The Deceitful One



Sunday, 18th October 1582.

In the dark of the night, Bryan jumped from the rooftop of one building to another as he sprint at his highest speed. Dressed in all black, he appeared to be a specter and it was difficult to see his true body because of how fast he was moving.

Tonight, he was going to raid one of the Holy Blood Sect's bases on the outskirts of Nadir. After having invaded the dreams of a few of their members in the past, he knew the location of two of their bases, and currently, he was on his way to visit one.

Naturally, he had worn the face of one of the Blood Path Transcendents whom he had previously killed. The base he was going to, mostly had Apprentices, Rank 1, and Rank 2 Blood Path Transcendents. And through his interrogation in the dream, he knew that there was one Rank 3 Transcendent as well, who acted as the warden.

However, he wasn't worried about it. He could go toe to toe with a Rank 3 Transcendent and come out victorious. However, if said Transcendent also knew the forbidden technique that Ron had displayed in his final moments, then that would spell trouble. That would effectively force upgrade the enemy to Rank 4!

Hence, he decided to first take out the Rank 3 Transcendent, before he had the chance to use the forbidden technique, and after that, slaughter all the remaining people in the base.

There were two reasons why he was invading the Holy Blood Sect's base. First, it was naturally because of his pure hatred for them. And second, and most importantly, it was because, at the last gathering, he had heard that this evil organization was planning something nefarious in the Belize Kingdom.

The Central Continent also seemed to be in the mix, from what he'd heard. Thus, he decided to investigate things for himself. After all, he couldn't always be passive. Besides, if he found some valuable intel, perhaps he could trade it with Solomon at the next Illuminatos gathering.

But he highly doubted that Solomon wouldn't know about whatever intel he could possibly find. Bryan believed that the founding emperor definitely had ears and eyes in all nooks and crannies of the continent.

About ten minutes later, he had finally reached his destination, which just so happened to be a hospital. When Bryan looked at this tall building, he couldn't help but click his tongue in annoyance. "What a smart way to maintain a constant supply of fresh blood."

The hospital was just the front, to say the least. The real base was situated underground. Thus, Bryan casually walked inside the hospital. He was wearing the face of one of the members of the organization, hence, he didn't have to worry about hiding and whatnot.

He straight away went toward the administrative area and took an elevator down to the lowest floor.

After exiting the floor, he found that the entire base was inside a large cavern. In one part, there were members meditating, in other parts they were practicing magic spells or carrying out drills.

Bryan looked around and then his eyes fell on a certain part of the cavern that was filled with dozens of cages. Inside these cages, there were prisoners of all ages—from a child of less than ten years old, all the way to an aged man.

When he saw this, his eyes narrowed. He noticed that all the prisoners seemed to be in extremely good health, unlike any prisoners he had ever seen. He speculated that these people were the organization members' supply of fresh blood and hence, needed to be kept in good health.

He only stared at them for a few moments and then finally made his way toward the room where the Rank 3 Transcendent, who was also the warden of the base, was meditating. All this information, he was naturally able to glean through the dream of the person whose face he was wearing.

After reaching the meditation room, he took a few deep breaths and then barged inside. He looked at the shadowy figure who was meditating in a lotus position in the center of the room, amidst the darkness, and screamed in panic, "Master! Master! There's been an att—"

However, before Bryan could even finish his sentence, the shadowy figure disappeared from his spot and viciously pounced at him. His palm had already turned into a Blood Claw as he used it to ruthlessly grab Bryan's head and pin him down.

The Rank 3 Transcendent roared, "How dare you barge into my room!" He was outraged that this member of the organization would so blatantly disrespect the chain of command. Not to mention, disturbing while someone was deep in meditation was very harmful to that person.

Any slight distraction would affect the carving of the mind runes. But fortunately, the warden had managed to not harm his soul.

Bryan, whose face was now firmly in the grasp of the warden's blood claw, struggled to speak. His eyes widened in horror. He hadn't expected the warden to immediately attack him.

The warden's eyes suddenly narrowed as he coldly muttered, "For your transgression, I have full authority over the punishment you will receive… and that will be death."

A ruthless light shone in the warden's eyes as he viciously clenched his claw. The next moment, Bryan's head exploded like a watermelon. Blood, bones, and gray matter splashing in all directions, including the warden's.

The Rank 3 warden looked at Bryan's twitching body and harrumphed. "This is what you fucking des—" However, this time, before he could finish his sentence, a silver claw appeared from in front of him and viciously grabbed his face, just like how he'd grabbed Bryan's earlier.

Alarmed, he looked in front and saw the same person that he'd just killed looking at him with a mischievous smirk. Horrified, he looked down and saw that there was no one.

It was an illusion!

Bryan—the real Bryan—looked at him with a smirk and finished what the warden was about to say earlier. "This is what you fucking deserve." The next moment, he cruelly smashed the warden's lower jaw with his silver claw.

Following that, he stabbed him in the chest with his other claw and yanked his heart out. The warden looked at everything happen in horror. Firstly, Bryan was too quick for him to even make a move. Secondly, he was rendered frozen by the malicious and tyrannical aura that Bryan emanated.

Without waiting a moment longer, Bryan stuffed the warden's heart right inside his broken jaw. He then tightly grabbed the warden's head with both claws and squeezed it to a pulp, along with the heart. Within ten seconds, Bryan had killed a mighty Rank 3 Transcendent!

Of course, all of this was only possible because he had used the art of deceit. If he were to fight the warden head-on, his chances of killing him wouldn't be more than fifty percent. But why would Bryan fight head-on in the first place, when he could just deceive his opponent?

Bryan looked at the still-twitching, lifeless corpse of the warden and sighed. Although the battle was over in a matter of seconds, a lot went on behind the scene. If the timing of his illusion and attack was even a second late, the outcome would be vastly different.

He wiped his hands of the blood and flesh and the next moment, small silver tendrils protruded from his face and began to twist and contort it. In but a few moments, Bryan's face structure had changed once again. This time, he was wearing the face of none other than the warden.

After removing all traces of blood from his clothes, he took a deep breath, calmed himself down, and exited the meditation room. He then loudly instructed, "Everyone, gather in front of me. There is an important announcement to make."

At once, all the people in the base—except the prisoners, of course—gathered in front of Bryan. They stood in terms of hierarchy and rankings. At the forefront were a handful of Rank 2s, then about a dozen Rank 1s, and finally, scores of Apprentices.

After everyone had gathered in front of him in a proper file, Bryan couldn't help but admire their discipline for a second. They really moved and acted as if they were in the military. He then silently looked at every single one of them, trying to come up with a strategy to kill all of them in a short period of time.

One of the Rank 2s standing at the front, gathered his courage and nervously asked, "M-Master, what is the announcement you wish to make?"

Bryan didn't reply, instead, his red pupils took the shade of pitch black and began to swirl. The people standing at the front were instantly sent into a daze, but they weren't the target of Bryan's illusions.

A few seconds later, there was an uproar amongst the Apprentices standing at the back. When the people at the front turned around to look, they were shocked to find that the Apprentices had begun fighting and killing each other, their faces full of panic and fear.

One by one, Apprentices began falling to their deaths. Bryan had put all the Apprentices inside a mass illusion. All they could now see was their biggest fear being manifested into reality, the person right next to them taking the shape of their worst nightmares.

That was the reason why they had begun killing each other out of sheer fear. Some of the Rank 1 Transcendents stepped in to stop this, however, the Apprentices began to attack them as well.

While, everyone was busy looking at or stopping the chaos that was ensuing, Bryan had already transformed into a dream creature. An additional pair of hands emerged and four tendrils protruded from his back.

ROAARR!!

He let out a primal roar and viciously attacked the Rank 2s standing in front of him who had their attention at the fight happening in the back. And just like that, a brutal massacre had begun.