[Lord of Abundance] Chapter 54 — The Crimson Crown
Chapter 54 — The Crimson Crown
While secretly gathering information from high above, Kun soon spotted something worth watching.
A long procession of humanoid creatures—different from the monsters living at the foot of the Flesh Mountain—was escorting a line of towering slaves.
The slaves stood over two meters tall, their skin gleaming with a metallic silver sheen.
A snake-headed, snake-tailed overseer cracked a barbed bone whip through the air.
"Move! Faster, you worthless livestock!"
There were tears.
There was grief.
There was terror.
Yet not a single silver-skinned captive dared resist.
A crimson streak shot out from the Flesh Mountain.
Another blood-red streak rose from the slave convoy to meet it.
The newcomer was a towering monster whose massive muscles bulged beneath scarlet skin. A pair of scythe-shaped horns curved from its head.
The other was a seductive woman from the waist up...
But below that, her body became a skinless serpent's tail of exposed flesh and scales.
Beautiful...
And horrifying.
The horned monster glanced down at the endless line of captives—no fewer than four or five thousand of them—and laughed.
"This New King's Grand Sacrifice... your offering is the largest yet, Herfelian. Perhaps only Matriarch Aoliane's tribute can rival yours. Once the ceremony concludes, His Majesty will surely reward you generously."
Herfelian smiled gracefully.
"You flatter me, Brother Shali. How could I compare with Matriarch Aoliane? I merely wished to contribute my humble part to the Grand Sacrifice. As long as His Majesty is pleased with these blood offerings, that's enough for me."
Despite her sweet words, hatred simmered beneath the smile.
A mere servant of the former king dares compete with us, the New King's followers?
His Majesty was merciful enough to spare her from returning to the Flesh Furnace... yet she still tries to curry favor.
How shameless.
Had she not fallen into a trap laid by the Spiritfolk resistance...
She could have captured twice as many "livestock" from the survivor city.
The thought filled her with resentment.
Although Kun couldn't yet understand their language...
His powerful memory recorded every syllable of their conversation.
Once he gathered enough samples, deciphering the language would simply become another analytical exercise.
What truly surprised him...
Was the world's power level.
The two monsters below radiated blood qi and vitality that had long surpassed the Third Rank.
Compared to the Fourth-Rank Gold-Devouring Earth Dragon from the Forest of Eternal Darkness...
They were hardly inferior.
...Hm?
I'm being watched.
How did they notice me?
Not good.
Killing intent.
"A Flying Eye Fish dares neglect its duty?"
As captain of the New King's royal guards, Shali tolerated no disobedience.
Every Sacred Clan member stationed upon the Holy Mountain had a designated role.
Neglecting one's work...
Was equivalent to disobeying the King's command.
Only then did Kun realize he had drifted far lower than the rest of the eye parasites.
He immediately attempted to ascend.
The next instant...
A blast wrapped in terrifying blood qi shot toward him.
Its speed was instantaneous.
"Wind Bullet!"
A simple First-Rank wind spell erupted.
Rather than increasing its power, Kun used it to propel the kite-like body sideways.
The attack barely missed.
"...Hm?"
Herfelian's interest was piqued.
"So this Flying Eye Fish has mutated."
"It can manipulate the air."
"What a pity."
"Its bloodline is simply too low."
"Otherwise..."
"It might have become one of us Matriarchs."
Watching a mere Flying Eye Fish evade his strike...
Shali's face darkened.
He had disgraced the King's trust.
Enraged, he vanished in a blur.
The next instant, he appeared before the tiny Flying Eye Fish.
Then...
He stomped downward.
Blood qi surged like an avalanche.
The sheer force behind the kick could have shattered mountains.
Buzz—
Realizing concealment was no longer possible...
Kun unleashed everything he had.
The eye parasite's massive eye snapped fully open.
Invisible waves of overwhelming psychic force exploded outward.
Even the surrounding air twisted under the pressure.
Although this borrowed body could currently cast only First-Rank spells...
The spiritual power Kun had brought with him rivaled that of a peak Third-Rank mental mage.
"Third-Rank Hypnosis."
"Eternal Sleep."
Buzz—
Even Kun hadn't expected such a dramatic result.
Shali's eyes suddenly closed.
Without so much as a struggle...
The enormous horned monster dropped straight out of the sky.
BOOM!
He smashed into the ground, leaving behind a massive crater.
Kun blinked.
A normal Fourth-Rank being shouldn't be so vulnerable to a Third-Rank spell.
Then the realization struck.
These crimson monsters...
Like the eye parasite he possessed...
Had incomplete souls.
They weren't naturally born lifeforms.
Their resistance against mental magic was astonishingly weak.
"Impossible!"
Herfelian was stunned.
A Flying Eye Fish...
Had the King's captain been knocked unconscious?
How could such a thing exist?
She would sooner believe those livestock-like Spiritfolk had finally invented a weapon capable of annihilating the Sacred Clans.
Every time those so-called spirit weapons detonated...
They merely accelerated the Sacred Clans' evolution.
They were divine revelation.
No...
They were the Apocalypse.
The Sacred Clans had been born into this world for one purpose:
To eradicate those parasitic Spiritfolk forever.
They would replace the Spiritfolk...
As rulers of this world.
It was the King's command.
And the will of the world itself.
Her bone whip lashed toward the eye parasite.
This time...
Kun truly had no answer.
He could only watch helplessly as the terrifying whip descended.
Behind it seemed to loom mountains of corpses and seas of blood.
If it landed...
Forget this fragile puppet.
Even someone as powerful as Dawn would almost certainly die instantly.
Crack!
To Kun's complete surprise...
It was Shali himself who blocked the fatal strike.
Apparently awakened from the hypnosis, the horned monster barked several incomprehensible sentences.
Then...
He stuffed Kun into a cage.
Kun chose not to resist again.
At least for the moment...
He wasn't going to die.
Whether this flesh puppet survived or not meant little to him.
What truly mattered...
Was the Spiritfolk civilization...
And his precious True Spirit Flower.
For now...
Waiting and observing seemed the wisest choice.
Before long, two crimson monsters carried him deep inside the Flesh Mountain.
Even the walls were made of living flesh.
Massive blood vessels pulsed rhythmically, transporting nutrients somewhere farther within.
Countless bat-like creatures clung upside down from the ceiling.
They packed the cavern so densely that it was almost impossible to count them.
A brief scan told Kun enough.
Every single one...
Possessed strength comparable to a Third-Rank creature.
Even ignoring the two Fourth-Rank monsters escorting him...
This hidden army alone would be enough to devastate the Kingdom of Dansu.
Perhaps even destroy the nation entirely.
Fortunately...
The distance between worlds was unimaginably vast.
Then again...
That made sense.
According to the desperate prayer he had heard, Spiritfolk civilization had endured for at least eight or nine thousand years.
Its accumulated heritage should have been extraordinary.
Yet even such an ancient civilization had nearly been exterminated by these crimson monsters.
That alone spoke volumes about how terrifying they truly were.
Of course...
Kun hadn't come to save the Spiritfolk.
He only wanted their priceless knowledge.
Well...
If lending a hand happened to solve the problem with little effort...
He wouldn't mind helping.
After all...
He considered himself an idealistic, ethical, law-abiding young mage.
The deeper they traveled...
The broader the tunnels became.
Contrary to expectation, the interior of the Flesh Mountain wasn't dark.
A crimson radiance shone from within every wall.
It was as though the mountain itself served as an enormous, perpetual light source.
Macabre...
Yet strangely beautiful.
Eventually...
Kun was brought into an immense hall built from flesh and white bone.
Molten rivers of crimson blood flowed on either side.
Before a colossal Bone Throne stood thirteen monsters of wildly different appearances.
Each radiated terrifying blood qi, no weaker than that of Shali or Herfelian.
And seated upon that throne...
Was a woman dressed in crimson.
She stood over two meters tall.
Graceful.
Perfectly proportioned.
Her skin carried the faintest crimson hue...
Yet possessed breathtaking beauty.
A pair of enormous white skeletal wings spread behind her.
Resting upon her head was a crystalline crimson crown...
As though forged from the blood of countless enemies.
Wine-red hair cascaded down her back like a waterfall.
Within her scarlet eyes existed only cold calculation...
And merciless indifference.
She looked down upon everyone below...
Like a god observing insignificant mortals.
Kun merely brushed his senses across the throne...
Then, he immediately withdrew every trace of his spiritual perception.
At the same instant...
He severed all connections with the puppet.
A Fifth-Rank Queen...?
What the hell!
Back inside the hidden chamber beneath Blackstone Castle...
Kun slowly opened his eyes.
His face was full of helpless resignation.
Possessing a flesh puppet...
He still had confidence in his ability to fight a few incomplete Fourth-Rank creatures.
But...
A Fifth-Rank demigod?
Forget it.
Being alive was nice.
Unlike the lower ranks...
Every step within the Heroic Realm was separated by a gulf as vast as the leap from Third Rank to Fourth.
As for the Fifth Rank...
Kun had only just glimpsed its doorway.
When he might actually cross that threshold...
Only heaven knew.
As tempted as he was by the Spiritfolk civilization's legacy...
He could still distinguish greed from reason.
Seeing that the precious True Spirit Flower remained healthy and unwithered...
Kun couldn't understand why those bloodthirsty monsters hadn't immediately destroyed his flesh puppet.
Still...
He couldn't bear to abandon the flower.
Instead, he added several mana crystals to the Soul Transfer Array...
Maintaining the connection between worlds.
The day the True Spirit Flower finally withered...
Would be the day all contact with the Spiritfolk world was permanently severed.
Holding onto that faint, unrealistic hope...
Kun changed back into his bright golden mage robes and left the hidden chamber.
Inside the enormous cocoon...
Dawn's transformation continued.
Whether it was a Bloodline Fusion Potion...
Or a Divine Blood Fusion Potion...
Even after being diluted a thousandfold...
Divine blood remained extraordinarily difficult to assimilate.
There was still a twenty percent chance of death.
Fortunately...
Thanks to Kun's magic and meticulous calculations...
Everything was progressing smoothly.
If all continued as expected...
Dawn should awaken the day after tomorrow.
At least...
There was finally one piece of good news.
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