"What do you plan to do now, genius? Running away is futile! That spirit once locked on something, won't stop hunting it down!"
"Just shut up, and watch how the pros are fighting," William rolled his eyes, before slowly standing up. At this moment, it didn't matter if he broke his training, as his spirits were madly clashing with that Black Phantom spirit with everything they had.
The shockwaves released from this clash didn't originate from him but from these spirits. They were instinctively trying to fight back with everything they had. According to that golden spirit, the Black Phantom wasn't going to just devour their small representation here but was going to devour their main bodies back at the spirit world using this link with him.
If they got the chance or the choice, they'd prefer to cut any ties with William at this desperate moment, but this wasn't up to them to decide.
Once he stood up, he took his sword out, and then cut his hand and his blood gushed out. The blood was like a small fountain, slowly tainting the black hemisphere up there with little splashes of redness.
But that was what he needed before testing out his theory.
"Let's devour you then," the moment his blood touched that black hemisphere William prepared himself for the upcoming clash.
As he expected, the moment his blood touched that black thing something came towards him. Yet unlike what he expected, it wasn't the spirit trying to kill him, but it was a pure form of spirit power, one that he never tasted before in this world.
"The spirit power of the upper world... Damn! I hit the jackpot!" he felt excited the moment he recognised this pure form of spirit power, a thing that soon changed to the total opposite.
"Agh!" he roared in pain in just mere seconds. It was the spirit power of the outer world, something that he could never tolerate or control with his current level of power.
It felt like he was letting lava enter his body, not his spirit body. He never felt such terrible pain before, and yet he never stopped devouring this spirit power for even one second.
He knew he took that spirit by surprise, as it had never faced such a challenge before. So it was better to hold on and keep devouring as much spirit power as he could before that spirit would notice what he was doing.
He knew he was treading on a dangerous path. The risk now wasn't in the expected clash between him and that spirit, but there was also the high grade form of spirit power.
He needed to endure, and yet such high and pure spirit power started to bring harm to him. He instantly took out healing elixirs, and gulped them like running water, without caring about anything else.
"Oh... A mere human can have such power? Interesting..." he didn't know how long he lasted, but he didn't last more than ten minutes actually. It felt like he stood there for many years, and was now resisting the urge to let go of all this and sleep.
"The last time I met someone like you was a monster, a despicable one who stole a wisp of my power. I can sniff part of that bastard in you, but you aren't him. You are interesting... Tell me, how can you stand against a god with a stick and believe in winning?"
"At least I'm struggling to win," William gritted his teeth hard, and couldn't think about anything else but to keep holding up. He said anything that popped into his mind, without even thinking for one second about it, "At least I'm fighting, not trying to run away like those cowards!"
"They are cowards indeed, I agree with you on that... However, do you believe in your odds of winning? That ability of yours isn't backed by anything, not by the spirit who originated this in the first place, which is me, not by a god, or even by any world's natural powers, the thing you humans love to call elements... It's even in its rudimentary stage, and I'm at the peak..."
"I don't care, as long as it works, I'll persist on using it!" William thought that the spirit was fearing his devouring ability, and decided to stall for time to do something, or perhaps succeed in shattering his fragile will and let him give up.
Yet he never thought that spirit wasn't feeling or aiming for any of that. In fact, it was genuinely interested in William and was amused by what he was doing.
"Tell you what, I never put humans in my eyes before. And here you are, giving me an interesting time already, hahaha!" that Black Phantom laughed, before it suddenly turned all serious, "Tell you what, why not make a deal here?"
"F*ck off and we can speak as long as you wish!" William spotted these words amidst his blood. His body couldn't handle the pressure of the pure spirit power anymore and was on the verge of collapsing.
Even with the lots of elixirs he used, nothing worked. If he could sit down and train, he might absorb part of this brutal spirit power and alleviate the pain slightly. But he couldn't feel his body nor control it the moment he started absorbing that spirit power.
"Trying to boss me around? Hahahaha! I like that spirit, fragile and weak, but at least it got hard and not soft bone..." the Black Phantom spirit laughed, seemingly totally amused by William.
Yet the latter wasn't feeling that great, and could only struggle to keep himself standing awake in the middle of all this torture. He knew the moment he closed his eyes and resigned to rest, he'd die!
"Watch me devour you then..."n0vεLuSb.c0m
"Hilarious! This is the funniest thing I ever heard in my long life, hahaha! Human kid, do you know who you are talking to? Do you know that if I wanted, then I could devour the four miserable spirits you have here?"