Chương 169: B3 - Chapter 5: Frenzy

Seth crossed the distance in a blur, the world narrowing to the target in front of him. Desert Aegis shimmered around his body, a sandy grit in the air mixing with the unnatural fog. In a moment of cold, hyper-focused lucidity amidst the red haze of his rage, he scanned the twenty empire soldiers who had peeled off to engage them. Most were still flickering with the blue light of Protecting Belts, barely visible through the swirling smoke of Night Veil. Armored Phantom Fists was the obvious choice.

He cast the Undead spell, and dark green aether erupted around his arms, solidifying into heavy, skeletal gauntlets. Seemingly sensing the sudden spike in killing intent, the Warrior who had just murdered Alfred glanced over his shoulder. But it was already too late. Seth's aether-clad fist crashed into the man's side. The impact was sickeningly loud, ripping through the soldier's remaining barrier instantly.

Before the man could recoil or haul himself away, Seth's other hand clamped onto the armored shoulder and his fingers sank deep behind the collarbone to anchor the Warrior in place. Seth rammed his right gauntlet into the man's gut. The breastplate folded. The man wheezed, doubling over. Seth punched him again. And again. And again. Each blow forced a wet, choking cough from the soldier until a mouthful of blood sprayed out onto Seth's armor. Snatching the man by the neck, Seth hurled him to the ground.

The Warrior tried to raise a shaking hand to defend himself, but Seth's fist descended in a green flash. The soldier's skull smashed open under the tremendous force of the blow—the combined weight of 150 Strength from his attributes, the Undead spell's boost, and the raw power of Beastmaster Rage. Seth didn't stop to watch the remaining life fade. He stepped over the corpse and charged the next foe.

Around him, the Kastal Rogues, who were close enough to see him through the dark fog, stared at him with wide, terrified eyes for an instant—then snapped into motion, double-teaming the nearest enemies. Ahead, the ground shook. Colossus unleashed Scorpion Charge and slammed like a runaway boulder into a cluster of three enemies: a Rogue, an Elementalist, and a Guardian. The scorpion cast Explosive Bastion, the golden barrier forming over the sandy layer of Desert Aegis.

Nightmare joined the fray, and the spectral head of a snarling direwolf erupted over the battlefield. An aura of pure dread surged outward, freezing the closest soldiers of the empire in their tracks, their knees buckling as the debuff drained away part of their attributes. Nightmare wasn't one to waste such an opportunity. He Shadow Stepped, materializing behind the stumbling Elementalist, and bit down on his thigh.

Gloom Fangs, dripping with black acid, tore through the man's flickering barrier and sank into his flesh. A guttural scream ripped through his mouth. Flames surged around his staff, but Colossus whipped a tail around, snapping the wood and breaking the man's concentration in a shower of sparks. The spear-wielding Guardian standing next to the mage recovered from the terror just enough to turn, his mouth opening to bellow a taunt to pull Nightmare off his ally.

Yet before the sound could leave his throat, Seth lunged in. In a desperate attempt to block, the young man raised his heavy shield, bracing for a collision, though Seth easily saw through it. He slid underneath the guard in a blur and hammered the man's exposed midsection. Once, twice, then thrice. The layer of his Protecting Belt flared violently and died in a single heartbeat, thanks to the bonus damage to barriers of Seth's spell. Fear flickered on the Guardian's face in a sudden, dawning terror.

His Toughness, armor, and defensive artifacts were all useless against this foe. Gritting his teeth, he triggered a spell. Jagged chunks of granite surged from the earth, interlocking over his armor in a second skin—Quartz Armor. It didn't matter. When the stone plating materialized, Seth's armored fist slammed into it, pulverizing the rock to dust and driving the force straight into the flesh beneath. Panic took over the Guardian. He opened his mouth and let out a booming surge of aether.

The sonic blast caught Seth point-blank, lifting him off his feet and launching him backward through the air. You think distance will save you? Seth didn't even wait to land and twisted in mid-air before casting Shadow Step. He reappeared instantly behind the Guardian, right in his blind spot, an inescapable predator that refused to let prey breathe for even a second. The man barely had time to turn, his eyes wide with terror as he seemingly caught sight of the ongoing slaughter in the dark fog.

To his left, the Elementalist was being shredded by Nightmare, while to his right, the Rogue was losing a hopeless war against Colossus, unable to cut the scorpion's shell or help his ally. The Guardian blindly thrust his spear. Aether coalesced around the tip, taking the form of a blue dragon's head, jaws wide open toward Seth. But Seth's senses were heightened to a razor's edge by his core. He slipped past the thrust, stepped inside the man's reach, and launched a brutal counter.

Seth hammered the Guardian left and right, his heavy, spectral gauntlets blurring. Ribs snapped. Jaw shattered. Cheekbones caved in. Barely a few seconds later, the man's eyes rolled back, blood spurting from a dozen ruinous impact points as he crumpled to the ground like a doll that had gotten its strings cut. Thanks to the cover of Night Veil, only a few of the approaching soldiers of the Empire noticed the one-sided battle.

Four Warriors charged through the smoke, intent on helping their falling comrades, but they ran straight into a trap. Love what you're reading? Discover and support the author on the platform they originally published on. Colossus' Explosive Bastion had already been vibrating, and it exploded outward. The shockwave of aether slammed into the four soldiers, destroying the protective layers of their belts in a single, violent flash before hurling them backward.

The men and women tumbled across the rugged plain, shouting in pain as the explosion scorched their skin and the unforgiving rocks scraped them raw.

"Now!" a voice roared from somewhere outside the dark fog. Then, a threatening boom resonated. A cannon shot. Seth used Shadow Step to dodge the explosion, yet the force blew away the remaining wisps of Night Veil. The smoke dissipated, which revealed the terrifying tableau to the rest of the empire's army. The Rogue, the Guardian, and the Elementalist—who had all been fighting fit, protected by barriers less than a minute ago—were now heaps on the ground, lying in expanding pools of their own blood.

Four of their trained elites had been butchered by a single man and his beasts. One-fifth of their strike team, gone in sixty seconds. The Warriors who had been blasted back by Colossus' spell scrambled to their feet. They looked at Seth, at the blood dripping from his spectral gauntlets, and then at the massive scorpion and the direwolf flanking him. Fear, cold and absolute, washed over their faces. Seth didn't pause.

His hand plunged into his pouch, emerging with three Detonating Bombs and a single-use spell-wand. With a wisp of aether, he primed the fuses—thirty seconds—and snapped the wand forward. A torrent of raw, unshaped fire surged out, engulfing one of the four unshielded Warriors. The man screamed as the flames enveloped his armor, cooking him inside the steel.

"Bring the field back up!" a voice roared from the empire ranks. Gritting his teeth, Seth seized the split-second window to drain the aether from his ring, forcing his bottomed-out Well to refill in a painful rush. The moment the Distortion Field slammed back down, severing the artifact's function, he funneled a chunk of the energy to Nightmare and Colossus. A few remaining spots of light were visible in his periphery. One of the Kastal Rogues was gone.

He had used an Escape Scroll to move out of the Rift when the field had been down. Expected, Seth thought coldly. One less liability. Nearby, the skirmish was chaotic but manageable. Two elite Rogues of the empire were still trying to butcher Seth's squad, but the numbers were now against them. He saw Selena drive a dagger into one of the men's exposed backs. Two Rank-50s against seven desperate Rank-30s and 40s—they would be able to hold them. Seth refocused.

Ahead, the remaining empire soldiers, shaking off the shock of the slaughter, roared and charged. A volley of spells screamed toward him—fire, ice, and jagged bolts of lightning. Seth triggered Huntbound Rush and dashed toward the injured Warrior, who was flanked by the three others. Raynold Class: Warrior Rank: 50 (High-Iron) Subclass: - Strength:??? Arcane Power:??? Toughness:??? Well Capacity:??? Agility:??? Regeneration:??? Battos Class: Warrior Rank: 52 (High-Iron) Subclass: - Strength:??? Arcane Power:???

Toughness:??? Well Capacity:??? Agility:??? Regeneration:??? Veronica Class: Warrior Rank: 50 (High-Iron) Subclass: - Strength:??? Arcane Power:??? Toughness:??? Well Capacity:??? Agility:??? Regeneration:??? Carden Class: Warrior Rank: 53 (High-Iron) Subclass: - Strength:??? Arcane Power:??? Toughness:??? Well Capacity:??? Agility:??? Regeneration:??? The Agility boost from his spell allowed Seth to weave through the chaotic barrage like smoke in a gale with the help of his core.

As he closed the distance, Armored Phantom Fists vanished from around his arms. Without missing a beat, he hurled the three bombs. Yet instead of aiming for the four isolated Warriors, he lobbed them over their heads, targeting the reinforcement wave charging from the rear. The explosion was deafening. Dust and rock shrapnel erupted, forcing the advancing soldiers to halt their charge and scatter. With the battlefield effectively split, Seth rushed forward.

Dusk Scythes surged from his forearms, the curved shadow-blades humming with power. Seth, Colossus, and Nightmare descended on the four isolated Warriors as a single predator. Colossus struck first, hitting the line like a landslide. His Scorpion Charge staggered them, and before they could recover, his stingers flashed out to inject Deathcoil Venom into all of them. Nightmare followed in the wake, Gloom Fangs tearing through one of the Warriors' legs to cripple him before disappearing with Illusionary Emptiness.

The soldiers tried to rally, raising sword, axe, and spear to form a desperate defensive wall, but their movements were sluggish. It wasn't just the Mantle of Terror weighing them down—it was primal fear. They backed away, eyes darting toward the wall of smoke among the craters caused by the explosions, clearly praying for help that wasn't coming. Seth lunged toward the Warrior he had wounded with the wand.

A female comrade tried to intervene, her sword sweeping out in an aether-enhanced parry, yet Seth didn't stop. His Dusk Scythe hooked around her steel, bypassed the guard completely, and plunged the shadow-blade deep into the wounded man's neck. He dropped instantly. Another Warrior, wreathed in a defensive shroud of flames, slipped past Colossus to avenge the fallen man. It was a fatal mistake.

Seth pivoted, his left scythe hissing as it sheared through the fire and the flesh beneath, carving him open from shoulder to hip in a single, brutal stroke. Simultaneously, Nightmare phased out of invisibility and pounced; his jaws tore into the throat of the female Warrior in a cloud of corroding smoke before she could scream. Then, the cost of the assault came due. As the dust cleared, lances of fire and a jagged bolt of purple lightning from the rear guard slammed into Seth's back.

His Protecting Belt flared violently and shattered under the attacks. A split-second later, an arrow thudded into his shoulder, sinking deep. Seth gritted his teeth; the pain only resulted in a spike of adrenaline. Of hunger. Not slowing down, he spun toward the Warrior with the chest wound, ducked a glowing spear thrust, and buried his blades of condensed shadow into the man's chest.

When he yanked the weapons free, he then rushed toward the final survivor of the quartet, who was facing Colossus while trying to dodge Nightmare's bite. Seth drove aether into his arms and swung his Dusk Scythes. The dark blades met no resistance. They passed effortlessly through the man's neck. A decapitating strike. Savage. Yet efficient. His core still screaming, Seth turned around and tilted his head just in time—a lance of fire screamed past his ear, the heat singeing his face. He looked up.

The ten remaining soldiers of the empire were surging out from the craters of the Detonating Bombs and rushing him. There were three Elementalists and a Priest in the back. Four heavily armored Guardians and Warriors at the front. Two Rogues with bows flanking the formation. Blood dripped from Seth's Dusk Scythes. His belt's barrier was gone, he had an arrow half-buried in his shoulder, his Well barely had a third of its aether left, and Beastmaster Rage's duration was already halfway spent.

Any sane man would retreat. Yet Seth gritted his teeth and charged.