Epic Of The Demonic Sage

Lucius looked at Kiana as an idea appeared in his mind. 

They needed to test out the defensive limits of Doyle who had now turned into a Lost. While Lucius was sure that he would be able to control him due to hell energy, there was still a fractional chance that the man might get out of control.

After all, there was the unknown factor of gifts in this world. Lucius didn't know if there existed gifts that could control other people and if they did whether they would be able to control Doyle.

There were many factors that could fall under this and Lucius wanted to have a backup in case someone ever took the control of Doyle away from him. He wanted to know the weakness that Doyle should have.

"I want you to use Sting Sniper on Doyle," Lucius ordered.

"Huh? Really?" Kiana asked.

"Yes, if it can break through his defense, then we will at least have a baseline of how much damage is needed to even start to hurt him." Lucius replied.

Kiana thought over it and found his concerns to be rather valid. 

"Alright, I'll do it," Kiana said as she got into a more proper position and came closer.

"Where do you want me to attack him?" Kiana questioned.

"Attack his shoulder. The thickness should be more than this and it will give us a better idea of breaching his torso." Lucius explained.

"Okay," Kiana said as she aimed her hand at the shoulder of the former man.

A layer of metal appeared on her palm before a small protrusion came out. This protrusion completely left the skin and floated over her palm, turning into a needle. Kiana aimed it at the shoulder of Doyle and shot it out.

Not even a sound could be heard when it was shot, but the moment it hit the surface of Doyle's shoulder a very crisp hum was heard.

~ting~

Lucius raised his brows and came to check what had happened to Doyle's shoulder. 

"Doesn't look much from just this…" Kiana said upon seeing that almost same shoulder.

"No… it has certainly done something." Lucius said as he picked up a pair of narrow tongs.

He pried the skin from where the needle had entered and used the tongs to see if he could pull it out. Surprisingly he could not do so and it was as if there was nothing in there.

"Let's see if there's anything on the other end." Lucius said before going to the other side.

Kiana watched on and saw Lucius lift the shoulder of Doyle lightly. Since he was still restrained to the table, it could not be lifted up too much. But it was still enough for Lucius to examine it.

"Oh? Seems like we didn't need to lift it at all… the needle passed straight through the table itself." Lucius said upon seeing the tiny hole in it.

He placed the shoulder back on the table and bent down to see the bottom of the table, seeing the clear hole. Turning his neck to the floor, he could see that the needle had pierced even the stone floor and embedded itself fully.

"Excellent!" Lucius said out loud.

"Is everything good?" Kiana asked.

"It's very good! Now we know that something on the level of your gift can stop Doyle and we also got to know that your ability is far stronger than we expected." Lucius praised.

Kiana had a smile on her face after seeing this and nodded he head.

"So it should be fine now, right?" Kiana questioned.

"Yes. Even if he breaks out of my control, we now know how to neutralize him." Lucius answered.

~phew~

Kiana couldn't help but take a breath of relief after hearing this. She had seen how much Doyle had increased in size and while she did not know his strength, she had seen Keith rip chains and break the wrists of others like twigs.

If even the slimmer Keith can do it, then Doyle, who was at least two sizes bigger in this state, would definitely be able to do a lot more than just that. It would become a terrifying thing if somehow he managed to get out of their control.

This was not something they wanted at all. And while Kiana was now confident that she would be able to kill Doyle if it really came to it, she didn't know if she would have the opportunity to do so during those particular moments.

After all, if something were to go wrong despite Lucius's planning and management, then it would have to be something really severe.

"Now that we know this, what's the next step?" Kiana questioned.

"Hmm… most of the development is already done for Doyle. I guess his brain only needs to adapt to it and awaken on its own. Once that is done, we should be ready to go." Lucius answered.

"So… we wait?" Kiana asked.

"Yes… we shall wait. I don't think it will take much longer either." Lucius replied.

"Though I think it's nearly time for lunch. I'll get us food till then. At least we might as well finish our lunch in that wait time." Kiana suggested.

Lucius nodded his head and agreed, "please do then." 

Kiana left the lab and quickly went to get some food for them to eat. She returned in less than five minutes with their lunch, which was just some sandwiches packed with meat and vegetables. 

As a surprise to Lucius, no matter how many worlds he saw during his journey through the dimensions, nearly every one of them had sandwiches as a type of dish. Even if their styles varied, the one thing that was common was that bread was used as a vessel and covering for the other ingredients.

With the lunch ready, the two of them finished it quickly and cleaned up. It took about one and a half hour since the testing for Doyle to show some movement.

"Hnghgh!" Doyle suddenly opened his eyes.