Chapter 48 Soul Absorption
"I wasn't relaxed." Azzy grumbled, "I was just caught off-guard by him. Didn't expect that he would have that kind of skill card. By the way, Chronos, why didn't you warn me?"
"Well... You are the one who told me that not to treat you as a beginner. I thought you would realize on your own the simple thing that one should never let their guard down."
"I already said, I didn't." Azzy tried to argue.
"Nope. You did. If you hadn't, then, you should have summoned Vajra, long time ago. You just want to see what kind of conspiracy he will brew. Because he has the aura of death on him, you were also curious how would he die. That's why you followed him.
Underestimating others isn't that much different from letting your guard down. And don't try to give an excuse. I can sense all of your thoughts." The Reaper lectured him.
Meanwhile, the beasts now got lost with their target being gone. While some of them tried to settle down nearby lightning crystals, a Galarian roared.
It sniffed out the human who was sitting on top of a rock in a meditative position.
It rushed towards Azzy. Followed by the mutated gold-grade rank-4 Galarian, the other beasts also followed it. Their anger redirected to Azzy.
Just as they reached nearby, Azzy suddenly stood up on his feet. A deathly aura erupted from him while his eyes turned pitch black.
His lips curled up, "You little things are really gullible..."
He then raised his hand towards them and spoke,<strong> "Soul Absorption."</strong>
All of a sudden, the beasts felt a huge amount of suction force from the palm and they started to lose mass.
Heavy roars escaped from them and many of them got scared.
They tried to run away but, within just a few seconds, all of them lost all the mass, and collapsed on the ground, losing their soul power.
As they didn't die, no soul orbs appeared. However, they aren't happy to be left alive.
Meanwhile, Azzy who was still in deep meditation, trying to recover his soul power, felt bits of soul energy of lightning attribute, fire, dark, earth, etc... entered his body continuously and are being refined at a terrific pace, almost instantly, filling his soul power.
After a while, as the recovery of his soul power stopped, Azzy opened his eyes and was taken aback.
His eyes widened in shock as he saw the skinny beasts on the ground. Many of them have fainted while the remaining that are awake, just stared at him.
Their expression seemed as if they were begging him for something.
"What just happened?" he mumbled.
"Simple... I took control over your body and used one of my soul skills, Soul Absorption."
"Soul Absorption?" Azzy then looked at the pitiful beasts once again. "Is this the result of it?"
"Yes... As its name suggests you can use this skill to absorb the soul energy of others.
Use it on the above rank, their soul power will be absorbed to fill up yours.
Apply on the same or a below rank, their core, the soul orb will be damaged.
Apply on far below rank, the soul orb will be completely absorbed and they will die whether it's a human or a beast."
Azzy now understood their expression. They wanted him to kill them, not spare them to live.
So, he fulfilled their wishes. He summoned Vajra and ordered it to kill the beasts that are lying down.
*Wow* It barked before dashing towards the victims.
The black wolf started to kill one after another. Even though it was just following its master's orders, as one the most powerful and oldest Arcana spirits, it was able to understand the feelings of spirits that are dwelling inside the fallen beasts.
It surprised Vajra that they felt thankful towards it even though its master is the reason they are in such a state.
After killing them, the black wolf glanced at the pond with constant ripples in the middle of it.
It walked towards the pond and then looked into the pond.
The crocodile inside the pond was shaking in fear. Due to being far away from the group and hidden deep inside the pond, its soul energy wasn't absorbed earlier but it did sense a powerful beast nearby that was a lot stronger than itself, a mutated gold grade beast.
Since its Master didn't order to kill every beast, the wolf shook its head and turned around to walk away and return to its master.
Meanwhile, Azzy was checking his soul card. "Hmm... even after absorbing the soul energy of 57 beasts, my soul power was only recovered to more than half.
This is one useful ability but if I hadn't been careless and lost my soul power, I would have killed them by myself and ascend to rank-5 by now." Azzy can't help but criticize himself for being overconfident.
Remembering Gideon, he closed his eyes, "Let's see what others are doing..."
Activating the aura sense, he expanded it to a three-mile radius around him.
He saw a rank-4 and a rank-3 are fighting a gold-grade rank-4 beast that has the shape of a tiger, indicating that it's a Galarian and they are Gideon and Ranier.
Other than that, he sensed another rank-4 and a rank-5, deep into the cavern. "That one is Leonard but who is the other man..."
Azzy already sensed the presence of rank-4, hiding deep inside the cave, long ago. He frowned, "Is that the powerful helper Leonard hired to take out me? If that's the case, everything will fit. The disappearance of platinum grade beast is also the indication of being killed."
Azzy clenched his fist. Even though he doesn't have an ounce of expression on his face, he was boiling in anger, inside when he thought about Leo's actions. "Killing him only gives trouble from school and the Royal family. After returning to the school, I should report it to the Master. He's a peak-rank-7. So, he might able to do something... Hmm..."
His thoughts were disrupted by a terrific scene, he saw through the Aura sensing.
Azzy saw the rank-4 tall man, suddenly attacked Leo. "They aren't partners?"
"You would be surprised if you would know the real identity of the so-called rank-4 human." The Reaper's voice once again echoed in his head. Azzy almost pictured the Reaper is grinning.
"Who is he?" Azzy asked him.
"Go and see for yourself," the Reaper replied casually.
Meanwhile, in the depths of the Cavern, just as Azzy sensed, the disguised beast is in a battle with Leo.
Leo was injured in the stomach after being pierced by the enemy's hands.
With his soul power getting low due to the usage of skill cards, he was only using Mantis to defend while he tried to increase the distance between them.
But, to his surprise, his mantis was overpowered quickly and was thrown towards the wall while the white-haired man proceeded towards Leo.
"Who are you?" He growled at him. "We don't have any enmity. Why are attacking me?"
"Me? Just doing it for fun." He licked his lips, "it's been a while since I ate human flesh. So..."
"Flesh?" Leo was taken aback and panic appeared on his face, looking at this psychopath.