The speed at which his enormous maw opened and closed had slowed, and his fangs had dulled. Some had shattered while chewing the shadow tentacles, their broken stumps still draped with black mist.
Half of his tiny scarlet eyes had already closed—not from sleepiness, but because they had gone blind.
The eyes corroded by ghostly energy had formed a layer of black ice crystals over their surfaces. Once those crystals shattered, there was nothing left inside.
By the third day, both sides had reached their limits.
Morko's mist body had dwindled to the size of a house. The translucent gray-black mist was so thin that every bone within could be seen.
Only the last wisp of ghostly green fire remained in his eye sockets, like a dying candle in the wind, ready to go out at any moment.
Kloz's mass of flesh had stiffened, not because it had been frozen by ghostly energy, but because he had gone too long without food.
His gluttonous instinct remained, but his stomach was empty—so empty that its walls had pressed together, unable even to secrete gastric acid.
At dusk on the third day.
The light over the Living Flesh Plain had completely turned gray-black.
It was a murky color somewhere between dark red and gray, like dirty water used to wash paintbrushes.
The gray mist and dark red light intertwined, impossible to tell apart.
The layer of living flesh on the ground had been turned completely over, exposing the soil beneath. The soil was gray-black as well, the color of something soaked through with ghostly energy.
The battlefield was littered with wreckage. Not a single intact corpse remained, nor a single soldier capable of standing. Only Morko and Kloz were left.
Morko knew this was his chance for a final strike.
There was