"You've been standing there with your eyes closed for more than half an hour. It's probably only a few minutes until midnight. How do you feel now?"
The fire in the dead forest had dimmed a lot, but the gray snow was still flying in the night sky. With the help of the doctor, Xia De sat down on the other half of the millstone buried deep in the snow, then looked down at his hands:
"The devil wants to see my appearance and then transform into my appearance to deal with me."
He placed his right arm on his right knee, lowered his upper body slightly, and looked at the doctor in front of him:
“So, I saw what I looked like.”
"No, no, that's not what you look like, that's your shadow."
The doctor corrected:
"I understand Goethe's power. You only see the part of yourself that you normally can't see. It seems like you've gained something from this?"
"Yes."
Although he only had one more spirit rune and one more passive magic, all his powers related to the moon were enhanced. He couldn't describe this feeling, so he summoned the Moonlight Greatsword.
The weight of the spiritual weapon was almost the same as that of a normal weapon, and Shade, who was a little weak at the moment, could hardly hold the weapon.
The greatsword with rune strings attached to it pierced into the snow, and the nearly translucent silver blade illuminated Shade's profile and the gray snow. The appearance of the Moonlight Greatsword also became more gorgeous than before.
"What a beautiful weapon."
The doctor also praised it, then took out a glass bottle from his pocket and handed it to Shade:
"I guessed that you would be in a mess. Drink this. The demon realm is not friendly to any creature with a soul. I know you have some special abilities, but it looks like it will take a while for you to recover."
So Shade drank the fiery red liquid. Just as the doctor said, he had stayed in the demon realm for too long, and the effects on his body needed rest to recover. After drinking the potion, although he did not recover immediately, at least his body began to warm up:
"In about an hour, I'll be back to normal."
Seeing that Xia De's complexion had improved a little, the doctor finally smiled and asked:
"Shad, Shad, didn't you say that you would give me the task of defeating the demon? Why did you do it yourself? I prepared for two weeks, but in the end, none of my preparations were used."
It can be seen that the doctor is in a particularly good mood. Xia De shook his head:
“There’s a lot going on.”
The doctor did not ask:
"Tell me later when you have time. This matter is over, and that's the key. By the way, what's going on outside? Why is the forest on fire? Also, I seemed to see a dragon flying towards this side just now, but your friend, a very beautiful black-haired lady, took your sword to stop it. The lady seemed to care about you, and she said she would be back soon."
He must have been talking about Miss Sylvia, so Shad didn't see the witch when he opened his eyes.
“Although you have said that Randall Valley is very lively tonight, I didn’t expect it to be this lively.”
The doctor continued, turning his head to look at the night sky illuminated by the fire. Xia De looked around, and there was no trace of the battle in the white yard.
"Doctor, did you see the other lady? I sent her to intercept Stone Oxenfurt."
"Ms. Marilyn Handel? Yes, she appeared after I swallowed Goethe. She introduced herself and was accompanied by a very strange soul. Together with that soul, she dragged the demon with chains. Are all your friends in Randall Valley so interesting?"
The doctor nodded:
"But she left too. She said that there would be many places in Randall Valley that would need her tonight. But, is the soul you were talking about this one?"
The doctor took out a narrow-necked glass bottle covered with gray snow from the snow at his feet. Inside the bottle, a miniature Stone Oxenfurt was constantly beating the inner wall of the bottle.
"The soul is in the bottle, and his body is in the snow next to us. We can see it by pushing aside the snow... Don't look at me with strange eyes. Since I know the knowledge of demons, it is normal for me to know how to imprison souls, isn't it?"
The doctor explained and handed the bottle to Shad. Shad leaned over to look. To Stone Oxenfurt in the bottle, it seemed that the giant's face was approaching.
"Doctor, your abilities are getting weirder and weirder, but this is definitely him."
Shade breathed a sigh of relief. This way, at least the two worst outcomes of the night had been avoided. When it was over, he would thank Ms. Handel.
"This soul is now completely under your control. Ms. Handel said before she left that you can send it away at any time."
The doctor reminded again, and Shade nodded, drawing a dark crack on his side with his finger. The doctor was so scared that he almost jumped up, but then Shade shook his head again, and instead of throwing the bottle in, he smoothed the crack:
"How do we get him out?"
"Just uncork the bottle. Be careful not to let him escape."
The doctor reminded him, and Shad uncorked the bottle.
The two saw the soul in the bottle turned into a puff of white smoke and flew out of the long and narrow mouth of the bottle. The white smoke flew towards the corpse under the snow, and then the living dead, breathing heavily, sat up again from under the snow.
"The Stone Mirror Demon-Goethe has been expelled by us."
Shade sat on the millstone, without releasing the Light of Imprisonment and the Chains of Sin, but just looked at Stone Oxenfurt in the heavy snow. The doctor sitting on the other side added:
"Don't even think about seeing him again for at least a thousand years."
"Oxenfurt, there is actually no hatred between us two."
Shade continued, and both Shade and the doctor were facing the burning forest sideways, their slender shadows trembling in the crackling sound:
"It's just a simple commission relationship between us, and you were very quick to pay. However, I know something about your past and the relationship between you and Hela Oxenfurt, so..."
"You want to be a messenger of justice, save me from the devil, and then kill me?"
Osenfurt asked, looking at the two figures.
"I saved you from the devil for another reason."
Shade shook his head:
"I can give you one chance, letting you choose between death and an ugly death. As a price, you have to repent. Kneel here now and count your crimes in detail, and confess to all those you have murdered."
"Is this still necessary now?"
Stone Oxenfurt looked up at Shade. Even in the face of the current situation, there was no sign of weakness on his face:
"Killing and robbing, this is my way of life. I have nothing to repent for, and I don't think what I did was wrong."
"If you hadn't met the devil, you would probably have become a famous pirate, or a murderer."
Shad said:
"Even now, do you still think that you have done nothing wrong?"
"Yes."
So Shade said calmly:
"Hela Oxenfurt said she doesn't want to see you anymore."
The man on the snow immediately shut his mouth. After being stunned for a moment, he turned his head and looked towards the window on the third floor:
"Let me see her again. Even if you don't want to say anything, at least let me see her again. I can give you everything I have."
Xia De shook his head:
"When those you killed asked you to forgive them before they died, did you ever show kindness to them?"
Osenfurt ignored Shade, and with the help of the snow, he struggled to stand up with his stiff body, then stumbled towards the door of the mansion.
Xia De just sat there and watched him run further and further away.
"You won't stop him?"
Dr. Schneider asked curiously, and Shade said:
"I hope you don't think my behavior just now is excessive."
The doctor raised his eyebrows and signaled Xia De to start:
"To be honest, I don't believe you have any excessive means."
So Shade took out the photo of the Watson family from his pocket. He had originally used this photo as the first line of defense against Oxenfort, but he didn't expect it to become a prop at the end:
"Don't keep those who should leave."
After saying this softly, he threw the photo into the air. On the gray snow surface, the shadow of the old photo drifting in the wind was reflected. The shadow of the photo was a tilted rectangle, but then the rectangle on the snow surface extended into the shadows of dozens of large black hands.
Xia De stood up, took a few steps forward, and suddenly chopped straight down with his right hand from top to bottom, and then the crack leading to real death appeared again.
At the same time, the souls of the old corpse with four arms, the rat-like half-demon, the old woman in ghost state, the ogre covered with pink fat, and the banshee covering her face with her hands, squeezed out of the photo together, and at the door of the mansion, grabbed Osenfurt from behind when he was trying to enter the mansion.
The old wight hugged his neck, the rat half-demon hugged his left hand, the ghost hugged his right hand, the ogre grabbed his feet, and the weeping banshee stabbed her hands into his chest from behind and grabbed the heart that originally belonged to her sister.
The heart was taken out of the zombie's chest and thrown onto the snow. Then the family of five dragged Osenfurt from behind, moving little by little towards the crack opened by Shade.
Stone Oxenfurt lay prone on the snow, leaving ten clear scratches on the snow with his ten fingers. He looked up desperately at the only lighted window on the third floor, but he never saw the person he missed appear there.
Shade and the doctor sat on their respective half of the millstone, silently watching the five resentful souls drag Ossenfurt into death. Screams were heard from the calm mudflats, but then the crack closed automatically, so the living people didn't know what would happen next.