Chương 71: Chapter : 71

A loud, deep humming noise echoed from underneath the floorboards. It sounded like massive gears turning deep within the foundation of the skyscraper. Right beneath Vane's hand, a hidden, complex runic circle suddenly flared to life. The magical lines glowed with a sickly, toxic green light, spreading rapidly across the dusty floor.

"Earthquake!" Ken screamed at the top of his lungs, immediately diving behind a broken, overturned sofa in the corner of the room. He covered his head with his arms, peeking out with wide, terrified eyes.

"Get under a desk! Wait, there are no desks! We are all going to fall through the floor! Save the potato chips!"

"Ken, stay down!" Sayma yelled over the rumbling noise. The floor in the center of the room actually broke apart. The concrete cracked and shattered, chunks of debris falling away into the darkness below. From the gaping hole in the floor, a massive, terrifying object began to slowly rise into the penthouse. It was a giant, thick glass tank, exactly like the one they had seen in the lobby downstairs. But this one was much, much larger. It was completely filled to the brim with a swirling, glowing green liquid.

It was the pure, concentrated, stolen life force of thousands of desperate addicts from the slums. The dark magic radiating off the tank was so thick and suffocating that it made the air in the room feel heavy and hard to breathe.

"Get away from him, Naomi!" Princess Iris shouted, gripping her rapier tightly.

"That is the stolen energy!" Naomi didn't need to be told twice. She felt the disgusting, toxic heat coming off the green liquid. She quickly dashed backward, putting plenty of distance between herself and the desperate gang boss. Vane struggled to his feet, leaning heavily against the wall. He looked at the massive glass tank with a look of pure, crazed obsession. He was completely desperate. He knew that using this machine on himself was a massive gamble, but he had absolutely nothing left to lose.

"You want to see my Curse magic?" Vane laughed, his voice cracking with madness.

"I will show you what a thousand stolen lives can do!" Vane stumbled forward and pressed his back directly against the cold glass of the giant tank. Instantly, the machine reacted to him. The metal gears on the top of the tank spun rapidly. A loud, mechanical clicking sound filled the room. From the center of the glass, a huge, incredibly thick metal needle suddenly extended outward. It didn't move slowly. It shot out like a bullet. SHINK!

The massive needle violently stabbed directly into the center of Vane's spine.

"Oh, yuck!" Ken yelled from behind the broken sofa, covering his eyes with his hands but leaving a gap between his fingers so he could still watch.

"A giant needle! I absolutely hate getting shots! I am never going to the doctor again! That is so unhygienic!" This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it Vane didn't make a joke. He threw his head back and let out a bloodcurdling, agonizing scream. The pain must have been absolutely unimaginable. The glowing green liquid inside the giant tank began to drain rapidly.

Thousands of stolen human souls, years of stolen life force, were pumped violently and directly into Vane's veins all at once. His physical body simply could not handle that much raw, unfiltered energy. His human form began to literally tear apart and mutate right in front of their eyes.

"Aaagghhhh!" Vane roared, his voice distorting into a deep, unnatural, double-layered demonic sound. His clothes completely ripped to shreds as his muscles bulged to grotesque, impossible sizes. His arms grew longer, his fingers snapping and stretching out into sharp, deadly claws. The heavy bandages on his chest burst open, but the wound didn't heal normally—the flesh just mutated, covering the cut with thick, leathery, dark gray scales.

With a sickening, wet crunching sound, two massive, leathery wings burst violently out of his shoulder blades, tearing through his skin and splashing dark blood onto the glass tank behind him. He looked like a creature pulled straight out of a nightmare. His face was the worst part. His jaw unhinged and stretched forward, his teeth growing into long, jagged fangs. His nose flattened, and his eyes turned completely pitch black, glowing with a terrible, toxic green light in the center.

He no longer looked like an old man. His face had contorted into a grotesque, giant, bat-like demonic entity.

"Sayma! Shield!" Princess Iris yelled, taking a step back as a massive wave of dark, suffocating mana exploded from the creature.

"Absolute Hexagon!" Sayma shouted. She threw both of her hands forward, instantly creating a thick, glowing golden honeycomb barrier in front of the Princess and Naomi. The shockwave of pure dark magic hit the golden shield like a physical punch. It was so heavy and so toxic that the air around it actually hissed and popped. The sheer pressure pushed Sayma's boots back an inch across the concrete floor. Naomi stood behind the shield, her green eyes wide with genuine shock.

"What is that thing?! That is not human anymore!"

"He mutated his own soul," Sayma said, her voice shaking slightly as she held the barrier.

"He absorbed too much Curse magic at once. He is a monster now." In the back of the room, hidden safely behind the overturned sofa, Ken Eliot was completely quiet. He was still crouching on the floor, but he was no longer waving his arms or making funny, terrified noises. His goofy, silly smile had completely vanished. The lazy, sleepy look in his eyes was replaced by a sharp, cold, and incredibly dark stare. Ken narrowed his eyes, staring directly at the massive, bat-like demon roaring in the center of the room.

He didn't feel scared. He didn't feel intimidated by the heavy, suffocating dark mana. To Ken, the pressure in the room felt like a gentle breeze. But what he did feel was a deep, intense disgust.

"You absolute idiot," Ken muttered under his breath. His voice was incredibly low, completely dropping the high-pitched slacker tone. It sounded much closer to the cold, god-like voice of the Sovereign. Ken looked at the empty glass tank, and then at the grotesque muscles bulging on the monster's body. He knew exactly what he was looking at. He could see the thousands of tiny, stolen human lives burning up inside the creature just to keep it standing.

"Using that much stolen life force just to cheat death," Ken whispered to himself, his jaw clenching tightly.

"You ruined thousands of lives, you farmed innocent people until they were walking corpses, all just to turn yourself into an ugly bat. That is just pathetic. It is completely disgusting." Ken usually didn't care about the bad guys. He usually just wanted to do the bare minimum, go home, and eat a cheeseburger. He hated doing extra work. But watching Vane throw away thousands of innocent lives just for a temporary power boost actually crossed a line for him. It wasn't just a political game anymore.

It was pure, selfish evil.