Chapter 1404: That’s a Dangerous Idea

Vesperhart raised a foreleg and slammed its hoof into the ground.

The sharp crack echoed through the enclosure of towering trees.

The surrounding forest erupted with growth. Roots shoved through the soil, trunks shot higher, and countless slender branches reached in from all directions, every tip aimed at Ethan and Auri.

Auri’s eyes widened as the surge of life energy washed over her.

It was so dense.

She raised both hands. Pure green energy rose from beneath her feet and formed a shield. The incoming branches struck the barrier one after another, leaves and green light shuddering with every impact.

Vesperhart finally turned its attention to her.

Its antlers lit up again, releasing an energy sphere that slowly advanced toward Auri.

"Would you consider handing over the girl behind you?" Vesperhart asked Ethan. "I will allow you—"

Ethan didn’t let it finish.

The energy sphere in his palm expanded rapidly.

White lightning spread along his arm as he hurled the sphere at Vesperhart with all his strength, then charged after it. A second energy sphere formed in his other hand.

"You want to take her?"

Ethan accelerated, reaching Vesperhart in an instant.

"That’s a dangerous idea!"

Vesperhart barely spared him a glance.

The clock around its neck stopped.

Its hands froze in place.

The surrounding air went still. Ethan halted in midair, along with the hem of his clothes, the white arcs of electricity, and the scattered leaves caught in the air.

His fist was less than a foot from Vesperhart’s neck.

The stag ignored him.

Its real concern was the two energy spheres in midair.

Its green sphere collided head-on with Ethan’s white attack. The two forces pressed against each other as white lightning burrowed into the green energy at the point of contact.

At first, Vesperhart paid it no mind.

Then the connection between its antlers and the sphere carried back something unexpected.

The white lightning wasn’t merely destroying the energy.

It was making contact with the time power inside it.

Although Ethan’s body remained frozen, his awareness extended through that thread of lightning. He sensed the force binding him and used the connection between their attacks to draw some of it toward himself.

Time energy flowed back along the lightning.

The frozen air around Ethan began to loosen.

The first arc of electricity flickered back to life.

Then his clothes moved.

Then his fingers.

Vesperhart arrogantly lifted a foreleg, intending to walk right past Ethan. It paid no attention to the fist suspended beneath its neck.

Before its hoof came down, the hands of the clock trembled.

Ethan broke free of the temporal restraint.

His fist drove forward that final foot.

White lightning and the second energy sphere struck Vesperhart’s neck at the same time.

Boom!

The impact hurled the giant stag backward. All four hooves left the ground, and the energy sphere between its antlers collapsed.

Vesperhart slammed into the wall of trees behind it.

Its massive body crushed a deep crater into the trunks, scattering branches and splintered wood. The stag was embedded in the wall with only its hooves and antlers sticking out, unable to pull itself free.

Vesperhart went still.

Why?

How could Ethan have broken through its time power?

Before it could understand what had happened, white energy gathered in the distance once more.

A new energy sphere formed in Ethan’s hand, and white wings spread from his back. He had no intention of giving Vesperhart time to think. Leaning forward, he charged straight at the stag trapped in the wall.

Vesperhart stopped questioning it.

Getting out of the wall came first.

It pushed with all four legs, but the moment its body shifted, roots burst from the ground behind it and wrapped around both hind legs.

Vesperhart looked down.

More branches reached along the wall, locking down its forelegs and midsection. It could still move its neck, but one second later, a thick branch looped past its antlers and cinched tightly around its throat.

Ethan glanced back.

Auri stood inside her green shield, controlling the branches with both hands.

He gave her a thumbs-up.

Then he locked his attention on Vesperhart again.

His white wings spread to their full width.

He accelerated once more.

Carrying the fully formed energy sphere, Ethan shot straight toward the stag.

While Ethan and Vesperhart fought, Auri had quietly moved away from her original position.

She circled along the edge of the tree wall and returned to the narrow hollow. For some reason, Thornroot’s presence had vanished from the area, and the towering tree made no further attempt to attack her.

Auri placed a palm against the trunk.

Pure Fairy power spread across the bark and entered the nearby branches, trunks, and roots. Without Thornroot controlling them, the trees offered no resistance. They soon began responding to Auri’s will.

So she simply took over the entire forest.

On the other side, Vesperhart remained pinned to the wall.

Roots bound its limbs, while another thick branch pressed against its neck. The stag kept struggling as the sphere between its antlers lit up, firing a green laser at the approaching Ethan.

Every section of air the beam passed through seemed to freeze for a moment.

Ethan immediately twisted aside, folding one white wing so his body skimmed past the edge of the laser.

Only after making contact with Vesperhart’s time power and borrowing some of it did he truly understand how dangerous the stag’s attacks were.

The laser didn’t just inflict an energy impact.

It also froze the target’s body for one second.

Just one second.

But in a real fight, that was enough to decide who lived and who died.

The green laser grazed Ethan’s shoulder and struck a tree behind him. The leaves around the impact point stopped in midair, their fall forcibly interrupted.

Vesperhart seized the chance to lower its head and shield the clock against the side of its neck.

It didn’t care how much punishment its body took.

As long as the clock remained intact, it still had a chance.

After evading the laser, Ethan corrected his course.

White energy gathered in his palm. He closed his fingers around it, concealing the sphere inside his fist. His wings drove him forward again, sending him straight into Vesperhart.

His fist slammed into the side of the stag’s neck.

Boom!

White energy exploded inward from the point of impact, crushing the wall of trees deeper behind Vesperhart. Cracks spread across the trunks, and leaves rained down from above.

Vesperhart could only grit its teeth and endure the attack.

It kept its antlers and the side of its head over the clock, refusing to let Ethan’s fist touch its surface.

One punch.

Then another.

White lightning spread through its fur and into its body.

Just as Ethan prepared to strike again, light flared in Vesperhart’s eyes.

It was ready.

The clock around its neck erupted with blinding white light.

Its frozen hands began to move—not forward, but slowly backward. Splintered bark returned to the wall, and fallen leaves rose along the same paths they had taken down.

The branches binding Vesperhart withdrew into the soil.

Ethan’s body moved backward along the path of his attack.

Time returned to the moment before Vesperhart had been knocked into the wall.

As the white light faded, Ethan’s energy-charged fist was still closing in.

But Vesperhart had already experienced this once.

It knew exactly where the punch would land.

The stag raised both forelegs. The rings beneath its hooves contracted inward, allowing it to catch Ethan’s attack cleanly. Fist and hooves collided, spraying white lightning in every direction, but Vesperhart wasn’t thrown back this time.

An energy sphere immediately formed beneath one hoof.

Green light compressed into a beam and fired point-blank at Ethan’s chest.