“You’re the sample that escaped, aren’t you? Now I understand.”
The mention of ‘sample’ from Seyeo was enough to pique Luke’s curiosity.
A sample?
What of?
Even if it was dismissed as his misunderstanding, the words were too significant.
“What does it mean, a sample?”
“You, that appearance. You’re not real, are you?”
“……”
It was the truth.
Currently, Luke was in a slight polymorphic state, altering his appearance.
He covered his horns and hid the poison on his neck.
This was to appear as a typical feline Hyun at first glance, rather than draw attention with an unnatural horned appearance.
Additionally, he had suppressed his growth further and altered the internal structure of his body to prevent his self-destructive breath from leaking out.
This was to avoid being misinterpreted as excessively grown.
However, what Seyeo was saying was somewhat different.
“Hmm, I never imagined a sample could take on a human form.”
“……What?”
That meant he had directly seen Luke’s original form.
In other words, he had witnessed a form other than human.
Could it be that he was referring to that form before Luke awakened in this era?
As Luke fell silent in confusion, Seyeo smirked, thinking it was a telling reaction.
“Ah, I see. You thought nobody would notice if you took on a human appearance? A cat with a dragon heart.”
“Th-that…”
The Dragon Heart was certainly not common.
Especially one embedded in the heart of a living creature was even more unusual.
However, ‘that’ had been repeated countless times for the sake of that research.
During this process, there had been many accidents, but ultimately, the goal had been achieved.
“I’m glad you’ve come back; your master is waiting for you.”
And it was all possible because the ‘sample’ existed.
Even though it was no longer an essential ingredient now that the plan had reached its final stages…
It was still useful.
With Seyeo’s ominous grin, Luke’s gaze sharpened.
“It seems you know a lot…”
When he met him before, he thought he shouldn’t have killed him so easily.
At that time, he should have kept him alive as long as possible to extract information…
‘No, this is also an opportunity.’
If he learned now, he could act.
Luke gathered his magic and gripped the knife tighter.
Ever since becoming addicted to the drug, he felt something was hindering his manipulation, but with sheer will, it still functioned.
“You’re still handling magic; impressive. But it’s useless.”
However, seeing Luke’s magic flow through his glasses, Seyeo mocked him.
“That anesthetic? It was originally made to deal with someone like you with a Dragon Heart.”
Indeed.
This was a tranquilizer specifically designed to subdue dragons.
Meaning it was created to penetrate the thick magic defenses of a dragon and put its massive form to sleep.
Simply enduring this with his small body was quite an achievement.
“……”
At his words, Luke frowned even more.
To have means to deal with a ‘Dragon Heart’ was as good as saying this place was connected to the ‘Dragon Heart.’
This meant something was being schemed using doppelgangers and Dragon Hearts.
An unsettling premonition stirred within Luke.
“You were planning to summon the extinct dragons… weren’t you?”
“Well, something like that.”
Seyeo shrugged and approached Luke casually.
“So, why not just give up…”
“Shut up!”
In that moment, Luke released the polymorph and moved his body.
He violently turned the magic used for polymorph and sliced the hidden knife toward Seyeo.
The magic bound by polymorph was still in a pure state, free from the drug’s effects, fully reflecting Luke’s will.
But-.
“I knew you would do that.”
With a swift turn of his head, Seyeo avoided the strike.
As a result, the blade merely grazed his face, not severing his neck.
And the next moment, the abomination attacked him as if waiting.
-Purrk!
“Ugh…!”
Luke, thrown far from the abomination’s strike and crashing into the wall, seemed unable to rise easily.
“Hmm…”
Somehow, it felt as if he was aware of the knife’s position. Was that the correct assumption?
Seyeo touched his deeply cut face and gazed down at the glasses that had cleanly split and fallen to the ground.
Faster than I thought.
With such a disadvantageous circumstance, it was quite a remarkable movement.
He thought that had he not noticed it, he might have really died.
“But now you really can’t move.”
With her last resort gone, she might just surrender.
Though a part of her wanted to shoot another round, seeing the drooping figure, it hardly seemed worth wasting the expensive drug.
Seyeo began to lift Luke’s body and choke him.
If he lost his breath right away, all creatures would faint.
Since it incurred no additional costs, it was a rather efficient method.
“I’m sorry. If you had just surrendered, I really didn’t plan to hurt you.”
“Grr…”
Luke’s body was effortlessly lifted.
As the pressure on his neck increased, Luke slowly lost consciousness.
“But seeing you like this, you really are a peculiar sight. A horned cat…”
It was at that moment.
“Heh, hehehe…”
Seyeo made a strange expression at the sight of Luke laughing while being choked.
“Huh? Why are you laughing all of a sudden? Ah, could it be you had a taste for being choked?”
“Cough, nonsense…”
Luke muttered, digging his nails into Seyeo’s arm.
“In this distance, you won’t be able to escape.”
“Huh? What can’t I escape from—?”
The next moment, Seyeo saw a flash.
It was the breath.
-Fwoosh—!
——–
“Cough, urgh!”
Breath.
As magic gradually solidified under the drug’s influence, it rose as an attack method.
Breath was fundamentally a physical activity rather than magic.
Therefore, even if all the Dragon Heart’s magic was restricted, breath could still serve as an effective means of attack.
However, once used, his mouth would be in a terrible state, making it a last resort.
Moreover, to exhale breath required a strong stimulation of the poison rising in his throat.
Yet, curiously enough…
He intentionally choked himself to make Luke faint.
Thanks to this, Luke stimulated the poison without any effort and was able to surprise him with fire right up close.
Had he underestimated the powerless appearance of a young girl?
Unintentionally deploying a deception tactic had become the case.
“Ugh… I didn’t want to use this.”
Luke rubbed his tender neck and breathed out deep flames.
Despite his best efforts to suppress it, the pain in his mouth was indescribable…
-Flame roar!!
Seeing Seyeo’s burning face was still somewhat satisfying.
Now that he had lost his vision, he could no longer be a nuisance to him.
Well, Luke had no intention of killing him.
There was still a lot he needed to learn from him.
Even for himself, recovering would be difficult as an immortal, so it wouldn’t be easy for Seyeo, who was just an Undead.
Luke slowly rose to his feet.
Then he snatched away the cane that Seyeo had been using.
It appeared that Seyeo’s cane didn’t use magic but had to be aimed and fired visually like a bow or crossbow.
Indeed, he felt no magic emanating from it.
‘Even looking at it again, what an unusual item.’
If he had known such things existed in the world, he would have had his guard up.
And, this annoying fog too.
But how could he prepare for what he didn’t know existed?
Now, he had no choice but to avoid such mistakes again.
Well, whatever happened, it was time to deal with the abominations.
Luke put the cane, which he didn’t know how to use, aside for the moment and turned his head toward the abomination.
—-!!
-Thud, thud, thud-!
The abomination, having lost its conductor, was in disarray and panicking, unable to decide what to do against the blinding flash of breath.
Luke began to classify and redistribute the mana influenced by the drug and the mana he could still manipulate.
Seyeo, without glasses, couldn’t read the flow of mana at all.
Yet, having lost even his sight, she couldn’t react to Luke at all.
And with Seyeo’s annoying interference out of the way, it was far too easy to annihilate the abomination.
‘If I gather the magic I can use, I could manage to cast one 5th circle spell.’
Thus, Luke began to combine the spell he would use in his mind.
The casting might take some time, but it was better to be certain.
The element… Fire is excellent for killing the Undead, but since this is a closed underground space, it would be wise to refrain from it. So I’ll combine wind, ice, and earth, excluding fire and compress the range to ensure it can definitely annihilate its body.
And stabilize.
Due to the disorientation caused by the fog, creating coordinates wouldn’t be easy, so he needed to be cautious.
Having cast the spell and charged it into his fingertips, Luke extended his palm toward the abomination.
Then he designated the coordinates inside the abomination’s body.
Typically, coordinates couldn’t be set inside a living creature due to the interference of willpower, but the Undead was different.
Thus, for a sufficiently skilled mage, creating phenomena inside an unintelligent Undead’s body was simple.
‘Elemental Explosion.’
This was a simple destruction due to the forced expansion of elements rather than a normal combustion reaction, and it was excellent at collapsing the target’s structure.
When it exploded inside the abomination’s body, the head at the center of that explosion was annihilated, and the surrounding flesh shattered into fragments and scattered everywhere.
-Pak!
—!
-Splatter, splatter.
Soon, a nasty noise reminiscent of sticky rain echoed throughout the underground.
