In the howling gale and the scattering petals, Moen's figure abruptly accelerated.

Without the enhancement of the alchemical core, his speed was no longer as elusive as a shadow, becoming slightly traceable.

Yet under the chill moonlight, his movements were agile beyond compare, and even more forceful.

"Shadow step!"

The long-absent footwork flared; the ground dented, and in an instant Moen pounced sideways toward Arag, light as a hunting leopard yet heavy as a shell fired from the barrel!

"So what! So what!"

Arag's eyes were bloodshot; the pupils on his cheeks were also filled with ferocity. Facing the oncoming beast, he subconsciously screamed in madness:

"There is the honored deity... the honored deity... You're just an ordinary human—what can you do? What can you do!"

Squelch.

What answered him was the sound of flesh parting from flesh.

Two perfect crescent moons rose at once—one above, reflecting the light of the sky; one below, cold and death-still.

Two pure-white blades gave Arag no chance to react at all; the arc of steel swept across his neck and his waist and belly at the same time. Flesh and blood were neatly severed, blood sprayed, more vivid than the flowers underfoot.

"...you."

Arag's gaze went blank for a heartbeat; as a pure mage, at this range there was simply no way he could react to Moen's attack.

But soon the blankness turned back into viciousness.

Arag's face twisted; he opened his bloodstained mouth, and a hoarse growl rumbled out of his throat:

"Ant! Ant! You can't kill me!"

The severed flesh writhed rapidly; countless threads of blood extended in a rush from within Arag's body, gluing his already three-segmented body back together.

Perhaps because the recovery time was far too short, the wounds failed to align perfectly; the restored shape looked grotesque, like some bizarre worm.

But Arag was oblivious, laughing wildly: "See? See? The power of the honored God is beyond your fathoming... mm!"

"Shut up!"

A cold blade slid into Arag's mouth and churned, turning that chattering vocal organ into pulp.

"As for what kind of piece of shit your 'honored deity' really is, I know better than you! If They truly had a might I couldn't fathom right now, They would have come personally to kill me already. Would it be your turn, you worthless fool, to bark here?"

Moen's gaze was indifferent. Without surprise he swung his blades—slash again! Slash again! Slash again!

Innumerable flashes of steel bloomed across Arag; innumerable sprays of blood burst forth, falling like a torrential rain.

Twisted clots of flesh were cleaved again and again, then healed, then cleaved, then healed; Arag looked less and less like a "human."

Yet the madness in his eyes only deepened. The mouth on his head was shredded, but a set of savage mouthparts sprouted from his chest, emitting a piercing screech!

"MoenCampbell, die!"

Moen reeled for a moment; before his eyes Arag still struggled and screamed, utterly powerless to resist.

But in truth, hundreds of twisted lumps of flesh were spreading across Arag, like a fleshly sea anemone in the midst of feeding; thick, tentacle-shaped masses of flesh used their numbers to temporarily smother the light of Moen's blades, and then several sharp bone spikes lunged for his chest.

Death closed in.

But in that instant, the small iron shard Moen had kept pressed to his palm suddenly turned icy cold. Moen jolted awake; his eyes sharpened and his body twisted aside.

What Lea had left behind played a tremendous role.

The bone spikes failed to pierce a vital point, but still left a massive wound along his side.

At the same time, Moen staggered.

He slowly lowered his head and saw a golden spear of light thrusting out from his own chest, blood and dense holy light spilling from the wound.

It was Faye.

Under Arag's control, she struck again.

At such close-quarters grappling, large-scale magic was naturally unusable.

But weapons condensed from holy light were still effective—and very effective.

When the holy light touched the crimson blaze within him, it was like cold water splashed into seething oil, instantly triggering a violent reaction.

It almost shattered the balance Moen had worked so hard to maintain.

And even if that balance did not break, with the Crimson Blaze temporarily unusable, his injuries at this moment were already fatal enough.

"Gurgle... gurgle..."

Arag, cut into a monstrous thing by countless flashes of steel, writhed again; an eye above the left of his head, and another on his shoulder, both cast looks of gloating delight.

The mouthparts beneath his crotch twisted in a sneer:

"In the end... you're only human."

So what if strength and speed briefly suppressed him? Creatures called humans are this fragile and pitiful—just a little injury puts their lives in danger. By contrast, I, blessed by divinity, have long since surpassed the human category; to be together forever with the one I love—that is what...

"Too slow."

Moen, eyes lowered to the wound in his chest, suddenly muttered something under his breath.

Confusion flashed in Arag's eyes, and then he saw Moen loosen his hands and let the pure-white twin blades fall.

"You..."

Arag froze for a beat, then let out a shrill laugh:

"MoenCampbell, you finally recognize your own insignificance—you want to..."

"I said... too slow."

Moen lifted his head and looked at Arag coldly, cutting him off.

"This method is too slow."

The love god's power was very strange.

Arag's recovery as a follower of the dark god was abnormally terrifying.

Once, the monster that Aluka became also possessed a fearsome regenerative power—but that was with her having fused the life force of several hundred villagers.

So where did Arag's life force come from?

It couldn't possibly be from the love god, because if They could invest that much power right under the church's nose, They would not need to stir up so many antics.

The love god may be a mutt, but given the chance They would never hesitate to do the killing personally.

Just like back at the academy, when They were willing to use even the saintess before the last, whom They controlled, to kill me.

Moreover, the power the love god was using at this moment—including the ambush just now—was entirely different from before.

Those flowers, that bizarre kind of life force.

This feeling was more like...

"But now is not the time to think about this."

Moen drew the spear of light from his chest, inch by inch.

Though flesh had been run through and holy light burned like fire, his face remained expressionless; he did not even twitch a brow.

"What I need to think about now is... hacking away one cut at a time is far too slow against a monster with inhuman regeneration."

Before the words had fallen, Arag saw the two white short blades streak away, skimming toward Faye.

He wanted to use those alchemical weapons endowed with living spirits to pin down Faye?

But to throw away his own weapons on purpose—wasn't that...

Arag did not get to think for long.

Because the next moment, the answer revealed itself.

Moen suddenly closed in; something as hard and as big as a clay pot slammed toward Arag.

It was... a fist.

A clenched... fist!

There was nothing special on that fist; Moen didn't usually wear rings, much less any other alchemical weapon.

But when that fist smashed into Arag, he suddenly heard a thunderous boom explode!

Thunder!

A technique long since mastered burst between the knuckles; fierce shockwaves, together with the anger that could no longer be contained, came crashing... down!

If blades are too slow, then use fists!

Boom!

Arag's flesh collapsed in an instant; his whole body was like a deep sea struck by a meteor, concentric waves of flesh surging outward from the center.

"You..."

Arag roared with difficulty; several flesh tentacles shot out from behind him, carrying sharp bone spikes as he launched a counterattack once more, trying to force Moen back to buy time to recover.

But faced with this attack, Moen did not retreat, nor did he defend.

He merely shifted his vitals aside a touch and let the bone spikes punch through his body. Then, instead of falling back, he kept going... with a punch!

One punch.

Another punch.

Countless fists, accompanied by peals of thunder, fell like a sudden downpour without pause.

Wounds from blades were easy to heal, but these punches turned Arag's flesh into dough on a chopping board—bones shattered, skin cracked, flesh festered. Tendon and bone were hammered together indiscriminately into a single mess; even if it healed, in such short spans it could only knit back into a limp, slack lump.

"No... wait..."

After who knows how many punches, Arag was finally afraid.

The undying life force did not bring absolute invincibility now, but endless pain—torment beyond the agony of a sundered soul.

With difficulty he pried open an eye from the fringe of his flesh, staring at the blond man—blood all over him, wounds all over him—whose ferocious face never paused. An absurd feeling welled up in him, and he voiced the question so many had once asked.

The hell... is this really a pampered duke's son?

"No... wait... MoenCampbell... let's talk... we can still..."

"Shut up!"

Without mercy, Moen smashed to pulp every eye and mouthpart Arag had struggled to regenerate.

Beg for mercy?

Sure.

Just not you.

You, Arag, from start to finish were nothing but a pitiful clown toyed with and controlled, even your mind corroded.

Therefore...

"Love god! Get the hell out here!"

Images rose before his eyes; farewells echoed by his ears. Those things turned into a blaze of fury, then into thunder that roared unceasingly upon his fists.

"Love god! Don't you damn well play dead on me!"

A punch.

A punch.

Another punch.

Moen meticulously worked over every inch of Arag's flesh, until a suddenly different sensation made him pause.

Arag's entire body had been completely punched through; beneath Moen's fist the earth and stone were caved in, and the mudlike flesh had splattered in a ring—no trace of a human shape remained. Flesh buds writhed atop the gore, but could no longer muster the strength to heal.

Moen's cold gaze swept across—and suddenly locked on.

"Found you!"

A wriggling ball of flesh burrowed up from the now utterly dead mass, trying to flee in a hurry.

But Moen, who had been ready, moved faster; he snatched that fleshy ball into his palm at once.

Atop the ball of flesh, sharp bone spurs pierced through his palm, yet Moen remained utterly oblivious, merely gazing coldly at the ball of flesh.

An eye suddenly opened, cold, lofty, yet carrying the anger of having been repeatedly overstepped by ants.

Moen took a deep breath.

"I know this is only a projected avatar of you, perhaps even just a wisp of insignificant consciousness; even if I wipe it out now, it will not be any great loss to you."

"I also know that for someone like me who has always wanted to muddle along, eat and wait for death, just to keep on living, this is an extremely unwise act."

"But... as I am now, I still want to say something to you with utter sincerity, ah, God of Love."

Moen looked down at the eye in his palm, the bloodstained corners of his mouth lifting into a grin, and he said, enunciating each word:

"Do not let me catch another chance, or I will, without hesitation, flay off your skin, tear off your flesh, take apart your bones, and as for that disgusting divine authority of yours, I will trample it to pieces and throw it into a cesspit."

"And then, until the day finally comes..."

"To kill you, this very existence, completely!"

With that, with the God of Love restrained, he was finally able to muster some scarlet flames; they surfaced in Moen's palm and in an instant swallowed the ball of flesh.

An enraged, shrill roar (whose very sound made one's mind twitch in pain and one's head reel) rang out, yet it still felt... so pleasing to the ear, so exquisite.

If those who had been tormented by the God of Love yet still died for love were to hear this sound, they would surely feel the same.

...