As the horse carriage slowly moved forward, Cade was acting as the coachman.
While sitting inside the carriage, 'Negary' was silently sensing the changes in the mana tide all across the city.
During the period when he restrained Roger, 'Negary' didn't only keep him imprisoned and had left quite a few secret measures on him.
For that reason, ever since Field took over Roger's body, his every move had been under 'Negary's' monitoring.
For so-called plans, the more steps there were, the more likely it was for there to be unexpected snags and issues during the process; that is, if they were inflexible.
'Negary' only had a single goal, that was to provide his targets a trial as well as enough pressure to make the trial challenging; as for whether or not these people could actually pass his challenge, that wasn't part of 'Negary's' concerns.
Because of this, having always had enough information in his grasp, 'Negary's' plans always ended up very successful.
Marche's information was completely grasped, the conflict between him and everyone on his side against Field was also irreconcilable, so the only thing 'Negary' needed to do was ensure that they met up. Under 'Negary's' temptations, Brewer had also surrendered himself to an Evil God, leaving nothing but a grudge towards his superior Brali who oppressed him.
Each individual within this entire scenario had an opportunity to escape from it and become 'Negary's' coachman. For example, 'Negary's' hypnotic suggestions had always been inside Brewer's mind, so if he had been able to disregard his grudge and not fully take on the power of the Evil God, he would have received 'Negary's' guidance; but very unfortunately, he couldn't.
Field was also the same. His characteristics as a spirit allowed him to clearly recognize 'Negary's' terror, but instead of facing this fear head-on, he decided to suppress it.
〖 Every individual has their own fears, but one needs to overcome and take control of those fears in order to truly achieve fearlessness. Without achieving this, Field would never be able to reach the truth about fear 〗'Negary' silently thought: 〖 Perhaps, he might even show an opening big enough for Roger to grasp and overturn 〗
Cade was a pleasant surprise, as 'Negary' had also taken his existence into consideration.
If Cade had chosen to help Marche, then he would have been able to forcefully invoke Field's potential; if Kalanci had been able to look directly at this rival of his, he would have gotten a chance to save himself as well.
Within 'Negary's' expectations, Cade was among those with the highest chance of death. Even when he had chosen to help neither side, there was a possibility of him not realizing 'Negary's' reach; and even if he had realized it, there was no guarantee that he would have made up his mind to find 'Negary'.
If Cade had not been able to reach 'Negary', then 'Negary's' spirit would have used its ability to unlock the limits of Cade's body, forcing him to uncontrollably evolve and die.
Every individual had their own limits, and within the trial posed by 'Negary', only those who could face their own limits and also overcome that limit would be able to achieve true evolution.
The golden sphere in 'Negary's' hand reached out its feelers to touch 'Negary', then activated its ability [Lord of Evolution] to guide the formation of the first Divine Embryo. The flowing mana of the mana tide were converging towards 'Negary', supplementing the energy necessary for his evolution.
While controlling the carriage, Cade sensed the mana rushing towards the carriage and felt increasingly fearful.
Sir 'Negary' is definitely not Michael; he absolutely cannot be.
Cade was forcing his heart to calm down. If he didn't have a habit of collecting information since a long time ago; if he hadn't suppressed his previously accumulated emotions and instead vented it; if he didn't believe in his instincts; he would most likely have already died.
At this moment, Cade already treated 'Negary' like an Evil God that descended upon Michael's body.
As the horse carriage approached the center of the mana tide, chaos was growing increasingly common, and Cade understood that his next test had arrived.
Cade was more powerful than Kalanci, but he had only learnt about half of Marche's blood magic, the rest of his spells were either things he collected over the years or researched and created himself.
As a slightly above average mage, he would have been fine simply staying near the outer ring of the mana tide to collect a bit of mana, but as he approached the center of the tide closer and closer, the intense mana flow would cause his internal mana to riot. If he couldn't calm this riot, all of his mana would be stripped from his body by the flow, while his body itself would be ripped apart bit by bit by the pull of the mana.
Furthermore, the environment wasn't the only danger, as the closer he approached the center, the clearer the competition could be seen.
There were only so many people who participated in the Mana Banquet: members of the House of Mages, leaders of various Mysticism organizations would also be invited, as well as a few independent Mystics who obtained their quota one way or another.
There were also those who had a quota but had no intentions of going like Marche. They had their own plans, so they didn't want to risk it by heading into the center.
It must be said, the harvest one could obtain at the center of the mana tide was considerable, but similarly, one moment of lost focus could mean being turned into someone else's harvest.
For example, as Cade tried to calm his increasingly chaotic mana, he noticed that the horses pulling his carriage were becoming abnormal.
The muscles of the two large brown horses were beginning to twitch while the carriage itself shook unceasingly.
Fhooo
Fhoo…
The two horses' heavy breathing was becoming increasingly louder, their muscles were abnormally bulging, causing their leg muscles to swell so much that they burst. The bursting flesh caused blood to spill, the abrupt pain caused the horses to feel startled, and the swollen muscles caused them to suddenly slow down while also staggered as they tried to run.
Cade tried everything he could to take control of the horses through the reins, but if he didn't come up with a solution soon, the carriage would surely tilt and fall on its side. The swollen horse muscles had already made him lose control of the carriage's speed, so if the carriage tilted over right now, Cade would die from the fall even without interference by magic.
He could easily resolve these issues by using magic, but Cade didn't have the courage to do such a thing. His internal mana was already rioting, so casting even a simple spell right now would mean that he had a death wish.
Cade was still hoping that 'Negary' would aid him, but he then noticed that regardless of how dangerous things were outside, 'Negary' was sitting firmly inside the carriage, reading a book without paying even a bit of attention to Cade.
In an instant, Cade had already been pushed into a corner, he was starting to regret his decision, suspecting whether or not his decision to pledge his allegiance to 'Negary' was the correct one.
If I abandon the horse carriage right now and flee, I can jump down from here into the garbage bin, while I might get heavily injured, I would at least be able to stay alive.
Cade's eyes became focused on a garbage bin on the side of the street. The bin was made of regular wood, currently filled with trash, so it would be able to break his fall. Suddenly, abandoning the horse carriage to flee had become his most appropriate choice.
Cade's instincts just happened to lose their effects right at this moment, neglecting to tell him the correct choice.
Listening to the sound of 'Negary' flipping through his book, Cade clenched his teeth tightly and prepared to abandon the carriage. At that very moment, he suddenly noticed what the horses' abnormalities were: they had bloodshot eyes, bulging veins, even their members had gotten fully erect, their mouths were drooling with a brownish liquid; all of which were the unique symptoms of overdosing on Strengthening Serum.
Strengthening Serum was, as its name implied, a type of serum that could greatly boost the human body's strength. Normally, it would only stimulate muscles to achieve a temporary steroid effect, but if it was used in large amounts, the user would become rapidly sick and could even result in sudden death.
With a bit of thinking, Cade understood why the horses went out of control. Someone had doused this entire street in Strengthening Serum so that when the mana tide washed over, it would activate the serum then greatly magnify its effects. When the horses travelled through this road, their bodies had absorbed the activated serum through breathing.
The reason why Cade didn't notice this before was that his body didn't undergo any changes at all. If the horses had inhaled the serum and turned abnormal, he should have also inhaled the serum and experienced the same thing as well. However, the fact that his body was still normal proved that 'Negary' hadn't given up on him, at least not yet.
Having understood this, Cade rubbed the reins over his hand with considerable force, causing him to start bleeding, his blood that was infused with mana swiftly affected the horses through the reins.
There was a very easy way to dispel the effects of this serum. Most serums that could affect the body through breathing usually acted the same way that oxygen did, which became mixed into the bloodstream. In which case, bloodletting through the swollen muscles was the easiest solution.
Before long, horse blood had splattered all over the road.
