Something was wrong, and He didn't see it in any of the prophecies—but it was before His eyes: the natural horticulturist who had rejected the blessings of the Shapers and threw himself on the damned, the excellent channel between the magnificence of the high and the dull reality, the anchor that could establish another rule, the darling of the gods, appeared before Him.

The lifeless who had occupied Mita Ashern felt a kind of ecstasy immediately after a moment of surprise and panic.

It was an unpredictable change: as a tiny fragment of the Demon Lord of Change, he had long watched every branch of the Crystal Palace that represented destiny, and knew all about any of them. So He can be sure that this is completely out of the equation - and of course! He did know the growth of every plant in the garden of fate, but he did not know the gardener who grew in the garden—the gardener's behavior He certainly could not predict!

In the midst of lightning and fire, he made a quick decision: to abandon Sibila Hastings, even though he had been planning for a hundred years. If He can convince the Gardener to be used by the Lord of Change, then there is no doubt that He will gain great favor from the Master!

Regardless of what he hadn't even done for Tzeentki's own body, what could the Demon Lord of Ten Thousand Transformations (and only a fragment) do at this moment, who was bound within the shell of a mortal psyker. It's always good to have dreams, so the demon host quickly reorganized his emotions and spoke to Fujimaru Ritsuka again with all his flattery: "Oh, honorable Chosen One, what do you want to know? ”

He wanted to read the other person's mind, but unfortunately, this human shell that imposed so many restrictions and constraints on him prevented him from using most of his spells. But on second thought, it may have been a blessing as well, as these limitations prevented him from instinctively reacting - if he really extended his psionic senses into the other person's mind, just such a spell action would be enough to completely destroy a small fragment of the Demon Lord of Change. Of course, this would also make it impossible for him to carry out his corrupting plan of "Slow Drawing" in the Flashstone.

But for a subspace creature, a Tzeentch demon accustomed to psionic senses and spell feedback like humans are accustomed to their own eyes and ears, the feeling of blindness is not very good. But he was confident: he succeeded in confusing the inquisitor Michaelia Verchak under the same conditions, and succeeded in manipulating the other party's behavior in a way that the parties were not aware of, by mere rhetoric without parasis. This successful resume apparently gave him an unshiny sense of confidence that he could replicate this strategy with his understanding of the human heart.

The good news is that the other person did not choose to exile Him in the first place, but was willing to enter into a dialogue with Him—a dialogue is often the beginning of a thousand changes, and this is undoubtedly a very good place to start. But, the bad news is that the parties' purpose is clearly very clear:

"'Mita Ashn', where is the original owner of this body you occupy?" Fujimaru Rika asked straight to the point.

The demon host let out a hoarse laugh of ill will. A specific question, not important, but the demons themselves are bound to know. The demon host sees it as a simple test of obedience, and has developed its own conversation strategy based on it:

"She's dead." There is no doubt that He lied, for humans possess a superficial suspicion determined by their weak biological nature, a game that would make most of the "wise" among them suspicious of the beasts that surrender themselves. In contrast, the words of those enemies who first chose to resist, and then who were tamed by their own hands, and who were compelled to bow down to them by various external forces, sounded more true to them. The demon host giggled and decided to perform a "disobedient rebellion" first—he was only a fragment of himself anyway, and even if he were indeed destroyed, it would not cause him any decisive damage. All he had to bear was the risk that the whimsical plan would fall through again as the fragments faded, and the Lord of Change's judgment that the setback, though great, would not break his bones if it was to endure.

"She's dead! Gone! I was rewarded for keeping me captive with this inferior spell! Even the last tiny fragment has been ground between my teeth! The demon host said with excitement. Mita Ashern's vocal cords were distorted and forced into an overly high-pitched pitch, a high-pitched noise mixed with psionic blasts that scratched at the listener's eardrums and thoughts. The temperature of the air dropped rapidly, and frost instantly formed on the ground covered with dried blood—but in a second, all of the above visions were gone, as if they were nothing more than the hallucinations of the people present.

The Aquila Scepter in Rikataka Fujimaru's hand paused slightly on the ground, and all signs of psionic energy that the demon host had set up in the room were gone.

Is this a spell? But the Supreme Heaven was not induced—even if it was sealed in a human shell, as a subspace creature, the demon's instinctive senses for observing the subspace would not be easily mistaken. For a moment, the demon host was puzzled by this phenomenon, but soon, he had no time to think about it:

"Where's Mita Ashn?" Rika Fujimaru pointed Aquila at the demon host and repeated her question.

At that moment, it was as if the demon host had been struck in the face, and Mita's head was twisted, burned, and then proliferated, and fell back sharply. He opened his mouth wide and let out a scream—perhaps a scream of terror and madness, which should have been soaked in psionic energy, but which could not find his own room to meddle once he entered the cell, sounded more like a cry of despair behind the unsoundproof double glass of the torture chamber: not so noisy that it would be audible to the other prisoners, and there was a little bit of material to imagine about "what was going on in that room".

At this point, the demon host, who was forced to indulge in pain, was convinced: this was not a spell. It doesn't have any elaborately orchestrated structure, but because of it deserves to be spurned, it's more terrifying than real spells. It's pure violence, it's a massive crushing - Rika Fujimaru really didn't stir up the waves of the subspace when she used her psionic energy, and the power she exerted came directly from the unspeakable throne. She did not spend energy weaving this power: there was no need to waste energy on such trifles. She just gave them a direction, and let them slowly "push" the demon host directly on the soul level.

It's like putting a person's hand under a slowly pressed hydraulic press. The demon host knew clearly in this process, which resembled "slow suffocation", that the fragments of themselves would be crushed by this simple violence. The predestined outcome is not terrible – what is terrible is the slow process in the middle and the pain that comes with it. He is not one of those masochists in the Silver Palace of Slaanesh next door, and this resistance is almost in place, so there is no need to be obsessed with it:

"I'll tell the truth, I'll tell the truth!" The faint voice of the demon host seemed to be muffled in some kind of confined space, and it was very reluctant to seep out of the crack before it could be heard. But even though he showed weakness like this, Fujimaru Rika did not stop the movement of his hand, but just kept it as it was, calmly ordering: "Say." ”

"I—I left her behind!" The demon let out a muffled scream, and his tone became more and more rapid, "I left her soul, tortured her, and then sucked her pain - it was too cost-effective to eat it directly, and it was more fun to eat it that way, so most of us did it, please, she was alive, and I would give her back to you-"

Rika Fujimaru finally deigned to remove the scepter, and the psionic stance of "smothering the demon host inside" immediately vanished. Mita Asher's shell trembled unnaturally, letting out small moans from the remaining pain.

"Thank you, thank you for your kindness...... though it was only a fragment, but the demon host here also thought that he had a solid near-death experience - very bad feelings, and I really didn't understand why those mollusc maggots in the silver palace liked to play like this.

"You'd better talk." Rika Fujimaru said calmly. She seems to be very good at keeping her emotions hidden, but it makes sense, after all, it's a necessary means of negotiation.

The demon host once again regretted that he couldn't read the other person's mind now, but this death-seeking thought didn't stay in his mind for long. After a little relief, He spoke again with great interest: "Yes, I will give you back this human soul." But until then, I have-"

Before he could finish his words, Rika Fujimaru had already lifted the Aquila Scepter again. This time, almost all of the demonic host's voices were shut behind an invisible position, and even Mita's tortured and mutated body began to bleed from the fragility of the tissue.

"Wait, stop!" Unable to bear it, Sahar leaned over and grabbed Fujimaru Ritsuka's arm - after seeing the tragic situation of Cadmus, of course, he also realized that there were some things that he could not touch, "You are also torturing Mita!" ”

"Trust me, she's not bad at that." Rika Fujimaru didn't change her mind, "Endure this time to drive the demon out of her completely." You don't want to find out in the future that Mita has become a time bomb related to the living and has been 'cleaned up' by other Inquisitors, do you? ”

Sahar immediately fell into an anxious falter. Fujimaru Rika ignored him and continued this "execution" until it was even longer than the last one, before procrastinating to stop the output of psionic energy. The frail wails of the demon host resurfaced in the reality of the cell, and the remaining shells of Mita oozed blood from her eyes, ears, nose, and mouth, as well as from the wounds caused by various lashes and punctures of holy nails.

"Where's Mita?" Rika Fujimaru asked calmly again, this time, her calm attitude finally terrified the Tzeentch demon. The prisoner, bound in countless scriptures and chains, let out a helpless sob, and then in the next moment—Mita returned.

Sahar clearly felt this happening, but it was difficult for him to describe its process in exact words. In terms of physical changes alone, the difference between the prisoner before and after the event is negligible. But it was this slight difference—the subtle difference in his demeanor, the speed at which his gaze moved, the wrinkles on his forehead when he frowned, the expression on his face when he endured pain—that allowed him to be sure that it was indeed Mita Ashn, his witch, and none other than him.

“…… Kill me. Her voice was hoarse from pain and fatigue, but she could still hear her original timbre. Sahar stepped forward with a little excitement, but only one step. Immediately after, he froze in place because he realized the current situation:

After a long period of torture, both mentally and physically, Mita had no strength left to discern the situation before her, and pleaded with everyone who could hear and hear her: "Please, kill me, let this all end." ”

This is a true saying. Sahar was able to judge with confidence. Human emotional responses are governed by hormones in the brain, and if an Astarte pays enough attention to this detail, their superhuman senses will capture information that is unnoticed by ordinary people and needs to be detected with a machine. At such a distance, Sahar could easily smell the subtle scent of Mita's body other than blood and filth—fear, fatigue, boredom.

He was a little at a loss for a moment. He is very good at creating these feelings through pain, forcing the other person to beg for death, but he never knows how to save a person who wants to die from these feelings. Sahar didn't know what to say, but Fujimaru Rika at this time was still showing the same almost cold calm as when he interrogated Sahar:

"Mita Asherne, can you hear me?" She asked.

When the human body is overwhelmed by a large amount of psionic energy that it cannot withstand, their nerves are prone to all kinds of problems: touch, limb end control, sight, smell - and as long as the organs themselves remain intact, hearing is often the least affected. This is the talk of Rika Fujimaru's own personal experience.

But that's not the end of the problem: Mita may have heard her call and couldn't respond to it. After a brief moment of silence, the demon once again snatched back—or rather, regained control of the body:

"What do you want her for?" There was genuine confusion in the thing's tone, "She's been in my hands for too long, and it's really not fun." You see, even when you ask her, she doesn't have the spirit and ability to answer you. If you need a psionic advisor, I can obviously do so much more - it won't cost you anything more, I'm much better than a normal human. ”

While the demon host Zen was trying to sell himself, Rika Fujimaru ignored it completely. Instead, she commanded a bewildered Sahar to stand aside, using her side against the cage where the demon host was being held, and then reached forward in a pose as if to catch something. The Space Marine didn't understand, but after a few words of persuasion, he did so: "What the hell is this for?" ”

"I'll borrow you to make my reading shelf for the time being, many books in the empire are too heavy, and it's inconvenient for me to carry them myself." Fujimaru Rika stood facing Sahar, and several lights lit up on the Ortenus Lingji exoskeleton, and then golden sand-like points of light fell out of thin air, accumulating in Sahar's spread hands.

Within half a second, the weight of the Imperial Books was "too heavy" for Sahar's hands to sink, but with mental preparation, a Space Marine could still easily lift the precious tome that had been transformed from golden sand into a pure gold shell, gemstone pages, human bone decoration, and gilt writing in an instant.

The demon host erupted into a scream of terror on one side, followed by a stack of expressions of weakness and begging for mercy. Sahar was caught off guard by the sudden reaction, but he continued to perform his function as a reading shelf, allowing Rika Fujimaru to slowly flip through the heavy cover in his hand, and then look at the table of contents bit by bit, looking for the corresponding number of pages.

"What book did you conjure?" He asked a little inexplicably, and Fujimaru Rika did not hesitate to answer:

"Second edition of the Book of the Word." There was a hint of schadenfreude underneath her calm voice, "It stands to reason that the first edition is more lethal, but the first edition I've seen is almost a shoddy pamphlet, and it doesn't look imposing in the binding. ”

In fact, Rika Fujimaru had already read and memorized the full text of the first edition of the "Sacred Words", and if she wanted to exorcise demons, she didn't need this reference book at all. The reason why such a thing is meaninglessly extracted is mainly because of the problem of deterrence:

At the very least, the demon host in front of him has indeed been frightened by this sacred tome.

(End of chapter)