Brand New Life Online: Rise Of The Goddess Of Harvest Chapter 1998: Blank & Granny Yaga

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From what his eyes could tell, these monsters had slaughtered the villagers, tortured them, and devoured their bodies. There was no scientific approach, no investigation, and no research behind any of it. It was all monstrous and aberrant, completely devoid of taste or purpose. It was chaos for the sake of chaos, something that only a true monster, or perhaps a clown, a jester, would do.

Someone who viewed life as meaningless, or saw everything in existence as nothing more than a personal playground where they could do as they pleased. A powerful being, an entity, a Death Apostle perhaps, with enough strength to rival even the strongest nobles. Someone capable of massacring an entire village filled with powerful members of the noble race as if it were nothing at all.

"Hey, I am here! Can you even look at me?!" Granny Yaga complained loudly. She kicked his leg and punched it repeatedly, though she dealt no damage whatsoever. "Ugh, you idiot! Stop ignoring your elders or you’re going to get it!"

"...What am I getting?" Blank glared down at her.

she screamed.

Three gigantic Aberrations walked toward them, grinning widely. They carried the corpses of dozens of people impaled on sharp spikes that grew directly from their bodies.

"Hm, how distasteful," Blank sighed as he glanced at the corpses. "This cannot possibly have been her doing, could it? This is... too much, I would say."

"Stop monologuing, they’re here!!!" Granny Yaga cried out. She turned and ran away as gigantic fists descended toward them.

Blank remained deep in thought even as the massive fists struck him with overwhelming force. The impact shattered the ground beneath his feet and released potent shockwaves that caused nearby buildings to collapse into pieces in an instant.

And yet, he was completely fine. His silver eyes gleamed as he looked back at the monsters. They continued punching him relentlessly while opening their jaws wide and firing beams of death energy directly at his body.

Still, they barely dealt any substantial damage. He stared at them blankly for a moment, quite fitting with his own name, and then let out another quiet sigh.

"They’re strong."

Despite not taking any damage himself, protected as he was by his invisible white ghost aura, he recognized them as genuinely strong opponents. His previous battle against Franken had been far more intense. That Undead had been an evolved specimen with quite a lot of trump cards. Blank had been holding back during that fight, but he likely would have won quickly if Elayne had not interrupted.

After that encounter, Blank had learned to be more cautious. Since then, he had invested heavily in defensive techniques. His body and soul were already incredibly tough on their own. He had simply awakened that latent power within him.

The Aberrations let out annoyed roars and confused laughter as they realized their attacks were having almost no effect on Blank.

"Since that fight against Franken, I realized I was actually quite rusty," Blank declared calmly. "So I dedicated myself to properly awakening all my power. I am not even using a technique right now, let alone any skills. What you are hitting is simply my bare body."

"?!"

As the creatures heard and seemingly understood his words, Blank retrieved a long spear made of ghostly white phantasmal energy directly from his soul.

"Shall we resume where we left off?"

His eyes gleamed with intensity. In the next instant, he blurred forward as a ray of pure white light. The power of the White Void manifested within his spear. He disappeared and reappeared behind one of the Aberrations.

A massive explosion of white energy erupted. It generated a gaping hole straight through one of the Aberrations. Black blood splattered across the ground as the creature struggled even to move. The hole nearly covered its entire torso, leaving nothing behind in its wake. The wound had been consumed by the White Void, one of the most dangerous elements that White Ghosts could cultivate.

He looked back and noticed that the Aberration was still alive, desperately trying to regenerate. Its tendrils simply could not reach across the opposite ends of the massive wound, leaving it utterly helpless.

"Strange," Blank said as he walked toward it and carefully analyzed its structure. "Bones reinforced with... souls inside? The muscle tissue is the same. Souls are sealed inside, alongside curses. I see. Every single one of these beings is like a legion of undead condensed into a single, movable form. But the question now is, how do they move if the other souls are merely sealed inside their bodies to strengthen them?"

As he pondered that question, the answer revealed itself quickly. He felt the souls trapped within the bones and muscles scream in agony. They gathered dark, murky energy that accumulated around the corpse and transformed it. Black, ghostly skin covered the body, and a weird white mask formed on its face.

"What is this lifeform... if I remember correctly, Hollows?" he wondered aloud. "Accumulations of dark energies and emotions given shape and form. They are so weak that nobody really pays attention to them, but there are reports of them growing stronger and mutating over time. They become extremely dangerous beings capable of taking humanoid forms. They are strange entities, not quite living beings and not quite undead either. They are bizarre spiritual creatures born from darkness. But... they aren’t really spirits at all either. Nevertheless, I never imagined they could be employed in such a way."

Blank looked back at the struggling monster and smiled lightly. He placed his hand on its head while its jaws tried desperately to bite him. The creature gathered dark energy and fired a beam directly at his face, but his new passive reinforcement proved incredible.

"You’ll need a bit more than that," he sighed. "At the end, these are tough but not unkillable. But the people here were surely weak. As a Noble among Nobles, I suppose my power is much more superior than that of the average warriors and soldiers. A great pity. Nevertheless... Soul Release."

A magic circle opened beneath the struggling Aberration. The souls trapped inside were unsealed in a single touch and flew away into bright golden light.

The other two living Aberrations took a step back, feeling the painful burn of this holy energy.

"Fascinating, right? This is a spell she made and taught me," Blank smiled. "Though she lacks the power to use it to its fullest potential, I can reproduce it. Imagine if this magic became widespread in the Netherworld. Chaos would break loose, and you undead wouldn’t have so much advantage and power, hm?"

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