Mystery: Gray Walker

Chapter 87 The Power of Gray Mist from Ancient Times

Although Clarice had tried her best to find the opponent's weakness, she still failed.

Green's bullets did not have the effect Clarice had imagined.

Marianne's anger, however, exceeded Clarice's worst expectations. Or rather, her instinctive reaction overwhelmed everything.

At the very moment Clarice gave the command and scattered the powder, the countless vines that surrounded her did not hesitate for a second because of the interference.

They suddenly closed together with several times the speed and force of before!

Several sharp-tipped vines pierced Clarice's limbs and shoulder blades from different directions in an instant, pinning her firmly to the wall!

Excruciating pain swept over her entire body, and blood instantly soaked through her clothes.

Clarice groaned, her face pale, but she gritted her teeth and didn't utter a single cry of pain.

"Calculation? Planning? Before the will of the 'Mother,' your wisdom is as insignificant as dust."

More vines coiled around her, tightening around Clarice's body, slowly 'plucking' her from the wall, lifting her into the air, facing the tree trunk.

"You will live to see how your companions die in despair, to see me complete my final ascension... and then you will become my nourishment, your knowledge and soul will become a part of me. This is... the ultimate destination of knowledge."

Clarice was suspended in mid-air, blood dripping down her face.

Suddenly, the trunk of the "Tree of Desire" in the center of the room began to rumble like a drum.

Mariana let out a long moan of extreme pain and pleasure as her body began to separate further from the tree trunk, her feet gently touching the ground.

She stopped looking at Clarice and instead tiptoed toward Green.

Her graceful figure kept swaying in front of Green's eyes. The fact that this Sequence 9 apprentice could escape her grasp aroused a sense of curiosity and... anger.

"Am I beautiful?" She stood in front of Green, her fingers gently hooking Green's chin.

Green closed his eyes, refusing to look at the body that exuded an aura of blasphemy.

He could feel the throbbing of the blood vessels under his skin, an instinct screaming for escape, but reason told him to suppress any reaction, whether it was fear, disgust, or that damned, forcibly aroused desire.

They will only hasten their own demise.

"Why did you run away? And if you ran away... why did you come back?" Mariana continued to ask, gently raising her fingers to trace the outline of his face in the air.

Wherever the fingertips passed, the air distorted slightly, leaving behind a sweet, spiritual trail.

Green knew he was doomed.

The Mariana before him was beyond his comprehension...

No, it should be beyond everyone's comprehension. Faced with such an existence, one's own struggles seem so ridiculous.

Even Clarice's painstaking calculations and sacrifices only resulted in her being nailed to the ground and left to die.

He took a deep breath, his lungs burning with pain.

He released his grip, and the empty revolver clattered to the ground.

Then, his left hand instinctively pressed against his chest, and through his clothes, he could feel a cold, hard brooch.

He had "stolen" it from Henry's safe. That strange ornament with its eyes closed and of unknown material.

There were no other weapons, and no time to think.

Without a plan, without a chance of winning, even his pitiful spirituality was nearly exhausted under the oppression of pollution.

But... it's better than just waiting to die, right?

"Why did you come back?"

Green's eyes snapped open, bloodshot and burning with an almost manic calm. "Because there are people here I want to protect! Because you... took my family away!"

His gaze passed over Marianne and landed on Clarice, who was pierced by vines, suspended in mid-air, covered in blood, yet still clenching her teeth.

"I don't care whether I live or die... but I want you dead!"

He abruptly ripped off the brooch from his chest, making a move that seemed utterly foolish to Marianne, but which made Clarice's heart stop.

The sharp pin suddenly pierced Marianna in front of her.

"Foolish human." Mariana stood still, looking at him with a sneer.

Suddenly, she had a strange feeling. The tiny brooch seemed to carry a chill that sent shivers down her spine, and even more eerily, she seemed to have lost the will to avoid it...

No, it's not a loss, but rather being temporarily "fooled" by some higher-level "rules".

She watched helplessly as the brooch with the closed-eye relief pierced the skin of her chest with a sharp pin.

There was no resistance.

No blood was flowing out.

There was no pain at all.

It was as if what was pierced was merely a void, an illusion.

A flicker of surprise crossed Mariana's eyes, but it quickly turned into undisguised mockery.

Her red lips parted slightly, just as she was about to mock the other person's ignorance—

The next second, something unexpected happened.

Around the pierced skin, an almost imperceptible gray line appeared and spread instantly.

Mariana's mockery froze instantly, twisting into utter horror.

She felt a cold, lifeless force, seemingly capable of annihilating all 'vitality' and 'desire,' surging wildly into her body, starting from that insignificant pinhole!

This power clashed most fundamentally and violently with the filthy divine power bestowed by the "Mother Tree of Desire," which was full of restless life and the impulse to reproduce!

It wasn't an explosion, it wasn't a fire, but... "erasure".

"Ugh... Ahhhhhhh!!!"

A scream that defied description, as if the soul were being torn apart inch by inch, erupted from the depths of Marianna's throat!

This scream was no longer the sound of humans or any other creature; it was a mixture of the creaking of trees breaking, the sizzling of flesh melting, and the final, synchronized wails of countless souls sinking into despair!

Her beautiful, naked body trembled violently, and instead of blood or sap seeping from her skin, a thin but solid and persistent gray mist seeped out!

The mist carried an ancient desolation and silence; wherever it passed, the dark red veins on her body quickly faded and disappeared, and her eerily fair skin turned ashen.

Even more terrifying is her connection to the "Tree of Desire" behind her.

The filaments connecting her back to the tree trunk, like spider silk thrown into a flame, silently broke and vaporized under the erosion of the gray fog.

The tree trunk itself groaned in pain.

Starting from the spot where Mariana was stabbed, a gray, 'dead' area is rapidly spreading across the surface of the tree trunk.

Wherever it passed, the bark peeled off, the flesh inside quickly dried and weathered, and the bulging tumors and profane organs withered and collapsed in patches, turning into gray dust that fell in rustling sounds.

"Mother..." Mariana stretched out her hand, which was covered with gray cracks, and grasped at the void in vain. The dark green vortex in her eyes spun wildly, but was constantly invaded and diluted by the gray mist, filled with fear and confusion.

"What is this... what kind of power is this?! No—!!!"

Her screams stopped abruptly.

Because the gray fog had spread to her face.

Her delicate features blurred and melted in the gray fog, like a pencil drawing erased by an eraser.

The last thing remaining was those eyes; the dark green vortex had completely collapsed, leaving only two empty holes being filled with gray mist, reflecting Green's equally shocked face, which was so close to him.

Then, her entire being, along with the massive, collapsing "Tree of Desire" behind her, began to silently crumble and dissipate like a sandcastle from the point where the brooch had pierced her.

The increasingly dense gray mist, seemingly capable of absorbing all sound and light, rose and spread in place, gently and thoroughly 'erasing' all traces of Marianne's existence, along with the evil tree and the remains of Viscount Linus on the tree that had not yet been completely devoured.

The whole process took only two or three seconds.

In the center of the room, only a slowly rotating, fading gray mist balloon remained, along with scattered, lifeless wood chips and ashes.

Clarice, with vines piercing her limbs and pinning her in mid-air, fell heavily to the ground when her support suddenly disappeared.

The excruciating pain made her vision go black, but she endured it and didn't faint. Her eyes were fixed on the dissipating gray mist and the young man standing stiffly in front of it, still holding that strange brooch in his hand—Green.

What kind of power is that? It can instantly annihilate Sequence 5... no, it might even be a fully 'resurrected' Marianna...

What exactly is that brooch?

This is an effect that ordinary sealing artifacts can never achieve!

This involves... involves a higher level of concept!

Most importantly, Grimm used this power and is still alive...

Green stood frozen in place.

The brooch in my hand still felt cold to the touch, but the original closed-eye relief on the brooch had now been replaced with an open-eye relief without eye sockets.

He...killed Mariana?

With a pin?

No, he didn't kill him.

It's this brooch...it's the one on the back of the brooch...

He had suspected that the brooch might not be an ordinary object, but he never imagined it possessed such indescribable power.

Green suddenly remembered the bas-relief with closed eyes on the brooch, the moment it "opened its eyes," and the fleeting sigh that seemed to come from an endless distance that flashed through his mind.

The threads of fate have tightened another link.