Wizard Dark Stream raised his hand and drew a circle in front of him.
A grayish-white light membrane materialized out of thin air. The three water blades slammed into the membrane, producing three muffled thuds and sending three ripples across its surface before dissipating.
Blood Fury lunged from behind Boulder.
His arms had completely deformed, covered in a layer of dark red mane from his shoulders to his fingertips. His fingers had turned into half-foot-long sharp claws, their tips gleaming with a metallic chill.
Clasping his claws together like a hammer, he brought them crashing down toward the back of Boulder's head.
The golden scale armor on the back of Boulder's neck suddenly thickened, and the edges of the scales lit up with blinding gold runic lines.
Blood Fury's clasped claws slammed into them, producing a deafening clang of clashing metal.
Knocked forward two steps by the colossal force, Boulder felt a small portion of the scales on his neck shatter. Before the fragments could even hit the ground, Blood Fury's second claw swept in and swatted them away.
Boulder used the momentum of his stumble to roll forward, simultaneously pulling another item from his storage device. It was a thumb-sized crystal bottle containing a half-filled portion of deep blue liquid.
He bit off the cap and poured the liquid into his mouth.
The moment the liquid slid down his throat, Boulder's aura surged violently.
The two young horns on either side of his forehead shifted from pale gold to a brilliant gold, spiral patterns emerging along their surfaces.
The faint, translucent scale patterns on his skin lit up entirely, enveloping him in a pale gold halo.
Swinging his arm back, he threw a punch that collided head-on with Blood Fury's descending claw.
Boom!
A visible shockwave exploded from the point of impact.
The blast wave rippled outward in all directions, blowing away the shattered fragments of the broken stone pillars within the altar.
The stone slabs beneath Boulder's feet caved inward, forming a five-meter-wide shallow crater with him at the center, yet he himself remained completely unmoved.
Blood Fury's crimson pupils shrank slightly.
He glanced down at his claw, noting a chip on the tip of one of his nails.
“Interesting,” Blood Fury said, his lips curling into a grin.
The sheer brutality and excitement in his grin practically overflowed from his eyes.
His body began to swell. This was no mere illusion from some spell; his physical form was genuinely expanding.
His bones popped and crackled, muscles writhed violently beneath his skin, and his spine elongated outward as a dark red mane grew all the way from the back of his neck down to his tailbone.
His facial structure shifted as well.
His jaw jutted forward, his teeth grew sharp and long, his ears elongated upward, and the pupils of his crimson eyes narrowed into vertical slits.
In an instant, Wizard Blood Fury was gone.
In his place stood a blood-red hound of staggering proportions.
Its head alone was at least ten meters wide, and its dark red fur stood on end like steel needles.
Standing on all fours, its massive claws plowed four deep trenches into the ground.
Its crimson eyes locked onto Boulder, a low growl rumbling from its throat.
Blood Fury pounced.
Boulder's expression shifted drastically. He crossed his arms in front of his chest, pushing the defensive power of his golden scale armor to its absolute limit.
As Blood Fury's claw slammed down, a blinding golden light exploded from the surface of the scale armor.
The stone floor beneath Boulder shattered completely, sending him sinking half a meter into the ground along with the rubble.
With a sweep of Blood Fury's second claw, Boulder was sent flying like a batted stone, smashing through an entire stone wall on the western side of the altar.
Before the debris could even settle, Blood Fury was already upon him, opening his massive, fanged maw to bite down.
Boulder erupted from the pile of rubble, a pitch-black trident suddenly appearing in his right hand.
Countless intricate silver runes wound around the shaft of the trident, which split into three prongs, each shimmering with a cold light of a different color.
He thrust the trident straight toward Blood Fury's throat.
Blood Fury tilted his head to dodge the prongs, but Boulder's thrust was merely a feint.
Boulder wiped his left hand along the shaft, and the three prongs of the trident simultaneously fired three different colored beams of light.
The red beam wrapped around Blood Fury's left front leg, the blue beam bound his right front leg, and the green beam shot straight for the giant hound's eyes.
In the next split second, Blood Fury shut his eyes.
The green beam struck his eyelids, leaving only a faint white mark on the surface of his fur.
Exerting force with both claws simultaneously, he snapped the two binding beams around his legs.
However, Boulder had already used this brief window to retreat to the other end of the altar.
He panted heavily, his golden scale armor covered in cracks and dents.
He pulled another bottle of the deep blue liquid from his storage device and gulped it down, causing the cracks on the scale armor to slowly begin repairing themselves.
At the same time, Wizard Dark Stream's five threads shot in from five different directions. Boulder swung his trident to block them, but the threads wrapped around the shaft, emitting a sizzling, corrosive sound.
Just as he was about to break free, Blood Fury's tail swept toward him.
The tail was as thick as a century-old tree, its tip covered in a layer of bony armor plates.
The tail struck Boulder's ribs, shattering more than half of his golden scale armor upon contact.
With a muffled groan, Boulder was sent flying horizontally, crashing into the rubble at the edge of the altar.
Leaning against the stone wall, Ethan took in the entire scene.
He raised his hand and shot five Thorn Pierces toward Wizard Dark Stream, their tips gleaming with a dark green, poisoned glint.
Without even turning his head, Dark Stream let a grayish-white light shield materialize behind him.
The five Thorn Pierces slammed into the shield and bounced off, failing to stir even a single ripple.
Dark Stream glanced sideways at Ethan, the coldness in his eyes causing the surrounding temperature to plunge by several degrees.
“Genos! Don't engage!” Boulder scrambled out of the rubble, the scale armor on his right arm completely shattered to reveal blood-streaked skin underneath. “Find a chance to escape! You're no match for them!”
Even as he spoke, Boulder pulled yet another Wizardry Tool from his storage device.
This time, it was a fist-sized conch, its shell covered in dark gold patterns.
He brought the conch to his lips and blew into it with all his might.
A low, resonant horn call echoed through the altar.
Wherever the soundwaves passed, the air grew viscous, causing the movements of both Blood Fury and Dark Stream to falter.
The sound seemed to carry physical weight, stirring visible ripples in the air that stacked upon one another, completely disrupting the two wizards' rhythm of movement.
Taking advantage of this window, Boulder rushed to Ethan's side and grabbed his shoulder. “Go!”
The moment the word left his mouth, Blood Fury's claw swept down.
The strike broke through the restraint of the conch's sound, the wind pressure generated by the claw tips pulverizing all the stone slabs beneath their feet.
Boulder shoved Ethan to the side and raised his trident to meet the claw head-on.
A blinding tempest of turbulent energy exploded at the point of impact.
The stone slabs beneath Boulder's feet disintegrated entirely, his legs sinking into the ground up to his knees.
Unable to withstand the immense pressure, the golden scale armor began to shatter starting from his arms, fragments spraying outward.
Yet, Boulder gritted his teeth and held his ground.
The young horns on either side of his forehead glowed so intensely they seemed on the verge of burning. His arm muscles bulged to their absolute limit as the three prongs of his trident simultaneously shot out beams of light, striking the fur on Blood Fury's chest.
The beams exploded, scorching a small patch of the fur on Blood Fury's chest and exposing the dark red skin underneath.
Blood Fury roared in pain, pulling his claw back.
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