Chapter 39: Still Luck?

Chapter 39: Chapter 39: Still Luck?

Seeing that his presence had already been exposed, Aegon did not bother hiding any longer.

?"I had no intention of intruding, Lady Everlight. I was merely passing through on my way to the deeper gorge. Seeing that you were in the middle of harvesting your points, I thought it best not to disturb you."

?Aria lowered her slender silver conduct-wand, while the constellation-engraved pages of her Grimoire chiming softly as it hovered beside her shoulder.

Up close, her crystal-blue eyes seemed to hold the reflection of a quiet night sky.

?"Passing through? To walk straight into the inner zone without a single scratch on your clothes or a drop of sweat on your brow, it seems the first-place scholar of the written exam is just as skilled with a blade as he is with a quill."

?Aegon glanced briefly up at the canopy. Unlike the outer ring of the forest, the dense silver mist blanketing this sunken glade carried a natural magnetic interference that blinded the Scrying Beetles hovering high above the treetops. Even so, he kept his left cloak draped carefully over the hilt of the Flame Sword at his waist.

Then, he replied coolly:

?"The written test only required a bit of reading. As for the forest, the outer perimeter was too crowded. Coming here was simply the fastest way to secure enough points to pass."

Aria raised a skeptical brow,

?"And what about Pillar 415? You have the same aptitude talent as me. Gold Tier. Maybe even better, I can tell you were still hiding."

?Aegon’s expression did not change.

?"As expected of the Grand Duchy’s Oracle.While ninety-nine thousand people were blinded by the crimson light, she was watching the runic resonance at the very top of the tower."

?"You overestimate me, Lady Everlight. My Blood Berserker Grimoire is just volatile."

?Aria frowned,

?"Strange...My Astral Sovereign Grimoire allows me to perceive the threads of causality around every living soul within ten paces. Even that feral boy with the black miasma in the western ravine has a clear, albeit twisted trajectory of fate. But when I look at you, Aegon Noiré, there is nothing there. It is as if you do not belong to this world at all."

?After hearing all these, Aegon seeemed calm. But only he knew he was sweating on the inside.

?In his original novel, Aria Everlight’s innate ability, the Eyes of the Astra, allowed her to glimpse fragments of the future and read a person’s destined potential. Because Aegon had transmigrated into a character who was originally supposed to die in bed at age ten, and now carried the primordial Grimoire of Creation inside his soul, his entire existence was a blank void to her divination.

?Before Aegon could offer a reply—

?BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!

?With loud booming sounds, the silver mist at the northern and southern edges of the clearing suddenly parted as though struck by a hurricane.

?Drawn by the shattered core resonance of the fallen automaton, two more five-meter-tall Giant Puppets came crashing through the ancient ironwood trees. One wielded a pair of serrated cleavers the size of barn doors, while the other carried a tower shield and a spiked iron mace that hummed with compressed earth runes.

?Unlike the ordinary ten-point dolls in the outer forest, these inner-zone guardians were forged with triple-layered meteoric iron and possessed combat power rivaling a peak Mid-Tier Knight.

?ROOOAR!

?A metallic screech echoed from the runes inside their horned helmets as their crimson eyes locked onto the two children standing in the center of the glade.

?Aria did not even look back at the giant charging toward her from the north. Raising her silver conduct-wand, she kept her crystal-blue eyes fixed on Aegon.

?"Since you claim your power is merely for self-preservation, Aegon Noiré, why don’t we test that theory? One each. Let us see whose blade is faster." Aria challenged.

?"Fine by me," Aegon replied calmly. "Sixty points is sixty points."

He had no intention of hiding anyway.

?At that exact instant, the two five-meter juggernauts launched themselves across the clearing like runaway siege engines.

?To the north, the pages of Aria’s Grimoire flipped rapidly as a dazzling array of compressed starlight condensed at the tip of her wand, bypassing the forest’s dampening field through pure astral density.

?To the south, the Giant Puppet wielding the tower shield and spiked mace reached Aegon in three thundering strides.

After raising its massive iron mace high above its head, the colossus brought the two-ton weapon smashing straight down toward Aegon’s skull with enough force to pulverize a boulder into dust.

?WHOOSH!

?The wind pressure alone flattened the tall ferns for ten meters around them.

?Aegon did not dodge backward. Instead, a faint crimson glow surged through his veins as he activated his F-Rank spell, [ Blood Rage ].

?Instantly, his already monstrous physical attributes increased by another 30%, pushing his Strength, Vitality, and Speed past the threshold of 50.

?As the gigantic spiked mace descended inches above his hair, Aegon blurred forward like a bolt of dark lightning. Instead of striking the impenetrable meteoric iron of the tower shield, he stepped straight onto the falling head of the spiked mace itself, using the giant’s own momentum as a springboard to launch himself three meters into the air.

?Shing!

?In midair, the Flame Sword left its crimson scabbard.

?To destroy a Giant Puppet, ordinary examinees had to spend half an hour chipping away at its thick chest armor with a full team.

?Aegon, however, knew that when Grandmaster Gorden designed the Giant Puppet series, the massive weight of the torso required an exhaust vent right beneath the collar plate where the neck met the left collarbone.

?Passing right past the puppet’s horned face mask, Aegon twisted his torso in midair and drove the burning tip of the Flame Sword straight down into the two-inch exhaust gap at the base of its neck.

?CLANG—BOOM!

?Compressed scarlet fire flooded directly into the giant’s central furnace.

For half a second, the five-meter colossus froze stiff, flames erupting from its eye slits and joints before its internal sixty-point core detonated from within.

?As Aegon landed lightly on the moss behind the crumbling metal giant, a chime rang out simultaneously from the northern side of the glade, where Aria’s second Giant Puppet collapsed into neat pieces covered in silver frost.

?Ding!

?[ Giant Combat Puppet Destroyed. +60 Points Acquired. ]

[ Current Score: 150 Points. ]

?Across the clearing, Aria lowered her wand and looked at the smoking colossus behind Aegon, which had been taken down in a pinpoint strike to its most hidden structural flaw.

?"See, just one strike straight through the primary furnace vent...Do you still intend to call that luck, Aegon Noiré?"

At her question, Aegon let out an exhausted sigh.