NOVEL SIMPLE Chapter 66: Dangerous Escape
[Above the city]
Shortly after Allaire made her way into the building, the fighting above the city experienced a massive shift.
The attacking aura users had slowly but surely been put under more pressure as the defending ones lost their mental inhibition and started unleashing more of their power. This kept them from fulfilling their tasks of defending their mages and suppressing Kheduil.
Once one of the two that were attacking him was forced to break away in favor of helping their mages the initiative instantly flipped. Kheduil was now able to focus at least some of his effort on countering the enemy mages, something a mage like him was better suited to do compared to aura users as he had more options than just dodging or enduring. Thus he quickly managed to give his own aura users some breathing room.
Instantly they used this newfound freedom to great effect, with the second enemy aura grandmaster that now supported the mages not being able to regain his side's advantage. Entangling the enemy mages in direct fights by disregarding the aura users tasked with their protection, the defenders slowly started to widen their advantage.
Compared to the disproportionally greater power the mages could show previously, the aura users now fought them on equal grounds even with a lower average rank, thanks to a one-person number superiority.
And while this group was forcing the mages to direct their entire focus on them, the remaining ones used their numerical superiority to overwhelm the two enemy aura users. But despite this, they were far from satisfied with their progress and after a few exchanges, one of them didn't instantly rush back in after recovering from the collision.
This delay was short enough that their enemies didn't think much of it, a decision they soon regretted. Among the two of them, one had shown himself to be significantly more powerful, forcing two of the three loyalists to focus on him. But instead of continuing to attack this man, he changed his target in the last second while the now lone attacher did his best to minimize his wounds.
As soon as the two others converged on the weaker enemy they overwhelmed him, with him choosing to block the overhead swing by his initial enemy. And despite making some last-second attempts to try and divert the sword towards the other attack, the strike found its mark. Feeling the fist impacting against his ribs with more force than he had expected, he couldn't keep stabilizing himself in the air and was hurled towards his right.
Already fearing a continued attack, he brought his sword before his body while reinforcing his defenses with an earth shield. World connection may only be able to manipulate existing elements and not conjure them, but this was a weakness that could be circumvented by using the second order aura expert ability to manifest them.
While this was far less mana efficient compared to when a mage would try the same, it was a good emergency technique as long as it is only used on a small scale. But this was a general problem for aura users, with few of their abilities being suited for attacking multiple enemies and practically none for defending multiple allies.
But in this case these drawbacks mattered little, so with his shield protecting him the man wasn't too worried about the attack he assumed was coming. But instead his two enemies turned, pushing back the other invader that was attempting to overwhelm his now lone enemy.
This initially made his colleague grin, but as soon as he tried to rejoin the fight he noticed something wrong though he couldn't quite tell what. By the time he crossed half the distance between him and them, he was sure that he was slower but couldn't believe it. Then, before he could rethink his actions the defender whose sword he had blocked attacked him.
Sneering at the stupid decision to repeat the same clash that ended in a draw multiple times before, he simply blocked the opponent's sword. Instantly he regretted this decision as the force that pushed against his weapon was far greater than it had been previously, overpowering him quickly.
Feeling the blade scrape across his aura armor just a moment later, he quickly tried to put some distance between them. To his shock, the enemy that previously barely kept up with him was now slightly faster.
Receiving three more strikes in quick succession, one of which nearly broke through his armor, his enemy was just about to deal what would likely be the final blow when the other aura user managed to break free from his enemies and force him back.
Despite this the man wasn't happy with the outcome, his thoughts lingering on the disastrous exchange.
Seeing the shocked look on his face while staring at where he had been hit. He was just about to follow the gaze when the arrival of all three of their enemies put him back on guard. But instead of attacking, they just stayed some distance from them while the one who had struck his ribs was gleefully smiling.
“Like my poison?” He asked into the pause of their fight.
Instantly the color drained from the man's face and he looked at his left side. And truly, there he found a stab wound just two fingers wide but with a violet-colored web spreading from across his skin. And while dwarfs were slightly more resilient towards toxins and poisons than humans and most other humanoids, it did little to slow the poison, a testament to its potency.
“How?” He could only ask, never having noticed a weapon in the man's possession that could have done this.
“Just because you can't, doesn't mean I can't. Not all mythical ranks are equal after all.” His opponent said tauntingly.
With this, he lifted both of his arms and turned the back of his hands towards them. Before the man could wonder what he meant, one fang-like protrusion suddenly grew out of his forearm and over the back of his hand. Its slight raindrop shape made it have a round, pointed tip and a blade running across its outer edge while also giving it a robust base.
“You're one of these crazy's.” His ally said when he saw this and he could only agree with his shock.
“I prefer genius, but what do you know of it? Oh, and before you attempt to slow it with poison element aura, don't waste your time. These little friends here hold a variation of a poison belonging to an island-devouring serpent.” He said, smashing what little hope he had.
“Stop bragging about your achievements and let us end this Rulic.” One of his colleagues said, shutting the man up.
A moment later the three were once again upon them, but the already poisoned man didn't even attempt to defend himself. Island-devouring serpents were a group of beasts quite famous for their power, poison, and ancestry. Just like lesser dragons were relatives to true dragons, island-devouring serpents were a relative of world serpents. While just the smallest descendants that were given a classification, they still had the blood of a legendary species that could match dragons.
As for how he gained two of its fangs as well as their poison, none of the two knew. But what they did know was that he went a step above what most emerging aura grandmasters did during the process of augmentation and instead of just strengthening his body to suit his needs, he also fused these fangs into himself.
The process would normally already be extremely dangerous and require extensive preparation, the act of essentially replacing bones, flesh, muscles, and organs with better and stronger versions having to be done carefully. But these at least still belonged to one's species, just having unearthed their buried potential.
But to add another species into the mix was incomparably more difficult, that is without even considering that he didn't replace a part of his body but added one. While it undoubtedly allowed a person to either cover weaknesses or elevate their strengths to new heights, the risks made it extremely unpopular.
The most that was still considered sane was to draw upon one's dormant bloodlines to gain some traits from the species of an ancestor. Among these, winged creatures that offered the aura user better flight were especially popular, though most canceled these plans due to the danger that adding new limbs posed.
Thus, seeing someone not just adding traits of another species to his body but also of a being with such a powerful ancestry caused the two's confidence to plummet. While it was dangerous, Rulic perfectly displayed that the reward was equally powerful.
Simultaneously the three defenders acted. While one of the three went to dispatch of the poisoned enemy, he started attacking the remaining one with his fists. This forced the man to constantly block him, fearing that he suddenly re-extended the poisonous blades.
Under the constant barrage of attacks from now three enemies, even the man started to accumulate wounds. This also slowly eroded his composure, the humiliation that came from being brought to his current state by weaker enemies that would individually easily fall before him being too much for him to bear.
“Originally I didn't want to do this but you leave me no choice. I, Verid, fought for our kind before you were even born and will do so for years to come.” Along with this shout, Verid's mana started to explode.
“So what if you are that old? Combined with the fact that you are still here it just means that you weren't talented enough to reach a point where the emperor invited you to him.” Rulic taunted him.
This made Verid finally snap, partially due to the truth behind those words. Any dwarven mythical rank that surpassed a certain power threshold would relocate to the emperor's capital. This was done due to the scattered nature of their mountain ranges, making it easy to take out all of their strongest fighters one by one before reinforcements could arrive.
And while this tactic essentially sacrifices these
regions should a group of powerful enemies attack them, it preserves their ability to fight back should it happen.
The only exception to this were the respective kings as well as their heirs, giving it the additional benefit of ensuring that they could keep order.
“Rue this day in the afterlife because I promise that you will soon see it.”
Using his increased speed to close the distance to the nearest enemy, Verid struck one of the three with enough force to instantly shatter his aura armor. And even then his fist continued, striking the man right in his abdomen and knocking the air out of his lungs. Before he even pulled his fist back, his target sank to the ground, unconscious and barely alive.
“Now it's your turn!” He shouted, propelling himself towards Rulic.
But despite seeing the explosive increase in power his opponent went through, the latter kept calm and prepared to meet him mid-strike. Ignoring the other defender's shocked look as he charged toward Verid, his fist met his opponent's fist.
Just as their strikes connected he extended the fang from his forearm while smiling like a maniac. While Verid mentally hesitated for a moment when he saw this, their fists still met in a mess of gore.
Slowly he felt his arm shatter apart, his blood and flesh flying everywhere while bone splinters dug into his skin. But he already expected this and similarly hoped that his opponent would suffer the fate he currently did. While Rulic's arm completely vanished, the strike even tearing away a part of his shoulder and right chest, the same was the case for Verid.
Additionally, his body augmentation remained largely intact, the fang-like protrusion lodging itself deep into Verid's right chest. For good measure Rulic followed up on their collision, using his left arm to leave a deep puncture wound in his abdomen.
“Your little trick only boosts your mana and strength, the king guessed so long ago.” Rulic said while laughing, enjoying the state he brought one of their most famous fighters into.
But Verid was long since no longer in a state to listen to this, his mind instead becoming overwhelmed with fear. Though not the fear of dying, but instead fear that he would fail a mission for the first time in his life. Feeling the poison already spreading through his body, he was just about to finish Rulic off when the latter’s colleague arrived between them.
“Seems like you didn't become as invincible as you boasted.” The man said, his previous fear of Verid forgotten.
Realizing this to be the case due to Rulic revealing the weakness of his technique, Verid quickly decided to change to another target. Turning towards the palace and using his superior speed to dash there faster than his opponent could follow, he cursed the inventor of this technique for its limitations.
Techniques were spell-like abilities for aura users that could be created, contrary to the abilities one gained with each rank, and were mainly used after reaching the mythical rank. And while he was lucky to even have found one in a ruin, being part of the only about ten percent of mythical ranks that did so as few were willing to share them and their creation was extremely difficult, he always felt its limitations to be holding him back.
As Rulic said, it may allow him to temporarily boost his strength and mana quality to an extreme, but it didn't give him more mana, increase his resilience, his stamina, his perception, or his agility. So while his speed increased thanks to being able to push himself off the ground with more force, he could only display this speed in a straight line as he lacked the perception to still see the world around him and the agility to turn while at such speeds.
Similarly, there were also problems arising from his lack of resilience, with his body barely being able to endure the rebound from the added strength.
Lastly, there was also the aftereffect, with the technique sapping his strength once it ran out while draining his mana during its duration and ending as soon as it bottomed out. Thus it was inefficient in longer fights, slowly turning into a detriment instead of an asset.
With this in mind, he rushed towards the palace, hoping to reach there before his mana ran dry and he became a sitting duck. Once that happened he could barely continue fighting, normally falling to early or advanced third rank in power, but with the poison he had no idea what would happen.
The two remaining defender could meanwhile only look after him as he rushed towards the palace, neither of the two having the speed to just keep up with him.
