380: I Am Perfection!

The evil god was entering its second phase.

Ian wasn't surprised by this.

Before transmigrating, he had occasionally played video games. Afterward, he had also enjoyed using magic to design tabletop games, so he knew full well that bosses often had a second phase.

After years of struggling through virtual worlds, he had long understood an unshakable piece of "common knowledge"—whenever one encountered a BOSS, there was a good chance it had a hidden second phase. In games, a BOSS might still show some discernible patterns in its first phase, but once its health dropped to the bottom, its entire style would abruptly change, its skills would upgrade, and the difficulty would soar.

This gaming experience, accumulated over a long period, had deeply imprinted itself upon players' cognitive frameworks. When players projected such game-based understanding onto real life, it formed a unique perspective—major challenges or "BOSSES" encountered in reality might very well have a "second phase" similar to those in games.

Yes.

It was perfectly reasonable for similar situations to occur in reality. After all, everyone knew that fantasy came from reality. By that logic, the fantasy setting of bosses having a second phase must surely have come from reality as well.

Mm.

Nothing wrong with that.

"Do you see it, wizard?" Countless mouths opened and closed in unison. "This is evolution! This is perfection! With every soul I absorb, I draw closer to my ultimate form!"

With that blasphemous declaration, the evil god's remaining shell—

The phantom formed from light and darkness, blood and gold—collapsed inward with a thunderous roar. Immediately afterward, an indescribable stench spread through the air, a nauseating blend of rich putrefaction, sickly sweetness, and metallic rust.

Face after face emerged across the same torso at once, while its voice became a torrent formed from the