Damned Healer-Chapter 523: Empty Threats

Darian and the twins stepped back into the center of the area. In that instant, Darian turned and exchanged a silent look with Camille. She quietly nodded and clenched her fists.

Between the stone plates that made up the center of the arena, a small and almost imperceptible root appeared under Darian's foot. It touched his leg, starting to release a powerful fluctuation; but Darian activated his domain, controlling it as much as possible.

A few meters away, Lucy and Lucius went through the same thing. But unlike Darian, they had a heart of nature inside their bodies.

Everything happened within three seconds after they returned, and then Darian's indifferent voice echoed:

"Continue the execution."

The arena was in complete silence. Camille turned to the executioners and ordered.

Inside the black cage, Mallory had never felt so terrified and enraged in her life. Before, she had somewhat accepted that she would die; but when the judgment began, because of her anger and desire to live, she talked back against the accusations — even though she knew that would hardly do anything.

After her son showed up, and she saw the incredible power he released, her whole being was filled with hope and joy. But now… the shock of knowing she would really die was unbearable.

Her face twisted. Her gaze locked onto the sky; she couldn't see anything up there, but that was where she last saw her son.

When the executioners acted, a terrible pain returned, as if her body was being pierced from the inside out. Even though it hurt a lot, it wasn't something impossible to endure.

Her eyes trembled, her gaze and last bits of strength still fully focused on the heavens.

'My boy is still there. He's definitely watching me… he's going to save me…' Her mind repeated those words full of hope.

High above, Vanh was indeed staring down at the ground, watching everything happen, completely frozen.

He clenched his fists, and blood started dripping. When he was about to move…

"Do you feel anger? Do you feel pain? Do you feel this is unfair and that you don't deserve it?" Darian's calm voice echoed through the arena, reaching both Mallory and Vanh in the sky.

"Remember your brother, when he was tied up and tortured to death by his own sister. Imagine what he felt in that moment… imagine what all the people you destroyed, directly or indirectly, felt. Can you? Of course not, right? You should be happy, after all, you were blessed with a quick death."

Darian's words struck her like lightning. At the same time, Vanh stopped where he was and didn't dare move… despite the sadness he felt, he had no right to intervene. His mother was reaping what she sowed. Even so… the pain in his chest was indescribable.

Darian sensed Vanh above, stopping and choosing not to act. Internally, he sighed, genuinely surprised. That idiotic Young Master from before, the one he beat up and humiliated as much as possible in that tournament… had really changed for the better.

He knew no one was truly evil; they only became that way after letting themselves be tainted by the world. But the Law of Karma was relentless, and after suffering the same evil they caused, everyone ended up changing. As for Vanh, he had been lucky enough to get tainted and still change within a single life. 𝗳𝚛𝗲𝕖𝕨𝕖𝗯𝚗𝚘𝕧𝕖𝗹.𝗰𝗼𝕞

Barely ten seconds passed after the execution resumed.

That method was called the collapse of life; created to avoid great suffering and kill the person in an instant, after a little more than two minutes.

That was the time the executioners needed to stabilize the technique inside the target's body. When the time ran out, the person would faint, then their life force would flow out of their body, gently killing them.

*BUZZ!*

Suddenly, the skies above the arena hummed, and an intense golden glow covered everything.

Everyone looked up seriously. At the center of it, two figures appeared with mocking expressions.

"Playtime is over." The bulky man roared.

Camille and everyone in the arena narrowed their eyes; an extreme fury burned in their chests. These people had no shame at all. Even those who considered themselves powerful and above everyone else on Earth wouldn't do something at this level.

"We'll give you thirty seconds to open the cage and return her… or we'll take her by force. And as compensation, we'll destroy your entire continent. How's that?" The bulky man's malicious voice echoed loudly.

"The Wube family is really surpassing themselves today," the calm voice sounded. Everyone turned to Darian, who was staring at the sky, "You were the ones who proposed that fifteen-minute rule, and it was even said that whoever wins takes everything."

"Fuck you, bastard." The tall man retorted coldly.

"That earlier thing was something from heir Vanh, not from the whole family. Now we're acting for the family's honor. Who do you think you are to judge our matriarch unilaterally? Your evidence is worthless, and in the name of justice, we'll take her back. Even if it's by force."

The whole arena stared firmly at Darian, fists clenched in indignation. No one was dumb enough to think everything Camille showed was fabricated. She even brought evidence from other planets, which could be easily verified.

Darian just snorted with indifference, "Big, ridiculous words, pretty typical of that pathetic family. Well, I don't like wasting time, you don't need to wait. Come if you've got the guts, I promise that'll be the last thing you do in your lives."

"Hahahahaha…"

Suddenly, both of them burst out laughing loudly, even holding their stomachs.

He threatened to kill them right here and now? They had just fought the three of them, and both had a good idea of the strength they possessed. Even if they had hidden their biggest cards, at most, with luck, they could deal a slightly heavier wound.

Up in the sky, Vanh had a tense and painful expression. He couldn't stop them; in terms of strength, he was slightly stronger than the two. In terms of status, he was still just the family heir. If his father ordered them to take his mother at all costs, he could only accept it.

"Great, if you want so badly to die and take everyone with you, we'll help."

The laughter stopped, replaced by an excited aura. They would take revenge for that earlier humiliation, erasing everything for good.

The two drew their weapons, and then the entire continent began to tremble.

They were a few hundred meters in the air. Without hesitation, the two shot down like golden bolts toward the arena.

Darian had a smirk at the corner of his mouth. These idiots were, without a doubt, talented and had reached their current level by merit, but… they lived their whole lives being trained only to fight and obey orders. That had a price, turning them into ridiculous people.

"How dare you!" Camille roared with all her power.

At the same time, Lucius and Lucy roared as well. But they didn't activate their blessing.

In that second, everyone in the arena felt the air become absolutely heavy, their pores open, and an absurdly dense natural energy invade their bodies.

At the center of the arena, it was like three volcanoes had erupted. An insanely powerful nature energy surged, coming from Camille and the twins.

It all happened very fast. The two immortals saw it and just smiled, indifferent.

The three on the ground stomped their feet in sync.

**RUMBLE!**

The land across the entire continent shook as if it were the end of the world. Then, coming from three different directions on the continent, the ground split open into massive craters.

In the next second, three radiant-green roots, each as thick as a hundred meters, shot out from inside those craters. All three were converging toward a single direction.

In the blink of an eye, the three immortals stopped, realizing the speed of those roots would surpass theirs and reach them before they got to the arena. They stopped and turned to defend themselves.

Their eyes shone with an intense gold.

That was a terrifying attack, one capable of making anyone on Earth with nine rings feel despair. They snorted, already expecting it. That was the secret weapon of this continent, the reason everyone feared acting against them.

"Ridiculous." The bulky man mocked.

The tall man snorted, and both… instinctively got closer, ending up less than three meters from each other. A natural reaction, since that way they could combine their strength and block it more easily.

Not that those roots could really do much to them. It's just… after all the humiliation from earlier, they wanted to crush this continent's secret weapon in an overwhelming way. Doing it together would be more impactful.

At the same time, on the ground, Darian waved, holding Awel.

His eyes shifted from red to a fluorescent green. His whole body glowed with a natural aura.

The two immortals above attacked the roots with their weapons; space-time broke before the explosion even happened.

**BOOOM!**

It was a terrifying blast. The three roots turned to dust, being completely destroyed, but…

...the two immortals narrowed their eyes — that was much weaker than they expected.

Then…

"Truly ridiculous." A cold voice echoed straight into their souls. The two abruptly turned toward the ground. There, they saw the world spinning in a natural power several times stronger than that of the roots.

Darian roared, "Disappear."

Only now did they realize their mistake.

*Blinding Break!*

All the natural energy moved suddenly, gathering in a single point. In the next instant, a slash that looked capable of splitting the world in half shot up to the skies.

The eyes of those two immortals widened. They felt death surrounding and embracing them with terrifying clarity. Their instincts screamed in despair.

The slash was only five meters long and looked like a blade moving with the wind. They barely had time to breathe before it was already less than ten meters away. Escaping was impossible, so they roared, unleashing every drop of power they possessed in defense.

Darian had a satisfied expression. This was the biggest advantage of using the technique together with Awel. The attack became much faster, even if losing a bit of raw power. If used at the right moment, the enemy wouldn't be able to run.

And the two were together, perfectly aligned. A single attack would hit them both at once.

Everything had been planned beforehand by Darian. If anything went wrong, Camille and the twins — the most powerful manipulators of wood power — would use only 30% of all the power of the World Tree. The goal was to trap the target in place, and then Darian would use all the rest in a single devastating strike.

And the power of the World Tree was hundreds of times stronger than usual. That was because Veyle planted countless herbs and incredible things brought by Darian in the place where Earth's World Tree existed.

In the other universe, those things would grow a thousand times faster. But in this universe without power, the herbs would become weaker and the overall level would drop absurdly… no alchemist would accept something like that, it would be a waste. But Darian lacked no resources, and everything he brought was for her to use in the best way.

So, Veyle chose to plant a bit of everything on Earth, filling the whole place with primordial herbs impossible to find anywhere else. She was still learning and practicing; this way, she could train with something weaker and understand more about these herbs.

Everything worked in Darian's favor for this moment. His attack reached a level a hundred times stronger than anything he had ever used in his entire life. After all, Camille and that ancient empire had never needed to use that power in defense before, and a tremendous amount had built up.

In the skies, the devastating strike hit the two immortals head-on.

**KBOOOOOOM!**

A wave of destruction spread across all of Earth.

The common people, who thought everything before was finally over, now felt the world become even more chaotic, because it all happened very close to the surface.

Slowly, space began to stabilize.

Everyone in the arena looked upward, holding their breath.

Then…

"!"

They saw two ethereal figures floating up high, emanating a faint golden light.

Everyone's eyes widened, and they swallowed hard. That… the two immortals…

Their bodies had been obliterated. Only their souls remained. But immortals didn't die from losing their bodies. They could stay in the world normally, and their overall power didn't drop that much.

The most knowledgeable and powerful had already heard stories of Immortal Keepers whose bodies were destroyed. In the end, no one knew how they solved it, but almost all of them recovered.

The faces of the two immortals were completely distorted. They could never have imagined that, right after becoming immortals, something like this would happen to them.

Intense fury burned in them uncontrollably. Now they would take revenge in the most brutal way…!

Their thoughts were cut abruptly, almost like a scare.

They turned forward — then saw something appear like a ghost.

"You guys are pretty tough, huh? Impressive." Darian's voice sounded full of mockery.

"YOU!!!"

"Relax, save your energy for the real fun." Darian said, waving his hand.

In that instant… two black runes just a few centimeters long appeared in front of him.

Darian smiled, and then the runes vanished as if entering the void.

In the next second, a dagger appeared behind the two souls.

The two black runes reappeared, being pulled like magnets straight toward them, giving them no chance to react.

"!"

In the arena, Camille and everyone witnessed something they would never forget in their lives. Actually, the whole continent watched it, happening just a few dozen meters above.

*AAAAAAAAAHH!!!*

Shrill, horrifying screams echoed. It was as if the two were being tortured in the worst purgatory imaginable.

Darian watched it all indifferently. It had been a long time since he used his shadow rune.

It had an easy time connecting with people whose karma was extremely dense and black. Adding that to Awel's help, and to how emotionally shaken those two were — now just souls — they couldn't even sense the danger.

The screams didn't stop even after ten minutes. They had no bodies, so the sound was an echo transmitted with their immortal power directly from the soul. Fortunately, only Spiritual Guardians could "hear" it. Normal people only felt something oppressive and terrifying in the air, without understanding what was happening.

But eventually, their own karma, which was refining their souls, came to an end.

"Oh… you really are pretty tough." Darian murmured, genuinely impressed.

Normal souls would be in a semi-destroyed state at this point. But the two were only severely injured, with their souls completely cracked, as if made of porcelain.

Darian stared at them, speaking slowly.

"I don't make empty threats. I hope you enjoyed the short period in which you thought you were immortal and unbeatable."

After saying that, he waved his hand.

His black power surged and shot out like two demonic snakes.

*CRACK!*

The sound of shattering glass echoed across the whole continent, leaving everyone watching completely frozen.

In the next second… everything disappeared.

Even Camille was pale and wide-eyed. She imagined Darian could destroy their bodies, forcing them to flee, but… in front of everyone, with everything being recorded…

...he really killed two immortals.