The Paladin in the Abyss

"Bruto! Climb onto my shoulder!"

The young Dwarf was seizing this rare opportunity, attacking the supports behind the Shark Lizard Beast’s hind legs with ferocity when he heard the call. Startled, he hesitated for a moment, but his unquestioning trust in Lancelot kicked in immediately. He dashed over, dropped his hammer, and clambered onto Lancelot’s ten-foot-tall frame using his hands and feet.

Lancelot’s body felt to him like freshly forged steel, hot and hard.

It must be the effect of the Enlarge Spell, the Dwarf muttered to himself.

As he climbed, Lancelot’s arms continued to lift; his lips were tightly shut, and the muscles in his arms and shoulders bulged, indicating he was exerting all his strength.

The Knight’s current posture resembled that of a farmer wrestling a chayote, except his prey was twice his size.

"Dimensional Bag!" Lancelot managed to utter between grunts, "Acid!"

Bruto hesitated for a moment, then his face lit up with surprise.

He absolutely loved Lancelot’s idea.

The Dwarf stepped onto the enlarged Frostslash and moved in front of the Shark Lizard Beast’s gaping maw. He glanced down and nearly vomited. Starting from the throat, the beast’s maw was filled with teeth—its blood-red, razor-sharp teeth evoked images of the meat grinders Dwarves use to make sausages.

Taking a deep breath, he took off the Dimensional Belt he had previously looted from the Mud Monster’s body. With a flick of his wrist, he untied the rope around the bag’s opening and upended it into the Shark Lizard Beast’s mouth.

A full 150 gallons of acid poured from the extradimensional space down the creature’s gullet, which was thicker than Bruto’s waist, straight into its belly. n/ô/vel/b//jn dot c//om

"How’s the taste?"

A triumphant smile spread across the Dwarf’s face as the hissing sound of strong acid corroding flesh rose, and a potent, pungent odor filled the air.

The Shark Lizard Beast’s limbs twitched at a frequency only a dying animal could achieve, its movements so violent that even Lancelot, exerting himself to the maximum, could not hold onto his sword tightly.

Bruto began to sway, on the verge of falling off the Sword Blade. But before he dropped, he took out two small bottles from his pocket and threw them into the Shark Lizard Beast’s mouth.

"Like that? Want me to season it more for you?"

The Giant creature’s violent struggles made the wound on its chin grow, and suddenly, Lancelot’s sword sliced out from beneath the Shark Lizard Beast’s jaw, splitting the beast’s lower jaw into two halves right down the middle.

But this freed the Shark Lizard Beast from its binds; the massive jaw that Lancelot had almost cracked finally closed.

Then it crushed the strong alkali bottles Bruto had thrown in.

A violent reaction erupted inside the Shark Lizard Beast’s mouth, the horrific heat melding the flesh and blood together. It could no longer open its formidable maw that had chewed through metal and stone; this mine was its lair, and it was the King here, not yet willing to give up, determined to rip its enemy to shreds.

The Shark Lizard Beast tried to unleash its fierce pounce, a move that had helped it defeat countless enemies before.

But its knees had been shattered by the Dwarf earlier, and the pounce became a ludicrously feeble lurch, turning its massive body sideways as the parts of its brain responsible for balance had been melted away.

In its dying moments, it caught a final glimpse of the enemy that had killed it—the strange sight of the iron Giant gradually shrinking.

What’s happening? Why did I come here? I wasn’t even hungry.

Then the Shark Lizard Beast died.

"Huff."

Bruto collapsed to the ground, sitting on his behind. The battle had skirted the edge of death throughout, and now he felt as if his body had suddenly been emptied, going completely limp.

Everyone looked as if they had just survived a great calamity, except for one person.

Lancelot’s Spiritual Sense told him the danger was far from over and was rapidly approaching, but he couldn’t pinpoint the source of the threat. He pulled out a mountain crystal equivalent to a Middle Grade Spirit Stone, urgently replenishing the True Qi that had been greatly depleted just moments before.

Just then, a fierce grey light burst from the eyes of the corpse on the ground.

"Malevolent spirit demon!" Kalalin was the first to react, crying out in alarm.

A flash of light passed, and the carcass of the shark lizard beast stood up once again, all its wounds gone without a trace.

The Malevolent Spirit Demon possessed an ability unknown to many: it could bestow a ’gift’ upon an ordinary creature through touch, enhancing the creature’s attacks. However, the Malevolent Spirit Demon could also see and hear everything around the recipient through their eyes and ears, and whisper into the recipient’s mind, making them believe these were their own thoughts.

Resisting the Malevolent Spirit Demon’s gift required a strong willpower, something utterly impossible for a beast like the shark lizard, whose brain was filled with muscle.

It had been used by the Malevolent Spirit Demon for hundreds of years, providing it with countless fresh corpses without raising any suspicion, after all, this was the Abyss—where it would be strange if a mining pit never had any miner deaths.

But the gift had another effect: once the recipient died, as long as the Malevolent Spirit Demon was on the same plane of existence, it could immediately occupy their corpse, regardless of the distance between them.

"You damned fiend, will this never end!"

Bruto, who had just been sitting deflated on the ground like a punctured ball, suddenly sprang up, running towards his hammer and shield that he had tossed aside earlier.

Lancelot didn’t understand how the Malevolent Spirit Demon managed all this, but he was very clear about the situation at hand.

He was not unprepared, either. During the battle with the shark lizard, he had never used his most powerful move—Innate True Qi—intending to save it for this threat that had previously slipped away from him.

The original plan of the Malevolent Spirit Demon was to command the shark lizard to kill these people, but the Human Knight had proven to be exceptionally strong under the effect of the Enlarge Spell, further fueling its desire for that body. In the last view of the shark lizard, it saw the effects of the Enlarge Spell dissipate, deciding it was time to take matters into its own hands.

In fact, Kalalin had already used up all of his second-ring Spell slots, the only thing he could do now was to make sure he didn’t become a burden to Lancelot.

However, the Malevolent Spirit Demon had no plans to let him go. The shark lizard glanced at Kalalin, and the poor Scholar once again fled uncontrollably.

Lancelot charged forward proactively. Given the size difference, once the shark lizard started its charge, nothing could stop it aside from the solid rock walls here.

The Malevolent Spirit Demon-controlled shark lizard looked disdainfully at the human. He had indeed demonstrated great courage and skill in the recent fight, but what could courage and skill amount to in the face of absolute power?

The shark lizard opened its massive mouth, revealing a full set of neatly arranged sharp teeth.

Just as it was about to bite down on the human, who clearly overestimated his abilities, the target vanished from its sight.

Lancelot once more used the Footwork Technique he had learned from the bamboo slips. Seizing the moment the shark lizard’s eyes narrowed as it opened its mouth, he leaped mightily into the air.

In this jump, he applied the mental method of Gathering Qi Slash, concentrating True Qi into his feet. To the onlookers, Lancelot’s leap was so swift that he looked just like a tree frog.

Given its body structure, it was difficult for the shark lizard to raise its head and observe above itself, but its upper body was covered with a thick Carapace, typically disregarding any threats from above. The Demon occupying the shark lizard’s body was well aware of this, though it had yet to realize the disappeared Human Knight had now positioned himself on its head.

In mid-air, Lancelot tapped into the very essence of the power within his Dantian Qi Sea.