Chapter 169: The Witch of the Black Forest

The witch clearly hesitated for a moment before saying, "In my opinion, it's much safer to just kill you and take it from your brain."

Scarcely had her voice fallen when the little wolf-girl launched an attack without the slightest hesitation.

Vinigo's assault came at the exact same moment. He lunged forward, reaching out to grab the witch.

Without a doubt, a witch possessing both sorcery and Kreegan technology would never allow a warrior to close in on her so easily.

She let out a shrill laugh as thick plumes of black smoke surged around her body, masking her as she vanished from the spot. When the witch reappeared, she was already in another corner of the space.

Before her stood two dinosaur-like, exotic creatures. Not only did these "dinosaurs" possess sharp teeth and claws, but their spines were also crisscrossed with rows of crimson and dark green crystalline ridges that flickered on and off.

They opened their mouths, and as the crimson crystals flashed, torrents of scorching flames erupted from within, lunging toward Sophie and Suna.

Sophie flung Suna far away with a flick of her hand, while her other hand gripped the Sword of Athletics and slashed outward horizontally. The violent gale of the sword cleaved the flames right down the middle, allowing Sophie to pass through the gap and thrust directly at the fire-breathing monster.

At the same time, Vinigo completed his character configuration—in other words, his previous charge had been nothing more than a bluff.

KOF System, Clark.

This soldier, devoid of any special abilities, fought on equal terms with a bunch of monsters capable of breathing fire, discharging electricity, and shattering the earth, purely by virtue of his mortal body, which spoke volumes of his strength. Moreover, Vinigo also mastered the authority of divine modification...

Divine Modification: Throwing Enhancement.

Utilizing the brute strength bestowed by the Bear of Tyranny, Mr. Clark's throwing power was explosively increased to execute maneuvers that the original Clark could never achieve—such as using an enemy as a cannonball to blast away another enemy.

Just as Vinigo was doing at this very moment.

Vinigo dashed forward, sliding past the giant claws of the bizarre dinosaur by stepping on the airflow of the empty sky, then reached out with both arms to embrace it, pulling the neck of one of the dinosaurs straight into his arms.

Super Argentine Backbreaker!

The poor dinosaur was hurled straight up into the air by Vinigo, landed on his shoulder, and was tossed forward. This single throw sent the dinosaur plunging heavily toward the direction of the witch.

If crushed by this half-ton monster, the witch would likely be flattened into a meat patty. She frowned slightly, raised her bark-like, aged right arm, and made a swift downward slicing motion.

Swoosh... Countless emerald vines emerged from the void, weaving into a net that caught the incoming dinosaur, using the resilience and sheer mass of the vines to halt this heavy cannonball dead in its tracks.

Entangled within the web was a green, human-female-like visage.

"A Rose Fairy, an elemental creature from the Elemental Plane of Earth?" Vinigo muttered in surprise. "What did you use to modify it?"

"So clever," the witch praised. "Building upon her original entanglement traits, I enhanced the magical toxins to paralyze opponents."

Vinigo noticed that the witch referred to it as "she"—it seemed she held a certain degree of emotional attachment to these summoned creatures.

The dinosaur trapped within the web fell rigidly to the ground as if petrified. At that moment, the giant net woven from vines shook and spread out, sweeping toward Vinigo's position.

"This speed is a fatal flaw," Vinigo remarked with a sigh.

Indeed, the movement speed of the vines was so slow as to be negligible, meaning their utility was strictly confined to defense, making it difficult to launch offensive attacks against enemies.

Ignoring the vines, Vinigo turned his attention to the dinosaur currently engaged in fierce combat with Sophie in front of her.

He broke into a light jog, threw his arms wide to embrace the dinosaur, and without a moment's pause, rolled across the ground with it. Like a tumbling giant boulder roaring as it moved, they crashed heavily into the side wall, producing an exceptionally loud impact. Vinigo instantly sprang up, followed immediately by driving his elbow down hard into the dinosaur's neck.

Sophie, whose prey had been stolen, did not complain; she understood Vinigo's intent and slashed her sword toward the vines.

Her blade was not sharp, yet a single sweep of her sword still caused countless vines to snap on impact, scattering and flying in all directions.

However, no sooner had the sword struck than even more vines coiled in from all sides. Every time Sophie swung her blade, severing a vast quantity of vines, her sword would become entangled by a multitude of finer tendrils. In the end, her weapon was completely wrapped in vines, making her face flush with exertion as she struggled in vain to swing it.

At that moment, a burst of flames surged behind Vinigo.

Chizuru, Intent to Kill, Ignite!

The moment Chizuru appeared, she greeted the enemy with the Annihilation Killer Slash. Countless flaming projectiles imbued with murderous intent poured down from the sky; these purple flames were the exact nemesis of the Rose Fairies.

Scarcely had they appeared when the Rose Fairy shrieked, dissolved into elements, and vanished into points of light that sank into the ground.

"A Phlogiston Fairy?" the witch asked in astonishment. "This kind of modification... actually bears quite a similarity to mine."

"Your modification utilizes the Kreegan spatial technology to open a passage to the netherworld, extracting the released dark power and injecting it into the vines of the Rose Fairy to mutate them into poisonous briars," Vinigo sneered. "Unfortunately, the principle I used is completely different."

"All roads lead to Rome, do they not?" The witch sneered and snapped her fingers, causing a ball of fierce flames to erupt before her.

Another Phlogiston Fairy; clearly, her physical form was more solid than Chizuru's, and the temperature of her flames was higher.

However, she was purely a fire element, whereas Chizuru was infused with the Intent to Kill.

Two torrents of flame—one red and one purple—collided fiercely in an instant. Accompanied by Chizuru's excited shrieks, the purple demonic flames were engulfed by the overwhelming numbers of the oncoming red flames. Yet, for Chizuru, this fire was no different than a warm bath; her only commentary was that it was "too hot."

Nothing more.

The purple demonic flames broke through the opposing red flames like a wave. Though inferior in quantity, they clung like maggots to a bone, notoriously difficult to shake off once attached. That peculiar energy, blending murderous intent and extreme heat, made this little Phlogiston Fairy deeply miserable. She struggled and writhed, but could by no means dispel that abnormal energy.

"Super Burst," the witch commanded calmly.

The little Phlogiston Fairy's eyes emitted a blinding white light, her body turning into a dazzling expanse of white in a fraction of a second. In an instant, the terrifying high temperature condensed at a single point and exploded in absolute silence.

Once extreme heat reaches a certain threshold, it possesses the majesty of the sun, capable of purifying most abnormal energies. Under the influence of this energy, Chizuru's demonic flames were instantly encroached upon by the fierce fire, reduced to their most primal essence, and dissipated into nothingness.

"Brilliant!" Vinigo and the witch involuntarily offered each other high praise.

"It's not over yet," the witch sneered, snapping her fingers once more.

This time, a sub-dragon composed of emerald leaped out from the void, stretching out its elegant long neck and slowly opening its mouth to emit a long, lingering roar.

A fierce gale arose as the violent winds from the Elemental Plane of Wind rapidly converged into the incandescent flames of the little Phlogiston Fairy. Like pouring oil on fire, it caused the flames to surge at an astonishing speed. The howling wind, mixed with the blazing fire, coalesced into an all-consuming firestorm intended to reduce Vinigo and Sophie to ashes along with everything else.

"A very powerful enemy," Vinigo smiled.

He extended both hands, opened his ten fingers, and revealed two small spheres resting in his palms.

"At a time like this, I can't afford to hold back secrets. It's just a pity it took me so long to make these few treasures," Vinigo muttered, shaking his head in complaint.

The spheres bounced gently and collided in mid-air. One of the spheres instantly burst forth with a massive number of gold-red tentacles, piercing the other sphere and plunging its tentacles deep within to greedily suck up the liquid inside.

One sphere was gold-red xenogeneic cells—the ultimate predatory virus manufactured by the Kreegan race to plunder entire planets.

The other sphere was the flesh and blood essence purified from the blood of the Tree Turtle, containing a massive amount of life energy.

Instantly, this sphere proliferated at an astonishing speed. Under normal circumstances, it would grow into a terrifying viral invader within minutes, becoming the nightmare of most living creatures. Unfortunately, before it could fully grow, the raging flames had already struck, engulfing it within.

Amidst the flames, the monster shrieked, its body instantly transforming into a structure highly resistant to high temperatures. Yet, the incandescent flames of the little Phlogiston Fairy were simply too formidable; although the howling wind caused the flames to drop in temperature while expanding wildly in scale, it was still more than any biological organism could endure.

Consequently, the monster was quickly baked to a glowing red. True to being the ultimate interstellar predatory virus with the strongest survival capabilities, however, it still managed to preserve a sliver of living cells even under such conditions.

Because of this monster, a small fraction of the flames was actually absorbed, while the rest was rapidly absorbed clean by Chizuru's elemental body.

At that moment, Vinigo produced another small vial and sprinkled the liquid within over the red-hot organism.

The previously dying organism instantly sprang back to life. It leaped up, greedily absorbing the liquid at high speed, and thrust out numerous tentacles to grab the two dead dinosaurs on the ground as food, tearing them to pieces with a few swift motions and swallowing them into its body.

Now, Vinigo possessed a high-temperature-resistant, yet uncontrollable weapon of mass destruction.

"What did you do?" the witch asked in astonishment.

"Just a little leftover residue from a fire elemental creature," Vinigo replied. "This creature possesses immense mutability and can find the most adaptive evolutionary plan within the optimal timeframe. I gave it the traits of a fire elemental creature, and it turned into a monster capable of absorbing fire—uh, though I can't control it yet."

Unable to control it? Then what was the point? Clearly, the witch found this somewhat difficult to understand.