Life Hunter

"I want to ask this one last time… Why am I the only one staying here?!" Flavio shouted at Arima who was leisurely sitting cross-legged in the middle of a meadow. He was taking a small break to stabilize his new abilities.

Meanwhile, Flavio was getting flustered in a corner. The reason he was complaining was that Arima had told Chulainn he could go back to the gate but not him. At that point, Arima knew exactly was what going on with the Téra and thought that Chulainn's new strength could help.

"I still need your help with something," Arima replied without opening his eyes.

Flavio frowned hard. "With what? I don't think I can help you with anything right now."

"It's quite simple. I just need you to use your ability on me."

"What?" Flavio's expression changed instantly. It went from confused to shocked. "What kind of modification do you want?"

"I want a transplant," Arima smiled and Flavio scowled. "A heart transplant. To be exact, I want you to give me a second heart."

"Impossible," the surgeon immediately rebuffed. "I don't know for what reason you would want a second heart but I can't do that. Although you're a freaking monster, you're still human technically. Transplanting a second heart when your body has not what it takes to make use of it is unfeasible."

"It isn't. You know it," Arima smirked and Flavio's eyes twitched.

"…Do you seriously want to do that? For that operation, I will need you to lower every defense. Even your immune system will have to be restrained. And the success rate of that surgery is no more than 1%. The exact average is probably lower."

"Of course, I want to do it. I wouldn't have told you to stay otherwise."

Flavio sighed and took out his glasses to rub his face. "Fine. If you die, that's not my responsibility. So? Where is the heart you want me to transplant?"

"It's still beating in the chest of a certain person."

"Who?"

"A unique individual even across the different Realities. He's the third Pillar here," Arima grinned. "One of the rare persons who have the right to call themselves true immortals."

Flavio's eyes narrowed. "You… want to attain immortality?"

"I need that at least to confront the Creators. But there's nothing really immortal in this world. The Creators can without a doubt kill immortals by either using OWL's or special 'authorities'. Even myself, I probably can kill one with Natus' ability," Arima said and the pentagrams appeared on his irises.

"These eyes can analyze an 'existence' and destroy it if it's possible. It means that I can scan 'immortality' and render it useless," he added. "Furthermore, my Ancient Demon form empowers Natus thanks to the four irises."

Flavio closed his mouth and waited for Arima to finish. "The reason I want to get immortality is that it will make me stronger. I do not care about never aging or dying. I just want the advantages that immortality can add to my theories. Also, having two hearts will increase the physical output of my body by at least a fold. And finally, with that immortal heart, I think I will be able to refine an organic factory."

"A factory?" Flavio wore a strange expression.

"That heart will be the factory."

"Of what?"

"Elixir." Arima casually responded and Flavio froze.

"…Are you talking about 'the' elixir?" He muttered shakenly. When one talks about elixirs it can mean many things. Especially in a world filled with magic craft and alchemy. But for someone at the level of Arima, it only referred to one thing; the Elixir of Life.

The most sought concoction in the entire universe. A potion capable of giving the one who drinks it eternal youth and true immortality whilst also curing every disease and injury. It's even said to be possible to bring back the dead with a single drop.

"{There's only one case recorded of an Elixir being successfully made,}" Krynox remarked. "{And it technically wasn't even made by intelligent species but by mother nature. That single vial worth of Elixir took exactly 345 877 924 years to be made. It happened because thousands of godly beings bought legendary ingredients from all over the world and mixed them up in a single place surrounded by the most majestic stars ever born. It's definitely not something you can produce easily. How do you want to do that?}"

Arima smiled. "I'm not going to gather any ingredient whatsoever. Nor am I going to use any fancy knowledge or technique. I'm basically going to break down the concept of immortality from that heart and transform it into a 'factory' which will slowly turn my blood into an Elixir."

Flavio was stunned. "…If you manage to do that, you'll be the worst nightmares of us doctors. If your blood becomes Elixir, your injuries might close before you can even see them… Are you going to engage in a war of attrition against the Creators? With your infinite mana, and possibly infinite Elixir, there are chances that you can stand your ground even without immortality."

"That's one part of the plan, yes," Arima nodded and opened his eyes. He stood up and cracked his neck. "But for now, we have to prepare. I'll go for the weaker Guardians and Pillars first. Although even they could be as strong or stronger than me. But it should be alright."

Flavio sighed. "How can you be so sure?"

Arima smiled at him. "Well, if things go bad, then I may need to go back temporarily and bring Night and Karma back with me. With them, I would be at least two times stronger. But for now, I'll do what I'm the best at."

"Which is?"

"Don't you know?" Arima smirked and summoned Superore. The double-barreled hand cannon shined. "I was an assassin back in the days. I'm not supposed to attack up-front. It's a one-hit kill or nothing."

***

Arima's first target was the tenth Guardian. Since he had fused with Krynox, he perfectly knew where the Guardians were. Although he couldn't track their movement in real-time because Krynox was not connected to the 'World' anymore, he still managed to find his target pretty easily.

Arima stared at the red-skinned Orc who was inside a castle around fifty million miles away and mused. It was really rare to see a species such as an Orc climb to the ranks of the Guardians.

Flavio watched calmly at first but when Arima started condensing something above his hand. He started sweating.

A tremendous amount of energy and mana was being compressed inside a bullet. Arima continued until it was about to break apart. Flavio paled and took his distance. But he knew that it was useless to just step back by a few meters. The energy in that bullet could very well annihilate galaxies. Even Arima seemed to be quite tired after making it.

He sighed and slowly loaded the bullet inside Superore. Flavio watched carefully then opened his mouth. "Are you sure it will be enough with that weapon?"

Arima snickered. "Don't underestimate guns, Flavio. This thing can be a lot stronger than what you can imagine. Without Karma around, this guy is definitely my strongest weapon," he said and vapor suddenly came out of his body and a green energy entered the barrel of Superore.

"That's…!" Flavio remembered something. While Arima was still limited by the magic circuits, he had managed to tear off the wings of thousands of angels through space manipulation. And now that he was free of that handicap and had acquired the Akashic Records, how much could he control? And to what extent?

Arima breathed in and pointed his gun at the Orc. He then channeled his innate energy inside his body and called two names, "Indra Vayu, Mithandruj. Come out."

Two phantoms immediately answered the call and manifested themselves around him. Flavio shuddered and held his breath.

Arima signaled with his eyes and the two phantoms shrieked before going inside the gun's barrel and fusing with the bullet inside. When that was done, Arima used Natus and scanned the trajectory until the Orc as well as the many magic barriers in the way.

Finally, Arima chanted something and thunder rumbled around him. Black and red lightning sparked around him and filled the gun's barrel with plasma and electricity.

"[Adducere exitium] (Bring destruction)."

"[Re vim extermina] (Erase matter)."

"[Veluta aeim, quifa quifa]."

"[Samda maa kaav]."

"[Fourth Cryptic Art, First Armament, Prod Materia Gun Metuunt Blasphemantes]."

Arima pressed the trigger and the bullet was propelled out of the barrel. The recoil made his hands tremble and even almost broke his bones. His feet had sunk in the ground and everything that was around the cannon had turned into powder.

The Orc instantly sensed something and only took half a second to spot both Arima and the bullet he had fired. The Plane Guardian saw the bullet coming toward him and sneered. It was too slow. He could dodge it without a problem. But the moment he thought this, something reached his forehead and he raised a confused voice during his last breath.

In the next instant, Indra Vayu screamed and his head exploded. The bullet also broke apart and imploded. At first, it attracted everything around it and even the sound was muffled. Then in the next second, the entire planet exploded.

Arima deployed his wings and grabbed Flavio before flying off to escape the range of the explosion. He landed on one of the moons of the enormous planet. Blended with the explosion behind him, there was an ominous presence that killed everything without discrimination.

What happened was very simple. Arima first injected raw energy into a bullet that was bound to his soul. That alone would have produced this explosion. Then he imbued the bullet with his spatial power. Before firing, he also ordered two of his Evil Spirits to go inside the bullet then used the Fourth Cryptic Art to finally attack.

When he pressed the trigger, Arima shattered every magic defense with Natus. At the same time, Mithandruj, the Spirit of Dishonesty and Lies, conjured a passive illusion on the bullet just before Arima's spatial ability teleported the bullet closer to its target.

Then finally, when the bullet touched the Orc, Indra Vayu appeared and made sure that the target died before the bullet could burst and obliterate everything around.

This was, unquestionably, the strongest bullet Arima had ever shot.

He absorbed all of the life force elatedly and grinned as he observed his clenched hand.

"Only 19 left."