew more frequent, his forehead burned, and his lungs felt stuffed with hot sand. Each breath brought both itching and pain.
This couldn't continue!
Cecilia hadn't arrived yet. He had to find a way to change the situation.
Silas spent only a few seconds thinking before clenching his teeth and deciding to play dirty.
He remembered that when his combat instructor, Gawain, had interviewed him, he'd once said that if you really couldn't win a fight, just open the gas valve in the room and take your enemy down with you.
Now he was preparing to do exactly that!
In any case, his recovery ability was strong. Even if he got blown up, it wouldn't kill him!
Silas had already observed that this room's gas valve was an old-fashioned type.
If he could hit a specific spot with a bullet, it would immediately release gas. But the problem was that he only had two bullets left in his revolver. He had to aim accurately enough.
Feeling the increasingly severe illness within his body, he steeled his resolve.
No time to hesitate, let's go!
"Bang!"
Silas pulled the trigger, aiming at Ma'am M in the center of the room. Perhaps because he was severely ill, the bullet didn't hit Ma'am M's body but instead struck in the direction of the wall behind her, producing a metallic impact sound.
Got it!
His heart leaped with joy as he saw the valve in the corner struck by the bullet, flipping open.
He knew that colorless gas was now rapidly leaking from it. Because the pipe opening was large, the gas would fill the entire room in a short time.
But before that happened, he had to hold Ma'am M off!
Silas reached into his coat and withdrew Azik's white bone whistle.
He'd already used the bone whistle three times. Without Azik's blood, the summoned spirit creatures weren't stable.
They might help him, or they might be completely useless, or even harmful to himself.
But right now, he could only gamble!
Silas endured the intense discomfort in his lungs, took a deep breath, and blew into the bone whistle.
The bone whistle made no sound. What followed instead was the harsh sound of a door opening.
"Creak..."
A rusted bronze door materialized from the void and swung open on both sides.
Inside was a chaotic space that couldn't be clearly seen. The door appeared right between the two people, separating Silas and Ma'am M.
"Splat!"
An arm covered in pale yellow ulcers slowly extended from within the door, slapping onto the floor.
The arm crawled forward, followed by a naked humanoid monster with a completely rotted body.
Its head was split in two, with the wound extending from the skull all the way down to the abdomen.
The edges were lined with sharp teeth, like a vertically growing giant mouth.
The monster's eyes on both sides simultaneously looked at Silas and Ma'am M. Its pale eyeballs gleamed with hunger and greed.
The next second, its torso split down the middle, then it separately lunged at both people present.
Damn it!
Silas cursed silently. The good news was that the summoned spirit creature had a strong desire to attack. The bad news was that it attacked him as well!
"Roar!"
After standing up, the monster was a full two meters tall. Even worse, its speed was faster than its appearance suggested.
With a gust of putrid, rotting stench rushing toward him, it was already right in front of him, its bone-white teeth inches away.
Silas dodged to the side. The half-bodied monster's sharp teeth tore through the floorboards, leaving shocking gashes.
It quickly rose and chased after Silas, as if it wouldn't rest until it devoured him!
"Cough, cough!"
The Clown's time still had over a minute remaining.
Silas would normally have been able to dodge, but a sudden abnormal sensation surging from his lungs made him cough uncontrollably, slowing his movements slightly.
"Boom!"
This brief pause was fatal.
The half-bodied monster's sharp teeth immediately pierced through his body. His entire upper half was impaled by the vertical row of teeth.
"Ahh..."
Intense pain surged from the wound. The teeth churned, greedily devouring the living flesh and blood.
"Get off!"
Silas endured the pain and shouted at the monster in Hermes.
"Aowwww!"
The monster was immediately struck by the Profane Words. Its body convulsed, and it wailed in agony.
Silas seized the opportunity to draw his silver dagger and viciously stabbed it into the creature's eyeball, piercing halfway through its head.
One stab, two stabs!
Only after the monster stopped moving did he use his hands to push against it, pulling his body off the spiked board of teeth.
The pain during this process went without saying.
When he finally freed himself and looked up, Ma'am M was fighting the monster.
Silas noticed a shattered paper figure on the ground around her, indicating she'd just used another substitute.
"Ma'am M, go to hell!"
Silas shouted at Ma'am M, using Profane Words to influence her mind. Ma'am M's figure immediately froze, and the monster pounced on her.
This time, her body didn't transform into a paper figure. Instead, she was viciously bitten by the monster's sharp teeth!
Excellent! Had she run out of substitutes?
Silas's spirits lifted, and he felt more confident about his plan.
Ma'am M's expression changed slightly. She raised her hand and pressed it against the monster.
The creature immediately howled, its body rapidly dissolving. Before long, it had turned into a pool of pale yellow liquid.
"Creak..."
The bronze door slowly closed and disappeared.
About several dozen seconds of delay, I'd say.
Silas thought, twitching his nose. There seemed to be a distinct odor in the air now, indicating that the gas had accumulated sufficiently.
"Is this your final trick?"
Ma'am M's scarlet hair now looked somewhat disheveled. She didn't appear as relaxed as her tone suggested.
"The thing this bone whistle summoned is weaker than what you called before."
"Cough, cough!"
Silas's lungs had reached an unbearable state.
He stood up, dragging his broken body, and once again charged toward the window, looking as though he was making yet another escape attempt!
According to the previous pattern, Ma'am M would next use flames to flash in front of him.
But now, the room was already filled with gas. If she did that, it would cause the gas in the room to immediately explode.
Sure enough, just as he rushed to the window, he saw crimson flames ignite before him.
Ma'am M's coldly smiling face blazed in the fire.
But the next moment, that cold smile turned to shock, because the flames beside her spread in an instant, rapidly expanding and breaking free from her control!
"BOOM..."
In the silent night, the sound of the explosion reverberated throughout the East End.
The ability to jump through flames could only grant momentary immunity to fire, not allow one to hide in it for long.
Just as Klein couldn't escape from a meteorite's flames either, because the high temperature and shockwave were equally lethal. (This is how it's explained in the original work)
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~ Push the story forward with your Power Stones