"Shwing!"
The deep, dark greatsword cut a fierce arc through the air, slicing away the spider silk that had crept toward him.
The severed strands twitched faintly where they landed on the ice, wreathed in burning black flame that took a long while to finally go out.
"According to Tracy's memories, this is her mother, the Sequence 3 demigod Demoness, the 'Saintess of White' Katarina Pelle."
M's illusory figure appeared on the ice, explaining to Silas.
"Her charm ability is extremely powerful. She can inflict petrification, black flame, and curses through spider webs and hair."
"She's also especially skilled in mirror magic, capable of casting spells through mirrors across a vast range."
Mirrors, huh.
Silas glanced down through his visor at the ground beneath him.
The ice was smooth and crystalline, faithfully reflecting his own figure, and beside it, an ice pick in hand, the white-robed Demoness smiling at him.
"Shwip! Shwip!"
The ice picks immediately broke through the mirror's surface and shot into reality, striking savagely at Silas's body.
"Crack!"
Fortunately, his black armor absorbed almost the entirety of the impact, though it shattered in that same instant.
"Shhh."
The next moment, Silas didn't hesitate to release what remained of the Shadow Armor on his body, separating the corrupted will within his mind and blending it together with the dissolving shadow, forging a filthy, pitch-black, twisted and corrupted monster.
Shadow of Depravation!
"Roarrr."
The moment that hideous monster appeared, it locked onto the "Saintess of White" Katarina inside the ice mirror and lunged forward with a howl, spreading across the ice like liquid.
"Hiss, hiss."
The ice corroded in its wake, and for a moment he thought he heard a woman's scream, faint and indistinct, but it soon fell silent again.
Before long, another sheet of ice crystal rose up, and within the mirror, Katarina in her white robe was once more smiling at Silas.
She looked entirely unharmed, as though the Shadow of Depravation had never touched her at all.
"Heh heh, a Sequence 3 Unaging, quite impressive indeed."
Medici's soft laughter echoed within Silas's body, its gaze fixed on Katarina with an air of amusement, thinking who knew what.
"Shut up."
Silas said coldly.
He had encountered Sequence 3 Beyonders several times before.
Among them, the royal family's "Chaos Hunter" Prince Grove, the Storm Church's "Sea King" Jahn Kottman, and now this "Saintess of White" before him.
Without exception, every one of these Sequence 3s had put him under tremendous pressure.
But that didn't mean he couldn't hold his own, especially now that he had advanced to Sequence 4.
"Boom!"
A vast expanse of shadow spread beneath Silas across the ice, and great gouts of blue-green flame radiated out from around him, burning away the invisible, tenacious spider silk.
At the same time, he began calling forth the tide within his mind, letting phantom seawater fill his spirit, granting the corresponding authority to his own body.
At once, the once-clear sky turned suddenly dark, thick lead-gray clouds filling the horizon. Silas's body gathered a violent, crushing pressure, resonating with the heavy sky above, making the entire stretch of sea tremble in response.
Storm's High Priest of Disaster!
"Crack!"
Countless bolts of thunder crashed down in an instant, striking again and again against the thick, unyielding sheet of ice that stretched nearly a hundred meters.
The shockwaves rippled outward as countless arcs of lightning, leaping and dancing across the ice's surface.
The white-robed Demoness had only just emerged from the mirror when she was engulfed in an endless, blazing white light.
The ice was trembling, and not only from the lightning. Beneath the surface, waves surged one after another, hidden currents building in power out of sight.
"Crack!"
Suddenly, cracks split open across the ice.
Under the combined assault of the lightning above and the deep sea swells below, even the thick, solid ice could no longer hold! The cracks spread rapidly, spreading across the entire ice sheet within moments.
At last, the waves broke through the fissures, deep blue water nearly black surging skyward, churning the ice fragments, and together with the thunder and lightning and the rising gale, the once smooth and level ice sheet was utterly reduced to ruin!
A shard of ice crystal was caught by the wind and drifted before Silas.
Amid the chaos, the invisible ripples were hard to detect, but Silas, in the midst of controlling the storm, felt a spiritual instinct flare in warning. He twisted his body just as a dagger sliced through the air, grazing past him.
"Pfft!"
Droplets of blood sprayed as Katarina, dagger in hand, dodged away in a swift, nimble motion.
Silas's pitch-black greatsword only managed to shear off a lock of her hair, and the lightning that fell like rain landed only just behind her.
The Sequence 3 "Unaging" landed lightly on her feet, raised her dagger, and turned back to look at Silas. Her eyes carried an impossibly seductive light as she opened her mouth and extended a rosy red tongue.
Silas watched as she deftly touched the blade of the dagger, running her tongue up along its edge, licking away every drop of blood she'd left on it.
In moments, she spat out a red flower from her mouth, and at the same time, began murmuring incantations under her breath.
She's trying to curse me!
Being an expert in his own right, how could Silas fail to see through her intent? Even as he directed thunder to strike down at Katarina, he used his hand like a blade, carving away a long strip of bloodied flesh from his own wound, chanting the same guiding curse-prayers, offering that flesh as a substitute for himself.
"Heh heh."
But upon seeing what Silas had done, Katarina merely smiled, an enchanting, seductive smile, her light, lilting laughter cutting through even the roar of thunder.
As she continued her murmured chanting, the vivid red flower burst into pitch-black flame!
"Boom!"
Silas's body was instantly bathed in the blaze. The flesh he had offered up as a substitute to bear the curse in his stead had done nothing at all.
A Sequence 3 Unaging was a master of curses. Ordinary methods of curse-breaking simply didn't work on them!
"Damn it."
Silas was scorched by the flames, the destructive black fire tearing at his body, unbearable agony flooding his spirit.
The curse of a high-Sequence Demoness was ferociously potent, and his pain had reached beyond all limits.
The skin on his body split open, his flesh charring to a crisp red-black, and his blood vaporized in an instant.
But that same agony stirred something savage in him. He collapsed onto the ice, reached out with a blackened, charred hand, and seized a thick clump of black material.
It was the lock of hair he had sheared from Katarina earlier during her close-range attack!
Trying to curse me?
Silas gripped the hair tightly, his face twisting in a snarl.
Let's see who can endure a curse better!
He viciously bit down on the Demoness's glossy lock of hair, then drew from within his robes a gleaming, pale white bone spike.
"Anguish!"
Sensing the strange ripple radiating from that half rib bone, Katarina's expression flickered, as though she meant to counter it, but it was already too late.
"Squelch!"
Silas gripped the rib bone reversed in his hand and drove it savagely into his own abdomen. His body's sensitivity spiked to its absolute peak in an instant, multiplying the pain many times over.
The intense stimulus surged along his nerves straight into his brain, an explosive signal flooding his entire mind!
"AAAAAAH!"
A piercing scream rang out from a distance. The once-serene face of the Saintess of White twisted, gripped by agony unlike anything she had ever felt before.
This curse of Silas's was far more horrifying than the one she had inflicted upon him!