Chapter 1790: Chapter 1790

Upon reaching his destination, Jenkins kept the unicorn airborne, circling high above the clinic. He had already committed the aura signature of the Enchanter carrying "Thunder God's Wrath" to memory. A brief search was all it took to pinpoint their location: the basement of the shop next door.

He put on his monocle, enhancing the power of his Eye of Reality. Now he could see not only the Enchanter's aura and the "Thunder God's Wrath" artifact, but also a wrench with a fainter, yet still distinct, supernatural glow.

He stroked the unicorn's head, signaling for it to wait in the air. Then, with his cat in his arms, Jenkins leaped from the sky, landing steadily on the street before the clinic. It was a street in name only—more of a makeshift gap between the haphazard buildings of the mining district.

He adjusted his clothes, willed his cat's fur to shift from white to a conspicuous orange, and then walked into the clinic.

Though the street outside was a chaotic mess of gravel, discarded newspapers, rotten vegetable leaves, and filth, the clinic's interior was surprisingly clean.

Clutching two seeds in his hand, Jenkins approached the front desk, where a young receptionist was dozing off. He cleared his throat and asked:

“I’d like to have my cat seen by a doctor.”

“Sir, we only treat people here.”

“I can pay triple the usual fee.”

Jenkins glanced in the direction the receptionist indicated.

“Besides this Dr. Pangwende, are there any other doctors available? My cat has a bit of a cold, likely related to the spring flu.”

He gave the cat a little pat, and it immediately let out an adorable sneeze on cue.

“But it’s already summer...”

Seeing Jenkins pull out his wallet, the young, freckle-faced receptionist quickly changed his tune.

“Dr. Pangwende is also excellent at treating colds. He’s the only one in the clinic today, I’m afraid.”

“Are there any other patients in the clinic, then? It’s hard to believe there’s only one doctor.”

“Sir, I can tell you’re from the city. This is the mining district. Why would any patients be staying overnight?”

“So there’s no one else...”

Jenkins nodded and tossed the seeds onto the floor. To maintain its clean appearance, the clinic was fitted with cheap floorboards, preventing the seeds from reaching the soil beneath. But as Jenkins stepped on them, the brown seeds instantly sprouted imperceptible, grotesque tendrils that writhed in the air before plunging into the floor, cracking the boards.

“One more thing. I saw a small shop next door. Does it have any employees besides the owner?”

“Of course not. A little shop like that would lose money if it hired anyone. Why do you ask?”

The receptionist asked curiously, but Jenkins just shook his head again.

“Then, one final question. Have you heard of the Gear Artisans’ Association?”

The receptionist froze, his mouth gaping open to scream. But before a sound could escape, emerald vines descended from the air and pierced his temples.

Since there was no one else in the clinic or the shop next door, he didn't have to worry about collateral damage. With both the shopkeeper and the doctor in the back being Enchanters, Jenkins was now almost certain this was a surface-level hideout for the Association.

He bent down to pick up a nearly transparent coin that the vines had spat out. Seeing that the seeds at his feet had finally broken through the floorboards and taken root in the soil below, he let out a low command:

With a shriek of maniacal laughter and a strange, rhythmic beeping, a black shadow materialized behind Jenkins and shot toward the back of the clinic, where the doctor was located.

The ensuing explosion and demonic flames nearly obliterated the entire building. But the doctor didn't die instantly. As Jenkins stood amidst the wreckage of the front hall, ringed by infernal fire, the uniformed doctor wretchedly heaved aside a fallen stone slab and crawled out. His eyes immediately fixed on the tall, slender young man.

“A Believer of Lies!”

He flung a handful of metal gears toward Jenkins, but a blessed fire hidden within the demonic flames leaped up, forming a wall that instantly melted the explosive metal.

Jenkins wasted no time on words. He drew the White Bone Holy Sword from thin air and swung it forward in a vicious arc.

A brilliant flash of sword light shot straight for the doctor's head, but he threw up his arms to block. The blade tore through fabric and skin, only to be stopped by a special alloy reinforcing his forearms. But the aura of death clinging to the sword ignored the metal, seeping into the doctor’s body to destroy his flesh and vitality while simultaneously causing the alloy to rapidly oxidize.

The blade paused for less than a second before slicing the enemy in two. From the severed torso spilled a gruesome mix of flesh and mechanical organs, and the blood that flowed out seemed to be mixed with oil.

“A level 3 Enchanter, with mechanical enhancements,”

he noted to himself, summoning the Twin Demons once more to blast through the wall connecting to the shop.

A deafening boom shattered the wall. Jenkins punched away a chunk of the falling ceiling and stepped over the rubble, walking through the black flames into the shop.

The black shadow materialized behind him again. Before the terrified shopkeeper could hurl the steam bomb in his hand, the cackling demon lunged forward.

Another massive explosion completely collapsed the flimsy structure. The shopkeeper’s body, which had taken a direct hit from the Twin Demons, burst apart in a shower of gears and metal screws. Jenkins paid the corpse no mind, his gaze fixed on the ground beneath his feet. There were three more Enchanters in the basement, none of them demigods.

The three of them were now fleeing with the demigod's body, meaning the underground hideout must have another exit. Fınd the newest release on ⓝovelFire.net

The seeds Jenkins had tossed on the floor had now sprouted. Instead of growing upward, they burrowed back into the earth, squirming beneath the surface like giant green worms.

Jenkins walked out of the shop’s ruins, ignoring the localized chaos the explosions had caused.

He stood waiting, sword in hand. Soon, the ground began to tremble slightly. Then, with a muffled boom from below, every piece of gravel on the street jumped into the air before settling back into place. Silence fell.

Jenkins hadn't been standing idle. Connected to the earth, he had been directing the giant vines as they tore through the ground below. It was likely the first time he had fully unleashed his control over plants since reaching the seventh level. The mutated vines had simply crushed the fleeing cultists in their tunnels, then coiled around their belongings, burst through the surface, and tossed the items at Jenkins’s feet.

Ignoring the other assorted items, Jenkins simply picked up the wrench and slipped it into his pocket. As for the Cursed Item, "Thunder God's Wrath," he hesitated for a moment before picking it up as well.

A sizzling sound erupted from his palm, and a foul stench filled the air. Barely managing to control the hammer, Jenkins slipped on the Air Bomb Ring and waved a hand at the ruins of the shop and clinic. A blast of compressed air erupted, leveling the area completely.

The noise would be more than enough to alert the Church that something had happened. This was far from over; their involvement was still necessary.