Chapter Fifty-Five: The Magic of the Beasts

“Master, that giant octopus—it seems to have noticed us! Shouldn’t we run away, now?!”

Catherine’s voice trembled, betraying a fear she couldn’t conceal. She had always thought of herself as a courageous person, but the moment those blood-red eyes of the Cthulhu Octopus locked onto her, she felt her heart seize up, shrinking like a mouse before a cat. She shook so terribly she nearly forgot to run.

Confronted with what might be a seventh-tier magical beast—the Cthulhu Octopus—and the oppressive aura of a predator high on the food chain, Catherine finally understood that courage was often far less formidable than one imagined, and willpower far less unyielding.

The Cthulhu Octopus had already swept everything within reach of its tentacles clean. Now, the two “little bugs” not far off quickly caught its interest. Yet, after estimating the distance, it realized that, restricted by the spatial gate, it couldn’t quite reach them. With rich experience hunting small, quick prey, it understood well that these creatures could flee at astonishing speed and that it would have only one shot—simply sucking them in with its massive mouth might not be reliable.

With that in mind, it pressed four tentacles against the edge of the spatial gate, straining to widen the portal as much as possible. Its massive head squeezed further into the material plane. Then, picking up three free tentacles, it let a dim ashen light flicker at their tips, swiftly tracing mysterious trajectories in the air. An arcane symbol gradually formed—familiar yet elusive. Catherine looked carefully, then gasped, “Shadow Cloak?!”

Though her magic was depleted, Catherine’s eye for spellcraft as a former high-level mage remained. The patterns the Cthulhu Octopus traced, along with the flow of energy—wasn’t this precisely the fifth-tier dark spell, Shadow Cloak? The spell’s effect was simple: release a ring of dark energy, inflict massive shadow damage, bind everything within the area, and drag it to a location specified by the caster. But hadn’t the “Third Edition of the Arcane Lexicon: Dark Arts” recorded that this spell was created three hundred and twenty years ago by the archmage Takurata? How could this octopus know such a complex array spell?

Now was hardly the time to ponder this. Catherine froze for only a moment before coming to her senses and preparing to leap back. Having once studied the spell, she knew its only flaw: the fleeting gap at the farthest joint when the energy ring formed. Once closed, there would be no way out—not left, right, above, or below.

Yet—she could not jump!

She pushed off hard, hoping to spring away, but her feet met a sensation like sinking into a pile of sludge. Instead of leaping, her feet sank several inches into the ground.

She didn’t need to look down to know: Mire Spell. The most basic of all dark spells, first-tier—Mire Spell! She hadn’t even noticed when the octopus cast it, but it was so perfectly timed. Normally, such a harmless, low-level spell would not have warranted her attention. But now, it was a death sentence.

Was this the supreme hunting skill of a top predator? Without using any overwhelming force, it had driven her into a desperate situation. Despite her awe, Catherine wasn’t overly worried. With the black energy ring of Shadow Cloak closing in, she turned to Ling Mo beside her, her eyes clear in their meaning: Well, Master, it’s your turn. Surely, you don’t think I can handle a seventh-tier magical beast right now?

Ling Mo sighed inwardly. Catherine’s split-second reaction had disappointed him, but now was not the time to dwell on that. His eyes flashed with fierce resolve, and with a sharp command, a faint golden energy shot forth, striking the rapidly contracting energy ring. The menacing dark band shattered into seventeen or eighteen fragments, then disintegrated into dust and vanished from the air.

The Cthulhu Octopus’s great eye narrowed, its gaze fixing intently on Ling Mo. It hadn’t expected that among the two little bugs, the one who showed no detectable energy signature could break its spell! How intriguing! Fascinating!

In that instant, as Ling Mo destroyed its spell, the surge of energy from him made the octopus’s heart race. If it could capture such a high-energy being, all its offspring’s energy needs would be met before they even hatched! Its eye whirled, and, making up its mind, it decided to gamble—its time on the material plane was short anyway. If it succeeded, the reward would be immense!

It hurled the massive fleshy sphere it was clutching back through the spatial gate, freeing all its tentacles, then pulled them back, bracing against the edge of the gate. With a mighty push, the portal doubled in size, and its enormous body finally squeezed fully into the material plane.

The instant the gate widened, the once gently swirling multicolored vortex within whirled faster, its pull on the Cthulhu Octopus intensifying severalfold, struggling to drag the intruder back. But the creature’s size was immense; even as its huge head was yanked back by the suction, its tentacles continued to weave arcane traces in the air with blinding speed, precision, and clarity.

This wretched octopus had ten tentacles, and could begin inscribing a magic circle from ten different points at once, with not a hint of confusion or error! This revolutionary casting technique shocked Catherine to her core, and left the tens of thousands watching the live broadcast utterly dumbfounded. It surpassed any known mage’s speed in drawing magical arrays. What should have taken dozens of seconds to chant was completed in a few breaths. From the array, a gargantuan claw of deep violet energy, spanning tens of meters, erupted and seized both Catherine and Ling Mo as if they were mere chicks!

Sixth-tier dark magic: Demonic Grasp!

If a human magus had cast this, the demonic claw would have been only a few meters wide, nothing like the sky-darkening force of the octopus. Though a sixth-tier spell, in the hands of the Cthulhu Octopus, its power was magnified many times over. Having unleashed such a powerful spell, the octopus could no longer resist the immense pull from the spatial gate and was forcibly yanked back through—but its Demonic Grasp was also judged as a “foreign object” by the gate and was dragged in along with it.

Though its entire body was being pulled into the demon realm, the octopus’s expression was one of utter triumph as it watched its two prey held fast in its Demonic Grasp, being drawn with it into the demon realm. Its ten tentacles even waved about in glee: Heh, my children, wait for me—Mother is about to bring you a feast! Those two little bugs must be utterly hopeless by now.

With a gaze full of interest, the Cthulhu Octopus looked at its prey—but its heart suddenly skipped a beat. Sensitive to the emotions of other beings, it could clearly sense that the slighter “bug” was indeed panicked and helpless, but the sturdier “bug” showed no fear at all, and even regarded it with a trace of mocking disdain!

What was happening? How could this be?

Before it could make sense of it, it felt as if everything around it slowed down, all motion becoming “delayed,” the rhythm of the world shifting to a strange, languid pace. A venerable voice echoed everywhere, chanting with the cadence of a sacred ritual:

“O Holy Light, thou art the gift of Aeon, thy power unstoppable; may you cleanse all evil from this world!”

At that moment, one of the stars within the perfect circular hole in the sky flickered. A pillar of pure white light, dazzling as the noonday sun, crashed down, striking the swirling spatial gate head-on.