Chapter 38. Dekan's Agony Secret Art (1/2)

As if gradually emerging from the shadows, two figures slowly took shape at the corner of the corridor, becoming clearer and clearer.

One of them was the terrifyingly large figure of the Faceless Man, surrounded by four masks.

The other was his companion, a short and skinny man.

"Hehehehe......"

A gloomy, strange laughter echoed in the corridor.

They had officially encountered me and Cornelia in the corridor.

Cornelia and I had no intention of continuing to run; we were prepared to fight them to the end.

"The girl can be kept, kill the boy directly."

"Alright."

After a brief exchange, the Faceless Man did not choose to make a move immediately.

Instead, the skinny man raised his hand.

Several cards appeared in his palm, and then his other hand swiped across the cards one by one, activating them all.

Instantly, black mist and shadows filled the corridor, and the ground became wet as if it had turned into a poisonous swamp.

As gusts of sinister wind swept in, Cornelia and I felt our bodies become incredibly sore, and even breathing became heavy.

What followed was blurred vision and a stinging pain from our internal organs to our skin.

These types of cards were clearly poison and curse types.

They weren't very aggressive, but they had long range and precise skill targeting.

Besides feeling all our attributes decrease, Cornelia and I were also afflicted with continuous damage.

But very quickly, the caster's expression also started to look wrong.

He felt an indescribable, intense pain in his body, which made him unsteady for a moment.

He couldn't understand the principle behind it.

It was as if he had been cursed at the same time.

"I've seen it all now, someone actually dares to curse ME!"

I was so angry I almost laughed, and without hesitation, I summoned the Ruined Poet.

Instantly, the 6x pain feedback became 60x.

The caster felt as if his body was being pierced by countless sharp swords, and his already bulging eyes widened like bronze bells.

He opened his mouth wide, his throat starting to rasp uncontrollably as if making a scraping sound.

Then, like a puppet with its strings cut, he fell to the ground, his life status unknown.

Confirming that the caster was taken care of, Cornelia immediately took out a Rank 3 【Group Purify】 and removed the cursed status from herself and me.

Since I, as a Rank 2, couldn't use Rank 3 spell cards, I had specially bought a Rank 3 purification spell card and gave it to Cornelia before setting out, just in case.

Protecting against poison, curses, and mental control was common sense when going out.

The Faceless Man narrowed his eyes, staring intently at the summon behind me, paying no attention to his fallen companion.

"Boy, hand over your epic card to me, and I will let you live."

The Faceless Man said coldly, an unconcealable madness in his eyes.

He wanted my card so badly.

Unfortunately, epic cards could not be obtained by killing.

Once epic and legendary cards were soul-bound, unless the user actively unbound them, they would not automatically unbind even upon death.

If the user was killed, the epic card would shatter and disappear with them.

This was also the reason why epic cards were so scarce in the present world.

Not all epic cards were successfully passed down.

Many were lost in the Shadow World or perished with their owners.

"Hehehe."

Hearing the Faceless Man's proposal, I seemed to be amused by him.

You wouldn't even trick a three-year-old like that.

But I still wanted to play with the Faceless Man, so I asked, "If I give you this epic card, will you let us go?"

"Hoho, of course......"

"I'll just skip to the 'But I refuse' part!"

Before the Faceless Man could finish, I shouted.

At the same time, Cornelia also charged towards the Faceless Man.

With just one swing of the hammer, she could knock him out with 20 times the pain!

"Then you can all go die."

The Faceless Man's tone was heavy with caution.

Already very cautious, he became even more so.

Although both my and Cornelia's ranks were lower than his, the epic card with its unknown effect was too great a threat.

The Faceless Man protected himself tightly with the Malevolent Spirit Mask, retreated slightly, and summoned three Rank 5 summons at once, ordering them to attack me and Cornelia.

Although Rank 5 summons were far from as powerful as Rank 5 warriors.

But a large number of summons could still be a headache for powerhouses of the same rank!

Summoning a bunch of Rank 5 summons to besiege a Rank 4 opponent was absolute suppression!

He summoned three 【Multi-faced Abominations】—bizarre and twisted beastly bodies covered with human faces in agony.

The effect of this Rank 5 summon was immunity to hard control, and it had high health and attack.

They couldn't be controlled and were hard to kill, giving no chance to people weaker than oneself.

"Your mechanism is too obvious. As long as I don't attack that boy, the stun won't land on me, and you can't deal with my summons at all."

The Faceless Man muttered, his eyes full of mockery.

However, next.

"Thud!"

Cornelia first knocked out a 【Multi-faced Abomination】 with a swing of her hammer.

Then she started to fight against the other two Multi-faced Abominations.

The one that fell to the ground was wailing in pain.

Before it could get up, Cornelia took the opportunity to hit it with another swing, almost completely knocking it unconscious.

After a brief clash, the other two Multi-faced Abominations seemed to not dare to touch Cornelia much.

As long as their attacks hit Cornelia, they would feel extreme pain and their movements would become stiff.

Faceless Man: "???"

What level of stun effect was this?

It could control a Multi-faced Abomination?!

No! It's not a stun!

The Faceless Man stared at the Ruined Poet behind me, analyzing frantically, and soon figured out the situation.

The epic card behind me, with its beyond-common-sense strength, did not provide a simple control effect bonus, but a pain sensation bonus!

The equipment on me and Cornelia must also have effects like returning pain or increasing pain sensation!

What the FUCK is this new evil cult school of thought!

Even the Faceless Man, a member of the Resurrection Church, couldn't help but want to curse out loud.

But.

He quickly calmed down.

The solution to this alternative system was also very simple.

The opponent's core, their command tower, was too obvious.

And pain feedback could not be transmitted back to the master through summons!

As long as the Faceless Man didn't use his own body to attack me, he would be invincible!

So if he used summons to attack me and the Ruined Poet, he would at most lose two or three summons, but it would definitely trade for me and the Ruined Poet!

Then, Cornelia, having lost the bonus from the Ruined Poet, would be nothing to fear.

"Let's see how long you can last."

The Faceless Man took out two more summon cards originally used for close-range protection and ordered them to bypass Cornelia and attack me.

Although all the summons were now wary of Cornelia's hammer, and Cornelia tried to block them all, blocking four was too much.

This made me frown, and I quickly retreated with the Ruined Poet, running towards the other end of the corridor.

The weakness of both me and the Ruined Poet was that we were too fragile and couldn't withstand a single hit from the enemy.

And to cover me, Cornelia was forcibly holding back the summons, and under focused fire, she was having a hard time holding on.

"Can't, fight!" (I can't hold on, we have to fight him!)

She believed the front line was about to collapse and shouted to me.

Her idea was to go for broke, give up on blocking the incoming summoned beasts, and attack the Faceless Man's main body to knock him out.

PART 2

"No!"

I immediately stopped her.

The Faceless Man might still have some protective cards he hadn't used.

Rushing in rashly was too risky.

It was possible that I, in the back row, would collapse first, and Cornelia wouldn't be able to smoothly touch the Faceless Man either.

If we wanted to win, we had to take down the Faceless Man with one solid hit.

This required waiting for me to create an opportunity for Cornelia!

And this opportunity, I was already preparing for.

I still needed a little more time to charge up this move that I had never shown to anyone before.

"Wait, mask, reflect, force!" (Wait for me to create a chance for you. Also, the masks around him have a damage reflection effect, so watch your force when you hit him!)

I conveyed the tactic to Cornelia.

Cornelia: "Got it!"

Earlier in the corridor, all the damage from my Hydrogen Explosion had been blocked by the Malevolent Spirit Mask.

As the caster, I noticed a very small amount of damage being returned to me.

From this, I judged that the mask had a damage reflection property.

As for why I wasn't returned a large amount of damage, it was due to the unique damage calculation principle of the 【Hydrogen Explosion】 card.

Its damage was mainly divided into two stages. The first stage was a Rank 1 Fireball spell. The purpose of this fireball was not to directly hit the enemy, but to provide an ignition.

The second stage was the explosion damage caused by igniting the hydrogen gas.

The ignition damage caused by the first stage could be considered as coming from the caster of this card.

But the subsequent explosion in the second stage had no damage source.

So the Hydrogen Explosion card had another use, which was to test whether the opponent had damage reflection equipment!

I certainly didn't want Cornelia to get seriously injured by the reflection from her own hammer swing later.

As long as it could make the Faceless Man faint from pain, it was enough.

The Faceless Man looked at Cornelia's and my sorry state and couldn't help but laugh.

"Hahahaha! I thought you guys were so tough?"

"As long as I don't hit you, you're just a useless piece of trash who can't reflect damage or pain!"

"Hand over that epic card now, and maybe I'll let you suffer a little less before you die!"

The more he understood the effects of the Ruined Poet, the more the Faceless Man coveted this core card of the new pain-reflection system.

However, seeing that I remained unmoved, his anger had nowhere to go, so he could only continue to taunt.

"Even if you are an alternative pain-reflection school that focuses on control effects, when you meet me, you have no room to play!"

"Playing with pain reflection and curses in front of me, you are still too naive!"

The Faceless Man opened his arms, the muscles under the gauze on his face seemed to be twitching strangely, and he would occasionally let out a crazed laugh.

"Hehehe."

My gaze was incomparably cold, my eyes as deep as ten thousand meters under the sea, darker than black.

The way I looked at the Faceless Man was like looking at a fool.

"Your stupidity is truly laughable."

"If I don't kill you, I'd be unworthy of being the grandmaster of the pain-reflection school."

I muttered to myself in an almost inaudible voice.

I seemed to have finally prepared something and shouted to Cornelia, "Wait, hit!" (Wait for me to control him, then you go hit him!)

"Okay!"

Cornelia's voice was a little excited.

Although she didn't know what trick I was going to pull now, based on her experience, the opponent could usually surrender at this point.

My ultimate move was finally ready.

It was time to show the true secret art of the "pain-reflection system."

I lowered my head, clutched my chest, and seemed to be repeatedly muttering something, my voice gradually getting louder.

"Cornelia was injured helping me block the enemy's attacks. It's all my fault. I'm so heartbroken, so guilty......"

As if possessed, I frantically hypnotized myself.

"Why must there be fighting, why must there be plundering, why target us, just because we are kind... I am already boiling with rage!"

I felt more and more depressed, my negative emotions about to reach their peak.

"I can't win, there's no hope, why am I so weak, I hate my powerlessness so much!!"

I bent forward, clutching my clothes tightly, as if my heart ached so much I couldn't breathe.

"Guilt! Anger! Despair!"

"Pain! It hurts so much!"

"Faceless Man, it's all your fault!!!"

"All my suffering is because of you!!!"

When I raised my head to look at the Faceless Man and shouted the last sentence.

The Faceless Man suddenly felt his heart thump violently, as if in an instant his heart was smashed and crushed by a thousand-pound stone.

Then came an indescribable twisting pain as if it wanted to tear his heart apart.

He clutched his chest in pain.

For a moment, the Faceless Man actually felt very sorry for being born human.

Next, he knelt on the ground, and a mouthful of filthy blood uncontrollably spewed out, dyeing his veil a rusty reddish-brown.

And although the summons could still operate, they had lost their master's real-time commands, and their movements became sluggish.

At the same time, Cornelia also took the opportunity to break out of the encirclement of the summons.

"You... how can you reflect damage?! I clearly didn't cause you any harm!!"

The Faceless Man's voice trembled as he looked at me in disbelief.

"You broke my heart!"

I shouted righteously.

Heartbreak is also an injury, and heartache is also pain.

Even though my heartache was the result of self-hypnosis, infinitely amplifying my inner negative emotions.

The ultimate secret art of the pain-reflection school—60x Heartbreak Attack!

The only drawback of this move was that it required completing self-hypnosis, and the casting time was too long.

"Pfft!"

Hearing my words, the Faceless Man couldn't help but spit out another mouthful of blood.

This mouthful of blood was coughed up out of anger.

He had never seen such a shameless person!

FUCK! That's not how you play a pain-reflection school!!!

However, at this moment, Cornelia's heavy hammer had already arrived in front of him.

The Faceless Man looked at the hammer getting bigger and bigger in front of him, and before he could even begin to feel fear, his consciousness was cut off.

With a "boom," the Faceless Man was smashed against the wall and knocked unconscious.

The summons also disappeared along with him.

She had followed my instructions and didn't use her full strength, only using a quarter of her power to smash the Faceless Man's head.

This blow only needed to knock the Faceless Man out.

So the damage reflected back to her was not severe.

"Phew, this time it's really over."

Cornelia clutched her head in pain and, unable to stand steady, sat on the ground.

In the distance, I also breathed a sigh of relief, looking very tired, and smiled helplessly.

In the messy corridor of this Demon Academy, the two of us looked at each other from afar and met each other's gaze.

A knowing smile.

It really had to be him/her with such tacit understanding.

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