Decent Burial!

Unfortunately, that dashing silhouette didn't last very long. Having been knocked flying by Neo's ambush earlier, Miki landed on one knee, supporting herself with her blade, her gaze filled with fury. Yet the sand armor on her body began peeling away rapidly like pouring quicksand. Inside the armor, there was unexpectedly no one at all—even the lively look in her eyes from moments before had vanished without a trace. Using a decoy body as cover for the real body to launch a counterattack was very common in battle, practically an essential skill in the assassin field, but this was the first time Karen had seen someone execute it to such a high caliber. The ground beneath Neo's feet turned into sand, and four sand steles rose simultaneously in an attempt to trap him completely. Instead of dodging, however, Neo rapidly cast a spell, chanting in a deep voice toward the ground beneath him: "Tower of Light!" In an instant, a Tower of Light began to materialize with Neo's position as its origin—except instead of rising toward the sky in conventional fashion, it extended downward. This was a testament to an exceptionally thorough understanding of Light spells: the thrill-seeker hanging the Tower of Light upside down. A fierce clash of spells erupted underground, triggering a violent explosion. Karen completed his defensive array just in time, encasing himself and the VIP carriage inside to shield them from the brunt of the shockwave. Amidst the smoke and dust, Neo initially thought he had neutralized the ambush, but soon, a woman's phantom appeared right behind him. Her hands reached forward, invisible threads wound between her fingers, poised to sever Neo's neck. Neo thrust his greatsword backward, but it had no effect on the woman's phantom. She seemed entirely nonexistent, yet the chilling sensation creeping around his neck was undeniably real. Left with no other choice, Neo had to slam his body backward directly into her. The woman dissolved into smoke before condensing instantly, countless fine grains of sand stabbing straight into Neo's flesh. "Hiss..." Neo drew a sharp breath as intense pain and a binding sensation swarmed over him. From the massive crater blown open below, Miki seized the momentum and charged upward with blade in hand. Seeing this, Neo relaxed his body. Rich flames of Light erupted across his entire form, suppressing all restraints, and he transformed into a blazing streak of fire that shot into the distance. Strictly speaking, Neo had taken the worse of this exchange. The minor upper hand he gained at the start hadn't dealt any substantive damage to Miki, whereas his own body had likely been turned into a hornet's nest. He endured only because he was sustained by his advanced bloodthirsty aberrant demon bloodline; had anyone else suffered such injuries, if they didn't drop dead on the spot, they would have at least been stripped of all fighting capacity. Just then, Karen noticed Luther, who had his face pressed against the carriage window peering outside like an inquisitive child, speaking a sentence. No sound came through; Karen could only read his lips, and he didn't appear to be speaking the Marklai language. Yet Miki understood. Her figure paused midair for a fraction of a second before she immediately gave chase in the direction Neo had fled. Not a Child of God... yet he can still issue orders? Karen didn't believe Miki was ignorant of intelligence that the Church of Order's intelligence apparatus had managed to obtain. Yet she still obeyed his command, choosing to pursue at such an inopportune moment. With Neo's departure, the ambush by the Light remnants came to an end, and they began retreating swiftly. Karen even caught sight of a figure resembling Vic among the crowd; it seemed he had integrated quite quickly. At that moment, the blocking arrays at both ends were broken, and security forces rushed in. Karen dismantled his defensive array and instructed Leon: "Take them to the hotel." "Yes, Section Chief." Karen then used an amplification spell to shout: "I will pursue! Continue protecting the targets!" "Yes, Section Chief!" Thousand Phantoms materialized, black wings flapping as Karen took off in pursuit. ... The chase between the two ahead lasted for a long time. Karen knew this was deliberate on Neo's part; having suffered a setback, he wanted to find a wider area to settle the score. This was what Karen worried about most. Even when you understood his temperament—that he could never control himself whenever there was fun to be had—it didn't stop you from worrying about his safety every single time, fearing he might take it too far and botch it. Along the way, Karen left markers at intervals to lead any potential reinforcements and search parties in the wrong direction. Doing this now carried zero psychological burden for him; after all, this special Light remnant department had been approved by the Regional Chief and was endorsed by the higher-ups. At the highest level, it could even be traced back to old Theisen's dying recommendations to the High Priest and Foden. Thus, while the Light remnants remained a taboo topic in other regions, the Yorktown Region... could be considered a pilot unit. Eventually, they arrived at a stretch of mudflats. Neo halted, and the dense sand and gravel embedded in his body began shedding rapidly—having pierced into him earlier, he had looked like a human shotgun target. Miki didn't press the attack, stopping in place as well, yet her body formed a subtle resonance with the sandy beach. When Karen arrived at a vantage point where he could observe the battle, he distinctly sensed a unique magnetic field taking shape there. Miki had already altered the terrain where their battle was about to erupt. This was experience. Karen set up a barrier to conceal his presence. Now, he could properly enjoy the showdown between two seasoned veterans brimming with experience. A faint phantom of his grandfather slowly emerged over Karen, though he kept the fluctuation of his grandfather's aura contained to prevent it from leaking. This meant Karen had engaged the characteristics of his family's faith system. While others watched a show with melon seeds, chips, and tea, Karen was far more rigorous and upright. It wasn't that he wanted to learn this combat style, but rather that as his status rose and his subordinates multiplied, the probability of facing assassinations in the future would only increase. It was a pity Philomena was still lying in the hospital. Had she been here, she surely would have gained a great deal. As for having Karen teach her, that wasn't realistic either. Karen was a good student, but not a good teacher. He could grasp things quickly, but others couldn't; he could hardly teach someone by saying, "Do this once, then do that once, and you're good. You get it, right?" The preparations on both sides didn't last long. One treated his wounds, the other set up the field, and then came an utterly classic clash. Neo crashed downward like a blazing sun. Karen felt that Neo enveloped in Light seemed somewhat happier; he wasn't sure if it was because of the background color or the man himself. Seven sand steles shot up before Miki. The radiant glow on Neo melted six of them in an instant, and just as he was about to melt the final one in a single breath, Miki struck proactively. Her blade cleaved through the light. Her figure seemed to pull off an extreme aerial maneuver, appearing before Neo in an instant as she slashed downward toward him. Neo blocked with his greatsword, but the clash of metal never came. Miki's blade suddenly melted, revealing a piece of yellow amber within, which encased a scroll. Layers of sand and stone swiftly enveloped Miki's body as she plummeted rapidly. A depression opened in the ground below to receive her, and the beach and the earth beneath hardened layer by layer, forming an absolute defense. Above, the amber melted, the scroll unfurled, and a surging destructive power was poised to erupt. Watching from afar, Karen couldn't help but frown slightly. Well, this was certainly an agile way to fight, though not what he had envisioned, mostly because it burned through a tremendous amount of vouchers. High-grade offensive scrolls were exorbitantly expensive. Even if crafted in-house without purchasing them, the cost remained extraordinarily steep. Judging by how proficiently Miki employed this tactic, it was clearly not her first time. It was hard to imagine that a faction lurking in the shadows—or rather, a fundamentalist group of the Church of the Desert—could master such an extravagant combat style. This only proved that the internal issues of the Desert Church were massive. The current splinter factions had grown strong on the Desert Church's own resources, which meant the Desert Church had nurtured its own opposition using its own wealth. According to the records, those "bishops" who fell by Miki's hand had very likely died to spell scrolls or sacred relics "plucked" from their own storehouses. Perhaps there were even Miki's people within their security details, opening the doors to let Miki in to commit murder while they slept at night. Additionally, Karen recalled that he had a forbidden curse scroll obtained from the skeleton. Thinking about it, he could probably practice a similar tactic. That way, when dealing with formidable and troublesome opponents in the future, he could employ it with finesse—for instance, having Thousand Phantoms fly over with the scroll while he immediately entered a defensive state shielded by Kangna. The black wings fluttering merrily behind Karen fluttered erratically for a moment. Neo, however, did not panic. Facing the activating scroll, a mist of blood appeared before him, instantly condensing into a massive crimson crystal that sealed the activated scroll entirely inside. What kind of bloodthirsty aberrant demon spell was this? Recalling how Neo had persistently questioned Kevin back in the Church of the Burrowers' territory, this meant that after that severe underground wound, not only had the man recovered, but his bloodline hadn't degraded—it had actually leveled up! At this moment, even Karen found it incomprehensible, bordering on absurd and unfair. For the first time, Karen cried out in his heart: On what grounds?! How could one approach this rationally? The man had been down to his last breath, personally rescued by Karen, yet just by lying around, he had achieved another massive breakthrough? If everyone were like you, what would be the point of anyone else's hard work? Soon, Karen spotted where the change came from. A phantom of the Mad Pope appeared behind Neo, but whereas the Mad Pope had previously struck only poses of roaring madness, his figure now coursed with crimson. The corners of his eyes were flushed red, and his raised hands sported elongated claws. For a moment, it was impossible to tell whether this was the phantom of the Mad Pope or the phantom of a bloodthirsty aberrant demon ancestor. Neo had successfully... fused the two legacies. Even after scouring Mr. Hoffen's notes, one couldn't find a similar record; this was simply inconceivable. Yet the reality was right before Karen's eyes, leaving him no choice but to believe it. Thinking back to how Neo had spent nearly a decade living in chaos, unable to distinguish whether he was Philias or Neo, and later received the embrace from Miss Eliza to gain the bloodthirsty aberrant demon bloodline, he had often complained to Karen that a whole committee was holding meetings inside his head. Later, after Philias "departed," he inhaled the special smoke from the Principle-Order god-creation project and awakened the Mad Pope bloodline, which only added more attendees to those meetings. In truth, such meetings... were essentially Neo playing multiple roles by himself. From a psychological perspective, he was a textbook case of split personality. Looked at from another angle, however, was this not him constantly fusing the multiple elemental powers within his body? The so-called debates and quarrels were more like a sublimation and integration of concepts. The power of Light was inherently the finest vessel for interpreting other spells, and Neo had dug even deeper into it, achieving a powerful fusion of bloodline and faith. If Karen had relied on his own uniqueness, the exceptional teachers Diss had prepared for him in Purr and Kevin, and his own formidable talent to step onto the fast track from the moment he was purified into a servant upon arriving in Wien... Then Neo had used the accumulation of the past decade to welcome this powerful volcanic eruption of growth. Had the two of them not crossed paths back when neither had truly taken off, perhaps the current Neo wouldn't have spared a second glance for a mere servant, nor would the current Karen care about a Whip of Order squad captain—one whose squad was named the Hound Squad, no less... childish, truly. Thus, had they not met at that specific stage, they likely never would have become friends. In fact, with two such figures emerging in the same region, they would have investigated each other, determined to unearth that Light remnant hiding beneath the Order system. The crimson crystal neutralized the scroll's effect, leaving Miki, who had burrowed underground in advance to avoid the blast, waiting in vain. Neo didn't keep her waiting long, either. Gripping the crystal with both hands, his body detonated with a bang in the very next instant, dissolving into a colossal mist of blood. Scarlet blood began raining down, instantly staining the beach red. This was a spell entirely reliant on an advanced bloodthirsty aberrant demon bloodline. Karen knew he couldn't replicate it; even if he could cast it, it would merely be a crude imitation, turning an advanced spell into the effect of a low-grade one—what would be the point? Unless he also sought out Neo for a bite, let Neo grant him an embrace, and then painstakingly raised his bloodline rank, only then would he have a chance to produce the same effect. This was why Karen currently stuck almost exclusively to Order and Light spells; high-tier spells were far too demanding on hardware specs. Below, Miki also sensed something amiss. A fissure split open on the beach, through which she saw the changes above and around her. She began preparing to flee. Then, from within the rain of blood, what sounded like an arrogant burst of laughter echoed out, followed immediately by the appearance of another Tower of Light. Again, it was inverted, its spire pointing downward. Only this time, the Tower of Light lacked that sacrosanct, inviolable aura of Light. Instead, it was permeated and circled by a bloody hue, twisted faces of agony continually surfacing and intertwining across each tier of the tower. From within the tower's structure came wave after wave of furious roars and snarls, as though a deranged entity were imprisoned inside. Was this... a necromantic aura? No, it wasn't a necromantic aura, but rather borrowed the manifestation of the necromantic school. Was this the inspiration Neo had gleaned from being blown up by Morindi in that cavern? Karen was already feeling somewhat numb; no matter how many surprises Neo displayed now, he wouldn't find them surprising. Yet he disliked this feeling. It brought a sense of defeat, and he instinctively felt the fellow was deliberately showing off, deliberately flaunting. What are you so smug about? What Karen didn't know was that in the past, he had given the exact same feeling to those around him countless times; Neo was merely the only one who consistently refused to admit defeat out loud. The Tower of Light roared downward, while below, the absolute defense that had belonged to Miki was pried open layer by layer. The surrounding rain of blood seeped in continuously, undermining the very foundation of this defensive structure. Miki resisted with all her might, yet she could not reverse the tide. She was like an onion: no matter how pungent and eye-stinging the odor she released, she could not alter the fate of being peeled away layer by layer. Finally, they reached the last layer. The only thing protecting Miki was the ring of sand inscriptions around her—likely an ancient heritage of the Church of the Desert, boasting astonishing defensive power. This was their final line of contest, and right at this moment, Karen heard that loud roar resounding from the rain of blood: "Come on...!" Buzz! In an instant, a wave of light showered down from above, followed closely by the swift condensation of scarlet essence, the bloody silhouette taking on an intensely three-dimensional form. On both flanks, blood-colored bones branched out, forming what resembled two massive sets of human ribcages; In the center, a ring of bloody light appeared, encasing Miki completely. Karen's brow furrowed instantly. He could understand the bloody ring of light in the center, but what on earth were those bloody, bone-like structures branching out on the flanks?! No, to be precise, those extra forms flanking the sides were completely superfluous, cumbersome, and useless in this battle! This could only mean that Neo had created this spell very recently, before having the chance to refine or master it, and was merely forcing it into application right now. Yet this method of using massive ribcages to suppress the flanks while focusing the main assault in the center... Wasn't that specifically designed to counter the defense of his own Dragon God Armor?! While lying in that hospital bed, this bastard had actually been researching how to break the desperate defense Karen had gained after acquiring the little bone dragon. He had been scheming the entire time on how to shatter his defense and beat him down! Heh, what a jerk. Next, when Neo's voice bellowed the name of this spell from within the rain of blood, it served as definitive confirmation, for what he shouted was: "Scarlet Light—Decent Burial!" Karen: "..."