Chapter 211: Envisioning Death

All powerful people carried a certain level of psychic pressure.

Even for people who weren't adapters, those who possessed qualities like confidence, calmness, and extreme intelligence could exert immense pressure on others.

Adam had encountered countless powerful adapters in the psychic world, but not many of them were able to truly exert psychic pressure upon him. In fact, it was a very exclusive list, consisting only of Sadou in his Great Sage form, Raven, Masao Yamamoto following his transformation, and now, Eyeless.

All of the other people on the list commanded immense power, able to alter the environment of the psychic world around them with their sheer auras alone. However, not only was that not the case for Eyeless, he didn't seem to have any impact on his environment at all.

His movement wasn't even accompanied by the natural flow of air. and it was as if everything around him had fallen completely still.

The psychic pressure that he possessed was extremely restrained, and it was impossible to imagine just how intimidating he could be unless one had actually been directly in his presence.

Compared with Adam, Hook was faring even worse. He felt as if he were being suffocated by the psychic pressure that Eyeless was giving off, and he instinctively tried to turn and run, only to be stopped by Anaconda.

"Eyeless detests those who run away in the face of battle and refuse to accept the trials and tribulations of fate. If you run away, you'll be the first one he cuts down."

"Thank you."

Hook was extremely grateful that Anaconda had stepped in right in the nick of time to save him.

In the face of the psychic pressure being exerted by Eyeless, the group was slowly becoming more and more anxious, and Hook wasn't the only one considering retreat.

This group had no cohesion to begin with, and in terms of moral character, they were almost definitely more deplorable than the group that had banded together to attack Dead Wood's team. Everyone had agreed to make a move together, yet these people had chosen to stay behind, and they were all hoping that the others would pave the way for them at the cost of their lives.

They were already cowering in the face of Dead Wood's team, so it was no surprise that they didn't dare to face an even stronger opponent in the form of Eyeless.

Out of everyone in the group, Medusa was most reluctant to face Eyeless. They had faced off once before, and that encounter had concluded in a heavy defeat for her, so she was well aware of Eyeless's powers.

"Eyeless, there's no point for you in fighting us. I suggest..."

Medusa was just about to say something, but the approaching Eyeless didn't give her a chance to finish. After getting closer to the group, he drew his blade, and all Adam saw was a flash of white light, which glanced past him before he even had a chance to react.

Half of his face and one of his ears were instantly sliced open like tofu. In the face of Eyeless's blades, the stellar defenses that he had always relied on were made to look impossibly frail.

If that attack had been directed at him, Adam felt like he would've already been dead by now. However, the target of the attack was Medusa instead.

The attack had glanced past him, and in fact, only the wind that it had swept up had sliced into his cheek.

How could there possibly be such a fast blade?

Adam turned to find that Medusa had already fled away into the distance, but one of her arms was missing, having been severed by the strike.

Medusa was one of the fastest adapters that Adam had ever seen, but in the face of that attack, she was only just barely able to avoid sustaining a lethal blow.

Even though her arm had been severed, she had earned herself some respite, thereby allowing her to speak.

"You've faced Dead Wood in the past as well, but he's hidden his true power this entire time. At the moment, he's taking on dozens of combatants on his own, so I'm sure he'll be a difficult opponent, even for you."

Medusa was indicating toward the battle that was taking place on the hill in an attempt to divert Eyeless's attention.

He knew that for someone as obsessed with training and growing stronger as Eyeless, a stern challenge and a difficult battle were more alluring than any other reward.

As long as one wasn't free of desires, they would always have certain weaknesses.

In this battle royale, Adam's goal was to win, so he was willing to work with others as long as they could help him win. In contrast, the four mecha brothers desired wealth and an exit card, while Ikkaku's was pursuing vengeance.

Going by that logic, Eyeless's weakness was his burning desire for challenges of increasing difficulty.

Even though Eyeless couldn't see, he still raised his head to sense what was happening around him, and it just so happened that the commotion ringing out from the battle taking place on the hill grew even louder at this moment.

It seemed that the control was beginning to wear off, and some people were already gradually returning to their senses. In order to strengthen their influence, the trio of monks was becoming louder and louder in their chanting, to the extent that the sinful intent that they were giving off was spreading even into the valley.

"Interesting." Eyeless was rather intrigued by the sound of the sinister chanting. "I'll let all of you go through if you can withstand one more attack from me."

"Why should I be the one to withstand your attack? You can attack him! He's more powerful than I am," Medusa claimed as she pointed at Adam.

"Is that so?" Eyeless turned to Adam upon hearing this. "I'll be the judge of that!"

In the instant that Eyeless turned his attention to Adam, his entire body instantly stiffened. He wanted to invoke and fuse with Clown, but Eyeless didn't give him the chance to do so.

In the next instant, Adam's pupils contracted drastically as he saw something flash past his eyes. Immediately thereafter, the world began to spin around him, and by the time his vision stabilized, he saw his own body slowly falling to the ground.

Why am I seeing my own body?

That was Adam's first thought, and his consciousness gradually began to fade immediately thereafter.

Ah, so I've been decapitated...

"He's not as powerful as you claim! You must pay the price for deceiving me!"

After decapitating Adam, Eyeless turned and unleashed another attack at Medusa.

This time, Medusa didn't try to evade the attack. Instead, she directly opposed it with her signature petrification ability.

Her petrification attack was the most powerful ability that Adam had ever seen. In fact, it could be said that this ability constituted the majority of Medusa's power. It was a top-tier ability in all regards, and it was virtually an unstoppable force of nature that was impossible to keep at bay.

However, for the first time in the battle royale, the inevitable nature of her ability was cast into doubt.

In the face of Eyeless's attack, the petrifying shockwaves released by Medusa were sliced into two before passing by on either side of Eyeless, petrifying all of the plant life around him.

"You've gotten stronger, Medusa." After slicing through Medusa's petrification attack, Eyeless stroked the blade of his sword to find that tiny spots of stone had appeared on its surface. "Very good. You've withstood an attack from me, so you can go through now."

After that, Eyeless quickly darted away, eager to move onto the next challenge and face Dead Wood's team in battle.

Meanwhile, Adam had also completed his own self-resurrection.

After his head landed on the ground, he knew that death wasn't far away, and before his consciousness completely faded, he enacted a plan that he had envisioned precisely for situations like this.

Given the frequency with which Adam found himself in life-and-death situations, he had envisioned his own death on more than one occasion. He could be decapitated, have his body shattered, burned to death... All methods of death were possible.

As a result of his visualization training, he arrived at a conclusion, which was that as long as he didn't sustain damage so severe that he was instantly killed and had his consciousness erased, there was a way for him to potentially save himself.

As an invocator capable of fusing with his own invoked entities, Adam was capable of pulling off some things that other adapters couldn't.

In the case of decapitation, it was very difficult for him to resurrect himself unless he had a special invoked entity at his disposal.

Even if he were to invoke and fuse with Clown, his most powerful anomaly, he would still only end up as a decapitated Clown that would be dead before too long.

Outside of a fusion state, he would fall to his demise even faster as his life force in his base form was very weak.

The only chance for him to survive this attack was to fuse with Sludge. Virtually all anomalies could be killed by decapitation, but that didn't apply to Sludge.

Even if its body were to be blown up into countless pieces, it still wouldn't die, so theoretically speaking, as long as Adam could fuse with Sludge before his consciousness completely faded, he should've been able to fuse his head back onto his body and return to life.

Of course, this was only possible in theory. In practice, he had never attempted such a risky experiment, but now, the opportunity had finally presented itself. In fact, to be more accurate, it had forced itself onto him.