Chapter 689

Hum—

A large swarm of Crest Worms flew about; this was the true form of Matou Zouken.

These Crest Worms were hideous in appearance, with slender bodies and sharp wings; they had red compound eyes on both their heads and backs. A rough estimate put the number of Crest Worms at over a hundred.

"What, not continuing your attack?"

Matou Zouken's voice arrived. This voice did not originate from within the worms' bodies, but rather from all directions.

The Crest Worms' flight speed was not slow, and their numbers were significant; it would be quite difficult to wipe them all out.

These Crest Worms did not pounce toward Su Xiao, but instead flew toward the basement exit. The reason was simple: although Matou Zouken was the head of one of the three great mage families and had lived for over five hundred years, he knew one truth—a mage fighting a Heroic Spirit head-on would absolutely meet a miserable end, especially against a "Heroic Spirit" as strong as Su Xiao. Furthermore, the Matou family's magecraft was not particularly excellent in terms of offense.

Su Xiao's figure flashed as he charged straight toward the swarm. He absolutely could not let this old worm escape alive today; the opponent knew some of his secrets.

Although Su Xiao did not fear the other six Heroic Spirits, it was best not to be exposed if possible.

Washinoki Washinoki Jishi of hexagonal energy shields appeared around Su Xiao. As soon as the Repel Shields appeared, he immediately cut off the energy supply. This way, the Repel Shields could move beyond one meter from him, though their duration was reduced to only one minute.

While charging forward, Su Xiao also controlled the Repel Shields to fly toward the swarm of Crest Worms in mid-air.

Realizing that dozens of crystal-clear energy shields were flying toward him, Matou Zouken subconsciously felt something was wrong and immediately controlled the worms to scatter in all directions, but unfortunately, it was too late.

Washinoki Washinoki Jishi of Repel Shields surrounded the Crest Worms flying in mid-air. All the Repel Shields converged, eventually forming a diamond-shaped barrier. Although the barrier was pieced together from dozens of Repel Shields, it was constructed extremely tightly.

Boom, boom!

The large swarm of Crest Worms rampaged inside the Repel Shields. These Crest Worms possessed immense strength, causing the Repel Shield barrier to roar incessantly from the impacts.

Unfortunately, Repel Shields with a strength of 400 points were not something a mage like Matou Zouken could break through; let alone a mage, even a Heroic Spirit might not necessarily be able to break through them.

Discovering they could not break through the Repel Shield barrier, the Crest Worms stopped their futile efforts and landed on the inner side of the barrier. The originally translucent barrier turned a grayish-black.

All the Crest Worms bared their fine, dense fangs and began to gnaw on the Repel Shields from the inside.

Click, click, click...

The gnawing sound reached a piercing level. The Matou family's magecraft was water-attributed and possessed absorption properties; the old geezer Matou Zouken intended to absorb the barrier's energy to break through the Repel Shields.

Su Xiao took a deep breath, exerting his utmost to suppress the activity of the Blade of the Qing Gang Ying energy within the Repel Shields, lowering the shields' strength.

The Repel Shield barrier flickered with blue light, and a large number of energy meridians appeared on its surface.

Click, click, click...

Fine, dense holes began to appear on the Repel Shield barrier; it wouldn't take long before it was gnawed away completely.

Having previously discovered that negotiation was useless and his true form already exposed, Matou Zouken stopped talking nonsense. He now wanted to escape this place. As for subsequent retaliation, he had many ways; if it came to conspiracies and schemes, no one was his match.

Su Xiao had appeared too suddenly, and Su Xiao never listened to an enemy's nonsense, so Matou Zouken's schemes and tricks had no place to be used.

Snap!

The Repel Shield barrier shattered. With a hum, a large number of Crest Worms rushed out from within the barrier.

"Unknown Heroic Spirit, you will be the first sacrifice of the Holy Grail War."

Matou Zouken gave a sinister laugh, and the large swarm of Crest Worms scattered, preparing to escape using their numerical advantage.

"After eating so much of my Qing Gang Ying energy, you still want to leave?"

Zzz~

Blue-white electric arcs erupted within all the Crest Worms' bodies.

"Ah!!"

A scream rang out. The magical power within all the Crest Worms clashed with the Qing Gang Ying energy. The Qing Gang Ying energy bared its fangs: Devour!

One Crest Worm after another exploded. A moment later, all hundred-plus Crest Worms were dead.

"Matou Zouken... is dead?"

Matou Kariya's eyes widened, seemingly unable to believe the scene before him.

"Not that easily."

Su Xiao glanced at the Reincarnation Paradise notification.

【You have eliminated Matou Zouken (2/5)】

【Because Matou Zouken's main body, the Crest Worm, has not died, Matou Zouken will recover after 5 natural days of slumber.】

That old worm hadn't died; it was just sleeping. If it were that easy to kill, it wouldn't be an old monster that had lived for 500 years.

"Xiang Bubu."

Su Xiao looked at Xiang Bubu Wang. Xiang Bubu Wang sighed, brought its nose close to the Crest Worm corpses on the ground, and after sniffing, Xiang Bubu Wang walked out of the basement.

Su Xiao followed closely behind. Matou Zouken had to die today; it had nothing to do with what he had done in the past—this was a personal grudge.

Just as Su Xiao had arrived in the Holy Grail world, Matou Zouken had intended to let the Crest Worms invade his body. If not for his high alertness, Su Xiao, who hadn't even been fully teleported over yet, would very likely have been ambushed by Matou Zouken.

As long as the difference in strength wasn't vast, Su Xiao never let his revenge wait overnight.

Su Xiao and Xiang Bubu Wang rushed out of the basement. Only then did Su Xiao discover that this pitch-black building was the Matou family's ancient castle.

As a mage family with hundreds of years of heritage, the castle they lived in was naturally not small, but the tone of this castle was gloomy, like an ancient castle about to be abandoned.

The castle was filled with the stench of worms. What Su Xiao had to do was simple: kill all the Crest Worms in this castle. He didn't believe Matou Zouken wouldn't die from this; the opponent's consciousness was in a deep sleep, making even resistance impossible.

After rushing to the first floor, Xiang Bubu Wang tracked the stench of worms to the depths of the castle.

After wandering around, Xiang Bubu Wang found a staircase leading downward at a corner on the first floor.

A wooden door blocked the downward staircase. Su Xiao kicked the wooden door to pieces. Behind the wooden door was a room where one couldn't see their own fingers. After the wooden door shattered, moonlight shone into the room, and with Su Xiao's vision, the scene inside the room came into view.

This room had no windows and was almost completely sealed; only the staircase under Su Xiao's feet could enter the room.

The entire room was a large pool, about 5 meters by 5 meters. The pool was filled with gray worms, dense and numerous. These worms had mouths full of sharp fangs and were wriggling inside the pool.

Stumbling footsteps came from behind Su Xiao; it was the limping Matou Kariya.

Ignoring Matou Kariya, Su Xiao walked down the steps into the worm-filled pool.

As Su Xiao's footsteps moved forward, the Crest Worms in the pool wriggled and scattered; they were fleeing.

When Su Xiao walked into the pool, there wasn't a single Crest Worm within three meters of him.

"So these aren't the main body."

Qing Gang Ying energy surged from under Su Xiao's feet, spreading across the ground like a tide.

Squeak~

The Crest Worms let out miserable screams. As long as they were touched by the Qing Gang Ying energy, their bodies were like snow meeting a hot iron.

Pop, pop...

Every Crest Worm that touched the Qing Gang Ying exploded. For Crest Worms composed of semi-energy, Qing Gang Ying energy was a natural nemesis.

As the Qing Gang Ying energy swept through, all thousand-plus Crest Worms in the worm pool died.

"Eh?"

A weak girl's voice came. A completely naked little girl stood up in the worm pool. Among the broken corpses of those Crest Worms, this little girl's fair skin was particularly conspicuous.

Su Xiao walked up. The purple-haired little girl raised her head, her eyes, which should have been innocent, were dim and lusterless.

The little girl's name was Matou Sakura; she should have been called Tohsaka Sakura. Unfortunately, she had encountered a father who would pit his own daughter: Tohsaka Tokiomi.

Tohsaka Tokiomi was a qualified mage, but he was not a good father. In Matou Kariya's words, it was all Tokiomi's fault.

In Su Xiao's view, this statement made no sense. Whether Tohsaka Tokiomi was at fault, he didn't know, but he knew one thing: all misfortune was caused by the insufficient ability of the parties involved. Whether killing or protecting, one's own strength had to be strong.

Want to protect Sakura? Just kill that old worm. Childhood sweetheart stolen? Just kill Tohsaka Tokiomi.

"Big brother, are you going to kill me?"

Matou Sakura looked up at Su Xiao, a small hand pressed against her flat chest.

"Ah."

Su Xiao reached his left hand toward Matou Sakura. A desperate roar came from behind.

"Stop!"

Matou Kariya lunged forward; he could no longer care about the gap in strength.

"Ugh~"

Matou Sakura, who had been waiting for death, retched, rolled her eyes, and looked somewhat dazed. She actually spat out a strangely shaped worm from her mouth.

This worm was blood-red all over, with a round head. As soon as this slender worm left Matou Sakura's mouth, it rushed toward the room's only exit.

"Grandpa?"

Sakura tilted her head to look at the worm on the ground and raised her small foot to stomp on it. This was Matou Zouken's main body.

With a pat, the fair little foot missed.

Just as the worm escaped to Su Xiao's feet, he raised his foot and crushed the worm with one stomp.

【You have eliminated Matou Zouken (4/5)】

【Because Matou Zouken's main body, the Crest Worm, has not died, Matou Zouken will recover after 64 natural days of slumber.】