Chapter Sixty-Eight: The Final Completion

As expected, not the slightest bit of carelessness could be afforded.

Grey—no, the malevolent will that ruled over the Dark Guild thought thus.

Survived? Perhaps that's not quite accurate, for it had never truly died. With its cunning and suspicion, when facing a hard nut to crack like the Glorious One, it always left itself an escape for any foreseeable defeat, and now, that precaution merely happened to be called into play.

Division of consciousness.

For one who could be called a master of soul manipulation, this was hardly an outlandish feat—long before it realized that it could never overcome the two before it with its own strength alone, it had already begun the process of splitting its consciousness, so that when the Glorious One's blade severed its head, its soul had long since been divided into two entirely separate, independent entities.

Of these, one held nearly all of its resources—let us call it the primary consciousness—which launched an assault on the Glorious One through parasitic means. The other, weaker consciousness took the safer route, hiding within a beetle it kept with it; should the primary soul fall in battle, it would retain enough to rise again—survival itself was its greatest asset.

Yet having to use its contingency meant defeat, after all.

This meant it had lost—truly lost, utterly and completely. For the first time, it had been vanquished, and in its own most formidable domain.

It could not resign itself to this fate.

But there was nothing to be done. Now, it was weak—so weak it was no stronger than an ordinary beetle.

So, it could only wait, only endure.

Its greatest, indeed its sole advantage lay in the fact that it was still alive, while they had yet to discover this fact.

This was all it could leverage.

As for revenge—

The high demon, fortunate to have escaped death, had no such intention. First, the abnormal feedback from the primary consciousness left it uneasy; second, in its current state, regaining its strength would be a long process. By the time it rebuilt the Dark Guild and revived the artificial demon project, those two humans would likely already have been consigned to the river of time. What mortals called vengeance held no meaning for it.

Indeed, one might even say that time itself was on its side.

After all—

Order is but a fleeting illusion; only chaos endures forever.

This is truth.

The malevolent will, born of humanity’s greed for immortality, sneered, and yet, no matter how chilling a beetle’s laughter might be, at this moment it held no dignity at all—especially as, at some point, its frail, feeble body had been seized by the neck, plucked from the pocket, its feeble legs and mandibles flailing in vain.

“Caught you, snake.”

A familiar voice froze its frantic struggle in an instant.

Was that… Number Twelve’s voice?

No—it should be Number One.

The killer was a humanoid weapon it had cultivated as a vessel for itself in the material world; the malevolent will knew them well, but if there was one it was most wary of, it was certainly Number One, the one who inherited the title “Mist Night.” Wait! Judging by the use of “snake,” perhaps it was not just the title, but a fragment of its shattered spirit that had been passed down as well.

A grave miscalculation.

It should have verified more carefully at the time.

Yet the malevolent will felt little true regret. Mist Night, its most perfect creation, had only one flaw—its very perfection, so complete that even its creator could not control it. Thus, when Mist Night was gravely wounded by the Glorious One from the upper districts, the will took the opportunity to reabsorb this being, an amalgamation of man and demon, back into the Dark Guild’s grasp, dissecting his body and implanting the pieces into thirteen test subjects, creating a new generation of killers, hoping the passage of time would erode any lingering will.

Yet even then, it seemed to have failed.

The killer before it was proof enough—but it had no intention of conversing with him. High demons like itself, whose existence was primarily spiritual, were rare and precious; without a host, they could not affect the physical world, but likewise, the physical world found it difficult to perceive or interfere with them.

In the worst case, its beetle host would be killed.

Probably…

The malevolent will did not underestimate the difficulty of one bearing the Mist Night name. Since he knew the name “snake,” clearly its mode of existence was no secret. If he had not prepared a means to deal with souls directly, he would not appear before it.

In other words, was he prepared for a killing blow?

Mixed emotions stirring, it raised its head, compound eyes staring at the mockingly smiling mask above.

“What a pitiful form,” said the killer, his obsidian eyes devoid of even a hint of emotion, cold and pure as black stone. “But to die in this form suits you perfectly.”

Without hesitation, without offering the slightest chance to react, the killer pressed his thumb and forefinger together.

Silently, the beetle died.

Like a corpse, its body lay separated from its head.

But a high demon would never vanish so easily—the malevolent will still lived, though not in the best condition. It existed as pure spirit, transcending flesh—an invisible, immaculate white serpent revealed itself.

And then—

Without any hesitation—

Escape!

Freed from the shackles of flesh, a soul might sound noble and dignified, but this was its most vulnerable, unguarded moment. To an ordinary person, ignorant of such things, they would be powerless before an entity on a parallel, intangible plane. But for someone intimately familiar with its kind, this was the golden opportunity to capture or destroy it.

For now, the protection of flesh was gone.

To this world, it was as rootless as a tree in the wind, with nothing to anchor it—and to prevent precisely such a predicament, it carried insects on its host, both for protection at a critical moment and to exploit their inconspicuousness to slip through enemies’ grasps and escape with its life.

“What a pity,” said the killer. Though he could not see the malevolent will in its spiritual form, it did not hinder him from acting. He drew from his breast a battered military canteen, unscrewing the cap without hurry. “I must bid farewell to the invisible you.”

Then, the air began to stir.

Like the gaping maw of a whale, the canteen’s mouth began to draw inward with a strange suction.

It might only have disturbed the dust in the air, but for a soul adrift from its body, it was a cataclysmic maelstrom.

The malevolent will struggled, its serpentine form coiling tightly, resisting with all its might.

But it was futile.

Inevitably, it was swallowed into the world within the canteen.

Perhaps a third of a heartbeat later, the battered military canteen glimmered with an eerie blue light.

“What a shame,” murmured the killer behind the mask that was neither smiling nor weeping, gazing at the glow on the canteen. He screwed the cap tightly shut, lifted his gaze to the empty air above, and whispered, “I can’t be there to witness your end, snake.”

He gave the canteen a little shake.

The Jar of Avarice.

That was its name. Back in the era of the ancient kings, when Night Watchers still existed, the alchemists of Prometheus created such specialized alchemical weapons to defend against unspeakable monsters that could invade souls. Uncapping the lid would create a singularity that warped both the material and immaterial planes, drawing in spirits manifest in the world as if by a great oceanic vortex, imprisoning them in the eternal darkness and silence within.

Yet, this was not how the Jar earned its name.

The Jar of Avarice was so called for its insatiable greed, devouring even the remnants. As standard equipment for the Night Watchers who guarded the Wall, its function was not merely to capture those eldritch horrors of chaos—it was the aftermath that truly chilled the blood. In that unknowable world within the jar, the value of a soul would be utterly consumed, its very existence erased, leaving behind only the purest, most universal energy.

To take everything—that is the true meaning of avarice.

—A most fitting tool for me, indeed.

The corners of Mist Night’s mouth curved faintly. His obsidian eyes fell upon the headless corpse on the floor. Feeling his blood boiling within and his heart threatening to leap from his chest, he closed his eyes, drew a deep breath, and exhaled: “Now, it’s time for…”

“The final integration.”

The thirteen next-generation killers were originally one, merely split into thirteen fragments and implanted into thirteen bodies. Naturally, these fragments yearned to become whole again, which was why, upon encountering one another, they would feel an all-consuming urge to kill. Even Number One, who had inherited the most complete memories of Mist Night from a century before, was not immune.

Nor did he wish to be.

He spread his arms wide, awaiting the descent of fate.

And then—

The corpse on the ground began to shrivel, blood snaking forth as if alive, winding around him like lovers reunited after a long separation, or newlyweds on their wedding night.

It invaded his eyes, his ears, his nose, every part of his skin where it could enter.

There was no scream, no cry. The killer merely closed his eyes, as if sinking into a dream from which he would never wake, his body curling like an infant’s.

Then he unfurled.

Floating weightlessly, defying gravity, his body spread in the shape of a star. Silver-white hair flowed behind him, his eyes black as the night opened wide, beholding a world of mist and gray.

And then—

The mists began to surge.