A Returner’s Magic Should Be Special

‘Is this really the pinnacle of alchemy?’

The Homunculus had a body that was superior enough to withstand Desir’s magic. However, as the attacks continued, the hard body began to be destroyed little by little.

It was far too weak. It was far from being called the pinnacle of alchemy.

[Burst Fire]

*Crash*

The Homunculus’s skin was cracked, muscles were torn, and bones were broken.

It had been thoroughly crushed by Desir’s magic.

Desir decided to end it; there was no need to drag this out any longer.

[Wind Press]

A Second-Circle spell that forcefully restrained enemies with wind pressure.

The Homunculus, whose body had been fractured, couldn’t overcome the wind pressure and flew into the wall.

Desir reached his hand out and aimed his next spell at the Homunculus. The spell quickly arranged itself in front of him.

[Fire Spear]

A fire spear fell down on the Homunculus.

*Baaaaam*

A heavy scream shook the basement. A cloud of dust billowed out. Accompanying the shockwave was a bright light; a sign that the defences of the Homunculus had been annihilated.

Desir turned his attention to Pureus.

“It’s over, Pureus. The Homunculus you were so proud of has been destroyed.”

Despite the fact that the Homunculus had been completely annihilated, Pureus was still smiling.

“There is nothing you can do anymore. Surrender without resistance.”

“Hahahaha. Foolish wizard. Do you think you have won? Do you not understand the meaning of eternal life?”

“What?”

Just as Pureus finished speaking, something stirred amongst the dust. Desir turned around to look at it.

It was the Homunculus.

It faced Desir, looking as it did when it stepped out of the coffin at the start of the battle. It was in pristine conditions, looking as if it had never even been in a battle.

‘Regeneration… It doesn’t look like that kind of thing… ’

If it had the ability to regenerate, it would have shown signs of restoring itself as he was attacking it. However, in the battle so far, no such thing could be seen at all.

‘This is something more than regeneration. It must be some kind of psychedelic magic that makes it look like it’s damaged.’

Desir couldn’t tell for sure, but intuitively knew that there was something afoot here.

Desir reached out to the Homunculus.

While he was not sure, he just had to subdue it again to clarify his doubts.

‘Whether it be a hallucination or something else, I will subdue it again and find out!’

He didn’t know what power it had used, but the Homunculus wasn’t his opponent anyway.

After Desir finished arranging his thoughts, he started to invoke spells on the Homunculus again.

However, in reaction to Desir, the Homunculus’ body seemed to have shrunk. It disappeared from Desir’s sight in an instant.

Before Desir could even react, Desir felt a sharp pain on his left arm. The pain was unbearable, almost as if it were on fire.

*Baaaaam*

Despite feeling a tremendous amount of pain, Desir completed the arrangement of his spell.

An intense shock wave struck the Homunculus and it was blown off its feet by the force, burying itself halfway into the nearby wall.

Desir was astonished.

‘It managed to attack before the spell was activated?’

Its speed had become incomparably fast in comparison to the last clash.

Even with improved reflexes and muscle strength from his strengthening magic, he was completely unable to respond.

The Homunculus pulled itself out of the wall and looked at Desir. It stood still, as if observing Desir.

‘Something has changed.’

This creature that had just jumped around without thinking before, now had a look of intelligence on its face. As if it were carefully contemplating the best way to attack next.

Desir invoked another spell. Simultaneously, the Homunculus began to move.

It was so fast that it left behind an afterimage, creating the illusion of there being multiple copies of it all over the place.

*Bang*

*Baaang*

Desir’s magic streaked through the air and smashed into the innocent wall.

The Homunculus had been slowly closing the distance before realizing that Desir’s magic couldn’t hurt it.

‘It has the ability to gradually improve its judgement. I can’t take my time dealing with it anymore. Since that’s the case… !’

Desir had internally admitted that he could no longer shoot down the Homunculus with a single-shot magic.

Upon reaching this conclusion, he decided to pour all of his effort into a long-ranged attack that it could not avoid.

[lce Crown]

It was one of the top-class spells amongst those of the Second-Circle.

He was planning to arrange this larger-scale magic while retreating from the Homunculus that would be preoccupied with that spell for a while.

“What… !?”

At that moment, however, the Homunculus rushed towards Desir.

Unexpectedly, it took the attack magic directly and approached him.

The speed it moved at was beyond imagination. It never even gave Desir a chance to unleash defensive magic.

Instinctively, Desir lifted his arms to defend himself.

*Bang*

A tremendous impact sounded.

With it, the mana capacity of the Clothes Line had dropped sharply. As the Clothes Line offset the shock, Desir’s body bounced back.

Immediately after Desir shook his head to clear it, he saw the arm of the Homunculus descending on him to split his head.

[Sigh of Kizard]

Fortunately, Desir was bounced back by the Homunculus shattering the defensive spell he barely got off in time.

Unfortunately, the Homunculus’s continuous attacks did not let up.

*Smash*

*Smash*

*Smash*

Explosions emanated from its simple yet powerful fist swings and kicks.

Moreover, as his vision on his right side was greatly reduced, this kind of close-range combat was very unfavorable for Desir.

‘In order to respond to this speed… ’

Desir remembered the way he handled the Chimera.

A spell arranged itself in front of him.

[Water Wall]

Desir summoned a cylindrical wall of water, blocking him off from the Homunculus on all sides.

[Winter Ice]

The water around him froze immediately as it formed.

*Chkhk*

“Kiaaaaah!”

The body of the Homunculus approached Desir with the exact timing he had hoped for. As it was partially through the water wall, it also froze under the influence of the spell combo.

It was trapped on his right-hand side.

Desir unleashed a spell of the Third-Circle while feeling a bloodcurdling sensation at how close this encounter was.

[Summon Lighting]

So far, with the exception of defensive magic, the only attack magic he had been using was at the Second-Circle to conserve mana.

However, Summon Lightning was a Third-Circle spell. It may not be the pinnacle of Third-Circle spells, but it definitely could not be discounted.

An intense thunderstorm swept the ice wall that had temporarily trapped the Homunculus.

There was a dazzling flash as lighting filled the enclosed room.

Within an instant, an extreme current of electricity penetrated the body of the Homunculus.

Using such a spell while surrounded by water definitely wasn’t safe, but it was certainly effective. As Desir expected, the Homunculus’s face was soon burned black.

The current was so powerful that Desir could see its red and blue blood vessels bursting all over its body.

“Khaaaaaak!

It screamed in pain.

*Crack*

At the same time, the ice sphere that had restrained it was broken, and thousands of shards of ice were flung out.

A blue hand reached through the ice shards and made a swipe at Desir.

‘What the hell is this ability?’

He couldn’t make any sense of it.

It truly felt like he had done significant damage to the Homunculus. The manner in which he had done it was even completely different from last time. How exactly the Homunculus was recovering was far beyond his comprehension and outside of his realm of experience.

Although he couldn’t figure out what it was, it was easy to figure out what it wasn’t. From the amount of damage it sustained and how it seemed to instantaneously revert to a perfect condition, it wasn’t a form of regeneration or an illusion effect.

‘Within a moment, it was back to its original shape.’

It was as if this was its natural state.

Anyone would be dumbstruck

Desir could only feel bitter at the mana expenditure for such inconclusive results.

[Raise Wall]

A stone wall soared out of the ground to block its path. The Homunculus didn’t care and charged straight through it.

The sturdy stone wall was torn apart like a sheet of paper under the Homunculus’s strength.

“… !”

But Desir wasn’t there when the Homunculus smashed through the wall.

The Homunculus’s eyes swivelled from left to right in search of Desir. Instinctively, it then looked up.

Desir was standing on top of the collapsing wall and had just finished arranging a spell.

[Burst Fire]

Dozens of fireballs, each drawing different paths, rushed at the Homunculus.

The Homunculus kicked against the ground, leaping backwards as it read the fireball’s trajectory, and nimbly escaped. It appeared to be reading the paths as if it were one step ahead at all times. An absolute feat of aerobatic mastery.

Fortunately, with the Homunculus preoccupied, there was a brief respite for Desir to gather his thoughts. This window would be brief though, as Desir had barely managed to distance himself from it.

With how the Homunculus had evolved, Desir struggled to find a solution to his predicament. Before, attacks were easy to get off, but functionally useless due to its healing ability. Now, however, Desir was struggling to find opportunities to attack; even if he did damage, it would just regenerate itself. In effect, any attack Desir could make would be meaningless.

‘But that doesn’t mean that I can solely rely on defensive magic.’

Defensive magic was not able to respond to the variety and strength of attacks from the Homunculus.

Unfortunately for Desir, the Clothes Line had begun to approach its limit.

[Warning: Clothes Line has less than 20 percent mana remaining. The defensive capabilities have been significantly reduced.]

Desir’s position could only get worse, the longer the battle went on. It was clear that Desir had lost the advantage.

During the battle, the Homunculus began to handle its power with a higher level of finesse. There were fewer gaps in its defenses and its attacks became even more relentless. Attacking and defending against this creature had become significantly harder.

It was clear now that it would continually evolve.

The more it battled against Desir, the more difficult it was going to be for Desir to handle.

Desir’s mana, on the other hand, became increasingly exhausted. Less than half of his mana pool remained.

‘If it continues like this, it will be rather dangerous.’

If the essence of Homunculus’s ability was regenerative power, it could be dealt with in the one-go by any attack that had overwhelming might.

If Desir used all of his remaining mana, he might be able to finish things off once and for all.

However, he was not convinced that Homunculus’s ability was regeneration. After hitting it with [Summon Lightning], he was almost certain that the source of its longevity was something else.

Desir’s expression slowly distorted.

“What a pathetic display.”

Pureus smiled, savoring Desir’s expression.

“It’s very sad that you cannot even comprehend this great wisdom. The truth that your trivial brain dare not even imagine. I at least want you to know what truth is overwhelming you in this battle.”

Pureus stared at the Homunculus with ecstatic eyes.

“The truth that I have embodied into this creature is not just eternal life. A truth on that level would just allow one to live forever. This is the true pinnacle of alchemy. And that power is… !”

*Baaam*

An explosion shook the room slightly.

Desir had succeeded in blowing an entire arm off the Homunculus using a Third-Circle spell.

However, the fragments of the arm that were scattered across the floor soon re-attached themselves to the stump of its arm and reformed a perfectly functional arm.

Des1r couldn’t believe his eyes.

It wasn’t anything like a regenerative ability. It felt like an ability that reversed time, restoring it back to its original state.

“It’s controlling Causality.”