Watching Huai Shi crunch up the chronic ailment and wounds that had plagued Decay for who knew how many years like a midnight snack, Decay's eyes went wide.
Literally wide.
After hearing that dog-barking explanation, he instead fell into numbness.
But soon, after the giant eye on the ground twitched slightly, a fissure actually appeared. Flesh blooming open like a lotus rapidly decayed and dissolved, and from within it, a hunched figure slowly crawled out.
Like a dark green big-headed doll, blood still poured from the incomplete gaping hole in his chest. He raised his head, opened his mouth, and took a deep breath of the outside air for the first time in seventy or eighty years.
"At last... I can come out..."
Decay sighed, barely able to move.
???
The Ruler's sudden transformation had already made Huai Shi's jaw drop. What kind of hellish transformation was this? You could do that?
Or had this guy been piloting a mech inside all along?
"What's with the fuss? It's only the Rite of Metamorphosis."
Seeing Huai Shi also wearing a shocked expression as if he had seen a ghost, a trace of pride and mockery appeared on Decay's face. But when he felt the lingering pain in his chest, his smile vanished before it could fully form.
Back then, he had worked like a mule for who knew how long in the Obscure Eye before gathering enough materials for the Rite of Metamorphosis. He fused with the remains of another Ruler, advanced into a Ruler himself, and gained two different bodies from then on.
He had thought his life had finally reached its peak, but before he could enjoy it for long, some bastard dragged him headfirst into a pit, where he was struck by lightning. To suppress his injuries, he