The sudden voice startled all five young hunters into surging their magic power. The Black Tortoise Array, the strongest defensive formation among the Four Symbols Array, unfurled in an instant. In the blink of an eye, a huge turtle with its head and limbs drawn in appeared in this black-and-white world.
It stared ahead with pitch-black eyes.
At the towering figure seated on the lofty throne.
Compared with its earlier indistinct appearance, its outline had become clearer, as had the clatter of sliding chains. Only its features remained impossible to make out.
The Black Tortoise "could see only a mass of blackness deeper than night, slowly revolving beneath that broad hood."
"Death is a faceless shadow, hidden beneath a robe called darkness. This shadow is everywhere. When you see him, he sees you, too."
The Diviner's voice sounded in the other hunters' ears, tinged with wonder. "Those words were notes left in a manuscript called On Death by a follower of one of the great beings in the Deep Starry Sky—I've always thought they were exquisite. Now it seems my instincts were right."
"Wasn't he lured away by the Black Gem?" Fatty Xin paid no attention to the Diviner's reflections, looking uneasily toward the indistinct, towering figure in the distance.
"Didn't Doctor just say he already had something of a Grand Wizard's bearing?"
Zhang Jixin stood at the very front with his arms folded and clicked his tongue. "A prospective Grand Wizard can split off a sliver of consciousness that's no different from an Ordinary Wizard—what's so strange about him saying a few words to us?"
"He didn't seem hostile when he spoke?"
Dylan coughed twice, then added weakly, "I'm short on blood and vitality right now, so I'm more sensitive to malice—I didn't sense any threat in his words