Since Michael was forced to use Foundation Break to keep up with the massive physical augmentation Ligno’vsh’s Curse provided, he was losing lifeforce consistently. His lifeforce was nowhere close to being drained, and it would require a lot more than using Foundation Break at the first stage to suck him dry, but Michael didn’t like where the fight was going.
He sustained more injuries in the last few minutes, and it was clear that the fight was going nowhere – at least, not in a good direction for him.
Michael used his control of the Curses and their, more or less forced, agreement to manifest several Seals. He didn’t tap into the power of their Major Seals yet since he had no idea if the Wolf Curse and the World Serpent would gain an opening to infiltrate his mind, but Michael would switch to the Major Seals soon enough. He was just getting used to the new sensation the Seals exuded before going all out.
A few Cursed Seals manifested all over his chest, neck, and around his eyes while the Serpent Seals on the Living Image glowed. A burst of power swept through Michael as the World Serpent gave him access to a minuscule portion of its power. The power spread through the Cursed Seals and entered Michael’s body, empowering him. His physical attributes skyrocketed, and he made use of them right away.
He pushed back against Ligno’vsh, executed a few well-placed slashes, and kicked her in the sides. Spikes manifested from enhanced Qi sprouting out of his leg right before the kick impacted. The Qi punctured through Lig’s natural defense and erupted, taking Lig by surprise.
Yet, despite being taken by surprise, Lig managed to regain her composure quickly. She didn’t expect Michael to have the same power. Vigilance overcame her, yet the situation changed once again. Michael continued pushing her back, all while a golden hue erupted from within him.
He unleashed the Extraction Aura using True Extraction after augmenting it with a Soul Tear and several Enhancement layers. His Cursed Seals empowered the Extraction Aura, its potency much higher than it used to be. Even though Michael had only manifested four Cursed Seals, True Extraction was considerably stronger.
The Extraction Aura spread and crushed Lig’s curse aura as if it didn’t exist.
Extraction Aura’s main advantage was its continued spreading without Michael’s intervention. He didn’t have to keep supplying the Extraction Aura for it to spread out further. All he had to do was configure how much of the devoured energy would be distributed to maintain and expand the Extraction Aura. The rest entered Michael’s body to replenish his rapidly declining energy pool.
The surroundings were sucked dry of life and energy. Golden tentacles shot out of the ground. They coiled around Lig’s leg, all while Insert was unleashed to the fullest, creating an opening for traces of True Extraction. The traces entered her body and drained her origin energy slowly. At first, the energy drained by the traces was insignificant. It was barely enough to empower the traces and expand them by a small margin. However, once enough traces of True Extraction entered her body, Michael went all out. He created hundreds of icicles infused with traces of True Extraction. Minuscule azure flames emerged behind the icicles. The fire exploded, hurling the highly resilient icicles toward Lig.
Since the curse aura was no longer present, Lig was forced to evade the icicles actively. She tried to evade them for a second, only to realize there were too many icicles. She couldn’t avoid getting hit by all of them. Therefore, Lig unleashed a burst of curse power to coat her skin with a curse power membrane. At least, that was what she was trying to do.
Michael figured out her plan before she could execute it properly. His Spirit Eyes saw more than enough to predict her course of action. Therefore, Michael bombarded her with Spiritual Domination, which was empowered by ten Enhancement layers. Even though the ten Enhancement layers disappeared after a quarter of a second to avoid wasting too much energy, the attack succeeded. Spiritual Domination impacted heavily, disrupting Lig’s focus.
She lost control of the curse power coursing through her. A wave of curse power shot toward her head to block the aftereffect of the spiritual attack, but it was already too late. The sudden attack had already inflicted the most significant portion of the damage.
The icicles shattered upon colliding with Lig’s thick and highly durable skin. Still, the traces of Extraction were released alongside the freezing mist that filled the vicinity all of a sudden. Michael shot into the freezing mist without hesitation. He used Insert on the freezing mist and the traces of Extraction with Lig as the target and appeared before her. She couldn’t see Michael, but he could see Lig. Her perception was incredible, thus she noticed Michael right before he could thrust his longsword through her chest.
But Michael never planned for the thrust to succeed. He pushed further, the Aethyr Shield transforming into a gauntlet. Michael punched Lig in the face, and ten layers of Enhancement were applied to his arm and upper body. The impact was heavy enough to hurl the woman through the air.
A gust of wind swept the freezing mist to follow closely behind Lig, who recognized the danger of Michael’s attacks too late. Too many traces of Extraction had entered her body alongside the freezing mist. She…was on the losing side.
The Extraction traces weren’t overly potent against another Curse User, but Lig’s internal defense system was less extensive and efficient than her skin and flesh. She could block cannonballs with her bare body, easily at that, and regenerated faster than most beings could dream of, but it was difficult to expel something from within her body.
Lig tilted her head for a second and frowned deeply. Her energy was sapped much faster than she’d hoped for, and her lifeforce didn’t fare much better. She could block some of the lifeforce drainages, but that was it. Her eyes widened slightly before they narrowed into slits. The crimson lines in her eyes intensified.
Lig’s curse power changed drastically. It compressed and was altered. It gained other properties. The curse power was more intense than before, and it flushed through Lig, who grit her teeth in unbearable pain…as she annihilated the Extraction traces by coursing highly destructive curse power through her body.
Lig obliterated herself to get rid of the Extraction traces. That was insane. It was almost as insane as — [She is a maniac like you!] Danny exclaimed. [We found another idiot!]
Michael cursed his brother. Danny distracted him just enough to miss that Ligno’vsh’s eyes were more crimson than black. She growled and shot toward Michael much faster than before. Her bones cracked as they broke from the tremendous strength she utilized to reach him.
[The Behemoth took over.] The World Serpent confirmed Michael’s suspicion.
‘It wants to kill me,’ He added inwardly upon sensing Ligno’vsh’s – no. the Behemoth’s – bloodlust.
Michael had no time to waste. His life was on the line. He used Cosmic Stride to increase the distance to Lig, only for her to appear before him again.
He acted instinctively and unleashed the Major Seals’ power.
His form cracked and expanded as something within and around him changed. The Extraction Aura transformed, and everything around him was devoured on the spot…and transformed into power.
A primal roar escaped Michael’s mouth as the Major Seals manifested all over his body. Faintly glimmering outlines of two massive creatures formed around Michael, whose form cracked loudly as signs of Curse Transformation appeared on his body.
The halos around him roared at the Behemoth controlling Lig. She froze in her tracks, only to find Michael’s hand around her neck. His hand tightened, and the urge to use just enough pressure to snap her neck overcame him.
However, before Michael could do something, a heavy presence crashed down on Michael.
Selena appeared next to Michael. She grasped his hand with ease and removed him from Lig, whose eyes widened in shock as the black in them returned.
Selena chuckled lightly, but her eyes drilled dangerously into the pits of Ligno’vsh’s soul. The gentleness in her eyes returned only as her attention returned to Michael, who’d already retracted the curse strength he’d unleashed. He never lost control of his body, though the Curses urged him to eliminate Ligno’vsh.
But that was understandable. The Behemoth Curse wanted to kill them first. Michael didn’t see anything wrong with that, and Selena seemed to be of the same opinion.
“You have a very interesting Major Seal there. Your Cursed Seals are smaller, but they’re very powerful. But that’s to be expected from one of the strongest offspring of your bloodline.”
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