Chapter 115: Double S

Chapter 115: Chapter 115: Double S

Felix stopped on the roof of a bus, his face turned towards the portal.

"Aria!"

Aria whipped her head around. "I feel it."

The ambient mana humming in the air had turned dark, heavy, and oily. The small fry stopped pouring out of the gate.

"A-rank wave incoming," Felix said, his azure eyes locked onto the portal.

The ground violently heaved.

RUMBLE-CRUMBLE!

Massive, armored forms forced their way through the tear. These weren’t the wild dogs from earlier; these were towering, eight-meter behemoths with hardened bone carapaces, their auras distorting the air into shimmering heat mirages.

THUMP! THUMP!

Aria’s eyes turned cold. "Wipe them out. Do not let them scatter."

She struck first. Her spear flashed forward.

SHING!

Driving through the chest of the lead A-rank; frost burst outward from the tip. Turning the beast into solid ice before it could even roar.

Darius drove his fist into the second.

KABLAM!

The earth shockwave blasting the creature clean through a brick wall.

CRASH!

Seraphina didn’t hold back anymore, her entire storm of water and lightning blades converged into a single piercing wave.

SHWOOOOO-ZZZZT!

Carving five A-ranks into pieces.

SHRED-SHRED-SHRED!

Liora’s darkness swallowed two whole, crushing them into flat silhouettes against the street.

Kael, Orion, Ryan, Mira, and Lena tore through the flanks with brutal coordination.

BANG! SLASH! THUD!

In less than ninety seconds, the entire A-rank vanguard lay dead in the street.

Felix didn’t celebrate. His gaze remained pinned to the gate.

"That was just the escort," he said quietly.

ROOOOOOOOOAAAAAAAR!

A sound like an exploding jet engine rolled out of the gate, vibrating through everyone’s teeth.

RUUUUMBLE!

The concrete under their boots split open.

CRRR-CRACK!

Two titanic shapes stepped into the daylight.

The air pressure dropped like a stone.

VVVVVVVRRRRRR!

True S-rank mana.

The beast on the left was a massive, armored predator running on six clawed limbs, its hide covered in thick steel-gray bone plating.

The one on the right was a reptilian horror sheathed in dark, obsidian crystals that absorbed the morning light.

The military personnel huddled behind the barricades hundreds of meters back completely froze in sheer terror, heart monitors spiking.

BEEP-BEEP-BEEP!

Felix let out a low, tired breath. "Finally. Something with some weight."

CRACK!

The pavement cratered as Felix launched forward. The six-legged wolf snapped its jaws.

CLACK!

Swinging a claw that could have sliced a tank in half.

WHIFF!

Felix didn’t bother dodging. He slipped inside its guard, emerald mana compressing around his forearm until it formed a blade of pure, solid green glass with a high-pitched ring.

It wasn’t flashy. It was just dense beyond belief.

He swung.

SHNK!

The green blade sheared through the bone armor, through the muscle, through the thick spine.

THUD.

The wolf’s massive head slid off its shoulders, slamming into the ground with a dull crash.

Felix hit the deck running. The crystalline reptile opened its maw, charging a blast of destructive mana that would have leveled half the block.

WUUUUUB-WUUUUB!

Felix vanished.

FWIP!

Reappearing directly above the beast’s snout. He brought both hands down, forming an emerald spike that drove straight through its skull plates and impaled its brain into the road.

KER-THUNK!

HISSS... The beast went limp.

Two S-rank bosses. Dead in less than a minute.

Darius lowered his arms, chuckling dryly.

"You’re getting ridiculous, Felix."

Felix stood up brushing dust off his sleeve with a gentle brush.

"Your mana compression is absurd," Aria said, walking up with her spear lowered.

"It works," Felix shrugged.

Since his core breakthrough, his mana wasn’t just larger, it was dense. He didn’t need massive, city-destroying spells. A tiny, hyper-dense blade of healing mana was enough to bypass almost any physical defense.

He turned back toward the gate, his jaw setting tight. "That was too easy. A gate this big doesn’t just empty out after two S-ranks."

"Agreed," Aria said, her eyes fixed on the portal.

Footsteps echoed from the tear.

TAP. TAP. TAP.

Figures stepped through the purple haze.

"Dark elves," Felix hissed, his eyes narrowing to slits.

Six humanoid figures stepped into the street.

They wore sleek, dark leather armor laced with runic carvings, radiating full A-rank signatures. Their skin was ashen-gray, their white hair pulled back, and their eyes were cold, calculating, and completely calm.

One of them barked a guttural command in an alien tongue.

"Ghra’kresh val-tor!"

Pointing at the two dead S-ranks on the road.

"Anyone speak whatever that is?" Seraphina asked, her water blades rising again with a faint whoosh.

"No," Felix said, his hand dropping to his side.

"And I don’t think they’re looking to negotiate."

Behind the six elves, two more massive beasts stepped through the gate. They were hulking, quadrupeds resembling armored drakes, easily twice the size of the S-ranks Felix had just butchered.

THOOM. THOOM.

The two lead elves mounted the beasts. Then, both elves reached into their tactical pouches and pulled out small, familiar black pellets with a distinct click.

Felix’s stomach plummeted. "No."

GULP.

The elves jammed the black pills down the beasts’ throats.

For one second, the monsters stayed still.

THUMP-THUMP.

Then, their bodies convulsed.

SQUEEEEAL!

BOOOOOOOOOOM!

A terrifying eruption of chaotic black and crimson mana detonated from both drakes. The sheer pressure shattered the concrete beneath them into dust.

SKRRR!

Their muscles swelled. Bone armor bursting through their skin in jagged, venomous spikes. Their mana signatures skyrocketed off the scale.

High S-rank.

Peak S-rank.

KER-BLAM!

Then it punched clean through the ceiling.

"That’s..." Darius’s deep voice trailed off.

"Double S," Aria whispered, her knuckles whitening around her spear. "Artificially forced SS-rank."

The two dark elves looked down from their mutated mounts at the ten humans standing in the ruined street.

A cruel, knowing smile crossed the lead elf’s face.

The two SS-rank monstrosities threw their heads back and roared.

SKRRRRR-ROOOOOOOOOOAAARRRRRR!

A sound so violent it cracked the foundations of the skyscrapers around them.

CRACKLE!

The smirk on Felix’s face disappeared completely. His eyes turned dead and dangerously sharp.

"Everyone," Felix said, reaching into his coat and uncapping the blue severance serum with a sharp clack. "Take your medicine."

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