Chapter 850 - 720: Skullcap

As if the world of trees descended, towering trees rapidly grew, with their roots extending across the entire Beast Fighting Arena, engulfing a crowd of Papermen and Paper Beasts.

Dong!

Several branches fiercely stabbed into the Paper Mountain, and the giant Paperman let out a piercing roar as wounds on its body continuously spewed out paper pulp.

The Paperman’s image likely came from Jiang Shaoxi, who was skilled at summoning Shikigami in the task world of Baekje Black Sky, and the paper pulp splattered on the ground, dividing into countless puddles due to surface tension,

from each puddle crawled out strange, half-congealed Shikigami.

"Hiss, so hot."

Falling downward, Li Cheng quickly withdrew the overheated Furnace of Eight Trigrams, shaking his hand while silently grumbling to himself.

Ω, affiliated with the Evil Science Alliance and improved the Ten Thousand Souls Banner, was judged to be gravely sinful, which was fair enough,

but many of the people he killed were bad guys!

Jiang Shaoxi attempted to enforce his unique methods and enslave the world;

Mithril betrayed the team, harming companions;

there’s no need to mention Joker, who adheres to the idea of not underestimating minor evils, doing whatever immoral things are fun,

like giving free machetes and guns to homeless people on the United States streets;

sneaking into gyms to replace protein powder with a popular sweetened drink;

ranking songs for a boy band in exchange for their fans’ good reviews for the Three Kingdoms Kill mobile game (it’s mobile rather than PC because Steam downloads are cumbersome, easily downloading the wrong thing like Steam Manager);

even if occasionally moved to do good, it’s always bizarre actions like "donating big bags of digestive aids to the hungry in Africa" or "reporting inappropriate websites after watching videos".

The International Criminal Court tried him in absentia, giving him over eighty death sentences and more than two hundred life imprisonments,

so Li Cheng killing him to alleviate more sin is a merit, right? But it cannot be deducted. It’s just absurd.

While pondering, Li Cheng landed on the top of the Paper Mountain, swinging the Wolf Mad Demon Axe heavily at the neck of the papery giant.

The Paperman, by sharing intelligence, knew about the Wolf Mad Demon Axe and dared not take the blade head-on, choosing to lean its head forward, raising its neck’s paper slices.

The paper slices rustled down, transforming into Shikigami resembling bird and bat hybrids, rushing towards Li Cheng.

The shadow of a Black Dragon emerged, and Li Cheng took a deep breath before spewing out Blue Dragon Lightning.

To expand the attack range, he specifically pursed his lips to split the linear thunder into several branches, sweeping across a group of Shikigami.

The thunder tore through the paper slices, damaging the wings as they spiraled down.

The remaining Shikigami immediately changed their flight posture, turning sideways to expel air from their hollow bodies, minimizing the hit area. Like the string transformation from "Calabitchu".

Uh... in some sense, Shikigami are indeed two-dimensional papermen.

The distance between both sides quickly shrunk as the Shikigami army "bam" reverted to three-dimensional, blocking before Li Cheng in a large area.

There were too many Shikigami, and not enough Ape-man Degeneration Gun bullets, not looking souled enough to be whipped and beaten by the rancher.

Considering this, Li Cheng detached a piece of Floating Engine Fragment, forcefully slapping it onto the side of the Wolf Mad Demon Axe,

as he retreated, swinging his arm forward, letting go at the limit point.

The Wolf Mad Demon Axe spun towards the forward-left like a free kick, bypassing the Shikigami intercepting net.

The massive axe inscribed with cryptic runes and ancient lines flew in an arc under weak gravity, circling from behind the Paper Mountain to the front.

Atop the axe blade, a weightless Shadow Falcon crouched.

Return, Swallow!

The skill activated, dramatically slowing the axe’s rotation speed, pulling it towards Li Cheng’s palm, driving into the chest of the giant Paperman, recklessly battering within its thoracic cavity.

The [Demon Exchange] skill seamlessly kicked in, swapping Li Cheng and the Shadow Falcon’s positions, appearing within the giant Paperman’s chest cavity.

Steadily catching the Wolf Mad Demon Axe with his palm, Li Cheng took another deep breath before spewing out Black Dragon Acid.

"What happened?"

Outside the arena, everyone looked at each other perplexed, only to see the giant Paperman suddenly freeze in place, motionless.

After a brief delay, a touch of green seeped from the collarbone, then the sternum, ribs.

Hiss—

The corrosive acid spiraled downward, pairing with the cutting effect of the Wolf Mad Demon Axe, tearing through paper and bursting out of the Paperman shell, corroding from inside out.

The giant Paperman frantically clawed at its chest, ripping open the paper skin as it watched its body gradually fall apart, eventually losing all strength and collapsing.

Without the Paper Mountain, the surviving Papermen and Paper Beasts were like water without a source, trees without roots.

Even a special individual with multiple Extraordinary Powers like Mithril was quickly eradicated and killed—after all, the Spirit Prophecy system is truly not a combat-specialized power system.

"Big hammer eighty, small hammer forty~"

Gray Rain muttered to herself, hammering Mithril’s head into its chest, then turned to the Joker, who had a leg broken by her.

"Wait!"

Li Cheng shouted telepathically on the Bluetooth channel, stopping Gray Rain from finishing off, "Joker can perform Possession Rebirth, don’t do it yourself."

"Eh? Aren’t Shikigami supposed to be without self-awareness? Can Possession still be used?"

"Better safe than sorry."

Holding the Floating Engine Fragment, Li Cheng descended to the ground, where the paper-formed Joker lay writhing like a maggot, seemingly without the ability to resist.

To be cautious, Li Cheng snapped his fingers, summoning back the Shadow Falcon.

With a thought, the Shadow Falcon jumped onto Joker’s back, pecking at the back of his head with its sharp beak.

Clatter, clatter, clatter.

The paper skull was soon pierced with a hole, and the Shadow Falcon drilled, pried with its head and tongue, forcibly lifting the skull open.

Like other Shikigami, Joker’s body was hollow, with only wave-shaped shredded paper inside the head, simulating a brain.

The inside of the skull was inscribed with something, flipping it over revealed, "Whoever reads this line in their mind is gay,"

followed by a smaller line, "Reflecting is ineffective,"

and an even smaller line below, "There’s a wolf in Qin Che’s house, don’t leave me."

"...What kind of nonsense is this?"

Even Gray Rain, as abstract as she was, looked bewildered,

Li Cheng rubbed his chin, musing, "Papermen lack self-awareness, it must not have been engraved by the Shikigami themselves, but imitated and copied from Joker’s essence—

That guy was probably too bored and really engraved the words inside his skull, as a prank for whoever might kill him and pick up the skull in the future player.

Truly has too much free time."

Li Cheng said this, taking a photo of the inside of Joker’s skull with his phone, casually posting it on the local network forum.

With Joker dead, the arena slowly filled with air, the broken paper ignited spontaneously, and the brick floor cracked open.

Li Cheng waved his phone to the audience, grabbed Gray Rain, and jumped into the fissure.