Chapter 674 - 561: Schmidt Acarnis

Chapter 674: Chapter 561: Schmidt Acarnis

A chilling sharpness pressed against the side of his neck, so intense it felt as if it could pierce his skin. This, combined with the sluggish feeling of sinking into a swamp brought on by the Spiritual Energy, was infinitely magnified in the human Mage’s Perception.

The chill of being on the brink of life and death, like the sharpest Ice Cone, pierced through the absolute rationality and calm he had maintained for years.

’It’s too late!’

At such a close distance, and against his opponent’s terrifyingly precise timing, it was too late to cast any conventional Defense Spells or use any displacement techniques.

The Short Spike, pulsing with a sinister violet light that seemed to devour souls, would pierce the side of his neck in the next moment.

However, as a Great Mage from the High Tower who was highly regarded and could hold his own, the human Mage was not without a final trump card.

Just as the tip of the Short Spike was about to touch his skin, a subtle glint of pained reluctance and resolve flashed in his eyes.

He had a miniature trigger talisman under his tongue, the Seed of Star Realm Transition. Forged from a mixture of Mithril and Star Realm dust, he had nurtured it with his own lifeblood for over a decade.

With a final, desperate surge of Spiritual Power, he detonated it!

This was no ordinary Magic Item, but the ultimate life-saving measure he had prepared for himself—an escape tantamount to a second life.

Its materials were incredibly rare, containing a sliver of solidified, elementary understanding of Space Law.

When the wearer faced a fatal threat, it could forcibly "project" part or all of their body into the highly unstable rift between the Star Realm and the Prime Material Plane, allowing them to evade an otherwise lethal attack.

The cost was the talisman’s permanent destruction, severe spatial tearing damage to the user, and a prolonged period of mental enervation.

"BUZZ!"

A strange, ethereal hum, seemingly from the endless void, erupted from the human Mage.

The air around his neck distorted and rippled violently, taking on the strange luster of a shattered mirror.

Roland’s certain-kill strike, which he felt had already made contact, bizarrely "slipped" through an illusory play of light and shadow, as if he had only stabbed a realistic Illusion.

’Success!’

’I dodged the fatal stab!’

But before the human Mage could even feel relieved, an irresistible and terrifyingly pure physical force, like being hit head-on by a Siege Hammer, slammed viciously into his chest and left shoulder.

In the instant his thrust was bizarrely evaded, Roland, relying on his astounding combat instincts, had seamlessly converted all his forward momentum into a no-frills shoulder ram and elbow strike.

It lacked the sharpness of the Short Spike, but it concentrated all his Power, speed, and terrifying explosive force, landing solidly on the human Mage’s torso, which he had hastily shielded with Magic Power.

"CRACK!"

The distinct sound of splintering bone rang out.

"SPURT!"

The human Mage spat out a mouthful of blood mixed with fragments of his internal organs. In that instant, all his Protective Spells dimmed and shattered completely.

He felt as if he had been hit head-on by a rampaging Ancient Giant Dragon. His organs were violently jolted, his vision went black, and his ears were filled with nothing but a deafening roar.

His body, completely out of control, plummeted at a terrifying speed toward a tidal flat littered with jagged black reefs on the island’s edge, like a kite with a snapped string or a javelin thrown by a titan.

"BOOM!"

The colossal sound of the impact briefly drowned out the booming of Magic from across the distant sea.

The human Mage’s body slammed into the reef flat like a meteor, carving a trench over ten meters long and half a meter deep in the ground.

The hard black reefs shattered and flew apart from the impact. A mixture of dirt, gravel, crushed seaweed, and shells shot into the sky, forming a massive, murky cloud of dust.

The shockwave spread out in a ring, violently displacing the water in the nearby shallows and creating a temporary crater. The resulting waves crashed against the more distant reefs with a thunderous roar.

At the end of the trench, in a shallow pit several meters in diameter, lay the human Mage. His dark gray robes were tattered and caked with mud and blood.

He lay motionless in the rubble, only the extremely faint rise and fall of his chest proving he was still alive.

But the once-daunting, immense fluctuations of Magic Power emanating from him were now as faint as a candle in the wind, almost imperceptible.

The dust slowly spread and settled, carrying the pungent smell of earth and the faint scent of blood.

And then, from behind a taller reef not far from the impact site, three heads cautiously peeked out.

Holland’s eyes were wide, his mouth slightly agape. He stared at the devastated impact site and the swirling dust, finally swallowing hard after a long moment and muttering.

"Damn... The boss was really ruthless this time..."

Bronson, however, wasn’t paying much attention to the outcome of the fight.

In his mind, it was only natural for Roland to defeat a powerful enemy.

He spared only a quick glance at the human Mage in the center of the crater before his gaze shifted swiftly to Mara, high in the air, who didn’t seem to have fully grasped the situation yet.

Seeing his wife was safe, he finally let out a long sigh of relief.

Ellis, on the other hand, drew a sharp breath, his gray-blue eyes filled with shock.

He subconsciously gripped the reef beneath him and whispered.

"That level of Magic Power Shield and a triggered spatial-evasion item... to have its defense shattered by pure physical force... If he hadn’t managed to trigger a few cushioning and Protective Spells at the last second before hitting the ground, he would probably be..."

His analysis came to an abrupt halt.

Because as the dust continued to settle, he finally got a clear look at the face of the unconscious figure in the center of the pit.

Ellis’s pupils contracted suddenly, his voice filled with incredulous astonishment.

"M-Mr. Schmidt?"

Hearing this astonished whisper, Holland turned his head and asked quietly in confusion.

"Ellis, you know that guy?"

The young Mage took a deep breath and nodded slowly, his gaze still fixed on the unconscious figure in the crater as he explained in a low voice.

His tone was a complex mixture of respect, regret, and confusion.

"I know him... or rather, I know of him."

"He’s Schmidt Acarnis. He was once the recognized genius of the academy, a senior a few years ahead of me."

He paused, as if organizing distant memories.

"His talent in Elemental Shaping and Defense Array studies was... astonishing. It’s said that in his second year, he could already cast Third Ring Spells consistently. His speed in understanding all sorts of complex Spell Models amazed even the instructors."

"Many senior professors believed he was highly likely to become the academy’s youngest recipient of the ’Great Mage’ title in centuries, and might even have a chance to touch the fabled Legendary Domain."

Ellis’s voice grew lower, laced with a hint of confusion.

"But not long after I entered the academy, maybe... five or six years ago? He suddenly left. No formal farewell, no explanation. It was as abrupt as his initial rise to prominence."

"The academy’s teachers were all tight-lipped about it, only sighing in private that it was a huge loss for the academy. As for where he went after he left, or who he joined, there were all sorts of rumors... I never thought he would have joined the High Tower."

He glanced at Holland and added.

"When I enrolled, he was already close to graduating. He was a legendary figure at the academy. I... I was fortunate enough to receive his guidance a few times on some coursework problems."

"Although we didn’t interact much, his clear insight into the essence of Arcane Magic and that... pure, almost severe Concentration left a deep impression on me. It’s just..."

Ellis’s gaze fell back on Schmidt, his brow furrowed tightly.

"It’s just... how did he become like this? Attacking others for the sake of a mission, and his methods..."

Ellis shook his head, not finishing his sentence.

Clearly, the heavily injured, unconscious senior before him had diverged somehow from the image in his memory: a brilliant, albeit aloof, genius Mage who was still within the bounds of "normal."

Before his words had faded, "WHOOSH!"

A piercing shriek tore through the air, approaching rapidly, its speed heart-stopping.

The three of them whipped their heads toward the sound and saw a blurry, spherical silhouette—a mixture of scarlet energy and a faint, dark-gold light.

Moving faster than the naked eye could follow, it shot down from the sky like a meteor tearing through the night, hurtling straight for the center of the crater where Schmidt had fallen.

That was no Magic spell; it was a diving trajectory formed purely from speed, Power, and some kind of condensed Energy!

"BOOM!"

A deeper, more penetrating boom than when Schmidt had crashed exploded in the center of the crater.

Dust and gravel were once again violently thrown into the air, forming an even larger, murkier cloud that almost completely engulfed the shallow pit.

The gale from the shockwave was so strong it sent the hair of Holland and the others flying from behind their reef, their cheeks stinging.

The dust slowly settled, and the view gradually cleared.

At the edge of the crater, a figure slowly straightened up.

It was Roland.

But his appearance now was completely different from before.

His once-fitted clothes were torn in several places, revealing the skin beneath, which glowed with a faint dark-gold luster but was similarly stained with grime.

On his exposed skin were several distinct scorch marks, as if licked by extreme heat, their edges still flickering with faint, lingering wisps of blue electricity.

Other parts were covered in a thin layer of white Frost, some even with tiny ice crystals, clearly marks left by extreme cold.

This was undoubtedly the price he paid for forcing his way through the Ice Nova.

"Roland!"

Seeing this, Bronson couldn’t help but cry out, his voice filled with genuine care and concern.

Hearing him, Roland turned his head and gave a calm wave in Bronson’s direction, signaling that he was fine.

Although he looked rather gruesome at the moment, he knew better than anyone that these were only superficial injuries.

The extremely high Elemental Resistance granted by his Dragon Scale Armor, when he fully activated his bloodline’s power, had almost completely neutralized the vast majority of the freezing and electrical damage from the Ice Nova spell.

The scorch marks and Frost were mostly just superficial aftereffects of the violent Energy impact and the physical effects of the sudden temperature change. They hadn’t penetrated deep enough to cause serious harm; he just looked a bit of a mess.

Compared to that...

Roland’s gilded, vertical pupils showed no sign of relaxing. Instead, like the most precise scanning instruments, they quickly and calmly swept through the thinning dust and the wreckage of the crater.

He had clearly perceived it at the moment of contact during that final, sure-hit dive bomb.

He hadn’t struck the solid body he expected.

And for him, ever since he came to this world, he had followed an ironclad rule.

Once you make an enemy, you must cut the weeds and dig up the roots. There can be no mercy, and you must not give your opponent any chance to catch their breath.

Let alone when that enemy was a Great Mage.

’If I let him escape...’

Just as Roland was focusing his Perception, his gaze like a torch scanning every inch of rubble and dust, from not far away...

...not from the center of the crater, but from a depression near the edge, concealed by the Shadow of a half-shattered reef.

...came an extremely faint, intermittent voice, one that was still trying to maintain a clear tone.

The voice was hoarse, punctuated by the pained, suppressed gasps of a heavily injured person. Every word sounded as if it were being painfully squeezed from a blood-filled chest.

"Cough, cough... This... this... powerful sir... I think... perhaps... we can talk?"