"I don't have the time to be saving a weed, so if you refuse to drink my medicine any further, I'll kill you" Pernod said without any reserves.
"Then, since I've already drank the medicine, can you return my glass eye to me?" Chromie opened his empty eye sockets, discarding his previous thoughts and asked Pernod.
"That thing was modified from the eye of some unknown strange creature, if you continue to wear it, you'll just pollute your elven bloodline further" Pernod gave him a reason that seemed likely to both be a lie and the truth.
"Then from now on, I guess I'll be a blind person" Chromie commented self-deprecatingly. Although this was something he brought onto himself, as his Tome of Sacrifice was something that caused the user more misfortune the more they used it.
However, humans were greedy creatures with many desires that they wished to fulfill. The more they desired to accomplish impossible tasks, the more unsatisfied they'd become, at which point they would sacrifice things again and again, exchanging what they currently had for things that they desired.
"The elven race has a spell called the Mana Eye. In order to study this magic, one needs to be blinded in both eyes as a prerequisite, so I can teach you the corresponding knowledge"
"The Mana Eye can not only grant you a more powerful sense of perception compared to before, but it will also allow you to see through illusions as well as destroy the energy structure of spells"
"Originally, this knowledge was something that only an Anti-mage soldier of Gods would be permitted to learn, and yet I'm teaching it to a half-elf like yourself"
"Just settle down and stay here for the next while"
Pernod spouted a series of complaints. It had been thousands of years since he lived underground, although the elves were long-lived, equipped with a stronger ability to endure the years, he had still become a bit unusual from the thousands of years of loneliness and isolation.
Soon after, Pernod left, leaving Chromie on the bed, pondering his life from now on, specifically, his half-elven life.
As invaders, the seven churches' policy against the elves had always been thorough extinction. After so long of this, other than elves like Pernod who had isolated themselves to remain underground at certain corners of this world, they could already be considered to be extinct.
If I awaken my elven bloodline and appear on the surface as a half-elf, what I would face is endless pursuit to death.
Even those who could not awaken, having only mutated into monsters and branded as blood of evil, would still undergo strict purging by the church.
It's quite obvious what kind of fate awaits me from now on.
Chromie could sense his body shifting and changing, several crucial places on his body felt itchy. If he touched his ear, he could even feel that it was growing pointy.
His appearance was changing into that of an elf, transforming into an entity that wasn't elven nor human, a half-elf.
If he didn't want to die, the best solution would be to hide within this underground ruin, away from the humans and away from the church.
However, Olga's body could only survive for a month; if he couldn't retrieve Olga's soul before that time limit, then she would permanently lose her life.
I need to return to the surface in a month, huh?
Chromie laughed deprecatingly. Currently, he was helpless to even save himself, not only did he become blind, but his body also seemed to have been restrained by the old elf Pernod.
Regardless of what was to come, Chromie was temporarily in a tough situation, and he had no choice but to slowly accommodate himself to being completely blind as well as other circumstances of staying in this underground ruins.
…
At another location, Darr's body was undergoing a new round of mutations. When he first mutated, due to Chromie's corrosive blood magic eating away at his body, Darr had to incorporate that into his own body after the mutation, giving his blood its current corrosive property.
And now that he had consumed a Gluttonous Demon Ghost alive, Darr's body was supplied with new blood properties that forced the new mutation.
If this was a controlled and stable evolution, then he would have only incorporated the positive characteristics of the Gluttonous Demon Ghost into himself; but an unstable mutation didn't differentiate. The mutation would pick arbitrary and random factors to incorporate into one's bloodline, the most one's willpower might be able to do was influence it slightly.
Darr's body continued to twist and writhe, several parts of his body directly exploded without warnings, pouring out ashen grey blood. Numerous deformed limbs continued to grow before quickly withering away.
Darr started screaming in pain and suffering, his outer appearance irregularly transforming. Compared to the previous mutation, this one was causing him a lot more pain. Gradually, he started to feel every inch of his flesh, every cell in his body, every fiber of his being telling him that they were hungry.
This wasn't hunger in the sense that it lacked nutrients or replenishment, but an addictive desire towards something completely foreign to him.
『 WHERE IS IT!? WHERE IS IT!? GIVE IT TO ME! 』Darr's greatly deformed body squirmed and writhed wildly, his face twisted as saliva uncontrollably poured from his mouth.
The reliance of the elves on mana was carved into their own souls, and even more so for the Gluttonous Demon Ghosts who devolved from the original elves. To conserve their mana, they gradually moved away from utilizing it, while evolving an acute sense of mana detection.
Darr wriggled his body, slowly becoming used to sensing the existence of mana. Sensing each and every Gluttonous Demon Ghost in his vicinity, as well as the glittering sun of a mana source right at the center of the city.
Without hesitation, under his compulsion, Darr's body started heading towards the nearest source of mana he could sense.
…
A Gluttonous Demon Ghost was crouched inside a hole, silently cannibalizing one of its own kind. Its razor-sharp claws ripped through the grey skin, devouring the mana-laden organs within. Feeling the pleasurable sensation of mana flowing into its body, it uttered a faint cry of unclear ecstasy.
Immediately, it looked up to the sky and raised its tongue bloody red tongue. The tongue was the most sensitive region on these creatures' bodies to mana, partly to enjoy the taste of mana while they ate, while also partly to use as a mana-tracking antenna.
It was due to this ability to mutually sense one another that the Gluttonous Demon Ghost still hadn't cannibalized themselves to extinction yet even after so many years.
Whenever breeding season came, these creatures would lower their guards just enough to copulate, then quickly leave after the act to prevent their breeding mates from killing them.
At the same time, the rate of survival for new-born Gluttonous Demon Ghosts wasn't particularly high. If the mother couldn't find any food, she would simply return and eat her child, hesitation wasn't even a factor.
After a few thousand years, the elves had become a race of beasts with unique breeding and survival rules.
And at this very moment, this Gluttonous Demon Ghost had just sensed a relatively weak mana source slowly moving towards it.
Glancing down at the half-eaten carcass of its kind, its bloody tongue moved around restlessly, ultimately letting its greed win over. Since the other party's mana reaction was so weak, they might be wounded, and being wounded meant they made for easy prey.
Such a simple thought crossed through the Gluttonous Demon Ghost's brain, it then crouched down next to its hole, preparing its body to spring forward. Once the other party approached, it would pounce on them without hesitation and kill them.
As the sound of a body dragging itself through the grass sounded, the Gluttonous Demon Ghost immediately leapt out, only to see a deformed tentacle reaching towards it; the numerous grey arms on the tentacles tightly grabbed it, then pulled it towards that monster.
The highly deformed limbs and nauseating organs were both affixed to a blob of flesh, the outside of which had a layer of mucus that housed several eyeballs that peered out from within.
Without much struggle, this Gluttonous Demon Ghost was pulled into the monster's body, becoming a new sacrifice.
