Layton knelt amid the ruins, the remaining half of his chest still working in vain as scattered sparks burst from severed wiring.
His blood-red searchlight eyes had dimmed considerably, flickering as he looked at Qi Wu. A smile squeezed out between his metal fangs, twisted and savage, carrying the peculiar madness of someone on the brink of death.
"Miracles?" His voice rasped out through his shattered vocal cords.
"That's the word you humans love most when you lie to yourselves. Miracles, hope, the future. You dress all your weakness up in those pretty words, then tell yourselves there's meaning in holding on."
He coughed. A puff of black smoke sprayed from his severed wiring, and gray-white mist seeped from the cracks in his chest.
"But look at this world, Qi Wu. Spiritual energy revival, demon invasions, humanity's defensive lines shrinking by the day, its strongest dying one after another. Kill me today, and stronger demons will come tomorrow. Kill tomorrow's, and more will come the day after. Can you kill them all? You can't."
He raised his head, his dying eyes fixed on Qi Wu like two guttering lamps swaying in the wind.
"Human bodies are too frail. They age, fall ill, and die. A genius like you comes along once in ten thousand years, but so what? Sooner or later, you'll die of old age, turn to ash, and be forgotten by those who come after you. Demons are different. They resonate with the tides of spiritual energy. As long as spiritual energy doesn't run dry, they won't die. They're endless, inexhaustible, pouring out of the abyss of another world like the tide, wave after wave, without ever stopping."
His voice suddenly rose, filled with the fervor of a dying man delivering his final judgment.
"This world will belong