Chapter 143: Thalor Vex [3] — The Demoness

Thalor was hammered by explosions powerful enough to obliterate him, only to reform instantly as though nothing had happened.

“I wonder what will happen first—your entire population dying because of you, or me! Let’s find out!”

Cackling like a maniac, Thalor charged downward. Purple and black energies surged around him, manifesting his Incarnation: a towering, armored demon-like entity with long wings, a razor-sharp tail, and enormous claws.

“Demoness!”

With a single command, the Incarnation roared and lunged at Gustaf, dodging the Gravity Spheres before slamming a fist into his face. Glasses shattered; Gustaf hurtled through the forest within Benladra’s Divine Realm.

CRAAASH!

He tore through dozens of trees, then wrenched himself back using Gravity to pull his own body. A colossal hand of pure Gravity materialized, slamming Thalor into the ground and hurling him straight out of the Divine Realm.

“Heh…”

Yet Thalor rose again. Black and red chains materialized around him, linking to countless people far away in the VPI underground. With a single step forward, Gustaf and Helena watched the chains flicker and snap as the connected silhouettes withered and perished, feeding Thalor their power.

“Hmm, delicious. There’s nothing tastier than the souls of Yggdrasians, truly.”

“Bastard!”

Helena roared, her mind fracturing with rage as she gathered her power in her palms.

While Gustaf wielded Gravity, Helena’s Esper Ability was…

Space Manipulation.

RUMBLE!

Space tore open and folded inward, converging around Thalor into a perfect cube. A small singularity—a black hole in space and time—opened within it, dragging him toward oblivion.

“Begone!”

Thalor was sucked into the void…

CRASH!

…but the cube shattered. He leaped back out, now encircled by three beautiful silver, moon-shaped mirrors hovering around him.

“Damn it, he’s back?!” Helena clicked her tongue in frustration. “How is he doing this?”

“Spiralwalkers are truly unpredictable,” Gustaf said grimly, channeling Gravity into his hands. “Their powers follow their own principles and laws, ignoring the world around them and imposing their own reality instead.”

“That’s right! That’s an amazingly accurate description of what we Spiralwalkers are,” Thalor laughed, clapping mockingly. “However, it’s nowhere near enough to cover what we can truly do!”

He swung his hands. Razor-sharp claws of flame streaked toward the Espers. Their psychic barriers held only briefly before shattering far too quickly. Dark flames erupted around them, swallowing the surroundings.

“Don’t let the flames touch you!”

“Hm!”

Gustaf and Helena merged their powers—Gravity and Space compressed together—unleashing a shockwave that obliterated the deadly flames from the Demoness Incarnation. Thalor soared toward them, his mirrors gleaming with vicious light.

“You forgot about something.”

He smiled coldly. The mirrors unleashed three beams of pure energy that struck relentlessly. Using their full power, he made the mirrors teleport and reappear around his targets, forcing the beams to bounce endlessly no matter how they defended.

“Moonlight Magic, is it?!”

“Not enough, young man.”

Gustaf and Helena fused their Esper Abilities once more. Gravity and Space converged into an overwhelming shockwave that annihilated Thalor’s mirrors in an instant. The beams shot harmlessly into the void and vanished.

“Hahah…”

Thalor chuckled as he advanced. His Aura surged outward, spreading rapidly—it was his Fantasy Domain. Slowly the domain overtook everything, corroding reality into an endless black palace where hundreds, thousands of people knelt before him in worship.

Black and red chains bound them to his soul, enslaving them forever in spirit and body as his fanatics. Thalor snapped his fingers. Hundreds perished in a single heartbeat.

“Aaaahhhh!”

“Gyaaahh!”

“Uuaaahhhh!”

“Gaaahhh!”

Their screams of agony and despair filled the air as they withered in terror, dissolving into pure energy that flooded Thalor with ever more Fantasium.

His form began to shift. The Demoness Incarnation overlapped with his body, gradually granting him a feminine, succubus-like appearance.

“Hahah… Hahahahaha!”

By this point, Gustaf and Helena realized this was no longer the young Thalor they had once known. It was someone else entirely—someone who had stolen his place.

Someone who had taken his skin, devoured his soul, and impersonated him all this time, infiltrating the Frostbane Kingdom from the very beginning.

Long, pitch-black demonic wings unfurled. Black horns sprouted from his forehead. His dark blue hair shifted to deep purple and lengthened dramatically.

Black and dark purple demonic armor materialized across his body, complete with razor-sharp clawed gauntlets and towering heels.

At that moment, Thalor was no longer a man, yet not precisely a woman either.

He had become something in between.

As Lady Seraphine had named him: “Verlan.”

“Just who the hell are you?!” Gustaf roared, unleashing hundreds of Gravity Bullets the size of cars straight at her.

“She’s clearly not Thalor! She must have usurped his identity with some vile Spiral!” Helena shouted, summoning spatial distortions and attempting to crush Verlan within collapsing reality itself.

But Verlan laughed. Her claws extended to the length of her entire body. With sweeping slashes she tore through the psychic assaults. Gravity and space warped, shattered, and parted before her.

Each step she took spread corruption outward. The once-beautiful forests, the grasslands—everything around Benladra began to wither and darken.

And the taint was closing in on her.

“ENOUGH!”

Gustaf screamed in desperation, pouring out every ounce of power he possessed until blood streamed from his nose and eyes. A colossal surge of Psychic Power erupted in all directions. The encroaching darkness recoiled as both Verlan and Helena witnessed a towering giant of translucent energy slowly rising behind him.

It was a single-eyed colossus glowing with cold blue light—Gustaf’s Esper Spiritualization, a materialized Psychic Mindscape that an Esper could project onto the world. Immensely powerful, yet a devastating strain on the brain without decades of mastery.

The danger was obvious: Gustaf was liquefying his own mind to wield it, all to shield his beloved wife, to prevent this hell-spawned demon from claiming her and twisting her into something monstrous.

“Hahahaha! HAHAHAHAHA!”

Yet Verlan laughed wildly. She shredded the Esper Spiritualization with vicious strikes—only for it to instantly regenerate and retaliate, slamming her with massive fists and hurling her downward. She sprang back up, shattering the earth with a single kick, her aura exploding outward into hundreds of dark purple flame demons that swarmed the giant.

“Uunnggh…! Nnnggh…! I won’t let you…! I won’t let you get to her…! No, never…!”

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