Chapter 248: Hellfire Fist — To Regenerate Is to Suffer

The Fruit Core was essentially a crystal used by the Fear Emperor to store energy, combined with a strand of his own consciousness, which allowed the creation of the Hungry Ghost Shara personality.

Kamiyu stared at the black-red crystal still floating in mid-air, her mind racing as she tried to grasp a thought. Suddenly, an idea struck her, and she turned to ask Mephisto.

She recalled the memory of her battle with Lei Yao, when Mephisto couldn’t bear his weapon being damaged and logged back in to resume the fight.

“Old Geezer, back when you were connected to the Doombringer, did you feel pain when Lei Yao consumed the Doombringer?” Kamiyu asked.

“Huh? How could I, a mighty Demon King, possibly feel pain?” Mephisto flatly denied it.

“Stop flexing. I’m asking you seriously—when I blasted the Doombringer with my beam cannon, did you feel pain?” Kamiyu casually flicked the sword with her finger.

“Ow, that hurts! Show some respect, will you? I’m your grandfather,” Mephisto complained.

“Seems asking you was pointless. From your reaction, I already know the answer.” Kamiyu looked confidently at Hungry Ghost Shara, who was nearly reformed.

Jack was no fool; he understood Kamiyu’s tactics. “The Fruit Core has the same type of remote control as the Doombringer. Are you thinking of directly attacking the Fruit Core to mess with the Fear Emperor?”

Kamiyu nodded excitedly. “Exactly. I’m not trying to seize the Fruit Core—I want to force the Fear Emperor to abandon it.”

“And I’ve realized something: the previous fire-based attacks weren’t ineffective against Fruit Ability Users. It’s just that their intelligence is so low they can’t feel pain. They were advancing through the flames anyway.”

“So you want me to go down and blast Hungry Ghost Shara with the Endless Fury Gauntlets?” Jack asked. “But what about you? Without me, who will protect you?”

“I should be the one protecting you. This is your first time facing a Fifth-Tier Ability User up close. Even though they’re a bit fragile, their Attack Power is no joke.” Kamiyu gently touched Jack’s armor, wondering if the Ancestral Legendary Tier Black-Scaled Snake Armor could withstand Hungry Ghost Shara’s attacks.

Jack snorted immediately. “Trust me, I can do this.”

“Mm.”

With that, Jack leaped directly from the Royal Pegasus, landing in front of the half-formed Hungry Ghost Shara.

Everyone in the Black Sphere War Room watched the scene unfold. “Big Brother Jack went down—did he find a way to break through?” they wondered.

The experts on the tree branches stared intently at the battlefield, exclaiming in surprise, “Close-range combat? Is this guy that bold?”

“This Black Armor Warrior—isn’t he afraid of death?”

“Wait, Kamiyu is a Ranged Attack type. Her attacks cover a wide area each time. How can she ensure she doesn’t hurt her own ally?”

“The transparent tentacles aren’t easy to deal with. How will the Black Armor Warrior handle them?” one expert said skeptically.

Captain Lin Fan took a deep breath and focused intently on the battle about to begin below. As a Close-Range combat Warrior himself, he admired the Black Armor Warrior’s courage and felt he could learn something from him.

What to do? Jack hadn’t considered this question. For him, facing an enemy only had one option: to strike with his fist.

Without a second thought, Jack took a quick step forward and immediately unleashed a Hellfire Fist, going straight for his Ultimate Skill.

The Endless Fury Gauntlets ignited him first, turning Jack into a man of flames. Charging up, he swung his right fist straight at the Fruit Core still exposed outside the body.

The Skate Shoes with triple Movement Speed made him far faster than ordinary people, even surpassing the Ultimate Skill speed of most Rogue-class Players. Instantly, he broke through the transparent tentacle palms obstructing his path.

No, it should be said that the flames of his Hellfire Fist burned the transparent palms blocking his way along with them. Dozens of tentacle palms, thick as giant pythons and long as serpents, caught fire, writhing wildly and painfully in the sky.

“What?” Hungry Ghost Shara, whose upper body had no head or face—only a mouth and throat—let out a strange, raspy sound of surprise.

He hadn’t expected this Black Armor Warrior to immediately unleash his Ultimate Skill, igniting the last tentacles he had placed in front of himself to block Kamiyu.

As Jack set the tentacle palms in front of him ablaze, everyone finally saw what the transparent tentacles looked like.

The people in the Black Sphere Room remarked, “So this is Hungry Ghost Shara’s Special Ability. How disgusting.”

“There are hundreds of these tentacle palms, each dozens of meters long. In the hands of someone who knows how to use it, this Special Ability would be incredible. But unfortunately, it fell to a brainless fool like Hungry Ghost Shara,” Li Changde analyzed.

He was right. In the series “XX no Melody,” such transparent tentacles were practically Invincible, crushing anyone they disliked without anyone knowing how to fight back.

Before anyone on the tree branches could speak, Jack spun around, dodging the Lethal killing move before him.

“What? He even dodged my Rapid Clap?” Hungry Ghost Shara’s throat emitted the sound.

Without waiting for its surprise to settle, Jack landed a punch squarely on the Fruit Core with a “Boom!”

Before Hungry Ghost Shara could make a sound, a deep, agonized groan echoed from the Fear Emperor Tree Core Zone.

“Moooooouuuuuu~”

Now, all the tentacles were ignited. It turned out Hungry Ghost Shara didn’t just have hundreds—at a glance, there were thousands of tentacle palms, all now set ablaze by Jack’s Hellfire Fist.

Kamiyu thought to herself, these writhing tentacle palms looked a lot like a dish called fried eel.

Hungry Ghost Shara was composed of these palm-like tentacles, now entirely engulfed in flames. This kind of Burning Damage was excruciatingly painful.

Why? Because Ability Users above the second rank, along with the Fruit Core’s characteristics, possessed extremely strong regenerative abilities. The higher the rank, the stronger the regeneration.

Now, it was a cycle of being burned while regenerating, with the newly regenerated flesh immediately set ablaze again—an endless, relentless loop. Whether you regenerated or not, this continuous Damage dealt Special Attack-level harm to the Ability User and the Fear Emperor.

“Haha, it’s working! My guess was right. The Fruit Core’s sensations are indeed linked to the Fear Emperor. Jack, that’s how you do it—hit it hard, hit it relentlessly!” Kamiyu clenched her fist, bending her arm downward in a victorious battle pose.

This wasn’t over yet. The ultimate move of the Endless Fury Gauntlets—Hellfire Fist—could be unleashed twice when used by Jack, thanks to his Thorns Reflection. It allowed him to perfectly reflect the Hellfire Fist damage he endured back onto his enemy.

Jack stared intently at the Fruit Core and said with a dramatic flex, “Thorns Reflection.”

Immediately, the flames on his body detached like a wolf’s head, lunging forward to bite down on the Fruit Core. The raging flames of hatred engulfed it completely.

“A wolf’s head? Has Mephisto’s influence already begun affecting Jack’s Skills?” Kamiyu, who had been delighted moments before, grew uneasy upon seeing the altered form of the flames.