Hunter of Immortals

Chapter 358: Fledgling Domain

Chapter 358: Fledgling Domain

Not long after Nun and Camera completed their evolutions, Sludge also completed its evolution to become a level six anomaly amid a flash of purple light.

This was the highest level anomaly currently in Adam's possession.

Even Scarecrow, which had been residing in his psychic world this entire time, hadn't ever reached this level, even at the height of its powers.

Sludge had evolved very slowly, but the process was complete after that flash of purple light.

Following its evolution, its height had swelled to around 12 meters, and the light purple coloration of its body had become dark purple, while the stone material of its body had become even harder than meteorite.

On top of that, a series of blue patterns that resembled a neural network had spread across its entire body.

All invoked entities were a part of the invocators psychic body, and with his sharp telegnosis, Adam was immediately able to sense that something was different.

Is this a domain in its fledgling stage?

All of the top-tier adapters that Adam had met in the past, including May, Wax Figure, and Hebi no Miko, had all possessed the ability to severely interfere with their environment, and for the first time, Adam was sensing this type of ability in one of his own invoked entities, albeit only in trace amounts.

Right as he was about to explore this ability further, the psychic world around him began to collapse.

I'll just have to leave it for next time.

With that in mind, Adam withdrew Sludge before departing from the human skin artist's psychic world.

This battle had been quite an eye-opening experience for him.

Up to this point, all of the anomalies that he had encountered had been so different from one another, possessing a vastly diverse range of abilities and traits depending on the experiences and personalities of their hosts.

The anomaly of the human skin artist was able to produce artistic creations capable of unleashing extremely powerful emotional attacks, and if it weren't for the fact that its physical defenses were severely lacking, even all of Adam's anomalies combined would've been no match for it.

If I can develop it at some point, it'll be a great help to me in battle.

In the instant that he returned to the real world, Adam was greeted by the sound of flowing water and the sight of a vast expanse of steam.

He turned to find that Mole and Armadillo were still keeping a lookout outside the stall, and the human artist had already suffered psychic death. Due to his old age, psychic death had led to brain death for the elderly artist, and his breathing seemed to have already completely ceased.

Mole and Armadillo were also adapters with potent telegnosis, and they were immediately able to sense it when Adam returned to the real world.

"How did it go, Adam? Did you manage to kill it?"

"I did. Did anything happen while I was gone?"

"Someone started a fight over there, but there was too much mist, so we couldn't see anything. In any case, they were quite far away, so I didn't bother to wake you up."

"I see."

Adam picked up a showerhead as he spoke, then smashed it repeatedly against the back of the old man's head, only stopping once his brains and intracranial fluids had spilled onto the ground.

"Why did you do that?"

"We can't blow our cover and let people find out that he suffered from psychic death," Adam explained as he washed the blood off his body, then gestured to depart with the pair of psychic mutants.

"You really are a smart guy, Adam!"

The three of them made their way out of the showers as they spoke to one another, and along the way, they spotted roughly a dozen bodies gathered together in one place.

Judging from the symbols on those bodies, they appeared to be members of the Desert Gang and the Survival of the Fittest faction.

"Only five out of 18 bodies have that mark on their shoulder... Looks like the members of the Survival of the Fittest faction are pretty capable fighters," Armadillo remarked.

Right at this moment, another group of people began to approach them, and the leader of the group was directly facing Adam.

"You know this guy?"

"I do. His name is Ross, and he tried to kill me before you two arrived."

"Is that right?"

Right as the two groups were passing by one another, Armadillo intentionally shoulder-barged one of the oncoming figures as hard as he could.

The bodyguard beside Ross was sent stumbling to the side before bumping into Ross, who turned around to find Armadillo glowering at him with a twisted expression.

"You'll be the next one to die!"

Ross and his dozen or so companions stood still on the spot as they looked at Adam's trio in silence.

They had witnessed what Armadillo and Mole had done earlier in the day, and given their ferocity in battle and the fact that Adam was an adapter, the odds were stacked against their favor, despite their numbers advantage.

"What're you looking at? Do you wanna fight right now?" Armadillo threatened as he took a step forward, completely unfazed by the opposing party's superior numbers.

"We have more people waiting outside."

There was no way that one of the leaders in the Desert Gang would be a coward, and Ross was certainly no coward, but he was a smart man, and he knew that certain confrontations were best avoided.

In this situation, the best option would be to intimidate Adam's group into backing down as that would allow him to save face while also avoiding an unnecessary conflict.

This was usually a very effective strategy outside, but it wasn't always so reliable in Darvaza Prison because there were far too many insane people here.

"I don't give a fuck who you have waiting outside! I'll fuck you up right now!"

All of a sudden, Mole sprang out from the side while Armadillo and Ross were speaking.

He was as fast as lightning in the psychic world, and he was also an extremely agile fighter in the real world. Before anyone had a chance to react, he jumped onto the tallest figure in Ross's group, then bit down onto the man's ear.

Right as the man's ear was torn off, he grabbed onto Mole's neck in preparation to slam him down onto the ground, only for Mole to reach up and plunge his index and middle fingers into the man's eyes.

Mole had already sprung into action, so Adam and Armadillo naturally had to join him.

Armadillo was also quite a capable fighter, quickly knocking down two people in a row. Meanwhile, Adam dodged several attacks using his telegnosis, and he knew that his combat skills were rather lackluster, so he locked his gaze on the three people who appeared to be the most normal out of Ross's group, then rushed over to the trio before tackling the three of them all at once.

As soon as physical contact was made, a psychic connection was instantly established, dragging the three men into Adam's psychic world.

Sure enough, none of them possessed particularly powerful psychic bodies, and they were no match for Adam in a psychic battle.

Within just a few seconds, the battle had concluded, and by the time Adam returned to the real world, the battle there was also drawing to a conclusion.

There were only around 10 people in the opposing group to begin with, and there were only four left standing at this point.

With Adam's help, Mole and Armadillo were able to make short work of the three people around Ross, following which Adam directed his gaze toward the man who had recently tried to kill him.

"I can tell you're a smart guy. I'm offering you an opportunity to live now. Are you going to accept the opportunity?" Adam asked as he approached Ross with his entire body drenched in blood once again.

Ross looked at the adapter standing before him, then at the pair of deranged, demonic figures behind him, and an emotion that he hadn't felt in a very long time emerged in his heart.

He had been locked up in Darvaza Prison for murder and robbery. Back then, Ross had been a bull-headed young man who feared and respected nothing, and even though he had heard the rumors about Darvaza Prison, he didn't take them to heart.

The first day he arrived in the prison, he set out to pick a fight with another inmate to establish a reputation for himself, but someone got there ahead of him, and what happened after that was something that he would never forget for the rest of his life.

That man was skinned alive before being dissected and eaten. His skin was made into gloves, his hair was used as thread for a sewing project, his blood was used as paint, his skull was transformed into a cup, and his finger bones had been plucked out one by one before being made into a necklace.

After witnessing that traumatic scene, he became a lot more reserved and subdued, relying on his street smarts to get on the good side of the Desert Faction and the wardens, and only then was he able to survive to this point.

It had been a very long time since anyone had dared to mess with him, but what he had just witnessed reminded him of the fear that he had felt on that day.