Is it Wrong to Copy Abilities in Apocalypse?

"Do it fast! The Lord is urging us to hurry it up!"

It had been a while since the beasts had killed the humans and scattered away after not being able to find Pratish, Rakesh, and Preety.

Right now, they were setting up the formation that the riddling phantom had asked them to make; they were just following the orders.

As for the earlier conflict, well, it was dissolved by Pratish himself after he saw the notification sent by his to-be contractor.

[The Riddling Phantom is saying that they are two humans he had decided to make your slaves.]

[The Riddling Phantom is saying that once everything is gone and done, they will be under your control.]

The moment Pratish saw these messages flash past his eyes, his body froze, followed by happiness.

'I will have slaves!'

Pratish had always been a guy who worked under people and never had someone working under him, much less people who would do anything he asked them to do—especially Preety, who was a girl with nice sets of assets.

This excited him to no limit, and his every thought of being betrayed or tricked by this star or god, whatever one wants to say, was washed away.

He was the weaker one, with no power to go against the stars; he knew it perfectly well.

So, just the fact that they had tried to justify themselves was enough to satisfy Pratish.

"I guess we are going to be brothers and sisters working under the same entity soon enough."

These were the words Pratish spoke as he started to sweet talk—something he was used to doing in his line of work—Rakesh and Preety.

Right now, they were happily working together as they had believed Pratish's words; they were just like him after all.

They were among the people who had tried everything they could possibly think of in order to gain a contract, only to face disappointment.

So, this time, they were giving their all.

They hurriedly placed the bodies of the dead humans as they were asked to do; they even decapitated the heads of humans if needed.

There was a lie said by some great man: A human could do anything if the situation called for it.

These three people were now butchering humans without a hint of aversion or hesitation in their eyes, something that wouldn't have been possible before.

They knew full well that the being they were about to get contracted with wasn't a god but a demon, yet they worked hard to get it.

They just wanted to survive, and for that, they were willing to do anything.

The same goes for Pratish, who was now glued to the spot he had been standing on as he stared at the new notification with wide eyes.

[The Riddling Phantom is offering you a final test; complete it within the given time and gain the contract.]

As he gazed at the message from this demon, he heard a pinging voice in his head as a new quest window appeared in front of his eyes.

[[{Star Sponsor Quest - The Riddling Phantom.}

Quest Category: Sponsor.

Difficulty: D.

Clear Conditions: -

→ Kill Rakesh.

→ Kill Preety.

→ Pour your mana into the magic circle.

Duration: 30 seconds.

Reward: A contract that would give you level 10+ stats, one mythical-ranked skill, and one epic-ranked skill.

Penalty: No Contract.

]

Pratish didn't know what type of quest this was or if there was even a thing like this in the first place, as he never really tried to read the information tab.

If he did, then he would've known that it was a quest that was generated by gods or demons, and usually it has a lot more participants than one person.

All he saw was that he was running out of time, and from his perspective, both Rakesh and Preety were already his slaves, so it was up to him what to do with their lives.

If that was not enough, then unlike Rakesh and Preety, who, just like him, were the people with the highest coins in their areas, he had his stats upped to level 5.

Rakesh and Preety, on the other hand, had used their coins on their skills, hoping to get them stronger.

So, right now, Pratish had an advantage, and only by making use of that advantage would he be able to complete this quest.

And yes, Pratish had decided to complete the quest.

As said before, he was desperate for power, and he was ready to do anything to get it.

So with a cold glint in his eyes, Pratish stared at the backs of Preety and Rakesh, both of them tired from all the moving bodies, taking a breather right now.

This was a time more perfect than any other, as they wouldn't even expect anything, so Pratish hurriedly took out his knife from the system's inventory and slashed it on Preety's neck from behind.

"Arghh!"

The girl screamed in pain as she hurriedly moved her palm up at the wound, trying to stop the bleeding, her eyes wide in pain and disbelief.

Rakesh was alerted by the scream, and he quickly bought his metal rod out of his inventory, but...

*Pierce*

*Cough—!*

As soon as he understood what had happened, he already had a metal knife's head protruding out of his chest, causing him to cough out a lot of blood as he fell to the ground.

"W-Why...?"

This was the last thing he muttered before his vision darkened, and Preety, who was still in pain, froze as she saw the sight.

'A-Am I going to die as well..?'

Such thought appeared in her head, making her brain work faster, trying to come up with ways to survive; a woman had many options to survive in the apocalypse after all.

"I-I can—!"

But her words were cut short by a sickening squelch that resounded throughout the dead surroundings.

*Squelch*

Her neck was pierced directly by the knife, entering from one side and leaving from the other.

"I didn't have any other choice."

Pratish, who had now finally regained his clarity as his adrenaline rush had died down, muttered, replying to the dead body of Rakesh.

[00:10]

His expression, however, turned to one filled with hast as he saw the timer ticking down.

He hurriedly sat cross-legged and started to push his mana into the magic circle in front of him; his eyes widened as he saw the blood flowing out of Rakesh's and Preety's bodies being pulled toward the center of the circle, but he let it be.

He just wanted to do what he was supposed to do, not wanting to raise any questions, but just as he thought everything was going fine, he felt his mana pool emptying at a pace faster than he could think of.

'W-What the hell...?'

He grew tense and horrified as he realized that in just a second, he would be left with nothing in his body, but before that could happen, his eyes widened to the extreme...

*Woosh*

The ball of blood that was being formed at the center of the magic circle made of dead bodies rushed at him at a speed he couldn't even make out.

"H-HELP—!"

He tried to call for help even though he knew that there was no one there, only to have it cut short by the ball of blood that directly entered his wide-open mouth.