The Glorious Evolution Chapter 594: A Taste of His Own Cruelty.

The Maw’s teeth crushed the Lurker’s subconscious barrier, and its forked tongues caught both souls, trapping them inside the creature’s spiritual leywell!

Their slick purple lengths coiled around their torsos, pinning their arms against their sides as the forked tips wound around their legs.

Rain and the Lurker struggled desperately, but the tongues tightened until their spiritual forms trembled within the coils!

Before either could wrench a limb free, one of the smaller mouths descended toward Rain at the table and tore a piece from his shoulder!

This time... he felt every bit of it!

"AAAAARGHH!!"

His scream joined the Lurker’s as the other mouths swiftly descended on them, taking small bites from their bodies and souls, akin to piranhas stripping a trapped animal apart while it still thrashed between their jaws!

Each bite sent agony burning through their consciousness, as horrid as the Aetheric Flames consuming the Hound!

Maybe even worse... as the notion of being mauled and feasted on physically and spiritually was more harrowing than getting burned to some.

"Stop! Stop!"

Rain kept thrashing on the chair, attempting to protect the bitten areas with his hands, only for more mouths to catch them!

He felt their teeth close around his fingers... felt them separate... then watched in horror as they were bitten off and chewed with great enjoyment.

Even when the Soulleech Maw had no facial expression, the smacking noises it made as it feasted on them were enough proof.

"No! NO! PLEASE! Just kill us already!"

He turned to Levi with a look of utter despair, begging for a merciful death... anything but this.

Alas... the only response he received was another mouth, taking a bite of his right cheek, leaving him screaming with a hollowed-out cheek.

Even the Lurker’s howl broke into frantic shrieks as they fed.

What happened outside to his body was a representation of what was going on to their souls... and the Soulleech Maw’s smaller mouths took little by little with each bite, making sure to savor the banquet.

’MASTER! PLEASE! DESTROY OUR SOULS!"

Realizing that neither begging nor escape would save them, Rain turned to his master... Na’thir.

Unbeknownst to him... Na’thir was suffering through the same agony after his wisp that was hidden inside their spiritual leywell was sniffed and caught by the Soulleech Maw too!

Every bite sent pain tearing through the connection to his real soul... Na’thir felt the teeth sink into his wisp, pull a piece free, and grind it between their jaws before swallowing!

Yet, he kept every cry behind his closed lips.

His fingers crushed the throne’s armrest, shattering it into fragments that scattered across the floor... his face revealed none of the agony ravaging his consciousness.

Never, even in his wildest dreams, had he imagined suffering at Levi’s hands like this.

Even Levi merely wished for it to happen since the moment he unlocked this ultimate.

And now... at the head of the table, Levi watched in silence.

His spiritual vision followed the tongues inside the Lurker’s leywell, which its shattered subconscious barrier could no longer conceal.

He had already recognized the third presence trapped between them.

Na’thir’s wisp.

That was why he paid so little attention to Rain’s pleas... he was watching Na’thir’s wisp, its small humanoid figure wearing the same suit Levi remembered from that cursed night.

Shadowy mist concealed his face, leaving his features unrecognizable... but Levi savored every frantic movement as a smaller mouth bit into it, making that once-imposing figure of his nightmares writhe between its teeth.

’Can you feel every bite?’

Levi hoped so... oh, how much he hoped so.

The sight brought back those dark red tentacles, their doglike mouths tearing into his parents... his mother forcing a smile through the agony, trying to keep him from watching even as they devoured her.

Levi remembered how desperately he had wanted those mouths to stop, but to no avail... too young and powerless to do anything.

Now, he waited for another mouth to open as his heart kept pumping cold blood through his body.

’Feast on him... Maw. Leave nothing behind.’

Levi’s lips curled into a cruel smile as the Maw tore another piece from the wisp... every frantic movement of Na’thir’s little figure widened it.

Watching the monster endure the same agony he had inflicted on his parents felt so damn good... and Levi savored every bite without bothering to hide his pleasure.

He wanted Na’thir to see it.

To remember it.

To engrave it deeply in his soul.

As this was nothing but the appetiser for what Levi planned for him.

And Na’thir saw every bit of that pleasure.

Even through Rain’s muddy vision, Levi’s smile remained clear... the boy wanted him to know how much he enjoyed this, and that deliberate cruelty filled the Bishop with murderous fury.

His wisp turned its shadowy face toward Levi, fixing him with a sinister gaze... Levi followed the movement through his spiritual vision and met it without losing his smile.

Na’thir searched that expression for the same fear he left him with during that cursed night... or even a slight of it, as he knew that such a traumatic experience wasn’t easily healed.

One could fake it, but true healing could never be hidden.

But no... he found nothing.

Only emotionless cruelty, as if Levi no longer saw him as the monster of his nightmares, but a mere goal on a list, a mere target he needed to erase to continue with his life.

’Is his mind truly that strong... or too broken to feel fear anymore?’

Na’thir had his fair share of breaking people’s minds and souls... he took great joy in his craft.

In his mind, Levi’s reaction should resemble the Hound’s more or less... emotions taking over him so fast, he wouldn’t even realize it until he snapped out of it.

In a sense... he was correct.

Levi’s current reaction wasn’t appropriate to the trauma infested in him.

But Na’thir had no idea that, within the Ancestral Trees’ spiritual trial, Levi had already spent six months sharing a cramped asylum cell with him and Darius!

Six months of hearing their voices, enduring their mockery, and listening to them breathe only a few steps from the bed where he tried to find a moment of peace.

A trial designed by the Ancestral Trees to make him understand that asking them to forgo their enmity was easier said than done.

At first, Na’thir’s presence alone had been enough to make him lose control... a few words about his parents, and he would awaken with blood on his hands and no memory of what he had done.

He had killed them over a thousand times.

And each time, the trial dragged him back through that cursed night before locking him inside with them again.

Na’thir was right about one thing... such a traumatic experience wasn’t easily healed.

Levi had spent months learning just how difficult it was.

He could have concluded the trial after the third month... instead, he remained for another three, sitting within reach of the two faces he hated most, learning to endure every feeling they stirred within him.

Eventually, he reached the frightened child buried beneath all that hatred... the little boy who had survived by clinging to the promise that, one day, those monsters would pay.

Levi had held him, comforted him, and told him he could finally rest.

He would carry the pain from there.

He would finish what they had survived so long to do.

And when he finally opened his eyes, he had freed both of them with a smile... even allowing Na’thir to wrap his hands around his throat without surrendering that hard-earned peace.

How could the Bishop know any of this?

He was still searching Levi’s face for the helpless child he remembered and traumatized, expecting a familiar expression to surface under the cruelty.

But Levi had already faced him at his weakest... again and again, in a room too small to escape his voice.

The hatred remained.

So did the promise.

Only now, Levi could decide exactly how to fulfill it... and savor every moment with a clear mind.

Levi’s current reaction pissed off Na’thir even more than having his wisp getting feasted on... as it made him realize at last that the boy wasn’t ruled by his emotions in the slightest when dealing with his vengeance.

And such entities were the scariest to deal with.

Hatred Through Reason.

Such a state was difficult to comprehend, let alone attain... and that was what made it so frightening.

Without that spiritual trial, Levi would never have reached it.

’Savor it while it lasts, boy... You won’t live beyond this moment.’

Na’thir forced the vow through their connection, his voice low and venomous.

His gaze remained locked on Levi’s smile, humiliation feeding a murderous fury that eclipsed the pain.

Then, the Maw’s teeth snapped shut around his shadowy neck.

His head vanished between the jaws, and the forked tongue sent the rest of his struggling figure after it.

One final swallow consumed what remained of him, followed by a satisfied burp.