Primordial Sage: Plight of Immortality

"Should I try to counter-attack with a sword? No, that won’t work…” Now, Illyan felt stranded. It would take only a second or two to fall back on the ground, but it felt like an eternity to him.

The enemy, lunging at him like a dart, seemed confident in his victory as his arms spread outward while dark tendrils came out of his palms.

However, this movement revealed his body under a robe.

Illyan expected it to be quite disfigured, given his limited understanding of the man. After all, he had to put these mantis blades on his body somehow.

But what he didn’t expect was the material embedded in his body.

Illyan’s eyes shone for a moment in golden light until they dimmed and the crimson color returned to his eyes. Falling, the hood on his head fell, revealing his bald and scarred head, but it was his eyes emitting the haunting bloodlust.

Ezekiel noticed the change but couldn’t change his body's course, so he instead covered his body in more darkness.

Illyan, on the other hand, closed his eyes and reached inside his robe to take out three small wooden amulets. He didn’t take them out before as they were difficult to use properly. They didn’t discern between superficial injuries and life-threatening ones, and with Illyan’s fighting style, they would be used up in a few exchanged blows.

But now, he had a use for them.

Just as Ezekiel got closer to him, Illyan threw the amulets at the mantis blades.

“Hmm?” Ezekiel saw it as he was prepared, but when he saw it, he sneered as he mumbled to himself, “What inferior goods…”

When the tip of his mantis blades touched the amulets, a small force field showed up. As all three of them were activated at the same time, it was much stronger, but it still wouldn’t take even a second for Ezekiel to get through.

What he didn’t expect was Illyan taking a deep breath as he flipped his body mid-air upside down and used the temporary force field as a springboard to jump on the ground faster.

When he was about to hit the ground, he took off his robe and threw it at Ezekiel as he flipped again to fall on his legs.

The moment the tips of his legs touched the ground, he started to exhale the air inside his lungs and used the rebound as leverage as he aligned his sword edge with the flow of wind and flicked it in one long diagonal swing using [Flow Breathing Technique].

However, as he fell faster than Ezekiel, he was too far to even reach him with the tip of the sword.

Ezekiel also felt the distance between them despite being temporarily blinded by the robe and didn’t care.

Unfortunately for him, Illyan didn’t stare at him and instead observed the wind around and the particles of spiritual and mana energy converging inside it as the swung sword started to pull the power around, pressuring the air at its edge.

Just as he finished the swing while fully exhaling all the air inside his lungs, the pressured air also left the body of the sword and became an air blade.

“Oh fuc-” Ezekiel, who realized belatedly that Illyan used his first ranged attack, wanted to dodge but was defeated at his own game as at that very moment it was him hanging helplessly in the air.

Blood sprayed everywhere as Ezekiel's body flew over Illyan’s head. But he knew it wouldn't end, as Ezekiel managed to lean to the side, evading the life-threatening injury.

What he noticed though, was that his left side was completely shaved with an arm, leg, and mantis blade lying in puddles of blood on the ground.

Unfortunately, he didn’t come out unscathed as his torso was torn, and he saw his innards spilling out. The armor completely crumbled and fell to the ground. He turned the blade of the sword down and used it as a support as he used the other hand to stuff everything back into his stomach while staring at the flailing tail of the enemy that was next to him.

Then he smirked.

With a limp, he came closer to it and threw away the sword. He saw the chitin carapace covering it and with his current strength, it was impossible to cut it. So, he instead hugged it tightly.

Ezekiel, who tried to recover from losing his limbs, suddenly felt the sensations on his tail and tried to stand up quickly.

But just then, he heard a mighty roar as Illyan strongly pulled and spun his entire body with the tail in his hands. Ezekiel’s body, like a puppet on the string, was suddenly pulled as he quickly met with the wall of the buildings on the side of the road.

He tried to muster up his aura of darkness, but each time he crashed into another obstacle, he would lose focus. And without the aura, his defenses were similar to Illyan.

The only difference was that he wouldn’t recover from this.

Boom

Just as all the buildings around were leveled with the ground, Illyan roared again as he lifted the tail overhead and slammed Ezekiel’s body into the ground.

Feeling the strength in the tail becoming more feeble, he started to pull at it, trying to get Ezekiel closer to him. But Ezekiel didn’t plan to just give up.

The tip of the tail rattled a little as the barbs started to fly at Illyan’s back. He didn’t care as he hunched over to protect his head and continued pulling. The barbs were falling on his back as blood started to make another puddle on the ground.

When Ezekiel, who was being dragged on the ground, saw this, his eyes gleamed with desire. Despite his current state, he still didn’t panic.

‘What a remarkable life force. If I had the same amount back then… No, it doesn’t matter. If I take him down I will have it now and finally finish my grand project…’

With a flick, the red stinger at the tip of his tail finally moved, prepared to stab Illyan. Ezekiel didn’t think it would hit but just hoped that he would let go of the tail.

But once again, Illyan’s actions went against his expectations as he just turned around and…

Bit down on the stinger.

For a second, Ezekiel doubted what he saw. After all, no sane man would do this.

The cracking noise resounded as the jaw turned at a weird angle. The bloodied teeth started to fall out of the mouth, and the painful poison flowed down his throat.

His entire face was even more disfigured than when he scarred it himself. But his eyes shined with determination as he pulled on the tail with even more strength.

When Ezekiel got closer, he wanted to use his second mantis blade to attack, but Illyan just put the tail in front of it. If he didn’t want his tail cut off, he couldn’t do anything. Soon, he got close enough, and Illyan stomped on his chest.

With a crunch, Ezekiel grunted as he gasped for air.

Then, when he noticed Illyan reaching out for his head, he knew that today was his defeat.

‘I apologize for underestimating you… It just makes me happy for how wrong I was hihihe..’

Just as Illyan wanted to crush his face, Ezekiel’s cheeks expanded like that of a frog and spat out gray liquid. It pierced through Illyan’s arm and exploded in his face, turning into gray mist.

Pain enveloped Illyan as the mist corroded his body, but he still held onto the tail. Unfortunately, suddenly there was a clicking noise and subsequently the slimy noise as the tail, or rather the carapace covering it, became looser.

When he noticed how the tail became lifeless, he spat out the stinger and groaned in annoyance. But he felt content. However, this liberating feeling didn’t last long as he heard loud noises and clanking of iron against iron. There was also the neighing of horses and the sound of hooves hitting the ground.

Soon, a big group of soldiers surrounded the street Illyan was in.

They looked scared when they stared at the destruction around. It was as if a natural disaster had come to this region. That was why the soldiers didn’t dare at first to get closer to Illyan who was in the midst of this at all.

However, when the leader came on the horse and saw that the only being around was Illyan, who seemed half-dead, he made a speech to encourage his soldiers.

“We are the swords of the mayor! How can we allow scourges like this to destroy our hometown? Arrest that man in this instant! For the mayor!”

Soldiers who finally noticed that Illyan was wobbling around regained some of their bearings as they yelled out.

“In the name of the law, surrender yourself!”

Illyan’s head was down, and thus they didn’t see his face, but they didn’t care because as long as they captured him, there would be no way out for him anymore.

Illyan, who was using his spiritual perception to make sure Ezekiel really escaped, heard the yells of the soldiers and was quite amused.

Now that he had exchanged blows with Flow Masters, he knew that those soldiers were not themselves. Even the leader didn’t develop tangible flow within his body.

When he saw them strutting toward him as if he was completely helpless, he even chuckled out loudly.

He may be crippled in the eyes of others, but to him, this was the norm.

Silence ensued in the street when Illyan started to laugh. It wasn't a normal laugh as he inhaled the corrosive mist, which damaged his respiratory system and his vocal cords.

Not only that, his jaw was disfigured too, and as such, the noise he was giving out was hoarse and gruff. It sounded extremely creepy, which made the soldiers stop in their tracks as they made a circle around him.

“What are you doing?! Don’t let him recover! Get him!” The leader, who saw this, beckoned his horse and prepared to interfere as he knew something was wrong.

Soldiers holding spears, prepared to puncture Illyan’s legs so that they could capture him, heard their leader's voice and came out of the trance.

However, it was at that moment when Illyan lifted his head and smiled at them.

His cheeks were torn apart, and his gums were cracked open and unnaturally red from the venom of the manticore. Some of the teeth were missing, but it wasn’t visible as the flow of blood was coming out of his mouth. The joints of the jaw were completely dislocated and broken down, creating a grotesque sight.

And now, the smile further distorted his mouth as if he smiled from ear to ear. Literally.

The soldiers who saw this once again stopped.

But Illyan already flexed his fingers as his nails started to grow at a visible speed.

“What kind of monster are you…” One of the soldiers muttered in horror while others started to pray to their god.

Even the leader's expression changed. And when he saw that Illyan was actually really recovering, he recoiled in the saddle in horror.

“Change of plans! Don’t hold back! Kill that thing!” Then he drew his sword and prepared to attack.

“Crossbows! Use the crossbows!” The soldiers in distance took out the crossbows while the spearmen in front made way for them while still being in formation to attack if Illyan tried to attack.

But Illyan saw it. The fear, the hesitation. They were different from Ezekiel and Aziro.

They seemed to have humanity left in their soul. They were just normal people trying to live their lives. Trying to feed their families and achieve their dreams. Some of them were young. Maybe even younger than his fabricated identity of Kaoran, who was 19 years old.

It reminded him of Terren.

He looked down at his stomach. The hole from which his innards were spilling was already sealed up.

He looked up again.

However… He felt that the need to justify his every action already dissipated deep inside his body.

He was liberated.

Illyan didn’t care anymore…

“Fire!” Just as the crossbowmen fired, he used the breathing technique to put all his strength in his legs as he sprang himself in the direction of the closest soldier.

He caught his spear and with a strong pull, he dragged him into his arms.

“Argh? Noo-” Before the soldier could do anything, he was penetrated by several bolts. Illyan didn’t block every one as they were surrounding him, but as long as his heart and head were alright, he didn’t care.

Throwing the corpse of the soldier away, he closed in on another. The soldiers wanted to defend but didn’t know how. It seemed as if Illyan was just passing through while their throats were slit open.

This made others more scared.

“He learned the [Flow Breathing Technique] too…”

The leader, who knew that the morale was extremely low and swept in with his horse hoping to lop off Illyan’s head.

Instead, Illyan, who noticed the horse, flicked his leg at the molted carapace of the manticore’s tail into his arms and swung it at the charging leader.

Obviously, the sword he had was of lesser quality and couldn’t cut through it at all, so the only result was him ramming straight into it which not only dismounted him but probably broke his spine too as he fell on the ground motionless.

The horse, on the other hand, was so scared that it didn’t stop at all and continued running in the same direction far from Illyan.

Other soldiers who saw the fall of their leader also wanted to retreat, but Illyan didn’t dawdle as he swept in on them and soon killed all of them amidst the screams and begging for life.

When the last soldier turned into a corpse, Illyan was gasping for air as he couldn’t breathe properly. His lungs were corroded by the mist and it was difficult to even move, let alone fight like this. But he endured.

Now that everyone was dead, he stood up and prepared to leave.

But not before taking his loot.

Out of everyone around here, he was only interested in Ezekiel’s body parts. He took the molt of the tail, the mantis blade, and his two limbs and started to limp away before anyone discovered him.

However, his eyes were cold as he stared at the left arm and leg which were covered in black bumps. But if one looked closely, it was not just a bump that was at the surface of the skin but rather it was something embedded inside of the limbs.

Something that was made out of unknown black material…