Eldritch Horror Theatre

Judging by her performance, although Lady Ais had mastered the Three Supreme Techniques of the Saint, she didn’t seem capable of using them simultaneously.

While creating these extreme testing conditions, Fu Qian naturally wouldn’t miss a single detail.

After discovering that the breastplate carried a healing ability, the current developments made it easy to reach a new conclusion: Lady Ais could not use her healing and attacking abilities at the same time.

Otherwise, she could have continued healing herself while dealing with the suddenly worsening situation.

This also seemed to explain why she had only treated her wounds after confirming the situation was relatively stable.

It happened in a flash. Almost as soon as she took a stance, a bone spear—different in shape from the previous one but even more vicious—shot from the corpse worm’s mouth once again.

Clang!

Although the Golden Armguard provided incredible strength in certain aspects, it didn’t seem to offer much of a boost to agility.

Already locked onto, and with most of her attention focused on Sophia, Ais took another solid hit.

Only this time, there was no spray of blood. Instead, a sharp, metallic clash rang out.It wasn’t that the bone spear had changed its angle of attack; rather, she had simply swept her right arm across her chest, covering the gap in her defenses.

At almost the exact same moment, a dark red beam of terrifying power swept back out, slicing the corpse worm cleanly in two from head to tail.

Amidst the twitching of the latter’s remnants, Sophia finally leapt high from another corner, charging right up to Ais.

Thud!

This time, it was a slightly muffled metallic thud. An ash-covered fist slammed into the exact same spot where the bone spear had struck.

...

Reborn and returned, Sophia clearly packed immense force into this punch, driving Ais backward until she slammed into the wall.

But not quite enough. Despite the crash, Ais swiftly stood straight again without even needing to activate her healing.

Bang!

A counterattack on an entirely different level of power immediately followed. A single punch sent Sophia flying backward, scattering a cloud of ash into the air.

Before Sophia even hit the ground, the Gold Face Helmet on Ais’s head locked onto her.

Boom!

However, the pursuing beam never appeared. Instead, golden flames abruptly ignited before her eyes.

In that moment, every drifting speck of dust bloomed with a dazzling radiance.

The only blessing was that they erupted in place. Alerted immediately, Ais abandoned her attack and leapt sideways, avoiding most of the flames—especially after nimbly stripping off her outer robe and tossing it aside.

But before she could even catch her breath, another cluster of golden fire exploded directly on her exposed right armguard. For a moment, the light made the three pieces of the Golden Saint Robe on her body shine even more brilliantly.

That punch...

Taking another reflexive step back, Ais froze for a second before realizing what had happened. She examined the spot on her armguard that had taken the hit while she was protecting her chest.

From the way her posture relaxed, it was obvious that the Weapon hadn’t sustained any damage yet.

But it was equally obvious that withstanding continuous attacks like this definitely wasn’t sustainable—

Yet even in such a critical moment, Ais couldn’t resist casting a glance in Fu Qian’s direction.

Over this brief span of time, the mutations on his body had become increasingly severe.

The arm that had first grown nails was now completely torn apart, splitting into multi-jointed strips, as if every finger had extended all the way back to his shoulder.

”Don’t get distracted. It looks like they can’t be killed.”

Facing her scrutiny, Fu Qian used his slightly deformed facial features to offer an approving expression, even adding a word of warning.

Clink!

Prompted by the warning, Ais instinctively rolled away, dodging a flying bone spike.

The corpse worm that had been sliced in half still hadn’t died. In fact, it had now split into two separate entities, and its attack methods had shifted.

Before she could even regain her footing, Sophia—who had just been sent flying—scrambled up to the ceiling on all fours like a gecko, then plunged downward.

Clang!

Evading continuously amidst the clashing of her Golden Armor against the floor, Ais rolled right to the feet of the man who had just warned her.

Bang!

In the very next moment, Fu Qian reached out and blocked a tremendously powerful fist flying at his face, force rippling outward from the impact.

”I said, don’t get distracted.”

Meeting Ais’s utterly horrified gaze—as she apparently hadn’t realized he’d anticipated the attack all along—Fu Qian sighed and repeated his warning.

Yet just as he finished speaking, a dark red light abruptly flashed, and a beam struck him square in the left side of his chest.

And that was with the immense force of the fist pressed against his hand never letting up.

”Were you going to ask if the Weapon could only activate one ability at a time?”

The next moment, a voice completely different from Ais’s rang out from beneath that Golden Faceplate.

At the exact same time, ripples washed across Ais’s chest again, resuming the healing of her wounds.

All three abilities, it seemed, could actually be used simultaneously.

This deeply calculated disguise had finally won them a chance to strike a lethal blow against their ”audience.”

”No...”

Faced with this situation, Fu Qian shifted his gaze away from his chest. Shaking his head without a single change in expression, he casually swatted the sneak attacker away and gave another reminder.

”How many times do I have to say it? Don’t get distracted.”

What a joke. As the Dream Dominator, exactly how many people had they stuffed into this minivan of theirs? Where did they get the nerve to try and fool this seat?

With a cold snort, Fu Qian pulled a Golden Belt from the left side of his chest and casually tossed it onto the ground.

”I came in response to the summons. Now, I am merely a man waiting for answers.”

...

Although the voice was heavily distorted, combining his memories with basic deduction made it easy to figure out who the sudden voice belonged to—another member of the expedition team, the true owner of the Golden Faceplate, Brother Scrooge.

Every anomaly had a reason. The reason Ais could break the limit and master three Weapons at once was actually very simple—the three Weapons were still being controlled by three separate people.

It was just that these three people had also fused together.

Ais wasn’t the only survivor of that expedition.

In fact, from Fu Qian’s perspective, this was very likely the reason Ais was in such a rush—they didn’t want to remain fused together. They needed new bodies.

That was why this reckless summoning and testing had occurred; its purpose was to select the most compatible body.

His choice of the pattern belonging to Ais had filled the final vacancy, making her impatient to take action.

It was somewhat grotesque, but unfortunately for the widely experienced Fu Qian, the greatest significance of this three-in-one Saint was simply that they possessed triple the desire to live.