Free Web NovelThe Golden Thorn Crown suddenly lit up, and a blinding emerald toxic light erupted from deep within the feathered crest.
Like a flare forcibly ignited, the entire Sacred Curtain Hall responded.
The pink tongue-like floor beneath Louis's feet suddenly lost its form; the surface collapsed and melted instantly, turning into highly viscous digestive fluid.
Meanwhile, the golden ribs on both sides began to close inward at tricky angles, as if to nail the intruder directly in the center.
Crimson Battle Qi erupted from beneath Louis's feet, forcibly pushing aside the thick mucus that swirled around him, yet it couldn't touch even a fraction of his boot soles.
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He then took advantage of the situation to kick off the contracting bone wall, using the immense inward-squeezing force to accelerate in the opposite direction.
"Boom—"
Crimson footprints exploded into cracks on the golden ribs.
Louis's figure was like a cannonball, aimed straight at the twisted golden tree in the center of the hall.
However, the moment he was mid-air, the temple completed its next phase of defense switching.
A low resonant hum echoed from deep within the ceiling.
Countless translucent emerald thorns dropped down, piercing the back of the necks and spines of the twenty-four shriveled corpses on the fleshy walls of both sides.
The corpses twitched violently.
Eerie green flames ignited in their hollow ❖ Nоvеl𝚒ght ❖ (Exclusive on Nоvеl𝚒ght) eye sockets, and the thorn threads tightened, transforming them from mere displays into weapons.
Twelve corpses were the first to detach from the fleshy walls; as they landed, bones pierced through their shriveled skin, their movements stiff yet carrying the instincts left from their lives.
In life, they had been the strongest Paladin Commanders, Sword Saints, The Adjudicators... all the most outstanding talents of the Holy See State, but now they were merely combat puppets being repeatedly deployed.
The other twelve remained embedded in the walls; their residual chest cavities were expanded, and their throats were propped open by thorns, emitting non-human chants that caused mental attacks.
The air subsequently deteriorated as corrosive toxic mist and compressed light bullets formed around them, beginning to predict his landing point.
The first melee puppet had already approached; in life, he was a peerless Sword Saint of the Holy See State, but now he was tattered and devoid of any dignity.
But even so, he still possessed the strength of a Peak Knight.
The moment his twin swords swung, they sealed off all of Louis's possible landing points—it was an unavoidable golden whirlwind.
But at this moment, in Louis's eyes, the world stood still.
【Bloodline Talent: Trajectory】 unfolded.
Color was stripped away, leaving only lines and predicted paths.
All movement paths for the next few seconds unfolded simultaneously on his retina, like a pre-drawn anatomical map.
He made an almost imperceptible sideways tilt in mid-air.
Only by one centimeter.
The golden sword qi grazed past his temple, cutting a few strands of hair.
At the moment they crossed, Louis flicked his wrist.
His longsword was coated in a pale purple misty light, precisely grazing the Sword Saint's neck.
"Snap." The sound was barely audible as the emerald thorns, hard as iron, instantly snapped.
The puppet, still in a charging posture, lunged forward due to inertia, its face then smashing into the ground as it completely lost control.
Almost at the same time, emerald mental tentacles spread through the air.
The Golden Thorn Crown began to intervene directly, attempting to read the thoughts in Louis's brain.
The next moment, a layer of platinum starlight lit up on Louis's body.
The moment the mental tentacles touched that curtain of light, they disintegrated instantly, like snowflakes falling into lava, leaving no trace behind.
His consciousness was calm and closed; there simply were no emotional anchors to grasp.
Louis did not break the connection; instead, he followed that mental channel and poured a surge of pink feedback directly back.
The twelve magic puppets in the air twitched simultaneously.
The chanting stopped abruptly, and expressions of extreme and twisted ecstasy appeared on their faces, as if they had instantly fulfilled a lifelong prayer they could never have reached.
In the next second, their mental networks completely short-circuited, their bodies lost support and fell from the fleshy walls, plummeting like kites with broken strings.
However, this did not give Louis a moment of relief, for the heavy puppets appeared immediately after on the other side.
Three massive bodies covered in thick golden bone armor crashed forward in a triangular formation; there was no technique, just pure accumulation of power, causing the temple floor to heave violently under their stomps.
Trajectory instantly found the optimal solution; Louis gripped the sword hilt, and crimson power was poured directly into the blade.
The metal let out an overburdened wail, yet it was still swung by Louis like a baseball bat.
"Get lost."
The sweeping strike sought no technique, only the result.
A shockwave exploded in the air, the bone armor of the three heavy puppets shattered simultaneously, and their bodies were flung away, deeply embedded into the fleshy walls on both sides like specimens nailed into a wall.
And the rest of the attacks followed in succession.
Poison rain, bone spurs, self-detonators, assassin-type puppets emerging from the ground... all the Crown's methods were poured out at once.
Louis raised his left hand, and dark purple mist swirled into a miniature vortex, swallowing all the attacks in the sky.
He actively stepped into the puppet crowd and began a composed counterattack. freeωebnovēl.c૦m
Every sidestep, every strike, landed exactly on a critical node.
The sword blade, trailing purple light, sliced through the air, cutting the green thorn vines that controlled them.
The puppets froze in their attacking postures behind him.
Half a second later, a series of dense snapping sounds rang out.
All the puppets collapsed simultaneously.
Yet Louis hadn't even broken a sweat.
Louis looked up, his gaze landing on the face within the golden tree that somewhat resembled his own: "If they were still alive, perhaps they could have stalled me for a while."
He casually tossed the already cracked longsword onto the ground, the sound of metal clashing echoing in the hollow chamber.
"But these things you control..." Louis took off his gloves and dropped them at his feet, "aren't even enough to make me use my full strength."
Eduardo, sitting in the center of the throne, did not fly into a rage as expected.
On the contrary, his expression gradually relaxed, and a kind of deeply unsettling sincerity appeared on that waxen face.
His features were like a wax statue softened by high heat, shifting slowly and unnaturally, the corners of his mouth curling into a gentle arc as if he were struggling to recall a long-forgotten expression.
He opened his arms, his voice soft, almost paternal: "Brother, you are too tired. The world outside is too noisy, too dirty, and too unfair."
His gaze fell on Louis; in those eyes, the pupil and iris could no longer be distinguished, leaving only a murky gold-green.
"Become one with us."
In sharp contrast to the tenderness on Eduardo's face, the feathered crest began to twitch frantically.
The thorn-like wings no longer maintained their original rhythm but vibrated rapidly, emitting a sharp sound similar to teeth grinding, as if they were crushing something invisible.
Louis didn't even react, simply looking coldly at the being on the throne.
Eduardo's hands suddenly clapped together.
"Vroom—!!" A distorted roar exploded within the hall.
The golden ribs supporting the spatial structure began to rotate as a whole, and the originally stable chamber was forcibly twisted into a ball, everything in sight beginning to flip.
The layer of pink tongue-like coating on the ground was the first to be torn up.
Subsequently, all matter in the palace was thrown into the air at once, churning together in the disordered gravity field to form an expanding vortex of flesh and blood.
Countless golden thorns reached out from the vortex, trying to drag the person standing in the center into it.
But facing this hellish scene of frantic rotation, Louis didn't even adjust his stance.
Crimson Battle Qi suddenly erupted from beneath his feet, pinning his body firmly to a fixed coordinate.
No matter how the space flipped and twisted, he remained perpendicular to the ground he had designated beneath his feet.
At the same time, the primal heart slowly released a platinum light curtain as thin as a cicada's wing.
Splattering rotten meat, acid, severed limbs, and thorns were forcibly repelled less than three centimeters from his body.
The whole world was rotating and tearing.
Only the point where Louis stood was quiet and clean, as immovable as a mountain.
And it was this nonconformity that caused the Golden Thorn Crown to lose control completely... the layer of barely maintained tenderness on Eduardo's face finally broke.
His mouth twitched, and his voice was torn into an unformed shriek: "Why?! Why are you different?!!"
The Golden Thorn Crown vibrated frantically, its green light surging.
"Since I can't destroy you..." His voice suddenly dropped, filled with hysterical greed, "then I will become you!!"
The next instant, Eduardo's body swelled abruptly.
"Bang—!"
The waxen shell burst like a skin that could no longer hold its contents.
Countless gold-green thorns used that body as a springboard, shooting out from the trunk and feathered crest simultaneously like a swarm of out-of-control giant pythons, lunging straight for Louis.
The tips of the thorns changed rapidly during flight, revealing familiar and unsettling outlines... they were faces that closely resembled Louis.
They opened their mouths and lunged at Louis; as long as they could get close, even for an instant, it would be enough to complete the final replacement.
And it wasn't until this moment that Louis finally raised his hand, calmly opening his fingers and aiming his palm at the monsters that looked just like him.
Dark purple mist erupted at this moment.
When the first thorn touched his palm, it did not pierce the skin.
It melted directly, and the purple mist spread back along the thorn, rapidly pouring back.
The light in the hall suddenly distorted.
The purple mist spread rapidly, forming a black hole that swallowed everything around it.
Even the few remaining bits of life force that originally belonged to Eduardo could not escape and were dragged into that dark purple.
"Sizzle—" A low and continuous sound echoed in the air, like some unsettling chewing sound.
The Golden Thorn Crown finally began to feel fear, and the thorns filling the sky began to tremble violently.
Louis looked up; his pupils had long since ceased to retain a human form, and his Molten Gold Vertical Pupils, set against the dark purple mist, were cold and cruel.
The thorns that were frantically retracting instantly froze.
What remained of Eduardo's body lost its support in the air and fell heavily.
Louis withdrew the purple mist and walked forward.
On Eduardo's face, that twisted expression of half-crying and half-laughing still remained.
But when his gaze truly met Louis's, a brief flash of clarity returned to the depths of his eyes; the expression was like a long-overdue liberation.
Louis raised his right hand, and red light gathered at his fingertips, condensing into a thin and sharp blade of light, like a scalpel.
"It might hurt a little."
He spoke softly, reaching his hand into the still-writhing mass of thorns, accurately grasping that frantically beating green core.
"Rip—!!!"
Louis expressionlessly ripped out the core of the Golden Thorn Crown with brute force. freewebnøvel.coɱ
The moment the core was lost, everything maintained within the hall failed simultaneously.
Flesh, bones, membranes, and ribs lost their support in the air and rapidly collapsed like burnt-out ashes.
Leaving only a rain of falling debris.
Louis stood in the center of the ruins, looking down at the rapidly weathering Eduardo.
That body could no longer maintain its form; flesh peeled off the bones like sand and dissipated with the wind.
Louis reached out and gently closed his eyes.
Then he looked at the green core in his palm, which was still faintly beating.
Louis did not hesitate and closed his fingers.
"Crack."
The core was crushed into fragments in his palm.
The green mist then spilled out, slowly merging into his mind.
