Badge in Azure

Translator: Nyoi-Bo Studio Editor: Nyoi-Bo Studio

The winged skeleton could not care less about the mechanical soul's fear. He would not allow himself to become someone else's slave. He finally understood the Three Kings' fear of losing their freedom forever!

The symbol was a type of rule in the first place. If the winged skeleton was controlled by it, Saleen would be implicated. Saleen's soul bond would be forcefully restrained by that type of rule. Saleen could not leave this dimension ever again, or else he would immediately turn into the symbol's slave.

The winged skeleton did not possess Nailisi's god-gifted talent to cleanse the symbol. He was envious of Nailisi's ability to devour everything, it was the ultimate rule of Luoluokaluo.

"Master, I am about to die." the winged skeleton's soul flame turned from silvery red to transparent. The power that he absorbed from Judikaka allowed him to break through the limits of a grade-8 spirit and the restrictions of the bond with Saleen.

The symbol seemed to sense what the winged skeleton was thinking. It spread out momentarily and released the sixty-four crystallizations of dark elements.

Four arthropods that looked like spiders appeared on themechanical soul's head. The four of them were struggling to push the mechanical soul's head out of the rock.

"Soldier! Stop resisting!" the mechanical soul was flustered. The symbol possessed power that he would not be able to stop.

The sixty-four crystallizations melted instantly and enclosed the winged skeleton's soul flame. The winged skeleton felt as if time had stopped as a voice rang out from the depth of his soul.

"Submit to me."

"Never!" the winged skeleton replied decisively. He had no idea where the symbol came from, but he was certain that no one would be able to stop him if he was intent on dying. Time could be stopped, but not reversed. By the time the symbol had fully used up its energy, the winged skeleton would then be able to burn up the soul flame and destroy it.

"If you do not submit, then you shall be destroyed!" The voice spoke with authority. It shook in the depth of the winged skeleton's soul, as if it was trying to waver his determination.

"This is exactly what I want. If you release me, we will die together."

"What a fool. It doesn't matter whose slave you become, it is all the same!" The authority in the voice was now replaced by ridicule.

The mechanical soul could not hear the conversation between the winged skeleton and the voice. He laid on the ground. After his body had been decomposed by the light elements, he was only left with half a skull and a section of neck. He did not dare to get near the symbol. He crawled around on the ground, trying to find anything he could devour.

"Foolish? This is loyalty." the winged skeleton could sense that time was passing very slowly. Time was passing so slowly that he might still not succeed in completely burning the soul.

"Does a spirit of the dead need to be loyal? Slaves will always be slaves, always looking for excuses for themselves." The voice continued to ridicule the winged skeleton. The winged skeleton could sense that his soul was vibrating continuously and would lose control any time. The voice was incredibly tempting.

"Loyalty means that even if the beginning was a mistake, the ending must be perfect. I can sense if Master is worried about me…." As the winged skeleton slowly spoke, he felt as if Saleen was really looking at him from a location far away. 'A mistake in the beginning' was how the winged skeleton felt about soul bonds.

Saleen only wanted his power at first so he tricked Daniel into obtaining the winged skeleton. Since then, Saleen had never done anything harmful to him.

Saleen had since given him a name as a sign of hope. Since then, the winged skeleton lost his freedom, but was given a reason to continue living.

As his soul was on the brink of destruction, the winged skeleton was abnormally calm. The soul that was shaking continuously was gradually stabilizing itself. Most people would think that his loyalty was hilarious. As long as Saleen did not give up on him, that was all he needed. From the dark death dimension to the colorful Myers Mainland, countless spirits of the dead had been summoned over to fight for humans.

Most spirits would be defeated and sent back to death dimension to be revived. It was a long and painful process and no spirit understood why.

"You… are a strange spirit of the dead, stranger than Judikaka." The voice seemed to recognize that it was unable to convince the winged skeleton so it changed its tone and continued, "Why don't we sign a bond?"

"Never!" the winged skeleton replied without hesitation.

"A soul that refuses to give in. That's worthy of respect. Alright, I have decided to let you go." That voice said helplessly.

"So can we die together now?" the winged skeleton asked.

The voice seemed to stop breathing for an instant before asking, "Do you have a problem? I already said that I will let you go and allow you to regain your body and strength."

"I can sense that you are going to hurt my Master." the winged skeleton answered calmly. He regretted his actions a little. If he had taken out the divine crystal directly and burned it into soul flame, this strange symbol would not have been able to control his desire to die.

The soul flame that was enclosed by the dark elements was being restrained by the symbol's rule. Time was passing tens of thousands of times slower there. These conversations were taking place at less than one ten-thousandth of a second.

The winged skeleton heard a long sigh, "Unfortunately there is no time left. Such an interesting spirit but I can only…"

The voice was cut off completely. The winged skeleton could sense that the fluid of the dark elements that had enclosed him were seeping into his soul flame. That symbol that had been controlling him from outside had turned into a shard of jade and had fallen to the ground.

The burning of the winged skeleton's soul flame was stopped. Not only was his soul not damaged, it has also completely merged with Judikaka's soul flame.

When the mechanical soul saw the symbol fall helpless onto the ground and turn into a piece of jade, he immediately pounced and wanted to devour it. To his surprise, when he bit onto the jade, half of his head cracked open and fell into pieces on the ground.

The winged skeleton was puzzled, but then understood what happened. That symbol had been hiding in the depths of Judikaka's soul for a long time and had already developed its own soul. This soul was too small and weak. It was only able to regain control of itself by borrowing the symbol's power, but it would not give the soul any power directly.

The question was who the person that created such a symbol that possessed such a unique rule was!

The winged skeleton could not afford to think further. There were sounds of metal cutting through the rock on the outside. The people on the outside must be worried that he had yet to die and they were there to finish the job!

The pure soul flame floated in the air. The winged skeleton chanted in the spirit language gently and opened up his death space to summon a jade skeleton.

This jade skeleton's soul flame was weak and was a faint pink color. This was something that the winged skeleton created. It would take a long time to develop before the jade skeleton would truly become strong. As for whether the jade skeleton would possess intelligence, that would depend on luck.

The winged skeleton's soul flame entered the bones of the jade skeleton and devoured that pink soul flame instantly. He needed to borrow a body in order to escape. No matter how powerful a soul was, it would definitely be damaged against spells. The winged skeleton had yet to adapt, so all the skills that he could use were still the same.

After taking control of the jade skeleton's body, he took half a step forward. With a crack, his leg bone broke and crumbled into powder on the ground.

A body as weak as this could not contain such a powerful soul!

The winged skeleton was gloomy. His soul flame had become stronger, but did not have a suitable body to inhabit. Jade skeletons were his best spirits and they even had a chance of developing intelligence. Even the jade skeleton's body would not allow him to move an inch.

Could it be that he had no choice but to enter the bodies of those disgusting spirits of the dead? In the winged skeleton's death space, he still had a few powerful spirits that were stronger than grade-7, but those spirits were summoned and not created by the winged skeleton.

As he searched in his space, the winged skeleton sensed the body of a zombie. This zombie was golden in color from top to bottom and was shining even in the absence of light. This was something he obtained from the Three Kings' spatial equipment. the winged skeleton had wanted to refine a powerful zombie as his assistant in case he was unable to command the spirit army in the future.

It looked like that soulless body was his only option.

The winged skeleton's soul flame floated out of the skull of the jade skeleton, which left the latter crumbling into powder. The mechanical soul, who was wriggling on the ground, tried to consume some of the jade skeleton's powder.

The winged skeleton's soul flame entered the zombie's brain, but could not quite adapt to it. When his soul flame expanded, it seeped into the skull of the zombie, burning. The body of the zombie was hundreds of times stronger than the jade skeleton. When the soul flame merged with it, the zombie's bones were not damaged.

Boom, boom…

The winged skeleton was surprised to find that after his soul flame entered the body of the zombie, not only could he control this foreign body immediately, the heart of the zombie began to beat slowly.

The winged skeleton decided to inspect the zombie's heart and was shocked to find that within the heart was an extremely viscous cluster of soul strength. Even the bloodstream, which should have been dried, became vibrant all of a sudden. The soul strength within the heart was transported around the body and in the blink of an eye, the zombie seemed to come alive.

"I'm alive?"

A funny question appeared in the winged skeleton's mind. By right, spirits of the dead were not really dead, but once they possessed a body of flesh and blood, they would resemble humans even more closely. It was as if a dead person had been revived.

The winged skeleton was stunned for a moment. Soon, he discovered within the depths of his soul that the bond between Saleen and him had began to loosen. His own soul flame was slowly unleashing an incredible power. The restraints of the bond were loosening. If this continued, the soul bond would be completely terminated!

The winged skeleton could clearly see the power of the bond being used by his soul.

The winged skeleton breathed a sigh of relief. The soul flame suddenly stopped jumping and within the flame, dark elements combined together to form a symbol that enclosed the bond between Saleen and his soul. The loosening of the bond stopped. The winged skeleton chanted carefully and slowly. A new rule of the bond was slowly interacting with the original bond and appearing in the the winged skeleton's soul. This rule of the bond was something that the winged skeleton had picked up from that symbol.

When he saw that the soul bond was still safe and intact, the winged skeleton was relieved and thought to himself, "Master, I finally understand what loyalty is".