Chapter 360: The Fountain of Youth (17)
When it comes to a villain’s “talk therapy,” the best way to deal with it is to simply ignore them.
Everly had no trust in Grant.
If she actually believed him and dismissed the Sacred Tree’s true form, her bracelet would enter a cooldown period lasting nearly a year. By then, without the bracelet to protect her, Grant could simply turn around and strike her, leaving her as helpless as a piece of meat on a chopping board.
Besides, Grant had committed countless heinous atrocities in his pursuit of immortality. If she let such a dangerous major villain live, who knew what kind of chaos he might cause later?
Since that was the case, she might as well eliminate this threat to society while the villain had yet to evolve into his complete form!
Having made up her mind, Everly paid no attention to Grant’s persuasion.
She stood where she was, holding her rifle at the ready, keeping a wary eye on Grant while simultaneously watching the battle between the Sacred Tree’s true form and the Thorn Witch.
The situation was actually quite promising.
After rescuing the giant serpent from the cannibal god, the Sacred Tree bracelet had received a major boost. Moreover, the Sacred Tree had been continuously siphoning energy from the witch. This was a far purer source of energy than offerings of blood and flesh, and thanks to the witch’s “nourishment,” the Sacred Tree’s duration had been greatly extended.
Everly could clearly sense that the summoned Sacred Tree could continue operating for quite some time.
The Thorn Witch, on the other hand, was in a completely different situation.
Savannie had not been at her peak from the very beginning.
The trial in the White World had forced the witch to expend some of her body’s “bridges,” leaving her in a half-human, half-thorn state. After leaving the White World, she had been subjected to repeated surprise attacks from the Sacred Tree and the curse of the voodoo doll. Her body had transformed into a ball of thorns, and she had lost her eyesight as well.
Worse still, the ability she prided herself on—draining the strength of others—was completely ineffective against the Sacred Tree. Instead, she had become the Sacred Tree’s own blood bag, with the Sacred Tree relentlessly siphoning energy from her.
The Sacred Tree’s energy drain was painless, so the witch’s pain-amplification trait could not be triggered.
The longer the battle dragged on, the worse Savannie’s condition became.
Even though Grant’s injury had briefly pushed Savannie into an explosive burst of power, it was nothing more than a flash in the pan. Without an even stronger stimulus, given the witch’s current physical condition, her resistance was doomed not to last.
Therefore, theoretically speaking, Everly didn’t need to do anything right now. She could simply stand at a distance and quietly wait for the Sacred Tree and the witch to determine the victor. Acting rashly would only risk making things worse.
Unfortunately, Grant was simply too clever. He could naturally see the situation just as clearly as Everly could.
Seeing at a glance that continuing like this would amount to a slow death, Grant’s eyes flickered. After a moment’s thought, he reached inside his coat and pulled out a brass key stained with red blood.
[Brass Key: This is a door key from the scene of a murder.
Seventy years ago, on a moonless, starless night, its owner held the key and attempted to unlock the tightly locked door of his home. Before he could do so, he was stabbed in the back and collapsed miserably at his doorstep.
Did the blood-soaked brass key, too, mourn that failed escape?
This item only activates when held by a human who performs the action of “inserting it into a lock and turning it.” Once activated, a spatial doorway will instantly appear and pull the key’s holder inside, allowing them to teleport to any location within a radius of 4.5 meters at will. If the destination is behind a door, the user will also receive a running-speed boost lasting five minutes.
Run—for your life!]
Everly had been watching Grant’s every move. She had even deliberately changed her position so that she was standing closer to him. The moment she noticed something was wrong, she immediately raised her gun and fired at Grant’s wrist.
Grant did not dodge.
He seemed to have decided to risk everything. Even after taking a bullet to the wrist, he stubbornly completed the motion of “turning the key.”
“Click.”
As the key turned, the phantom image of a wooden door appeared in midair. The tightly closed door suddenly swung open with a thunderous bang, swallowing Grant, who was still clutching the key.
It was actually an extremely rare spatial item! That sinister bastard Grant had secretly been holding onto such a precious item all this time!
The moment Everly saw him disappear, her first thought was that Grant intended to join the battle—to deal with her directly, or perhaps to act as the witch’s eyes and help her fight the Sacred Tree’s true form.
The reasoning was straightforward. According to the guards, the island would sink in a little over twenty minutes. Grant couldn’t possibly pass up this opportunity to obtain the Fountain of Youth, so he wouldn’t use the item to escape. As for climbing the ladder, Everly and the Sacred Tree’s sudden intrusion had caused Grant to miss his chance to hand the meteorite over to the guards. With the guards there, he couldn’t climb the ladder without permission. Doing so would be tantamount to suicide.
Since he could neither escape nor climb the ladder, he naturally had no choice but to join the fight.
Based on this reasoning, Everly turned her head and shouted toward the Sacred Tree, “Watch out! Grant disappeared!”
Before the words had even left her mouth, a strong smell of blood suddenly wafted past her nose. At the same time, she heard slightly labored breathing from behind her.
So she was the opponent Grant had chosen!
Sensing something wrong behind her, a chill ran down Everly’s spine, and every hair on the back of her neck stood on end.
Almost instinctively, she tensed the muscles in her lower back. The instant the sound of something cutting through the air drew close behind her, she suddenly ducked, bending backward and sliding sideways, perfectly evading the ambush.
His first strike missed. Grant seemed to have completely lost his mind. Without even adjusting his center of gravity, he followed through from his stumbling position and thrust the dagger at Everly once again.
From his movements, it was clear that he had received some combat training. But perhaps his physical condition simply wouldn’t allow it—he had learned little more than flashy techniques, without the strength or speed necessary to properly execute them.
Catching a flash of white hurtling toward her face, Everly reacted with lightning speed. She raised her left forearm and precisely caught Grant’s wrist from underneath, using the block to dissipate most of the force. With her other hand, she immediately seized his wrist and twisted it inward.
Everly’s intention was to twist Grant’s wrist joint until the pain forced him to drop the dangerous weapon. Unexpectedly, the seemingly refined and delicate Grant appeared to unleash every ounce of ferocity he possessed at that critical moment. No matter how hard Everly twisted, even as the bones in his wrist emitted an ominous creak under the strain, he still kept a death grip on the dagger.
At the same time, his injured left knee made him unsteady. Losing his balance, Grant pitched straight toward Everly.
—Wait. Something’s wrong!
As the silver-white blade drew closer and closer to Grant’s chest, Everly’s scalp prickled with alarm. She was just about to reach out to catch and steady him when Grant’s left hand, which had been pierced by a bullet, suddenly exploded with unprecedented strength. His fingers clenched hard, his nails digging deeply into Everly’s skin as he seized the hand she had placed on his right wrist. Then, in a motion almost like guiding her hand, he drove the dagger into his own chest.
“Savannie, I’ll go ahead… You have to win. And one more thing—I love you!”
After forcing out those words, Grant suddenly spat out a mouthful of blood. His body went limp, and he collapsed.
Everly’s eyes widened in shock.
Wait, what?! What the hell was he doing?!
He had even used such a precious spatial item just to suddenly appear and launch a sneak attack. After failing, he actually killed himself on the spot and framed her for it?!
No way. As the main villain, how could he possibly die this easily? Everly had assumed there was no genuine affection between Grant and Savannie, that their relationship was nothing more than cold mutual exploitation. So how had they suddenly turned into some tragic romance?!
“No—! Grant! Aaaaaah! Grant, my Grant! How dare you kill Grant!”
Everly was still stunned when the consequences of Grant’s death appeared before the staircase.
Because of the continuous energy drain, the witch had originally been on the verge of defeat. But upon hearing her lover’s dying confession and realizing that he was gone, it was as though a volcano that had been suppressed for too long had finally erupted. She completely lost herself to madness.
The withered thorns that had collapsed to the ground after losing their strength suddenly began to glow with dazzling red light, once again becoming vicious and aggressive.
At the same time, dozens of thorns as thick as arms burst through the ground beneath the ball of thorns. They converged in midair, their razor-sharp tips aimed directly at the Sacred Tree’s true form as they stabbed downward. Their brutal force tore through the defenses surrounding the Sacred Tree, pinning its slender body in midair.
The witch had gone berserk!
Damn it! The Sacred Tree would have won before long, but Grant’s suicide had thrown everything into chaos!
The veins on Everly’s temples throbbed as she prepared to put an end to Grant on the ground and then hurry to the staircase to help the Sacred Tree. She had just raised her gun when an unprecedented and overwhelming sense of danger suddenly enveloped her entire body.
It was as though some terrifying and dangerous monster had locked its gaze onto her. Everly’s entire body stiffened, and a chill ran through her.
What was that? What exactly was watching her?!
From the moment she noticed something was wrong to the moment she pulled out the mirror, only a few seconds had passed. She was just one call away from completing the exchange with Bloody Mary when a sudden, intense wave of pain struck her, and everything went black as she briefly lost consciousness.
When she regained consciousness, it was because of the pain.
The pain came in relentless waves, overwhelming her senses and leaving her desperate to cry out and escape from it.
Something was there… something was invading her mind!
It was so cold, so vast, so powerful, and so voracious. Everly’s formidable will was as fragile as a withered leaf before it, crumbling at the slightest touch.
It was a cunning hunter that had remained hidden in the darkness, waiting patiently for its chance. Only when Everly’s mind was shaken and her defenses faltered for that brief instant did it suddenly launch its attack.
Countless tendrils spread wildly. The moment they found a crack in the world of her mental power, they immediately forced their hard, pointed ends through it, then gradually pried the opening wider, pushing more and more of their massive forms into Everly’s mind.
These uninvited intruders were like chaotic masses of noise, carrying horrifying sounds filled with intense mental contamination as they rampaged through her consciousness.
A violent pain surged through Everly’s mind. It felt as though something had forced its way into her consciousness, filling it with countless writhing, crawling sensations that left her utterly overwhelmed.
The chaotic noise was like an inescapable web, wrapping tightly around Everly’s will and compressing it into the smallest possible corner, locking it away in the darkest, noisiest, most miserable part of her consciousness.
With the troublesome owner pushed aside, the unwelcome guests had successfully entered her domain.
From this moment onward, Everly had completely lost control of her own body.