Chapter Thirteen: The Art of Concealment

Time was running out, the situation was sudden, and the two had not had time to work out any detailed plan beforehand—only the simplest division of labor. Alice was to draw the enemy’s attention and search for something she cared deeply about. Gongsun Ce, whose ability meant he needn’t worry much about injury, would move about the periphery, probing for the limits of their opponent’s powers.

They both knew that engaging in a war of attrition in such a complex environment would only put them at a disadvantage. Their goal was singular.

Find the true body of Tyros K.

Alice led her companion out from the narrow alley formed by the shipping containers, holding up one finger as she explained her thinking: “I found something odd from the very start of this fight… You saw that mouth, didn’t you? The one that looked like a grotesque mutant from a biohazard experiment?”

The young man recalled the bizarre mouth, above which grew an ear. Logically, since the enemy had to form a mouth to provoke them, the ear must serve a purpose too.

“The communication tool he formed from flesh serves both to hear and to speak,” Gongsun Ce understood what she was getting at. “But there were no eyes above that mouth.”

There are no omniscient beings in this world. Tyros could freely manipulate his own body, and judging from those masses of flesh, he probably no longer needed ordinary organs—but perhaps due to the limits of his ‘Law of Impermanence’, the man still needed tangible organs for communication.

A mouth to speak, an ear to listen, but the most crucial organ for interaction had yet to appear before them.

Where were the eyes that identified the interlocutor?

“How does Tyros K keep track of our movements? That’s the crux of what’s been bothering me. Even during our conversation with the agent, I felt something was off. If he could really precisely follow our every move, he’d have attacked the moment I began questioning him.”

But that wasn’t what happened. Gongsun Ce remembered clearly—between Alice’s first words and the blood spike shooting out, two or three sentences had passed.

That meant Tyros did not attack upon spotting a slip but waited for White to reach out his hand—a visible, easily observed gesture.

“So, it’s his eyesight.”

Alice snapped her fingers, delighted. “Exactly! If he placed his listening flesh-mud too close, it would have aroused our suspicion. Tyros had to rely on visible actions to decide when to strike. But where was he watching from? Not on the ground, not inside the containers, nor in the shadows with camera-like eyes. Considering the limits of the ‘Divine Transcendence’, there’s only one answer.”

Alice Adaire pointed to the sky. “Up there! His countless eyes are hidden in the glow of the setting sun, floating dozens of meters above ground. To observe us so precisely from such a height, he must have enhanced his vision as well.”

The young man adjusted his glasses instinctively. “I’m a little envious, actually.”

“What’s there to envy? The City of the Firmament has such advanced technology, can’t they cure nearsightedness?”

“I’m not brave enough for that surgery. Who knows if it’ll make me blind in twenty years.”

The psychic and the hunter ran together deeper into the dock area. Ever since Gongsun Ce’s mysterious disappearance and subsequent reappearance at the other end of the wharf, those nauseating masses of flesh hadn’t appeared before them again.

“You said just now that his true body is hard to move? Then it seems his chosen tactic was to build a surveillance net in the sky, with the core at the center. The only place in this dock that offers both a high vantage and safety is obvious.”

The orange-haired man had even stopped harassing them with blood needles.

Clearly, he finally understood his own predicament.

He was gathering his strength, no longer wasting energy on pointless attacks, preparing for a final showdown.

The hunter reached the center of the dock and halted before a massive structure. It was a solidly built steel-framed platform painted red, supported by four pillars, and above it hung a telescopic crane arm capable of hoisting dozens of tons of cargo.

It was a quay crane, a common sight at every harbor, known as a ‘shore bridge’. Even though the City of the Firmament’s main freight transportation relied on a still-secret orbital elevator rather than traditional sea shipping, the process was much the same as in any city.

Perhaps because loading had been interrupted midway and the workers evacuated, this crane stood in the center of the yard rather than at the perimeter like its distant companions.

Alice pulled a small monocular from her pocket and whistled. “Want a look?”

The young man took the scope and gazed upwards.

What he saw were countless fine red threads drifting in the air and, at their network’s nodes, innumerable red eyes, all the same color as the bloodlines.

Gongsun Ce gagged. “Ugh, you did that on purpose.”

“Now you’ve seen it, I don’t have to. What’s the situation?”

“It’s almost the same as the network I encountered before, but now the hubs are eyeballs… and every one of them is staring at me like it’s about to shoot a laser.”

“You’re kidding—”

Just as Alice suspected, Tyros ruthlessly abandoned his painstakingly built surveillance web, condensing his blood into spears and exploding the eyes for propulsion. Countless scarlet rays rained down from the sky, like a sudden storm on a night of gales. The blood-red light targeted only this small area, intending to trap both of them in a single, inescapable net!

Alice immediately grabbed her companion’s sleeve to retreat, but the young man raised his hand. “Fortify.”

A semicircular barrier formed out of thin air, sheltering them from the bloody downpour. Not a single blood spike pierced this immaculate white substance; all attacks dissolved into bloodwater, thwarted.

Three seconds later, the psychic dissipated the shield.

At the same time, the door to the crane cabin opened from within. The orange-haired man stood in the doorway, face grim. He covered his face with his hand, glaring at them through his fingers. “Damn you… you hellspawned freak! Filthy trash fit only for swine! How dare you!!”

The psychic shrugged, struggling to contain his irritation. “If you can’t think of any new insults, there’s no need to force yourself. We’ve been fighting for almost fifteen minutes now. How many of your attacks have I blocked? You knew from the start you couldn’t corrode my power. You should have foreseen this outcome.”

The huntress pulled a face. “Please, your desperate look makes me seem low-class for chasing you this far.”

“You vile, shameless woman! Slut who’ll sleep with anyone!”

Tyros’s invective soon devolved into a torrent of filthy curses. Gongsun Ce couldn’t entirely follow the strange vocabulary but guessed that swearing was much the same worldwide—a handful of nouns and their usual embellishments.

Alice rolled her eyes. “A thug’s always a thug, even with the Law of Impermanence. I’m surprised you haven’t run by now. Come down quietly, it’ll all be over in a moment.”

The orange-haired man’s tirade broke off. His breathing was harsh as he spat through gritted teeth, “Run… run? Do you know how much flesh you’ve cost me… how long it’ll take to recover all that tissue, how much time to regrow it? Run?! I’ll kill you… Alice Adaire, I’ll kill you!”

Several blood spikes struck the crane’s supports. With a howl of rage, the crane gave a strange wail. The multi-thousand-ton structure tipped forward, falling toward the two in the center, as Tyros leaped, charging alongside the collapsing mass.

“Go,” Gongsun Ce said.

“What? I thought you could hold that up.”

“I’m a psychic, not Superman.”

“Then let’s move.”

The shore crane crashed to the ground, smashing countless cargo containers. The roar from the docks drowned out even the blaring horns in the streets, the boom echoing through the entire district.

The hunter and the psychic vanished from their spot, reappearing five meters away in the shadow of a stack of containers, their feet touching a flower.

Tyros charged after them, and in mere seconds, the orange-haired man’s appearance had changed utterly: his skin was gone, replaced by viscous blood coating his muscles; his fingers became claws, and his hands split open, spraying chunks of bloody flesh; only his twisted, devilish face remained recognizable.

Apart from retaining limbs and features, Gongsun Ce could scarcely call this creature human. What desire could drive someone to twist their body into such a form?

“Die!” the thing roared, venting its fury as it rushed them. Alice threw a short arrow at its head, only to see the monster’s skull split apart, letting the arrow pass harmlessly through.

She hissed. “Careful! His reaction speed is way up!”

Gongsun Ce accelerated backward with his ability, but the blood-flesh monster kept pace, bellowing as it lashed at him with its claws.

He immediately formed a barrier—with this blow, the white wall even trembled! “His destructive power and speed are up too. Care to explain how? I thought he specialized in area and immortality—corrosive attacks were bad enough.”

Alice dodged a punch. “No idea! Who knows what a Malefic Arcanist can pull off next? I wouldn’t be surprised if he switched to another Divine Aspect right now!”

“Lend me a few of those arrows.”

“These are Heart-Armed weapons attuned to my intent—you can’t use them without the inheritance ritual!”

The world of the Law of Impermanence was truly vexing.

Gongsun Ce sighed, visualizing the power he required.

Now that the enemy had revealed his entire form, there was no need to only defend.

He needed strength—overwhelming force for a decisive blow.

Where to strike, how much force, what form the power should take—these were determined not only by practice, but by the psychic’s own imagination.

He pictured the most effective attack against a humanoid target.

The young man stopped, clenched his fist, and aimed at the monster’s midline.

“Invisible Fist.”

To fell a human, you need a punch!

Centered on his right hand, a crushing impact manifested from thin air, smashing into the creature’s abdomen.

The invisible blow tore away a third of its mass, leaving only the lower half—two massive legs—and its head, flying through the air.

The severed head laughed maniacally as it lunged at him. “Fool! That attack doesn’t work on me—”

“Triple Strike!”

Tyros’s head was slammed into the ground, his running lower half simultaneously crushed to pulp.

Gongsun Ce had no intent to kill; he showed restraint, sparing the head from destruction.

He unclenched his fist and approached the orange-haired man’s head as it lay in the pit. “I despise the rude, abhor those who abuse power, and loathe those who insult others. Tyros K, your curses truly angered me—otherwise I wouldn’t have hit so hard…”

The psychic frowned, realizing the man was grinning.

“You soft-hearted simpleton. Do you really think you’ve won?”

“Watch out!”

At such close range, there was no time to create a barrier. As the hunter warned him, Gongsun Ce leapt back.

Tyros’s head exploded before him, just as when the man first appeared—a storm of flesh and blood.

Thanks to Alice’s timely warning, he avoided the heart of the blast, escaping with only a torn jacket and a mostly lost sleeve.

The flesh reassembled and transformed at startling speed, restoring Tyros’s blood-drenched form. He shrieked with laughter. “Ha—hahaha! You can’t hurt me, swine! Still not caught on? You’ve fallen into my trap from the start—I have no true body!!”

The psychic frowned.

Helpless standoff, an unkillable foe—was it all as before? Had their previous deductions been nothing but error? Had Alice been right: Malefic Arcanists could not be judged by common sense? Was this mutated enemy truly without a core?

Were they facing a monster that simply could not be defeated?

“Think, you pig! Look at your bewildered face—stand there and rack your brains all you like, you’ll never find what does not exist!”

Gongsun Ce dodged the claws; he reminded himself: now, more than ever, he had to keep his mind clear.

No one controls their emotions perfectly, and no power is without flaw.

If it was all for show, was even that rage on the crane cabin an act?

Was his Law of Impermanence truly that strong? He replayed the battle in his mind, searching for any detail that could be suspect.

Memory froze on the moment the orange-haired man appeared before them.

Gongsun Ce laughed.

“Haha… For you to keep bluffing now is truly stubborn, and for me to be fooled by such a simple trick is downright foolish. If I told this story, Mr. Gongsun would die of laughter at my stupidity.”

Alice blinked. “What?”

“It’s just a little trick, Miss Alice. Like a desperate man bluffing at the end—a last, deathbed struggle. Think back to when we first met him?”

The hunter recalled Tyros’s grand entrance.

He’d used his own body as a bomb, opening with a spectacle.

The woman laughed aloud. “Hahaha! So it’s the same old trick—a puppet to mislead us! Still a thug at heart!”

She gripped three short arrows, gazing at the blood-flesh monster. Behind it was the toppled crane—the cabin, just where they’d guessed the real body would hide.

“You’re dreaming—!”

Tyros seemed truly panicked now; perhaps, when they’d discovered the crane, he’d already been cornered. He howled, charging the hunter. “You won’t get away with it!”

“Gongsun Ce, the shadow!”

“Leave it to me.”

The psychic pointed; a white panel formed in the air.

Sunset light fell on the opaque surface, casting a shadow on the ground—carefully adjusted to lie near the fallen crane.

A small freesia bloomed in the shadow. Alice smiled with satisfaction. “Brahman Aspect: Divine Transmission…”

She ignored the monster at her back, firing all three arrows behind her at the flower she’d planted minutes ago.

The flower that had let them escape the crane’s crash and arrive here.

“Shadow Freesia.”

The arrows pierced the shadowed flower, then shot out from the one beside the crane.

Three faint sounds like breaking glass—and the blood-flesh monster suddenly froze.

“Ah… ah…”

The hideous, warped form quivered and collapsed, dissolving into a puddle of dead flesh.

“…What?”

“Divine Aspect Arcanists aren’t so easily killed. At most, that’s a heavy, heavy, heavy wound.”

The psychic covered his mouth. “I just meant—it’s disgusting. Even if your power can adjust the firing angle, what if you’d missed or miscalculated?”

In the sunset, Alice turned, her long hair aglow in orange light. The hunter blinked, giving him a sly smile. “I trust you to protect me.”

“I have to say, that tone really doesn’t suit your age.”

“I’ve changed my mind. Maybe I’ll take care of you first, you brat!”

“There you go.”

The two walked toward the blood-soaked cabin.

Though they had yet to see what form the enemy’s true body would take, the psychic’s intuition already told him the final answer.

This battle was over.