Brand New Life Online: Rise Of The Goddess Of Harvest Chapter 1997: Monstrous Hollows

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The grotesque aberration swelled unnaturally like a balloon filled with dark energy before violently exploding into countless burning fragments. Chunks of blackened flesh and twisted bone scattered across the battlefield, wreathed in twilight flames. Yet even as they burned, the severed pieces twitched with unholy life, dragging themselves across the ground in a sickening attempt to reassemble.

Elayne’s sharp eyes narrowed as she analyzed the horrifying regeneration process. She quickly realized the source of their unnatural toughness and near-endless recovery. Unlike typical undead, which used a body merely as a vessel with the soul loosely enveloping it like clothing, these monsters were fundamentally different.

Their souls had been forcibly extracted, fragmented, and then meticulously sealed inside individual body parts, muscles, bones, flesh, and even their dark nether cores. Every inch of their black, cursed musculature was saturated with trapped souls and dense layers of malicious curses. This created an incredibly hardy and bizarre life form, one that no ordinary cultivator at her level could ever hope to defeat through brute force alone.

While her loyal Fungal Titan kept the second Hollow occupied in a brutal clash of titans, Elayne prepared her next decisive strike. She channeled the full power of her Heroic Legendary Sword Arts, merging it seamlessly with her radiant Divine Sunlight and the purifying intensity of her Twilight Flames.

Her sword moved like a streak of holy light, cutting through the scattered remains with surgical precision. Each strike burned away the cursed flesh while forcefully exorcising and purifying the sealed souls within. Deprived of their spiritual fuel, the pieces finally lost their ability to regenerate and crumbled into inert ash.

"I need a faster, more efficient way to finish them," Elayne thought, her mind racing even amid the chaos. "Complete vaporization might be the answer... but that will require significantly greater magical output."

Fresh spores and vibrant fungi rapidly sprouted across the battlefield, feeding on the fallen remains and reassembling into a brand-new Fungal Titan. Her first creation was taking a heavy beating and showing clear signs of damage, but the Hollow it fought was also weakening. Fungal colonies had already begun infecting its body, slowly draining its strength with every passing second.

At her command, the two towering Fungal Titans lunged forward and pinned the raging Aberration to the ground with overwhelming force. The beast roared in fury, opening its massive maw to unleash a devastating beam of concentrated dark light. Elayne reacted instantly, executing a perfect Heroic Parry that deflected the attack and sent a brilliant counter-beam of pure sunlight straight back into the monster’s face.

The aberration let out a blood-curdling scream as its head and upper torso burst into purifying flames. Seizing the momentum, Elayne roared with righteous fury and charged forward. Her sword became a whirlwind of bright, explosive strikes that relentlessly burned and blasted the creature’s body. Mushrooms and spores continuously bloomed across its wounds only to erupt into bursts of twilight flames, compounding the devastating damage.

Driven by anger and determination, she summoned a third Fungal Titan from the battlefield’s abundant corpses. With three colossal fungal guardians now at her side, Elayne decided it was time to regroup. She began moving toward the locations of her closest allies, hoping to gather everyone together quickly.

she whispered under her breath, a flicker of genuine concern crossing her usually resolute face.

.

.

.

Just where in the blazes did we land?!"

Old Lady Granny Yaga coughed violently, her wrinkled face twisted in irritation and disbelief as she glared at her new surroundings. One moment she had been in the familiar world she knew, the next, she found herself in this nightmarish realm.

"W-What is this cursed place?!" she exclaimed.

The scene before her was utterly alien and unsettling. She stood amid ruined, half-collapsed houses overgrown with strange vegetation. Beyond them stretched eerie crimson grasslands that swayed unnaturally.

Overhead loomed a warped, sickly purple sky dominated by a glowing crimson moon. In the distance, a massive pillar of swirling darkness and blood-red energy rose ominously from a towering crimson castle.

"A-Ah!" Granny Yaga’s eyes widened in horror as several Aberrations emerged from the shadows, smiling at her with vicious, crooked grins. Each one carried a long, grotesque spear impaled with dozens of fresh human corpses. "B-By the gods! What kind of monstrosities are these?!"

She stumbled backward in revulsion, quickly summoning her ancient grimoire. Her teeth clenched tightly as the grim reality sank in, this entire land had been brutally corrupted and brutalized.

"Ghostly Garden was once such a beautiful sanctuary," she raged, her voice trembling with fury, "and you wretched things have gone and ruined it! Do you really think I’m just some helpless old hag? I’ve still got plenty of moves left in me!"

One of the aberrations charged at her with terrifying speed. Granny Yaga’s grimoire flipped open on its own, pages glowing with ethereal light as dozens of goblin spirits materialized and merged into a colossal ghostly hand.

The giant spectral hand swung forward with godlike force, smashing the lead aberration and sending it crashing violently into its two companions. All three monsters tumbled across the crimson grass in a heap.

Undeterred, the monstrosities rose again, laughing maniacally as they gave chase. Their heavy footsteps made the ground tremble. Granny Yaga panicked, gritting her teeth and running as fast as her old legs could carry her.

Despite the impressive power of her Hand of the Goblin God spell, the aberrations refused to stay down. No matter how hard she struck them, their bodies simply regenerated the damage within seconds.

As she fled, a fourth aberration suddenly leaped from afar and landed directly in her path, its massive red eyes glowing with malicious hunger.

"Damn it all!"

She clicked her tongue in frustration, her grimoire’s pages fluttering wildly once more.

The giant spectral hand manifested a massive spear forged of ghostly flames and hurled it with tremendous power. The projectile struck the aberration square in the chest, creating a massive explosion that blew a gaping hole through its torso.

Yet even with such devastating damage, the creature remained standing. The horrific wound began regenerating at a visible rate, dark energy knitting the flesh back together.

"T-This is insane! No wonder the White Ghost Soldiers couldn’t defeat them! What in the nine hells are these things even made of?!" she cried out in disbelief. "Ugh, forget it! I’m done playing around here, goodbye!"

She turned and fled at full speed, riding atop the giant ghostly hand for greater mobility. The aberrations pursued relentlessly, drawing closer and closer with every passing second.

Just as she found herself completely surrounded and on the verge of being overwhelmed, a powerful shadow descended from the skies above. White ghostly void energy surged around the newcomer like an aura of deathly purity.

From within his white ghost soul, a long spear of condensed ghostly energy materialized. With a single, precise thrust, he unleashed a devastating barrage that riddled the aberrations with hundreds of piercing holes, shredding their limbs and leaving them twitching helplessly on the ground, unable to regenerate.

"Blank!" Granny Yaga cried out in pure relief and joy. "You’ve come to save me!"

"Old woman," Blank replied in his usual flat, emotionless voice, barely sparing her a glance as he scanned the area. "Where’s Elayne?"

"She’ll be fine! She’s the strongest of us all!" Granny Yaga waved dismissively. "Just save me first!"

"You don’t need to yell. I was going to do that anyway," Blank said calmly as more monsters began to approach. His eyes narrowed slightly. "These things... why do they look like something She would create?"

He studied the stitched-together, mutated bodies, enhanced bones and flesh infused with the crystallized darkness of stolen human hearts.

These Hollows were bizarre creations, yet they resonated disturbingly with memories of his aunt, the ruler of this domain.

She had always possessed a fascination with creating such twisted beings. But she also carried a strong sense of morality and responsibility as a leader.

Would she truly go this far? Slaughtering innocents so indiscriminately? And even if she had, would she really discard their bodies so carelessly?

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