However, his aptitude was limited. The Gale Spirit was only unlocked to Tier 3 at most, far inferior to Roman.

Moreover, from the beginning of the night attack, Bill had been fighting using Merging Thoughts. His magic power was gradually reaching its limit, and the wind speed was already greatly reduced. He was about to lose his combat strength.

After the two sides fought for a while, the leader of the men in black was covered in blood. He had finally broken through the defense line and there was no longer any obstruction between him and Roman. He roared angrily and raised his sword, wanting to fight to the death.

This was because elemental sorcerers trained their minds and senses, so their physical fitness would not increase much. Compared to a Third Enhancement Mutant Blood Warrior, they were clearly weaker.

However, the prerequisite was that he had to get close.

Facing the approaching enemy, Roman did not panic at all. With a cold glance, a pillar of fire shot out from his palm and hit the leader of the black-clothed men, knocking him to the ground.

Immediately after, a gale appeared out of thin air beside him, lifting his body into the air.

Roman had fused with three nature spirits. His strongest was the fire spirit, and the other two were the rock spirit and the wind spirit. Like Bill, he had also mastered the method of levitation.

However, at this moment, the leader of the men in black, who had already been set on fire, roared and took out a cylinder from his pocket. He aimed it at Roman, who was in midair, and activated some mechanism.

Roman immediately felt a sense of danger.

Sou! Sou! Sou!

In the next moment, dense black bone spikes shot out from the cylinder at an extremely fast speed. They were like black lotuses that suddenly bloomed, enveloping Roman and the surrounding space!

“What is this?!”

Roman was terrified. He raised his hand and stirred up a violent wind, wanting to stop the projectiles.

However, this black thorn pierced through the wind wall and headed straight for him, about to turn him into a sieve.

“Hahaha, go to hell! Try the special Miraculous Armament of the royal family — Sting of the Bee Swarm!” The eyes of the Demon Hunter leader melted in the flames. He could not see the outcome of this attack, but he was laughing hoarsely.

Roman’s eyes reflected the approaching thorns, and his face finally revealed panic and fear.

At this critical moment, a figure suddenly blocked his vision, standing in front of him.

Thud thud thud!

Countless black spikes hit, and the figure trembled from the impact.

The remaining black spikes flew past and finally stabbed into the ground in the distance.

The figure who blocked this wave of rain fell from the air and landed in the dust with a bang. The pool of blood under him expanded as all signs of life left the body.

The only other person present who could float was Bill…

Roman stared at Bill’s body on the ground, stunned.

There was both the blank palpitation of a brush with death and the disbelief of Bill’s actions.

Bill would actually risk his life to save me?

He was not such a person at all!

Why did he do this?!

Roman suddenly came back to his senses, his eyes turning red.

“You all deserve to die!!”

Boom!!!

An inferno was released in anger, like a meteor shower.

He no longer cared about anything else and used Merging Thoughts to the limit to fuse with the flames, burning all the enemies he saw.

…

The fire burned for the entire night before it was finally extinguished.

The camp was almost destroyed, and black smoke rose everywhere. The pungent smell of burned flesh filled the entire valley.

The nearly 200 royal Demon Hunters that attacked were all charred corpses and wiped out.

As for Roman’s subordinates, only 30% survived, all of them injured.

Bill’s body had bled out. The front was pierced like a hedgehog, beyond recognition.

Beside him, Black #1 nudged Bill’s body with its nose and whimpered softly.

The sword-tailed eagle circled in the sky, continuously letting out a miserable cry.

Roman stood at the side, lost in thought.

None of his remaining subordinates dared to disturb him. They carefully cleaned up the battlefield, not daring to make too much noise.

“Why would you save me?”

Roman looked down at Bill’s body and muttered to himself. He had repeated this sentence countless times.

They were only in a cooperative relationship. Bill was not his subordinate, and their relationship had become distant in the past few years. They rarely spoke to each other anymore. He even showed signs of placing the other party under house arrest…

Roman could not understand why Bill would sacrifice himself to save him.

He did not know how to examine the relationship between the two of them.

Before he left yesterday, he had even instructed his trusted aide that he could remove Bill if there was anything unusual about his actions.

But at the critical moment of his life, Bill was willing to sacrifice his life to take the bullet for him.

Roman was at a loss. His worldview had been turned upside down.

An indescribable sense of shame welled up in his heart.

Little by little, the past few years flashed through his mind. Bill’s silence, his own vigilance…

Roman covered his eyes, his tone complicated.

“Bill… I didn’t expect myself to have such a heavy place in your heart. Perhaps I’ve never understood you.”

After a long while, he put down his hand, his eyes flickering with a cold light.

“You learned sorcery from me, so you’re considered an apprentice. I’ll take revenge for you… The royal family of Tarn, hmph!”

…

Main world, morning.

In the Supers Law class, the teacher’s voice was monotone, and every student below was drowsy.

Zhou Jing supported his chin with his hand. He seemed to be listening to a lecture, but his thoughts had already drifted far away, thinking about astral traveling.

Last night, the interface was finally connected to the new Astral Realm. Unfortunately, due to the restrictions of the Apostle slot, he could not create a new apostle to travel through.

Zhou Jing hesitated for a while, but he did not rush to retrieve Jason. He might as well use last night’s time to summarize the basic information he had learned from class about Plane D19 and plan his route to enter the new Astral Realm.

He did not want to be like when he traveled through the Mutant World. He decided to fully utilize his current intelligence advantage and make many backup plans in advance so that he would have a clear target the moment he traveled.

After staying up all night, he had gained a lot of results. Now, he was only short of officially traveling and putting it into practice.

Zhou Jing had already made up his mind. No matter what, he had to empty an apostle slot tonight. He had to be ruthless and withdraw Jason back. Even if he suffered a loss, he did not care.

While he was letting his imagination run wild, the interface suddenly pinged.

[Detected that Bill (No. 003) is dead.]

[The Mutant World is currently in a disconnected state. Recycling the Astral Apostle… Recycling complete!]

[Records Updated!]

[Experience log has been recorded, and relevant exploration results have been entered into the Records.]

[Do you want to check the death playback?]

Zhou Jing jolted awake and almost stood up in excitement.

italics “Bill died? Hahaha… What a good death!!”

(TL Note: In case you missed out on the comments, the author of AA is currently on hiatus due to burnout and mental issues. Hopefully he recovers soon! In the meantime, I will still continue translating as usual, we have enough chapters to last for a couple of months before we catch up to him, so let’s all pray that he recovers soon and can get back to writing!)