'Damn monster.'
Sylwen dodged another blow aimed at her head. Her water blades tried as much as possible to cut Grakka's body, but because of the resistance magic, it was impossible to sever a limb completely as she wanted.
'She even said my attacks are weak… weak my ass. It's that cursed resistance magic that makes her think that.'
Lowering herself, she created a sphere of water on her fingertip and aimed at her opponent's thigh. Gathering her mana into a single point, a high-pressure jet condensed to seven times her normal power struck and pierced part of the thigh.
"Finally a good attack, elf."
Her water pierced Grakka's muscular thigh, but it wasn't enough to stop her from continuing to move—exactly as she had originally planned. With some desperation, Sylwen summoned a barrier around her body, managing to stop another axe strike that was about to hit her. Seeing her attack blocked, Grakka directed all the magic she had accumulated in the axe into her leg. With a red flash at high speed, her leg pierced the barrier and struck Sylwen in the stomach.
"Time to use the technique my best human friend taught me."
While her opponent coughed blood in the air and fell backward, Grakka remembered the training she had before the war began. Enrico was in a slightly lower stance than usual and his muscles were tense.
"What is that, best human friend?"
"An idea for a new attack, but it seems it's very difficult for me to do."
He was trying to compress his muscles in a way that would accumulate more power in the strike when he released it. It was a good idea if not for the problem that his magic wasn't as suitable for physical use, even though he used it very well. After thinking for a moment, he seemed to discard the idea and started considering another one.
'It's incredible how he failed, yet already has other ideas… prodigies really are on another level.'
"Now that I think about it, I believe you can use this technique."
When he turned to her, Grakka didn't hesitate at all and accepted being taught that potentially powerful technique. Besides, why would she refuse a skill that could make her stronger? Her body seemed to shrink slightly and hot air escaped from her mouth, making her appearance quite frightening as a red aura surrounded her body.
"What is that?"
Not wanting to find out what would happen, Sylwen—still in the air—used all her magic on her body to create a new barrier. She only knew it would be extremely dangerous. The layers around her body reached a thousand, possibly the strongest defensive capacity among Circle Six mages. Of course, doing that guaranteed defeat afterward, for the simple reason that she would be almost out of mana.
'Even so, I have to survive.'
Time seemed to slow for a moment for both of them. Grakka could see the fear of death in the elf before her, but there were two reasons she wouldn't stop. Her internal muscles seemed to start tearing, but all of them turned green with her resistance magic. Her nerves also became green and her eyes overflowed with resistance magic as a green aura poured out in great quantities.
'First reason: this elf was definitely the one who killed the elves and dismembered them at the base… how can she feel this fear after doing that?'
A single step forward was enough to make the frozen castle tremble. Her axe fell to the side because she wasn't ready yet to use this technique together with a weapon, so she simply transferred the magic within it to her body.
'And second… I don't pity my enemies.'
Combining her fire magic and resistance magic within her body, the entire potential of the attack was transferred to her right fist. The pressure placed on her own body was absurd even for someone like her who had trained her physique for years.
"Crimson Rupture Fist."
Her fist passed through every barrier around Sylwen's body in an instant. Continuing forward, Sylwen had her chest pierced by Grakka's arm, killing her instantly without any trace of resistance. She pulled her hand from the elf's now lifeless body and let it fall onto the cold floor.
"This technique is strong…"
Kneeling, she breathed heavily as her body returned to normal size. Her body felt great pain from trying to push her muscles to such extremes. She would have to train a lot to use that technique together with the axe and without suffering that side effect, since she couldn't even stand up again.
"Huff…"
For the first time she did something smart and waited for her body to return to normal before running back into the war. There were still opponents who could be interesting to fight. She didn't get up immediately because she couldn't. With a tired smile she looked outside the castle.
"What a frightening technique he created… compressing your muscles to turn your body into something capable of piercing everything."
She understood the basics of the technique, and honestly wanted to understand much more about the other possible techniques that might exist inside that human's head. Before thinking further about a decision she was considering, she saw an explosion in the distance—right where Valença was.
'That's strange… I don't think that human would use her magic like that with possible allies nearby.'
Which meant someone had probably made Valença angry. Grakka didn't know who it was because she hadn't seen where they had gone, but she was sure of one thing.
'Whoever made her furious won't live much longer.'
And she was right about that. At the place where the fire mage stood, she looked at the dark elf with necromancy magic with a furious gaze while the big one began to rise in the background. The dark elf was sweating heavily under those dangerous eyes.
"What did you do?"
Behind her, the big one revealed himself to be Val'Drakar—expressionless, and without the slightest trace of the soul that the statue once had.