Chapter 2477

2477 – Ignorance

"Aaagh!!" Renara felt pain and weakness assault her suddenly, so she cut off her advance and retreated!

"Agh!!" Renara began examining what had happened to her under the Butcher's hostile gaze, and found her body almost completely enveloped in the crimson and yellow mist.

That moment that made her feel intense pain was the moment the two mists corroded Renara's defenses and seeped into her center of energy gathering, and they were currently feeding on it directly, rapidly, and voraciously!

"Get away from me!!" Renara shouted as she retreated to widen the gap between her and the Butcher, and she released the two grips and began throwing them, but to no avail.

The two swords had bound themselves to her arms with rings of mist, and after invading her center of energy gathering, they became a part of her body that could not be separated. No… if it were an arm or a leg, she would have cut it off without hesitation in a situation like this!

"You!!" Renara shouted toward Marlik, "How… how did you do this?!"

"What?" Marlik laughed, "Are you the only one allowed to use her Law?"

Marlik was advancing toward her steadily, confident that the battle was over and that there was no room for escape.

He could indeed feel Renara's immense energy fleeing from her toward the two swords.

Then he laughed, "Since you directed the collision energy at me and boasted about Energy Conversion, I used the law of Accumulation of Causality to create a suitable environment to make you take the two swords from me, and it worked." Then he laughed again, "Hehe, it was like luring a child with candy."

"Don't mess with me!!" Renara shouted, "I inspected the two swords for any Soul Imprint or Energy Imprint, and with the law of Energy Transformation I can find things like that easily, but there was nothing!" Then she raised her voice wearily, "And even now I don't feel that the two swords are bound to you… how did you make them attack me?!"

"Who said I did anything?" Marlik continued advancing with the same smile, "What you hold is Awakened Equipment that has consciousness, ambition, and expectations from its controller. If the holder refuses it, it will attack directly; if accepted, it begins a process of compatibility and feeding, where you feed it a massive amount of energy from your Energy Convergence Center — you would need thousands of consecutive years of weakness and absorption to secure it…"

Then he gestured toward her with his head, "Taking you to the Sword was a folly built on ignorance… Either he would have rejected you and attacked you, or he would have begun the process of attunement and feeding mid-battle and incapacitated you… Either way, it was over the moment you took hold of the First Sword." Then he laughed, "Hehe, but you took the Second as well, sealing your fate."

As he advanced with his tone dripping with gloating, Marlik sent a spiteful glance toward the two Swords…

In truth, he would have preferred that they rejected Renara and attacked her, for the two Swords had spent millions of years with him, yet the two betrayed him and began the process of attunement and feeding… Tch!!

Thinking about it made Marlik seethe with even greater rage, "Killing you alone won't atone for your mistakes, I'll dismember your joints first!!"

After that sentence, Marlik drew a small dagger and continued approaching Renara, his eyes saying he had already begun choosing where to cut.

And there was no need to quicken his steps or worry about anything, for the speed and rate of consumption of those Swords made it impossible for Renara to gather any strength to flee, indeed impossible for her to gather strength to operate an Instant Space Gate like the one the elite of the True Beginning Empire were famous for!

"So that's how it is… so that's how it is…" Renara began to mutter, "My ignorance defeated me." Then she nodded a few times, "This information isn't something I can obtain whenever I wish; it only comes through experience… No matter, I'll keep trying until I've learned everything."

"There are no more trials for you after today." Marlik felt a twinge of unease at that sentence, so he quickened his steps and thrust toward Renara's elbow, "There's no escape for you today!"

"Oh, but there is~" Renara smiled, "My transcended Lord won't let me die so easily."

Whoooosh

At that moment, a Hexagonal Seal appeared on Renara's forehead, and a golden light enveloped her body, blazing fiercely.

Crack

The arms of mist that had been piercing Renara's body shattered and crumbled as though made of clay, and the rings binding her body faded away. In the blink of an eye, the two swords detached from Renara and began drifting slowly away into space.

Then Renara turned around and launched herself with all the strength she had left.

"No!" Marlik screamed, "Why do you have all this momentum? Nooooo!!" Marlik grabbed the two swords and charged after Renara like a madman.

But

Zzzzt—

Renara used an Instant Teleportation Array and leaped into it, then destroyed the array's remnants behind her in an explosion that erased all trace of her destination.

"Nooo!" Marlik screamed, "No, you fleeing whore, come back!!" Then Marlik grabbed his head with both hands, the two swords still in them, "What is with this strange amount of momentum? Has the damned All-seeing God descended in his body to free her?!"

"Damn it…" Marlik's face began to contort—it was not his habit to leave a fight hanging like this.

It had taken years before he began to forget his battle with Robin Burton, but he could console himself over his loss back then with the fact that the fight had not been completed, and even if his opponent was a Candidate and possessed several Master Laws, if the fight had continued he would have had a chance.

But now that damned partner of his had done the same thing and fled!!

"Booofffftt—" Marlik spat blood, placing his hand on his chest…

And when he looked at what he had vomited, his expression worsened further, "Damn."

His internal injuries had accumulated to a great extent—each one of those shocks that had been redirected back at him was enough to kill several Law Dominators!

Then he exhaled, "Hooo~" and turned toward the battlefield that stretched the size of an entire Star Field.

Perhaps he could not reach Renara or fight her with his current strength… but he could kill one of those Behemoths and destroy one or two of those Law Dominator arrays.

Zavarus especially—that fat worm looked extremely tempting…

"Don't think about it…"

"…?!" Marlik flinched when he heard a certain voice and looked in a certain direction.

There, a pair of ruby-like eyes were staring at him very calmly.

"The lost son Hedrick, I knew you wouldn't stay away from a battlefield like this…" Marlik showed a wide smile, but there was something tense about it. "Do you want to dance too?"