Read Novel Full Chapter 1160: Full Steam
Chapter 1160: Full Steam
Black Fang’s pulse was wild, animalistic, the rhythm of a predator in ecstasy, and not just because she was bleeding and in danger. No...
She was thrilled, excited. She was having incredible fun.
Any other time, he would’ve smirked at her quite questionable reaction, but now, he couldn’t afford the distraction. His jaw was locked, his breath controlled, his eyes fixed only on the path forward.
The world blurred. The ground was gone. The horizon vanished. All that remained was the climb, taking them higher and higher until the clouds themselves became the next enemy to shatter.
And so he ripped toward the heavens, wind shrieking around them, a man and a witch cutting the sky in half.
Far below, the Scarlet Lilies blinked after their targets. But when Lilith finally glanced upward, her expression slipped.
They weren’t just climbing.
They were leaving.
"How much mana does that man have?!" she gasped. "Our reports suggest he’s a hybrid like me, which means his Magic stat should be relatively low!"
Normally, that logic held true.
In this world, a person’s mana pool was tied directly to their Magic stat.
One point of Magic equaled ten mana, just as one point of Vitality equaled ten health. It was simple, reliable, and an ironclad rule every warrior and mage lived by.
But Quinlan enjoyed a little bonus in this area.
What Lilith didn’t know was that his Unique-tier class, Primordial Villain, was a monster of a foundation.
It wasn’t just a hub for powers considered "evil," but one that made him a walking stat stick. Every one of his attributes was boosted by twenty-five percent, and his mana and health reserves were given an additional fifty percent on top.
Almost all noteworthy classes in existence provided some kind of boost like this.
A knight-type might get a bonus to his Vitality and Strength. A sage’s spells hit harder due to increased Magic. Hybrids like Lilith had to balance their stats between all four, not neglecting either magic or physical prowess. This was what made the hybrid specialization a fool’s errand, a way to ruin one’s prospects.
But Lilith was someone who never gave up on her dream of becoming a Spellblade, and her risky dream was fulfilled when she unlocked a class that helped her do just that.
But no other class was as generous and simple as Quinlan’s. None of them was built like the Villain.
It was this hidden edge, this unnatural efficiency, that allowed Quinlan to win against enemies far above his supposed weight class. And now, fueled by the curse-power of his lover and the reckless drain of his reserves, he was doing more than surviving.
He was outpacing them.
Void’s voice was devoid of her usual drawl. There was no laziness in her tone anymore, only focus, sharp and cold.
"Two can play that game..."
Her eyes, those bottomless pools of void, flared brighter than they ever had before. And then, the air cracked.
The blinking increased.
This was no longer her usual, measured displacements between points of space; no, this was something else entirely.
Each flicker came faster than the last, a strobing barrage of displacements that blurred her body into afterimages. Mana poured out of her in torrents, expenditure that matched Quinlan’s drain step for step.
The Lilies felt the shift immediately; the world itself was recoiling from the frequency of her jumps. Even they struggled to keep it together at this immensely straining pace.
The chase ignited in earnest.
One man and one witch tore through the skies like a missile, wind screaming as Quinlan bent it into razors to slice their path open. Behind them, Void blinked so rapidly that the distance between them was shredded second by second, her presence hammering closer with each impossibly quick shift.
The clouds trembled, scattered apart by the turbulence.
And then...
Quinlan and Black Fang vanished into the wall of white, swallowed whole by the clouds.
Lilith’s head throbbed.
The rapid strobing of Void’s displacements was frying her nerves, her brain struggling to even process the rhythm of the jumps. Her vision swam, and nausea coiled in her gut, but she forced herself to stay sharp.
"Don’t stop!" she shouted at Void.
Her blade howled and ripped into the clouds ahead, the slash detonating with thunderous force.
At this point, Void was moving so swiftly across the skies that she herself nearly tanked the slash meant for the clouds. But disaster was avoided when the veil of white split apart, creating an opening carved wide enough for them to glimpse their prey at last.
But what they saw wasn’t what they expected.
There were no fleeing boots. No silhouettes vanishing into the distance.
Instead, at the heart of the storm, a figure sat cross-legged in the air, utterly still.
A man.
He was meditating.
Lilith’s eyes sharpened, and her Spellblade senses caught it; streams of raw mana were flowing into him, visible currents swirling around his body like rivers pouring into the sea. Her heart seized in shock.
"No way! He can even regenerate mana?!"
Quinlan smirked with closed eyes, hearing her shout of disbelief. His mind replayed the messages he received after re-entering the universal laws after leaving the sealed off world of Zhenwu.
Two messages, namely.
✦ Qi Gathering Stage Achievement Retained:
Your refined qi control has evolved into a streamlined mana circuit system.
Effect: +100% Mana Regeneration.
✦ Meridian Opening Stage Achievement Retained:
Your twelve open meridians now serve as active mana channels.
Effect: Enables Active Mana Absorption.
—
Lilith had assumed - like everyone else - that he was a boy forced to play on the main stage far above his league, easy prey for the king to snatch while he was still young and weak. But that notion had been ripped apart piece by piece.
Protected by the old fox Yoruha. Allied and fighting alongside the infamous Black Fang. And himself... He was no fool, stumbling around, waiting to be saved.
He was a nightmare of hidden edges, an ever-expanding arsenal of tricks that defied the very rules of the world.
Lilith’s fingers trembled against her hilt. For the first time, she wasn’t sure she understood what she was fighting.
But her doubts were cut short.
Because next to Quinlan stood death herself.
Black Fang, standing on a floating platform.
She was a ruin of flesh, her body drenched in blood, clothes torn. Yet not once did she falter. Not once did she bow beneath pain or exhaustion. Her stance was steady, her eyes alight with nothing but cold, merciless hunger for the blood of her enemies.
The clouds shuddered around her as she raised her blade.
Lilith’s instincts screamed.
"Void, dodge!"