The battle between Peter Gramm and Mekhaz began soon after they entered the combat ring.
Mekhaz summoned a highly flexible metal armor that encased his entire body. It looked like a single piece of metal was constantly moving, adjusting itself to fit the Warlock Centaur perfectly like a second skin.
Peter Gramm frowned when he saw the armor. It was clearly Mekhaz’s Soultrait.
He exerted his own Soultrait following Mekhaz, and manifested a huge mace that weighed heavily in his hands. The mace was black, and intertwined with crimson lines that resembled veins. The crimson veins connected to the crimson thorns that protruded all over the mace.
Peter Gramm channeled some energy into the heavy mace, thus decreasing the weight in his hands considerably. He issued rapid strikes and moved slowly toward the Warlock Centaur, who had yet to initiate an attack.
Once Peter Gramm was in Mekhaz’s proximity, the Warlock Centaur made a sudden move. He shot forward, manifesting a three-meter-long spear in his hands.
The spear whirled around Mekhaz before he thrust out with deadly precision. Peter twisted his body and lifted the mace to block the attack. He altered the spear thrust’s direction ever so slightly. It was just enough to evade the spear blade by a few centimeters. His body inched closer to Mekhaz after the attack, and using the tiny gap in his opponent’s defense, Peter Gramm attacked.
His mace smashed heavily onto Mekhaz’s chest, causing ripples all over the Warlock Centaur’s Living Armor. Peter expected Mekhaz to try to avoid the attack, yet the Warlock Centaur didn’t even budge. He wasn’t forced to retreat nor did he show any response to the mace’s heavy impact.
No Tier-3 Lord had been able to block Peter’s attacks that easily. His Mace of Destruction was one of the most destructive weapons he had ever seen. No armor ought to be able to block his attacks. Not even the armors manifested through manifestation-type Soultraits!
However, Mekhaz’s Living Armor was different. Living Armor was a Soultrait that absorbed a considerable amount of force of impact, both physical and elemental. The remaining force would be spread through the Living Armor – distributed evenly across the body once it was released, thereby decreasing the injuries one would sustain.
Blunt attacks could numb Mekhaz, but killing him with brute force was near-impossible, not as long as his Living Armor was intact!
That was something Peter Gramm noticed after his first attack impacted on his opponent. Mekhaz continued to move without showing any signs of disturbance. Not even his rhythm was disrupted. It was almost as if he allowed Peter’s mace to impact rather than Peter tricking Mekhaz into landing the first blow.
Michael noticed the same from outside the combat ring. He was currently moving around the combat ring to slowly advance toward Killian Zeus, who had never stopped using his Soultrait to charge Thaor’s half-charred body. Michael was not too sure how much longer Thaor would be able to endure Killian’s attacks, but it didn’t look good. That was certain.
Michael moved slowly to prevent attracting any attention. He had long since activated Eagle Eyes to keep a watch on the other human prodigies standing near Killian, and the battlefield. Once the battle between Peter and Mekhaz ended, the situation in the Ulran Arena would change once again.
Michael had to help Thaor before that. He didn’t want the tension to escalate. After all, it was already bad enough that the Berserkers and Warlock Centaurs of the Ulran Arena never retracted their Artifacts. Their weapons were still sitting tightly in their hands, ready to be used at any moment.
The Berserkers and Warlock Centaurs’ opinions of the humans they’d encountered didn’t seem to be great. Michael was probably the only reason why they would hold back. Differentiating their opponents once their anger and wrath were unleashed wasn’t that easy, especially not since most humans looked quite similar in the eyes of the Berserkers and Warlock Centaurs.
The humans were small and looked frail. It was not as if some of them had three arms or two sets of legs to be able to tell one from the other. Only their skin and hair color seemed a little different.
Michael hoped that the Berserkers and Warlock Centaurs could be a little bit more patient, just a little while longer.
As Michael continued to move around the combat ring, the battle in the combat ring intensified.
Mekhaz moved nimbly within the combat ring all while slashing and thrusting his spear toward Peter Gramm. Peter was forced to retreat as he was unable to keep up with the Warlock Centaur’s nimble movements and fierce blows.
Peter’s eyes narrowed as he realized that Mekhaz was a heavily armed cavalry unit with great movement speed and tremendous physical strength, not just a mighty beast. He knew that the Warlock Centaurs were powerful, but he didn’t expect to be overpowered in a challenge of brute force. His Soultrait was the essence of destruction, and his physical strength had been increased to the peak. All of his Artifacts enhanced his physical strength and endurance. Even his Soultrait reinforced his constitution on top of his body’s refinement.
Until now, Peter Gramm had been confident to fight the Berserkers and Warlock Centaurs in a head-on battle even without his Mace of Destruction. Unfortunately, that didn’t seem to be the case.
Or his opponent was just too strong – an anomaly amid his ordinary kind that he had the misfortune of sparring. Taking a deep breath, Peter Gramm’s lower arm began to glow. The glow encased the Mace of Destruction’s handle, influencing the manifested weapon considerably.
The glow dimmed a few seconds later, revealing the Mace of Destruction fused with Peter Gramm’s lower arm. His lower arm and Soultrait had fused, resulting in a massive increase in Peter’s strength. Crimson red veins shot up toward Peter’s upper arm, tightening around it with a vice like grip. Peter released a muffled groan in response.
Mekhaz witnessed all of this, but he didn’t stop the fight. On the contrary, his attacks accelerated. He inflicted several cuts all over Peter’s arms and legs, pushing the human Lord backward – until Peter gained full control of the power he gained after fusing with the Mace of Destruction.
The moment the intensity of the battle increased, Michael figured that he didn’t have much time left. His steps accelerated and he appeared amid the group of Killian’s subordinates.
They were fully focused and didn’t even notice Michael as he had concealed his energy fluctuations as much as possible. Killian and his subordinates paid attention to the combat ring and noticed Michael only after it was already too late.
Michael appeared next to Killian Zeus seemingly out of nowhere. He took a deep breath and used the Power of Enhancement that had been stored inside the Legendary Ring Artifact to empower Extraction as he unleashed his full power.
A Dome of Extraction burst forth from Michael’s body. It expanded rapidly, shrouding Killian Zeus and Thaor entirely. Michael stopped expanding the Dome of Extraction once everyone he wished to target had been engulfed. He extracted all the origin energy permeating the air to further empower the Dome of Extraction.
Following that, Michael focused on the origin energy channeled into the bolts of lightning and lightning currents all around and within Thaor. The energy he extracted ended up inside Michael’s body, where he annexed the altered origin energy. The lightning energy tingled quite a bit, but Michael ignored the sensation. He continued annexing and extracting the origin energy within the lightning bolts, ignoring everything that happened around and within him. 𝗇𝑜𝑽𝚎𝑙𝑛𝗲xt.𝗇𝓔t
Thus, Michael didn’t even realize that the tingling sensation of the lightning energy was stimulating him. It allowed him to annex the energy faster, which was quite helpful as it allowed him to obliterate the lightning currents spreading through Thaor before he was punched in the face.
Michael slumped to the ground, his jaw hurting like hell. He looked up, just to see Killian’s furious face. His face was red in anger as he towered in front of him, bolts of lightning manifesting in his palm.
“Don’t touch my lightning, you fucking peasant!!!” He roared, but Michael was neither shocked nor scared. There was a vibrant smile blossoming on Michael’s face.
“Since the day I met you, I realized that you were a nutcase. You see…I am pretty good at figuring out people. And you…you are a piece of shit, but that is not something I have to tell you, right?” Michael responded, still smiling brightly.
His focus never left the Dome of Extraction that had finished extracting the lightning currents all around Thaor. This allowed the healers to rush over and move Thaor aside while simultaneously casting numerous healing Soultraits to tend to the Berserker’s wounds.
Killian Zeus frowned deeply when he saw what the healers did, but he turned back to Michael, his face overflowing with wrath.
The bolts of lightning had shrouded Killian’s entire arm by now. Michael knew that he couldn’t avoid fighting Killian, but that was suicidal. He was ready to use the entire energy he had annexed in the last few seconds to create a humongous Glacicle before he would run away.
However, that didn’t seem to be necessary as Michael perceived something from behind him.
But before he could make sense of it the next moment heavy pressure descended all over the Ulran Arena. The lightning crackling alongside Killian’s arms dispersed, and both the Mace of Destruction and the Living Armor dissipated.
Killian paled and slumped to the ground. He was having a hard time breathing, all while Michael didn’t sense much.
The heavy pressure didn’t affect him. It was not directed at him, after all.
Michael turned around, just to see that someone had appeared at the entrance of the Ulran Arena.
The moment Michael saw the figure, he frowned deeply. Simultaneously, the Berserkers kneeled onto the ground while the Warlock Centaurs bowed deeply.
“Chieftain!!” They shouted in unison.
Meanwhile, Michael’s frown deepened.
This someone at the entrance of the arena – the Chieftain they were bowing to – was someone Michael was quite familiar with.
It was the Librarian.