Barely spanning the quarter of a nail's thickness was the spatial crack, shaped like the letter 'Z.' Its centre was slightly spherical, flickering with jet-black lightning.
The crack had appeared within the syringe's cylinder. Iota stared in awe as the syringe began to suck in the Fisherman Devil's blood.
But unlike the usual when it sucked in the blood of someone, the syringe seemed to be absorbing and compressing the blood.
A golden stream flowed out of the spatial crack and mixed into the blood, causing the majority of it to vaporise and flow into the crack.
The Fisherman Devil's corpse began to wither rapidly as his bones turned brittle, shattering after a series of crackling sounds.
Crack! C-Crackle!
"Fuoooh…" Iota exhaled hard as an intense sense of exhaustion set in him, making him wish he could knock himself out right away and hibernate for a month or two.
But, it didn't seem like things would wait for that as the ground rumbled faintly. Something was digging into the treasury, rapidly.
"Someone intruded the Sect?" Molido trembled in worry, especially since the middle-aged woman had been left at the Sect entrance, 'No! It's dangerous for her!'
He intended to rush to her rescue immediately, but he was helpless. Without a pair of legs, he couldn't walk or run. Moreover, his Fear was completely exhausted. Being in the presence of the Fisherman Devil was replenishing his Fear, but he hadn't accumulated enough to swing through the place using his strings yet.
"Sir Iota, please save her!" Molido shouted at Iota, despairing when his words seemed to have fallen on deaf ears. Iota was wholly focused on the syringe that was emitting a torrent of energy.
Molido was helpless. The Kjallar that was carrying him stared at him with its feline eyes. The moment he tried to escape, it would pin him down. Moreover, even if he wished to escape, he couldn't do so.
The faint trembling of the ground meant someone had infiltrated the Sect. It implied Iota was in danger. So, in that case, Molido had to make Iota's well-being his top priority. As a drug addict, his body was wholly subservient to Iota.
As a result, there was an effect on his mind too. Part of him wished to save the middle-aged lady. But a larger portion of him intended to protect Iota.
It was messed up in her perspective, but it was what it was. Nothing could be done to change it.
Swoosh!
Almost an hour later, the torrent of energy vanished as Iota touched a brightly lit golden syringe on the ground, the edges engraved with ruby patterns. The needle shone like an emerald while the blood within had turned to resemble copper sulphate in colour.
The crack in space had vanished by now, but even by a large stretch, Iota felt a tremendous amount of power condensed within this syringe. Instinctively, he knew and understood that within the syringe remain the essence of the Fisherman Devil.
Anyone injected with it would gain the Fisherman Devil's power.
Iota stared at the Fisherman Devil's corpse that had turned to dust. Nothing of value remained in it, but despite that, he scooped it into a bag and slung it around his hip.
Crack!
Iota stared up and observed a crack in the ceiling. He transformed the syringe—with the Fisherman Devil's Essence—into a tattoo and stored it on his body, grunting at the added weight. It felt like he was suddenly added with a dozen kilograms.
"Did someone infiltrate the Sect?" He asked Molido Garobu.
"I'm afraid so," Molido Garobu said in worry, "We need to escape."
"Escape?" Iota looked around, "And leave all these treasures behind?"
"If the enemy is someone that can drill all the way to us, they should be formidable." Molido said as he stared at the Kjallar, "We have a strong ally, but a one-armed Kjallar can only take care of a Spirit. If more than one Spirit attacks us, we'll be screwed."
"That's true," Iota nodded as he looked around and stretched, relaxing, "There's no reason to mess up everything due to greed. But first,"
He flicked his hand, shooting syringes at the cocoons of baby Kjallars, watching their bodies wither in a matter of seconds. Ever since he turned the syringe with the Fisherman Devil's Essence into a tattoo, he felt empowered, figuring out that he could store the entirety of a person's blood in a syringe and transform it into their Essence.
'Recall that sensation.' He thought, remembering when he arrived at this world and swallowed the resultant spatial crack, followed by the spatial crack that was invoked just now.
The exhaustion worsened as he collapsed to the ground, causing tiny spatial cracks to appear in the syringes, barely a hundredth the size that appeared within the one used on the Fisherman Devil.
The moment they appeared, the bodies of the baby Kjallars withered as their Essence was stored within the syringes, numbering twenty-one in total. With a thought, the syringes vanished and appeared as tattoos on Iota's body.
The reason he only focused on the baby Kjallars in the cocoons was that they were useful in raising his Kjallar's strength. After all, even a one-armed Kjallar was equivalent to a Spirit in strength. A two-armed Kjallar was equivalent to an Apostle.
As long as he improved its strength to the level of an Apostle, Iota could be open about his existence in Garobu City and remain safe.
"Is there any secret exit?" Iota asked Molido, intending to flee.
"No…" Molido shook his head, "There's only one entrance…"
"Forget it," Iota said as he injected Nasp blood into his body and focused on his surroundings, filtering through the various scents as he expanded his senses and detected three people and two creatures.
One creature was furiously digging through the ground while the people were dumping the excavated soil to the side. They were camping within the Sect.
So, even if Iota were to leave through the treasury, he would only arrive within the Sect. A clash was inevitable.
His eyes darted to the side as Iota stared at a wheat stalk. A moment of consideration later, he injected Nakdu's blood into himself and placed his hand on the wheat stalk, causing it to grow and expand in size.
"Let's get inside." Saying so, Iota sent the Kjallar inside a cocoon, observing that it was pretty cramped. He injected two more syringes of Nakdu's blood and expanded its size a bit more so that it could remain comfortably within.
Following that, he expended the remaining power to cause all the wheat stalks to grow to a uniform height so that it wouldn't be odd. He threw Molido into one of the cocoons and entered the final one himself, watching the cocoon opening close gradually.
Thump! Thump!
"Only one way to survive this ordeal…well it would shuck if I fail." Iota condensed the syringe with the Fisherman Devil's Essence and calmly injected its contents into himself.
As the syringe vaporised, intense pain surged in his senses, to an extent a normal person would have committed suicide. But in contrast, Iota was all smiles, 'I feel pain like a normal person.'
He then fainted as the Fisherman Devil's Essence began to gradually influence his body. The last he sensed was a Hhoka breach into the treasury.