Chapter 97: Godbeast VS Powerhouse

When under a threat, especially one that affects their very life, most creatures tend to reveal whatever it was the cause of the threat wanted to know.

That is, when the threat is not a natural phenomenon.

True to the demon’s words, the cave was just afar off, and it was protected by an array of runes, which inevitably served as an energy source for Ragnarok. The runes flared once as the scythe’s hunger reached them, pulsing in desperate defiance, and then, as the array was drained completely of mana, they dimmed till they no longer shone.

There was no alarms, no guardians. Whoever had put them there had trusted the runes entirely.

Mikael set foot into it.

The cave was vast and dimly lit and seemed to stretch into darkness, its rough stone walls glistening with moisture and green with algae. The air was cold and heavy, carrying the earthy scent of damp stone and grass.

As he went further in, he could hear water dripping steadily from the ceiling, each drop echoing through the cavern and amplifying the eerie silence that already pervaded the entire ‘forest’ that was basically the body of a beast. A Godbeast, as they called it.

Drip. Drip.

It was almost soothing, if one ignored where they were standing.

As he went deeper and deeper, the less the cave felt like a cave it was supposed to be.

The walls, rocky at the start, seemed to pulse ever so slightly. Thanks to the battle going on outside between the beast and the General, a deep, very perceptible vibration travelled through the ground beneath his feet. Sometimes it was steady, like the distant beating of an enormous heart. Other times it was erratic, and the entire passage shuddered, shedding loose pebbles and dust from above.

Mikael did not slow down. He simply adjusted his footing and continued inward.

The cave only got narrower as he ventured deeper, until his shoulders nearly brushed both sides.

At this point, the walls no longer resembled stone. Here and there, bulges and veins of faintly glowing energy ran through the dense surface, branching like roots beneath almost translucent flesh. When he passed a particularly thick one, he could see something slowly flowing within it.

Mana, raw and unrefined, being carried toward a single destination.

With every step inward, the heat grew. The faint glow within the walls steadily grew brighter and brighter, till it illuminated the path with a dim crimson light, while the air became thick with an overwhelming pressure that made breathing significantly harder. Any ordinary human would have turned back by now, or collapsed.

Only after a couple of minutes of travelling, with the continuous rumbling and the turbulence of the battle at the surface, did Mikael reach his goal.

The narrow path suddenly got wide and opened into quite the colossal chamber, filled with almost nothing. An empty space, so large that the crimson light failed to reach its ceiling.

At its center, a mass of condensed energy, structurally similar to mana, floated, only it felt much older and more refined. Enormous and pulsating quite wildly, it was suspended within a thick web of luminous veins that extended in every direction, anchoring it like a spider’s prey.

The Godbeast’s core!

Thump!

The entire chamber trembled and pulsed audibly, so violently that it even blocked out the effects of the outside battle.

Thump.

The core pulsed again, and again and again.

Thump.

For the nth time tonight, Mikael’s lips curved upwards in a smile, one that was as grateful as it was satisfied.

The immense life force of the Mangrove Lion Turtle.

At the very least, it should be able to help him complete a few cycles.

***********

“Erica, it’s me. Let me in.”

General Rodain flew overhead the Domain of lightning and thunder.

He was quite shocked when he arrived seconds ago, at the sheer amount of distance it actually covered. Bolts crawled along its surface like living serpents, and the thunder it birthed could be felt in the chest from miles away. Its owner, Erica, had just recently managed to fully deploy and recall the Domain as most Sage Ranks were taught to.

It was by no means a small feat. Although, he could somewhat guess the cost she had paid just to keep it from falling.

An opening appeared at the rear end, one which the General picked up on instantly, and he was inside the domain in seconds.

Still midair, General Rodain took his stance and placed a hand on the hilt of his sword. The Godbeast had not even noticed him yet, its attention entirely fixed on the barrier and the aura before it.

That was its mistake.

“Lithorne Family Technique, First Form. Land of the Rising Sun.”

In one quick motion and without wasting a single movement, he drew the sword out of its sheath, and with that same momentum, he swept a long horizontal arc near the rear legs.

For a heartbeat, it looked as if nothing had happened.

Then came the roar of stinging pain, just as an entire limb slowly separated from the rest of the body and crashed into the ground. In blue flames.

This caused the massive creature to lose its footing and topple, amidst reverberating groans and roars. The earth cracked beneath its weight, and a cloud of dust rose, swallowing half the Domain’s interior.

General Erica flew over to her partner. Her face was pale, and a thin line of sweat ran down her temple.

“You got here quite fast.”

“Wouldn’t miss it for the world. Not to mention, you don’t get to fight a Godbeast every day. So I decided to check it out.”

Erica sighed. “Unfortunately for you, it’s still an infant compared to other much more evolved ones. A far cry from the already humanoid ones.”

“An infant,” Rodain repeated, glancing at the severed limb that was bigger than most houses. “Heaven help us when it grows up.”

The Godbeast looked like its cooldown period had ended, as another beam of energy began charging in its mouth. The air itself seemed to bend toward it.

“I am almost out of soul essence,” Erica said, her voice tight. “I’ll reinforce my Domain again. Take the bastard out.”

“Aye aye.” And with that, General Rodain flew off in a streak of flames.

The beam hit the barrier, and General Erica gritted her teeth and groaned, both hands trembling as she poured everything she had into holding it. Lightning screamed across the Domain’s walls. Cracks spread like spiderwebs.

But this time, the beam managed to penetrate the Domain’s barrier instantly, and out into the world outside.

Its effects?

They were truly devastating!

A small part of the city just a few miles ahead turned red for a split second before being completely burnt to the ground.

Erased.

A crater filled with only piles of ashes and billows of smoke stood as evidence that something once stood there.

“Rodain! Get to it!” General Erica screamed as soon as she turned back to the beast.

General Rodain flew above the entire chaos, as high as the barrier allowed. The heat of the flames trailing him had turned the air around him to shimmer.

Gathering mana at the tip of his fingers, he drew a magic circle in the air. Line after line of burning light bloomed into place, each rune settling with a crisp, deliberate click.

“Banish from existence, all who dare to defy me. Pulsar Beam.”

*******

Mikael had set his scythe just below the floating core, and the moment he did so, Ragnarok immediately got to devouring the mana, at quite the speed. The glow of the core dimmed ever so slightly, and the veins around it shivered.

Mikael decided to allow it to ‘recharge’ a bit before he began the transmutation. He sat cross-legged, closed his eyes, and steadied his breathing until his heartbeat matched the rhythm of the chamber. After a few moments, the first cycle of the day began.

It was agony, as it always was. If anything, the resistance of his soul was exponentially greater than his first attempt! He pushed forward nevertheless.

‘No pain, no gain,’ he thought. ‘Just as the human sayings go.’

After an excruciating thirty minutes or so, there was once more turbulence, different from what had been happening all the while he was inside here. It was sharper. Closer.

The trembling was followed by a sudden, violent tilt at one part of the rear region. The scythe lurched, destabilizing the flow and crumbling the entire process.

The backlash from the forced stop caused a mouthful of blood, as well as bloodied ears, to come into the picture. Mikael wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and focused, trying to restabilize his soul before it could fracture further.

But then, he felt a massive gathering of significantly refined mana from above. It was heavy, controlled, and utterly unlike anything the General had shown so far. That was also when he noticed the other presence that had just entered the battlefield.

One that was significantly stronger than the General, and was most likely the cause of the now more frequent turbulence.

That person was at the same level as the Headmaster back at Silver Arcane!

Mikael slowly opened his eyes, crimson light reflecting in them, and his smile returned, thinner this time.

“More surprises for me to figure out?”

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