Our Family Has Fallen

No one knew if it was because Lance knocked on the door a bit too hard, or because he forgot to bring a gift.

But Lance could feel that the Ancestor had taken control of this pocket of space, and that sudden appearance just now was the power of the Limping Walker traversing the void...

"So you still foolishly believe you’re independent of the whole, but I understand all of this better—and I will, properly, demonstrate it to you."

The Ancestor didn’t give Lance much time to think. As he spoke, he spread his hands and raised them, his fingers forming a strange gesture.

Perfect Copy!

In an instant the arena was torn open by blood-colored tendrils, and several perfect copies, almost identical to the Ancestor, erupted from within.

Lance and the others naturally didn’t waste words, they simply raised their weapons and fired.

"Kill them!"

As the words left his mouth, the bullet instantly struck the first emerging Ancestor—the true body—right in the head, blowing it apart.

But the twisted flesh seemed to have no weak point. After a single stagger it stood firm again, and the wound on its head healed over in the blink of an eye.

Though this probing shot hadn’t been loaded with Supernatural Ammunition and was never going to hurt an evil cultist much, the scene still made Lance notice something.

Unlike those cultists’ out-of-control proliferation, the Ancestor’s self-healing actually manifested as fast and flawless as Lance’s own Flesh Reconstruction, without developing tumors or other odd tissue structures, or the signature black eyeballs.

As expected, this bastard Ancestor’s mastery of flesh was deep. After all, Lance himself still couldn’t create copies like this.

That single shot had already declared the battle begun. Dismas didn’t rush to fire; instead, he drew his shortsword in one hand and lunged.

Reynard also charged in with his sword raised, eyes locked on the true body, but those perfect copies blocked his way, forcing him to swing and cut them down.

The sharpness of the Legendary Longsword showed itself—falling upon the bizarre enemy, it easily tore open an exaggerated wound, and even more terrifying, it came with a Holy Flame-like burn, clearly adding damage against these Aberrant Demons.

They could see that, although the monsters were humanoid, their insides weren’t human at all, but corrupted flesh twisted and knotted together.

In other words, these so-called perfect copies were nothing more than hollow skins; even their clothes and ornaments were condensations of flesh. In truth, they were still Aberrant Demons.

Lance couldn’t help but lament that his own control and use of flesh still couldn’t compare to the Ancestor’s!

The Ancestor wasn’t idle either. Lance saw him raise his right hand, and a strange power surged, rapidly restoring the copies that had just been wounded, which made Lance feel even more uneasy.

And it’s group-based? How is this almost the same as my Flesh Reconstruction?

"I’ll hold them—get in there, now!"

Balistan roared and charged with his shield, his ferocity like a surging wave driving forward. He smashed aside one blocking copy by sheer impact, then swung and hammered another away, buying the others a chance.

Dismas immediately lunged, driving his sword into the Ancestor, but just as he pulled it out intending to follow up with a throat slash, he hadn’t expected the wound to simply heal along with the withdrawing blade, turning that stab into a wasted effort.

The eerie sight left him momentarily puzzled. His blade was coated with Corpse Decomposition Spores, a method specifically meant to counter cultists’ self-healing. So why was it doing nothing today?

But he was a battle-hardened veteran; he showed not a hint of panic. He gave up on swinging the sword and went straight to drawing his gun and firing from the hip.

Point-blank shot!

The bullet infused with Supernatural Power almost instantly shredded the true body’s flesh. In theory, the power contained in the shot exploding should have had an effect.

Yet they watched the wound close up just as quickly, and that Supernatural Power failed to influence anything at all.

"You’re not his match. Leave the true body to me. You handle the copies."

After only a brief observation, Lance had already gathered plenty of information. Just as ordinary Supernatural Power was useless against him, once your control over flesh reached a certain level, it was fundamentally unshakable.

He had devoured the New God born from Hamlet’s million souls. Even though he hadn’t fully succeeded, compared to that, Corpse Decomposition Spores or a bullet’s tiny Supernatural Power were like a single drop of water falling into a lake, naturally causing no reaction.

But Lance felt no fear. Since he’d roughly gauged the level, he struck without hesitation, drawing Wolf Fang and pointing it straight at the Ancestor’s true body.

My blade is far from dull!

What Lance intended was to use Wolf Fang’s sharpness to tear that body apart. As long as he could perform a sacrifice, it would become a battle of "god against god."

Just like back when the butler faked his death and Lance exploited the chance to sacrifice him—even managing to struggle in those circumstances. It was enough to show that kind of monster was far beyond what Lance could handle back then, yet in the end, it still became his starting capital.

With Reynard and the others blocking the copies, Lance quickly caught up to the Ancestor’s true body. He raised his hand and slashed, the ferocity of his motion utterly free of wasted words.

Yet even he felt something off. After that first slash, he didn’t follow up with his usual storm of blows; instead, he fell into a brief silence.

He’d originally thought the Ancestor was just self-healing after being injured, similar to his own Flesh Reconstruction, but only by striking personally did he realize—the Ancestor was actually controlling his flesh to separate beforehand, just before the blade fell.

What kind of concept was that? It was like chopping empty air. The seemingly dramatic wound was nothing more than stirred air, incapable of causing any real damage.

Lance immediately reacted, swinging several more rapid strikes, but each blade passed through harmlessly, further confirming the situation.

Immune to all damage—unless you can inflict true harm.

And trying to leave your weapon inside his body was unrealistic; the Ancestor wasn’t incapable of moving.

However, Lance also seemed to notice something interesting: to maintain this special state, the Ancestor had sacrificed his offensive capability.

In other words, this degree of control over flesh required massive concentration. He could hardly split his focus to do anything beyond flesh control, forced to endlessly summon copies to attack in his place—clearly aiming to wear his enemies down.

And you want to play a war of attrition with me?

Lance almost instantly came up with a countermeasure. He didn’t bother with more chatter, and simply pulled out his big treasure—a Warhammer of bizarre design, radiating a sinister aura: Void Annihilation!

Lance didn’t bring it out to launch a direct attack, but to raise it high and let out a furious roar.

"Void, aid me!"

The strange hammerhead at the top erupted with an indescribably uncanny power, and an even more terrifying scene followed—the void-constructed background of this space was torn open yet again by that weird power.

Even the normally posturing Ancestor’s true body couldn’t afford to keep his arms folded in a pose when he saw this. He hurriedly raised both hands, unleashing bizarre spellcraft in an attempt to erase the rift.

Lance wasn’t afraid of a contest of sorcery. His aura surged wildly, and the Warhammer seemed stimulated by something, its spherical head blazing with even stronger power.

As Lance swung the Warhammer and smashed it toward the empty air, the strike clearly didn’t hit anything, yet the entire space shuddered, and a thunderous roar like drumbeats reverberated through the void.

The rift, previously being suppressed, abruptly stopped shrinking and instead was ripped wider open.

The Ancestor naturally refused to give up and immediately summoned more copies to attack Lance. But perhaps because his attention was divided, this batch included imperfect copies.

Biased Breeding!

Compared to those copies identical to the Ancestor, these imperfect ones could barely maintain their forms, with large patches of chaotic flesh showing through.

Still, no one cared. All of the copies, as if called by the same summons, rushed Lance at the same time.

𝘧𝓇ℯ𝑒𝓌𝑒𝑏𝓃𝘰𝘷𝘦𝘭.𝒸ℴ𝓂

But Reynard and the others weren’t corpses. If they couldn’t hit the Ancestor, they could at least kill the copies, couldn’t they?

They immediately formed up around the Lord, striking at the copies and buying him more time.

A chaotic melee erupted on the spot...