Astartes of the Bear School

Chapter 1803 1775. Metal Ball

Blue-purple flames and scale powder poured into the Minotaur's body.

The solid flesh, bones, and internal organs were all rapidly eroded and charred by the flames that penetrated deep into the bone marrow.

After this knife strike and one more magic seal, Lan En immediately pulled back.

With the continuous and deep burning of [Flame Dragon Fire], no matter what, his contact with the Minotaur in these few short seconds had already maximized the damage.

The "ignore damage" caused by the Isu artifact has completely reached its limit at this moment.

"Moo!!!"

The Minotaur roared wildly, and began to swing the golden axe in his hand and the horns on his head wildly.

The walls of the labyrinth built by the Isu were shattered and collapsed one after another under its rage!

In this underground world, it really seems like the world has ended because of the wrath of the Minotaur!
The blue and gray Isu building materials were collapsing, and large chunks of rock above their heads were also falling off and crashing down!

A small earthquake suddenly erupted in the underground space!
While Lan En was dodging the large pieces of rubble that were falling from above his head, he continued to take the time to add scars with strange blue and purple flames to the Minotaur's body.

Finally, more than ten seconds after the battle suddenly started and the intensity suddenly increased to the extreme.

The artifact on the Minotaur was completely unable to cover up the injuries on its body.

In its huge and sturdy chest, the internal organs that were burned by the Flame Dragon's flames were completely exposed, and its chest had almost become a large charred hole.

The burnt muscles had deprived the Minotaur of the ability to swing his weapon to attack, and the pectoral muscles were an important part of arm movement.

"Tum~"

The minotaur's huge body fell to the ground, and the sound was much quieter than the rubble that was shaken off by it.

After all, it is a fleshy body, with elasticity and cushioning properties.

Afterwards, although the Minotaur that caused the collapse had completely stopped moving, the rock collapse was still a large area.

Many natural rocks continued to fall down for another five or six minutes before they finally stopped.

Lan En walked on the arena in the maze, and his feet made a continuous "crunching" sound as he stepped on the gravel.

The natural rocks that fell from a height of dozens of meters, when they came into contact with the ground built by the Isu people, the ground was basically intact, but the rocks were all shattered.

It can be seen that the Isu people's building materials are superior to natural rocks.

But even this kind of building material was reduced to a pile of powder before the horns and brute force of the Minotaur.

The rubble obscured the glowing crystal strips embedded in the surrounding ground, making the lighting in the area even dimmer.

It also made the witcher's amber cat eyes shine more conspicuous in the dim light.

Lan first walked to the body of the Minotaur which was almost buried by rubble, and grabbed the golden double-headed axe from under a pile of rocks with a clang.

The falling rock just now hit the arm of the Minotaur who was already lying down, knocking the axe away.

The witcher glanced over here and then looked away.

[Clairvoyance] I can feel it a little bit, but it’s not too strong.

This should be a very high-level Isu artifact, but that's all.

Lan En did not think that this thing would be the "special artifact that can corrupt the will of the weak and even have the ability to defend itself" as described by Cassandra's biological father Pythagoras.

After stuffing the double-headed axe into his alchemical leather bag, Lan En went to a nearby place and dug up the pile of stones where the Minotaur was buried.

The body of the minotaur appeared.

Lan En pulled its tail and limbs, turning it over and over to look at it, but he really couldn't tell what was wrong with it at all.

Finally, the witcher had to focus his attention on a conspicuous place that he didn't know the effect of - the right corner of the Minotaur that was shining with golden light.

Two horns, one shiny and one not. From the beginning he felt that this thing was a little unusual.

Now that the Minotaur was dead and Lan had gauntlets on his hands, he began to try to break off the golden horn.

Surprisingly, this is quite simple.

This piece of horn seemed to be stuck on the Minotaur's head. It was not as strong as before when it hit the wall with such force that it could knock down the walls of the maze built by the Isu.

After Lan En took it off, the horn, which had been shining with golden light, suddenly became brighter and became almost scorching hot in a short period of time!
The Minotaur's motionless body began to twitch.

Lan En looked at the half-man, half-bull corpse. Amidst a surge of energy, a holographic projection of light and shadow burst out.

A Minotaur made of golden light emerged from the corpse as if trying to reclaim its horns from the witcher, and then reached out to him.

"…give us strength, when our strength fades…"

A sound that seemed like an auditory hallucination and had a distinct electronic feel was transmitted into the demon hunter's brain. Lan En frowned slightly and took a step back. Clear light particles appeared on the Minotaur's shadow and continued to converge towards the bull's horn in his hand.

In the end, without waiting for the unknown light and shadow to have any effect, all the light particles were absorbed by the bull's horns.

And as the palm of his hand felt warm, Lan En watched the hard and solid horn in his hand turn into a golden metal ball with circuit patterns on its surface in the light.

Lan En looked at the place where the body of the Minotaur had originally been lying. Now there was only a withered and shrunken humanoid corpse, and it was impossible to tell how long the corpse had been dead.

And in Lan En's brain, waves were emanating from the metal ball, trying to connect and resonate with his brain waves.

The metal ball didn't care at all whether it had physical contact with humans, or whether it was covered by armor or several layers of clothes.

It has always relied on thoughts, brain waves, and genes to influence the humans around it.

'Now, surrender!'

It sends messages, or commands, to the humans around it. These commands are transmitted through brain waves, and then directly activate the key in the human genes.

From ancient times to the present, there has been no room for disobedience.

As long as you are human, you are 100% under its control! Today, there will be no exception...

"Pah~pah~"

The movement of the metal ball being thrown into the air and then falling back into the hand was smooth and regular.

Lan En tilted his head and nonchalantly played with the metal ball in his hand.

"Mentos, what did you say this thing was trying to put into my brain?"

"I can't say I'm completely clear about this, sir." The biochemical intelligent brain was processing the brief brain wave interaction just now, while responding to the subject's questions in an orderly manner.

"I just detected the communication between this object and your brain waves, but it seems that it just wants to... transmit some special signals?"

"According to my analysis, these signals should be a means of interacting with a certain... object? Command? But as we all know, sir."

“Its interactions probably don’t affect us.”*2
Lane and Mentos came to this obvious conclusion together.

After experiencing many worlds, Lan En had long understood that humans from different worlds might look similar and communicate similarly, but there were still some fundamental differences.

For example, humans in the Fire World are an intelligent race that was born after the original fire stabilized the rules of the world.

This kind of human beings are undoubtedly not the same species as the humans who have evolved from aquatic single-celled organisms to terrifying upright apes.

Who knows what the effects and limitations of the unique artifact created by the Isu are, but it probably won't target a creature from outside the world.

After all, you have to first realize that such people exist before you can start studying how to target them.

"Brain wave interaction, commands, and this corpse... Tsk, I didn't know a human corpse could have this form. So this should be a human, right?"

Lan En squatted beside the shrunken corpse and muttered for a while, then stood up and prepared to leave.

This labyrinth built by the Isu for the Minotaur should have a history of tens of thousands of years even if calculated based on recent times.

Although the Isu's building materials were very good, after being dismantled so violently by the Minotaur, Lan En still thought it was wise to withdraw quickly.

Even without using the route recorded in Mentos, it would not be difficult to get out of the maze by following Theseus' golden thread.

When Lan En climbed up to the ruins of King Minos' palace again, the circular gate on the ground closed automatically with the sound of stone friction, as if it had detected someone entering or leaving.

As expected, Adonis was waiting at the door.

"The Minotaur is dead. Thank you for your help, Adonis."

Lan En walked up to him, squatted down and said to him.

But the little boy obviously didn't care too much about these questions. He just stretched his head to look behind Lan En, looking for something.

"My dad hasn't come out yet?"

The demon hunter sighed silently and shook his head.

"I searched the entire maze. Your father..." Lan En handed the ring to Adonis. "You are actually prepared, right? Your father loves you very much. If he were still alive, he would definitely look for you."

The little boy started crying, but he was still sobbing, tightly clutching the ring that Lan En gave him.

"Thank you...thank you. I'm just afraid, I'm afraid I'll forget him."

"If you can really forget about him, I think your father will be very happy about it." The witcher stood up and patted the little boy on the head. "Keep it well, Adonis. You have to move on with your life."

As he said this, Lan grabbed the boy's shoulders and asked him to turn around.

The bald old man who had been rescued by Lan En before, still with bruises and scars on his body, stood not far away and looked at him.

(End of this chapter)