Chapter 127: The Skull King’s End
Cillin never fought someone head on knowing that he was the weaker force. That would just be masochism.
Cillin had specially created these flying knives before he came here. The flying knife wasn’t thin, and a powerful corrosive liquid was wrapped inside its brittle exterior. Cillin even used inert materials to prevent the powerful corrosive liquid from eroding through the flying knives’ shell.
Cillin’s original plan was to used the flying knives’ hard exterior to pierce through the enemy’s skin, and when the flying knives shattered, the corrosive liquid that spilled out would then play its role.
The actual outcome turned out the way Cillin had planned it to be as well. Hissing sounds appeared appear when the corrosive liquid was spilled onto Carranio’s outstretched tail, and the pain enraged Carranio greatly. This brat was cheating again!!
Carranio let out a drawn out roar that sounded like he would vent out all of the anger he had stored inside his chest. The sound wave took out and shattered most of the crosses nearby.
Not far away, the gray cat who was crouching on top of a cross that lost two thirds of its body jumped down to the floor and flicked its ears. This level of sound wave could not harm it, although it would have to find a new viewing spot to observe the battle now.
Carranio’s roar spread far, far away, alerting even Wa Qing and Emmus inside the energy shields.
“That’s…” Wa Qing said in bewilderment.
“It’s the Skull King, I think.” Emmus said. Even he could hear the anger contained within that roar. He never imagined that Cillin would be able to push the Skull King to this point. He really was an unbelievable person. According to Emmus’ knowledge, the Skull King Carranio was someone who would not let out a howl like this even when he lost all of his subordinates.
Carranio was really angry, and really mad. He had never felt this sullen except that one year when he was wounded by that man.
It was bad enough when he lost a hundred thousand subordinates to this brat. Now, he had even wounded him!
Carranio decided to throw all caution to the wind. In the worst case scenario, he would lose a tail that would regrow itself several years later anyway. The pain he had to endure was only temporary. Right now, all he wanted to do was to utterly obliterate this devious and cunning little brat!
This fight was doable as long as he did not fight Carranio head on and dodged single-heartedly. As he retreated while the other man pursued, Cillin continued to play out his strategy of backing away once and flinging flying knives right after. By now, Carranio’s tail had lost an entire layer of skin, and he was numb to the pain already. He refused to believe that Cillin could keep doing this forever!
Cillin wasn’t in a hurry. Right now Carranio was in a state of fury, and that was a good sign because an enraged Carranio would not spare too much brainpower and think further into things.
When Cillin was still very young, he once heard a conversation like this.
“Do you know why a hunter is superior to his prey?”
“Because a hunter is stronger than the prey. The hunter is strong, and the prey is weak.”
“No. It’s because a hunter knows how to lay traps.”
A hunter is an angler. They would throw down the bait and wait quietly for the fish to take the bait.
Those who lived in the forest would use traps to capture large and ferocious animals. Sometimes, when they felt like it, they would even enjoy the trapped beast’s final show. They had long since gotten used to capturing their prey while spending the least amount of effort.
Both Cillin and Carranio saw each other as their prey. But who would be crowned with the prey at the very end of this fight?
When Carranio noticed that something was amiss, it was already too late.
The numbness had first started from his tail. Then, it swiftly spread to the other parts of his body.
It was only then Carranio realised that the cunning brat had cheated again.
The purpose of the corrosive liquid was to erode the surface of Carranio’s tail so that the poison that came afterwards would act better.
It was the same flying knife and the same mass. However, the contents were entirely different. Carranio aside, perhaps not even Emmus would have figured it out until it was already too late. If the knife’s mass was different, then Emmus might have become greatly suspicious and guessed that these particular flying knives were somehow different. However, Cillin had considered even this factor from the moment he began making these flying knives.
A powerful corrosive liquid, and a concentrated neurotoxin. Cillin had considered both their masses from the moment he began mixing them.
However, even if their masses had been different, the current Carranio would probably have overlooked it anyway. The pain on his tail was also a reason why Carranio had consciously ignored anything that’s going on his tail, inevitably delaying his realisation long after the first neurotoxin knife had struck him. When he truly noticed that something was wrong, the poison had already spread to the point where there was nothing he could do to stop it.
After spying on Poison Fang for so many years, Emmus’ evaluation of Carranio was that he was a determined, ruthless, and powerful man. However, even though he wasn’t stupid, he was still lacking in both smarts and caution.
The Skull King’s past successes caused him to overlook too many hidden dangers. He never stopped believing that he stood at the top of the world and had the power to look down on the ants that crawled beneath him. In reality though, he was dragged to the abyss before he was able to truly understand the saying that the one who stands at the top, is lonely.
Cillin had collected the neurotoxin of the vines that once caught Cary off guard, and various other neurotoxins from other flora and fauna on the green planet as well.
Cillin had prepared this concoction specifically for Carranio. When he was in Enji’s workshop, Cillin had bred two types of worms, concocted a powerful corrosive liquid, and synthesised a neurotoxin that not even a rank A genotype could resist.
Carranio felt that everything was growing blurry and pulling further and further away from him. He could feel that his sense of hearing, touch, smell and taste were all declining, and every joint in his body rusting away like they were scrap iron. The condition only worsened with every passing second as his movements grew duller and duller.
Every muscle in his body began to convulse. His breathing began to turn rapid and erratic, causing Carranio to feel as if he did not have enough oxygen no matter how hard he tried to breathe in. His brain grew murkier and murkier, and the scattered flames in the surroundings felt like they were burning at his eyeballs, forcing him to look away into the darkness.
Not far away, on top of a heap of ruins, the gray cat watched the battle unfold with open, round eyes. Right now, it was staring at Carranio with a cocked head, who was treading a drunken S-shaped path and dragging his once nimble and flexible tail lifelessly across the ground even though he seemed so powerful and extraordinary just moments ago. Right now, Carranio looked like a drunkard who was lurching unsteadily amidst the ruins.
Cillin stood still a hundred meters away from Carranio as he watched the man taking one step after another towards his direction. However, the neurotoxin had affected both Carranio’s senses and his mind greatly, so he eventually veered off course and finally collapsed on the ground; the place where he once punished the sinners and witnessed their executions.
In the past, he, Carranio the Skull King would sit at a high spot and watch arrogantly and disdainfully at the ants embroiled in either bloody battle or torture on this cross field. But now, the roles had been switched.
Carranio felt as if he was lying beneath a gigantic cross, while the devilish young man standing on top of the cross stared indifferently at his embarrassing and silent struggles. His throat could no longer form the right syllables, and the only thing that came out were indecipherable grunts.
He really was just trying to utter one simple word – devil.
Cillin continued to stand at a distance and stare expressionlessly at Carranio. There was no indifferent detachment, no mocking smile, no joy or relief after having exacted vengeance in his eyes. There was only tranquility.
A while later, Cillin took out a small lump that looked like a marble before flicking it towards Carranio in the ruins. The marble struck Carranio’s body and shattered into many bits all over him.
The wind, blew.
The remaining ‘Birds of Paradise’ within the ruins smelled the scent in the air and flocked towards Carranio.
Cillin closed his eyes and felt the last disturbance happening on these ruins.
It was time to end this.