Reincarnated as an Energy with a System

Chapter 1939: Mirrored Wounds

Blood flowed from the wound across Ning’s palm, running between his fingers before dripping onto the polished floor of the palace corridor, while Number 4 watched him from beneath the visor of the royal guard’s armor.

Her eyes held the confidence of someone who believed the battle had already ended.

The wound on Ning’s hand perfectly matched the cut she had made across her own palm, possessing the same length, depth, and angle despite nothing ever touching him, and after examining it for a few moments, Ning understood that her power allowed her to share the injuries she inflicted upon herself with another person.

"How do you feel?" Number 4 asked.

"I thought you were here to kill me," Ning said. "This isn’t going to do the job."

"You think I can’t kill you this way?" she asked.

Ning looked her down. "Can you?"

The Lizardwoman answered by placing the edge of the blade against her forearm and dragging it through her scales, causing another wound to immediately open across Ning’s arm beneath the sleeve of his formal suit.

She continued making cuts along her arms, shoulders, and legs.

"This is not bad, but I hope you do understand that we’re being hurt the same. By any chance, are you trying to murder me by killing yourself?" Ning asked.

"I don’t need to kill myself to kill you. I just need to hurt you enough so that you die and I don’t," she told him.

Ning watched the blood spread across his clothing. "Won’t you die as well if we have the same injuries?"

Number 4 let out a snort. "Unlike you, we Lizardfolk possess much stronger natural healing than most other races. Which means my injuries will begin closing while you continue losing blood. I will live, and you will die. That is all we want anyway."

Ning looked at the wounds covering his body, then shrugged.

"Go ahead."

Number 4 hesitated for only a moment before continuing, her blade passing through the scales of her shoulder and then along the side of her ribs, causing matching wounds to appear across Ning’s body as more blood soaked through his suit and gathered beneath his feet.

The other guard standing near the door did not react to any of it, and Ning finally turned his attention toward him, noticing for the first time that the man had not moved since Ning arrived and was leaning strangely inside his armor.

When Ning touched him, the guard collapsed forward, forcing Ning to catch him before he struck the floor, and a brief examination revealed that the man was unconscious but otherwise unharmed, having most likely been incapacitated before Number 4 took her place outside Ning’s room.

Ning placed the guard against the wall and returned his attention to Number 4, who had grown increasingly arrogant as she watched the cuts continue appearing across his body.

She sliced through her other arm, stabbed the blade into her thigh, and cut across her stomach, while her natural healing slowly began closing the earliest wounds she had made.

Ning’s body became covered in injuries that would have already killed an ordinary person, with blood flowing from his chest, arms, legs, and sides, yet he remained standing without showing any sign that the pain or blood loss affected him.

Number 4 noticed this, but rather than questioning why her target had not collapsed, she convinced herself that Ning’s durability merely allowed him to survive longer than expected and began attacking herself more aggressively.

Cut after cut appeared across Ning’s body as Number 4 pushed her ability further, and the more blood that covered his ruined clothing, the more certain she became that her plan was succeeding.

Her own breathing grew heavier because her healing could not completely keep up with the speed at which she injured herself, but the wounds across her palm and arms were already beginning to close, while Ning continued appearing more damaged with every passing second.

She believed the difference between them proved her claim that a Lizardfolk could outlast him, and her confidence became strong enough that she finally decided to end the confrontation with a single fatal wound.

Number 4 lifted the blade toward her neck and pressed it beneath her jaw, where the scales were thinner and the flesh could be cut more easily. She looked directly at Ning before pulling the weapon across her throat, opening a deep wound that sent blood pouring down the front of her stolen armor.

At the same moment, an identical cut appeared across Ning’s neck, and blood sprayed across the wall behind him as Number 4 stumbled backward and waited for him to collapse.

Ning didn’t collapse.

He didn’t even move.

The woman couldn’t understand. "How are you—"

Her words froze in her mouth when she saw Ning next.

The wound across Ning’s throat had somehow vanished, closing so completely that no scar remained behind. The injuries covering the rest of his body began disappearing one after another. The cuts across his palms, arms, shoulders, chest, stomach, back, and legs all healed within moments, leaving only the blood staining his skin and the shredded remains of his formal suit as evidence that they had ever existed.

Number 4 stared at him while pressing both hands against her own throat, unable to understand how the injuries she had transferred so perfectly could simply disappear when they had already caused enough damage to kill almost anyone else.

Ning snapped his fingers, and the blood was gone, the suit restored.

It was as though nothing had happened to him.

"That’s... not possible," she barely made the words out.

"You don’t need to know if it is possible or not."

Before she could react, he closed one hand around her throat, lifting her from the ground while her weakened body struggled uselessly against his grip.

Blood continued slipping between his fingers from the wound she had made upon herself, and although her claws scraped against his wrist, they could not break his skin or force him to release her.

"So, tell me," he asked. "Is it just you here today, or are the other Numbers here too?"