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However, one thing was certain. Waled’s strength was growing at a terrifyingly fast pace ever since he had devoured Cillion.

‘I can’t let this go on.’

Henry immediately put his hands together and cast a spell. It was a 5th-Circle ice magic that would freeze Waled.

“Frozen Hands!”

As soon as a rune formed in his hand, Henry quickly struck it to the ground. A massive hand made of ice jumped out from the ground like a dolphin and instantly attacked Waled.

Crack!

The ice hand didn’t hurt Waled physically; instead, it merely brushed past him like a gust of wind. Waled was then frozen in place and turned into a huge ball of ice.

‘Did it work?’

The ice was too thick for ordinary people to break.

Henry considered this a natural way to stop Waled, as he didn’t know how else the monster would transform if he didn’t intervene.

Snap!

Henry snapped his fingers and retrieved the dagger that was on the ground far away from him.

‘There’s no damage on the dagger.’

The dark-colored dagger still contained Henry’s poisonous blood. In other words, this meant that Waled had used a special kind of power that Henry didn’t know about to rid his body of the world’s most powerful poison.

Henry squinted once again and stared at the frozen Waled.

‘As expected, I can’t leave him like this.’

Henry wished he could take Waled alive to the lab in Salgaera and thoroughly inspect him, but he was too unpredictable for Henry to be able to do that.

In addition, he was tight on time because there was also the Fief War going on. Many things were not in his favor.

‘...It’s a shame, but it can’t be helped.’

Henry had no choice but to execute Waled right here on the spot.

After making up his mind, Henry snapped his fingers and summoned a massive iron hammer.

If he struck the frozen Waled with an iron hammer, he would surely shatter him into tiny bits of ice.

Henry gazed at Waled, frozen solid in a ball of ice, and then swung his hammer, but as he did so, Henry saw Waled’s eyes move inside the ice ball.

Clank!

Something unpredictable happened again when the hammer made contact with the ice.

“...!”

The hammer that Henry had summoned was much harder than the ice, but for some reason, the ice didn’t shatter. Instead, it merely sounded like two metal objects had collided.

This was obviously Waled’s doing, but just how had he done that?

Henry instinctively felt threatened and quickly distanced himself from the ice. As soon as Henry backed off, Waled stretched his body, as if he had just woken up from a nap, and shattered the ice.

A powerful explosion occurred, and as a result, hundreds of sharp ice fragments flew everywhere as if a grenade had just exploded.

Clank! Clank! Clank!

The scattered pieces of ice flew into Henry’s magic Shield, and Waled laughed in a grotesque voice as he looked at Henry.

- Goop, goop, goop!

‘Damn him…!’

Henry’s Frozen Hand had never worked on Waled in the first place. He had only pretended to be entrapped in the ice.

Henry was fuming. Aside from being ridiculed, Henry wondered why his magic wasn’t working against him.

‘Why isn’t it working all of a sudden?’

Henry thought of any possible explanations for this.

‘...Can it be?’

Henry wondered if Waled had gained Cillion’s ability of magic resistance when he absorbed it.

‘…He literally became a Chimera.’

However, Henry had never heard that it was possible for one to absorb its spirit and gain their resistance.

Nonetheless, he decided to stop thinking about it. Since creating Chimeras was forbidden, those people had been doing it in secrecy, so Henry naturally didn’t know much about the creatures.

Henry gripped the Colt Sword in his hands even tighter.

Neither poison nor magic worked on Waled. In the end, Henry had no choice but to use the swordsmanship skills he had learned from Hector against Waled.

- Goop?

Waled started deforming again, so Henry didn’t want to give him any more time.

Henry immediately took a fighting stance.

However, just as Henry was about to take a step forward, Waled’s large body suddenly split in half.

‘What now…?’

Actually, Waled hadn’t split in half, but rather, his pupa-like shell slightly split apart, signifying that Waled had just entered into his next life cycle.

Henry had no choice but to carefully observe Waled while still maintaining his fighting stance.

Judging from the way in which Waled’s body was shifting, it looked like the process of metamorphosis, and Henry was very curious as he had never seen something like this before.

- Krk, krk!

Waled slowly broke away from his large body as if shedding his skin. Then, an unknown creature with a slim figure emerged from within the shed skin, covered entirely in body fluids.

‘My god…!’

Henry felt like he was watching a demonic beast evolve, as no animal or plant in the world evolved in such a gruesome way.

When the newborn creature, fully soaked from head to toe, came out of the shell, a strong gale came from the direction of Waled’s body.

Whoosh!

Strong winds sometimes made strange sounds, and right now, it was one of those times.

Henry enveloped himself in mana and stood still like a rock. Without moving, he decided to observe Waled’s transformation until the end with wide eyes.

Crack, crack.

Having left his shell, Waled flexed his back, and something came out of it.

Crack! Boom!

He had also grown wings, large and colorful like those of a moth.

- Haa…!

Waled unfolded his wings and stretched them, revealing them to the entire world.

Waled had turned into a completely different creature. He faced the strong wind as if it were a light breeze, seemingly enjoying the refreshing sensation.

‘...Incredible.’

Waled had completed his transformation.

This creature was Waled for sure. His facial features had remained the same, but his body structure and his hair were not that of a human.

Waled had grown taller and his muscles were smooth like armor. His whole body was colored in white and green, and there were patches of hair in some areas. He didn’t have any reproductive organs, so he had basically evolved into a creature that didn’t require any clothing in the first place.

He finally opened his eyes after slowly spreading his wings, which were several times bigger than his body.

His eyes were no longer the blue ones he had inherited from Alfred. They had changed into a yellowish-orange color.

‘You’re a monster.’

Monster was the only word that could describe Waled in his current state, as he hadn’t changed into an extinct human race or a demon, but rather a completely new species.

The wind finally stopped blowing, and Waled slowly lowered his head from feeling the refreshing breeze.

- Khekekeke!

The corners of his mouth rose, and as he made eye contact with Henry, he let out an unpleasant laugh.

“Haaa…”

Waled was clearly provoking Henry.

Henry was done sympathizing with Waled as he was clearly too far gone for him to show any mercy.

After concluding his thoughts, Henry began warming up his two Cores.

Aura was the best method of revealing the user’s feelings.

Henry kept a calm face, but his Aura was anything but calm. His aura radiated an emerald light, showing exactly how he was feeling.

‘Haste.’

Without hesitation, both Henry and Waled moved at the same time.

Henry used Haste, whereas Waled used his two wings to quickly close the distance between them.

As soon as Henry got close enough to Waled, he swung his sword in a horizontal line with lightning speed. The moment the two came in contact, Waled looked at the tip of Henry’s sword instead of his eyes.

Swoosh!

Waled tilted his head back and dodged Henry’s sword like a circus acrobat, and then instantly folded his wings forward.

‘Damn it!’

Henry quickly kicked Waled in the stomach. Fortunately, he just barely managed to dodge Waled’s wings, but he didn’t manage to move his sword out of the way.

Clank!

It was a very close call.

Waled managed to grab only the tip of the sword with his wings.

- Khekeke!

Having grabbed Henry’s sword, Waled once again let out a disturbing laugh.

“Flamed Thorns!”

While Waled was holding onto his sword, Henry used it like a wand to set off a fiery explosion from its tip. However, despite successfully casting the spell, there wasn’t any booming sound.

…Shhh!

“...!”

Instead, dark smoke escaped from Waled’s folded wings, which meant that Henry’s massive explosion hadn’t damaged Waled’s wings at all.

The only aftermath was a bit of smoke rising from Waled’s wings, similarly to a chimney from a house in the countryside.

Right after the explosion, Waled slowly spread his wings.

- Khekeke.

As he spread his wings, Waled’s face became visible again, casting Henry a mocking, contemptuous look.

With a stiff expression, Henry quickly distanced himself from Waled again and looked at the tip of his Colt Sword, which was severely damaged. Since his sword had been trapped in the explosion, it had absorbed all the damage, which explained why the tip was so deformed.

‘...What a mess.’

Henry dismissed the broken sword and summoned a new Colt Sword, since Vulcanus had made him many extras.

“Sword on.”

Znggg.

Henry was now holding a new Colt Sword.

He looked at Waled once again.

‘This is exactly like Von told me.’

After Waled had shed his skin, he was definitely a lot more powerful, given that his physical prowess had been amplified and he wasn’t affected at all by Mage-level magic.

As Henry had expected it to be in person, he could finally understand why Von had struggled in his fight.

‘But...’

Crack, crack!

Henry slowly stretched and cracked his neck.

Waled was definitely a formidable foe, but Henry didn’t think that Waled was stronger than him in the slightest bit, because…

‘I’m Henry Morris.’

His body had changed after reincarnating, but his soul still remained the same. He still had the soul of Henry Morris, a former Archmage. Therefore, Henry didn’t think in the slightest bit that he would lose.

- Khekeke!

Had Waled read Henry’s mind?

He laughed at Henry with an even more grotesque smile than before.

However, Henry smirked.

‘You’re wearing the mask of a human, but you’re just a worthless beast.’

Waled imitated the look of a human. However, no matter how strong he was, he couldn’t speak, making him no different from a beast.

Henry gripped the sword in his hand tighter again.

In the end, whether he was a beast or a monster, he couldn’t make Henry’s surrender.

Henry’s Aura burnt even stronger now.