I Reincarnated As A Stick

Chapter 308: Fusion Verse: True Submission

Whoosh! Whoosh! Whoosh!

Unlike before where the magic circle Horell conjured would manifest a gate that created a large number of weapons, this time, the magic circle that was in front of Horell’s extended palms now manifested a small sphere with a terrifying aura surrounding it. Not long after, this small sphere then expanded in volume by multiple degrees in an instant, stopping a decent number of lightning pillars at the front from moving.

Soon after, this sphere then split itself into multiple chunks as these chunks gradually transformed into weapons of various shapes and sizes. Of course, as the sphere was gradually transforming into multiple weapons, that meant that the lightning pillars could now pass through the gaps between the weapons and strike Herellia and Horell down. But who said Horell didn’t take that into consideration?

“Shatter!” Without hesitation, Horell let out a loud shout as he infused a great amount of energy towards the weapons made from the large sphere. He then utilized his mind to the fullest, controlling the weapons like they were an extension of his limbs through the energy connection he had established. It did not take long for some of the lightning pillars, which had used the gaps to their advantage, to be dispelled thanks to the cooperation of the weapons.

Naturally, once the sneaky lightning pillars were dispelled, Horell then redirected his attention towards the large swath of lightning pillars wanting to gobble the two of them up. Without delay, he commanded the weapons to arrange themselves neatly in front of them as he willed these weapons to attack the lightning pillars, focusing on cooperation instead of individual power.

Back then, when Herellia was still in the state of familiarizing herself with her skills, Horell had used the weaker version of the skill he had cast to fight against the pillars, sacrificing his weapons one by one until the pillars dispelled. Although it allowed him to dispel quite a decent number of pillars in the process, the amount of energy he lost from the shattering of the weapons was far greater than the amount of energy he could recover, even with the buffs he had cast on himself.

With that in mind, he knew that he should fight against these pillars with a different approach, utilizing a small group of weapons to share the burden of dispelling a lightning pillar, which in turn would reduce the rate of energy loss that he had to endure. Thanks to this strategy, Horell was able to dispel a pillar at a speed far faster than before while he was able to recover enough energy in the process to repair the weapons he sent out that were damaged.

While Horell was focused on dispelling the lightning pillars to give enough time for Herellia to recuperate, Herellia, on the other hand, could not help but look at Horell in awe. The reason as to why she was in awe was because Horell was exhibiting a level of combat power far greater than what he had shown her before. To her, it was as if the Horell in front of her had undergone an evolution.

In fact, this was the thought she had in mind, prompting her to ask him, “Horell, out of curiosity, did you undergo an evolution or something while I was evolving?”

In response, Horell radiated an aura of immense confusion as his concentration was briefly broken, allowing some of the lightning pillars to pass through the array of weapons he had arranged. Fortunately, Horell was able to notice this in time, increasing the control he had on the weapons for some time before returning it to normal. After that, he took a few deep breaths to regain his composure before turning around and responding, “Herellia, I’ve already undergone an Existence Tribulation. I can’t evolve as fast as you just did.”

“Then how did you gain this much power in such a short time?” Herellia asked in response to his words before continuing, “Were you hiding some of your skills from me to wow me or…”

Just as she was about to continue interrogating Horell about his secrets to becoming stronger, she then recalled that they had a companion that was capable of enhancing one’s combat power to a great degree in a short amount of time. With that in mind, she then looked at Horell with an aura that felt like she finally knew the answer as she asked, “Did you become this strong because of Argentum?”

“Pretty much,” Horell did not deny the fact that he was this strong because of Argentum. It was then that Herellia understood why Horell was this strong, even though he wasn’t this strong in the first place. Taking a few deep breaths to increase the rate at which the sensation she felt disappear, she then asked Horell, “At your current state, how long do you think you can last?”

“Taking into consideration the amount of time I’ve been defending you against the pillars, around thirty more minutes, give or take,” Horell replied, basing his answer on the amount of time he lasted while he was protecting Herellia when she was still familiarizing herself with her skills. Hearing Horell’s answer, she then lightly nodded before standing up, lightly stretching her body as she let out a light sigh.

“It takes me five minutes to recover from a state of uselessness to a state where I could barely defend myself,” Herellia muttered to himself, thinking that it would take quite a bit more time for her to return to her peak condition. Nevertheless, she did not waste the time that Horell bought for her, deciding to head towards the crimson magic circle she had conjured to increase the amount of time Horell could buy for him.

Although there was a limited duration for the magic circle to exist, that did not mean that this duration could be extended. What Herellia had in mind was to infuse more of her energy towards the magic circle, as well as ask Horell to transfer some of his energy to her to extend the duration of the magic circle even further. Of course, before she headed to where the crimson magic circle was, she looked at Horell and said, “Horell, follow me.”

“Eh? Where are we going?” Horell asked in response, to which Herellia replied, “The crimson magic circle I conjured. I’m planning to infuse more energy into it so you could stall for longer. I need you to protect me while we’re heading there.”

“Alright,” Horell nodded as he responded to her words, redirecting some of his concentration to where Herellia was while most of it was still focused on controlling the weapons. Due to Herellia running around, luring a great number of the lightning pillars before attacking back then, the distance between her and the magic circle she had conjured could be considered to be too far in her current state. She felt that she could head there as fast as possible, but it would result in her becoming incredibly exhausted, which was something she did not want to feel again.

And so, without hesitation, she went ahead and walked to where the magic circle was, but at a faster pace. Although the sensation she felt was not disappearing, it was not intensifying either, allowing her to let out a sigh of relief as she focused her sense of vision towards the magic circle, sending some of her energy strands from time to time to find out how much time was left before it disappeared.

Surprisingly, the cursory examination of the magic circle she did was actually wrong. The magic circle did not have a couple of minutes left before it dispelled, but rather, it had over ten minutes remaining before it dispelled. With that in mind, she realized that she had placed enough energy for it to last around twenty minutes or so instead of the ten minutes she first thought.

“There’s still a few minutes left before the magic circle fully dispels,” Herellia muttered to herself as she looked at Horell from time to time. At this moment, Herellia felt that the power surrounding Horell was starting to flicker, with some of the strikes he did on the lightning pillars not having the power it used to. It was also at this moment that she noticed that the lightning pillars close to the magic circle, which were at a state of inaction before, were now making their way to where the two of them were.

It did not take long for her to obtain the reason as to why this was happening, inwardly sighing as she muttered, “It seems they’ve sensed that the two of us have weakened, hence the reason why they’re now making their move.”

“For now, I should ask Argentum to replenish the buffs on Horell,” she continued to mutter, thinking about the best course of action that would reduce the burden Horell was currently feeling. Without delay, she sent a strand of energy towards Argentum, not waiting for Argentum to respond before saying, “Argentum, replenish the buffs on Horell as soon as possible. I feel like it’s about to disappear.”

“Hm?” Argentum let out a sound in response as he extended his enhanced senses towards Horell. In a short amount of time, he was able to discern that Herellia’s statement was indeed correct, prompting him to send a large number of energy balls towards Horell, allowing the aura surrounding him to return to its previous state once more.

“Alright, I’ve replenished his buffs,” Argentum said after he was finished before adding, “Anything else?”

“For now, nothing. Thanks,” Herellia said before cutting off the connection between the two of them as her sense of vision was focused on the magic circle. At this moment, the two of them were only tens of meters away from the magic circle. With an aura of relief and elation surrounding her, Herellia felt that they were going to survive this onslaught of lightning pillars without a problem. But just as the distance between her and the magic circle had finally reached a distance where she could directly infuse her energy…

Whoosh!

The magic circle naturally dispelled as the energy in the crimson petals forming it had finally run out. In an instant, the protection that Herellia was hoping to rely on, had vanished just like that. The emotions she felt at that moment made her slump to the ground as she let out a long sigh of defeat.

Even though she felt like the hope of them surviving had now become bleaker, she still grasped onto this hope as tightly as possible as she told Horell, “Well, it seems that the magic circle has dispelled. Should I go make another one of those magic circle things?”

In response, Horell replied while still facing up against the lightning pillars, “Do you have enough energy to make another one?”

Herellia went silent after hearing Horell ask that question. She then went ahead and examined the insides of her body, checking the amount of energy inside her body. Not long after, she let out a sigh of slight disappointment as she shook her head and said, “No.”

“Then, focus on recovering your energy,” Horell said in response to her brief statement before adding, “I’ve finally found a rhythm to fighting against these lightning pillars, so don’t think about the time we took to head here. You still have 30 more minutes to recuperate.”

“Thanks, Horell,” Herellia said with a sigh. She then let out a light chuckle as she replied, “To think that you’re actually this dependable in a life and death situation.”

“Well, what can I say, I’m forced to help you out,” Horell let out a nervous chuckle as he replied before continuing, “I still feel like something bad to happen, even up to now.”

“I’ll try to find a way out of this,” Herellia said to reduce Horell’s worries. She then added, “For now, focus on stalling for more time.”

In response, Horell nodded before focusing all of his attention on controlling the weapons he had conjured through the skill he cast. As for Herellia, she decided to sit on the ground before closing her vision to ponder on what the best course of action from now on would be.

‘Naturally, the best course of action for this would be to conjure a magic circle once I recover enough energy,’ she thought to himself. ‘But the amount of energy needed for me to cast one would go beyond the time Horell gave me for recuperation, so that’s a pass for now.’

‘As for the next best course of action, it would be to fight back against the lightning pillars using the skill with that weapon I made.’ As she thought up to here, she felt like the chances of them successfully clearing all of the remaining pillars were bleak. Indeed, she was thinking of clearing all of the remaining pillars in one fell swoop instead of defending against them. Although they could stall for far longer and slowly whittle away the lightning pillars that attacked them, the current situation did not seem to be in their favor.

‘All of the lightning pillars are in front of Horell, but due to how Horell is attacking them, he’s only fighting against a small number of them at a time,’ she thought to herself. ‘I can recover to my peak condition before the time Horell gave me is up, but the amount of energy I would recover at that time would only be enough for two activations of those skills. In short, I can only remove 200 lightning pillars before going into that helpless state again.’

Just as her thoughts came up to this point, another thought that resonated with the other thoughts surfaced in her mind, prompting her to look at what it was. After pondering over it, this thought soon integrated itself into the plan Herellia had as she felt that this would not just be the best course of action, but the ideal course of action.

But just as she was about to start with her plan, she continued to ponder a what-if scenario, asking herself, “Now that I think about it, what if even if I did that, there would still be some lightning pillars remaining?”

“I can’t afford any deviations for this type of situation,” Herellia muttered to himself, only to recall that there was a set of skills far stronger than the ones she used before. Unfortunately, she was not able to familiarize herself with it, although she knew that even the weakest skill in that set had a power output many times greater than the strongest skill she had used.

“It seems I have no choice but to try familiarizing myself with that skill within the time limit Horell gave me.” Herellia let out a sigh of defeat in response to this statement. Nevertheless, she knew that this would allow them to dispel all of the lightning pillars at once, prompting her to focus all of her attention on it as she muttered, “[Blood Empress Decree: Fusion Verse, True Submission]. A skill birthed from the fusion of Submission and Domination. For one to comprehend it, one must follow the saying, ‘Once one is forced to submit, one can eventually dominate. Once one dominates, one forces others to submit.'”

“What does this saying mean?” Herellia asked herself, mulling over the saying for quite some time. Surprisingly, after a few minutes, her thoughts shifted towards the situation she was in a while ago. Just as she was wondering why her thoughts had shifted to it, it was then that she finally understood the meaning of the saying.

“Once one is forced to submit, one can eventually dominate. Once one dominates, one forces others to submit. I see! I finally understand what it means!” Herellia said in an excited tone as she hastily opened her sense of vision before standing up. She then hastily sent a strand of energy towards Argentum before saying, “Cast all of your offense boosting spells on me! It’s time to end this round!”

Although he did not know why Herellia was so confident and excited, Argentum did what he was told, casting all of the offense boosting spells he had in his arsenal to increase Herellia’s offensive power.

Whoosh! Whoosh!

In an instant, the aura of power radiating from Herellia had increased to an incredible degree, prompting the lightning pillars that were attacking Horell to stop for a bit and examine what Herellia was going to do next. As for Horell, after sensing the aura Herellia was emanating, he asked her, “Are you going to make a move?”

“Yeah.” Herellia nodded. “Of course, continue to attack the lightning pillars while I’m attacking. I’m not super sure if I can dispel all of them.”

“Alright,” Horell said in response as he nodded. Then again, although he agreed to Herellia’s order, he was still curious as to what Herellia was going to do, prompting her to focus most of her attention onto Herellia instead of the lightning pillars.

As for Herellia, she looked at the large swath of lightning pillars near the two of them before gripping on the crimson halberd she held onto all this time. She then pointed it towards the sky before summoning all of the energy inside her body to head towards the tip of the halberd.

Whoosh!

In an instant, the blade of the halberd was covered in a golden sheen, contrasting the crimson color of the blade. Nevertheless, an aura of tyranny radiated from it, shocking even Horell from the sheer intensity of it. Of course, this aura was left ignored by Herellia as she focused her sense of vision towards the lightning pillars and muttered, “Once one is forced to submit, one can eventually dominate. Once one dominates, one forces others to submit.”

Whish! Whish!

After saying those words, she then slashed with the halberd in a cross pattern, sending a large golden X towards the lightning pillars as she shouted, “[Blood Empress Decree: Fusion Verse].”

“[True Submission]!”

——–

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