Supreme Magus

3058 Shifting Gears (Part 2)

To make matters worse, the ruins of Argantyr's right side were already rebuilding themselves into the missing arm and a second Searing Light was taking form in front of the proto-hand.

Lith followed Solus' instructions to the letter, Blinking away at the last second and to a position that forced the Elemental Lord's left arm to trace a wide arc to follow the Engine's movements.

The problem was that more and more light bullets joined the chase by the second and the Engine couldn't get too far away from the mana geyser without losing control to the Elemental Lord.

With such limited options, it was only a matter of time before that game of tag came to an end.

<"There you are!"> Argantyr had figured out the pattern in the Blinks and aimed the Searing Light where the enemy would be instead of where he was.

The Prime Engine was caught while stepping out of the dimensional door but it had a Spirit Barrier surrounding it that took the brunt of the damage. The impact sealed the Engine's movements long enough for the scattered beams of Searing Light to catch up with the spell's main body.

A hail of sharp rocks, incandescent magma, and light hammered at the Engine from every side. The mere shockwave from the blast raised a mushroom cloud and uprooted trees.

Even from their position, the three white cores needed to conjure a Hush spell to not be deafened by the noise.

"What an idiot." Rethia said.

"Agreed." Sinmara nodded.

"I really wish we could show this to our children." Surtr sighed. "It would be a priceless lesson about how power without wisdom is nothing but madness."

<"What the fuck?"> In his frenzy, Argantyr came to their same conclusion only when it was too late. <"How can his energy signature have gotten stronger after enduring my attack? He should be half dead!">

Only then did he notice that the position he had predicted was right in the middle of the mana geyser. By standing there, the Engine had greatly accelerated the recovery speed of its tower core.

Only then did the Elemental Lord realize that the emerald barrier was long gone, replaced by a colossal alloy shield brimming with mana.

Argantyr's mana.

Lith and Solus had used the Blinks to replenish the tower's strength while also buying time for the Workshop and Factory to craft Yurial's Guard.

The tower shield behind which the Engine stood was comprised of Davross, Adamant, Orichalcum, and silver, with the stronger metals at its center to take on Searing Light and the less durable metals closer to the edges where the pressure was lower.

Straight in the middle of the shield, there was a thin layer of Darwen that coated the metal and served as the first line of defense. It wasn't part of the alloy because all Lith's and Solus' attempts to craft something with Darwen always ended in catastrophic failure.

On top of that, the shield was enchanted with a single spell, the variation on Silverwing's Bastion that Lith and Solus had derived from Yurial's notes about the impossible arrays.

Six elemental crystals formed a perfect circle and worked as focus points for the stolen elemental energies. Akin to Yurial's Hexagram, the Guard didn't stop an enemy's spell by overpowering it but by splitting it into its basic components and absorbing them.

Unlike the Hexagram, however, Yurial's Guard didn't need to charge up all elemental points nor was it forced to channel the stolen energy into a fixed spell. Lith and Solus drew upon the Searing Light accumulated inside the shield and unleashed their Tower Void Spell, Twilight Storm.

Light turned into darkness element and was imbued in the snow which in turn was carried by a horizontal tornado that erupted from the tower shield. Air and water magic synergized in draining the humidity in the air and making the temperature drop by dozens of degrees per second.

Solus had opted for snow instead of hail or shards of ice because it wouldn't bounce back on impact. Snow would pile up on any barrier Argantyr might conjure, blinding his Life Vision and eroding his strength.

<"Shit!"> The Elemental Lord tried to Blink but the severe elemental imbalance he had caused first and the Engine had aggravated now short-circuited the spell.

'I could Spirit Blink, but that would just delay the inevitable. I've consumed too much of my energy reserves to heal my wounds and empower Searing Light. I must endure this spell and buy myself enough time to recover.'

Even with his limited battle experience, Argantyr knew that math wasn't on his side. He could only draw upon what his opponent left of the mana geyser's power and unlike the Engine, he had no equipment to weather the incoming storm.

Every bit of mana he would spend would further deplete his pseudo cores and he doubted that the unknown lost city would give him a break out of fair play.

'I need to weave my next attack while I prepare my defense.' The lost city crouched in a kneeling position so that he would offer solely his back to Twilight Storm and manipulated the earth element to bury himself below its surface.

'I can't block or dodge, but I still have a way to avoid it!' Argantyr turned the solid ground into mud to sink faster and use it as a protective layer after making it solid again.

Twilight Storm froze the mud and ripped the protective layer to shreds like paper. The cold weakened the stone walls while the black snow piled up on the Elemental Lord's back, sapping his strength.

'I don't care. I can take this kind of wounds. My Divine Right array gives me more mana than the repairs will take. Also, by bathing in the underground world energy, I can recover much more quickly than I would by standing on my feet.

'Everything I get, he loses. I'm tipping the scales back into my favor.' He had to repeat over and over in a mantra to endure the humiliation of hiding like a rat from a lost city much smaller and younger than he was.

"Wow. Cursed objects are all murderous trash but this one is humble." Surtr said. "Probably the humblest I've ever met."

"Yeah." Rethia nodded. "Mages have a huge ego and their creations inherit it. Most people I know would rather die than prostrate themselves before their enemy."

"Disagree." Sinmara shook her head. "Not about the ego thing. I think Argantyr is just that desperate and as long as he wins, no one will believe the claims of the loser."

The other two white cores had to concede the point. A lost city couldn't kill another without dying in the process. Since they would both survive and there was supposed to be no witness to their fight, victory was the only thing that mattered.

'Once I get my hands on the geyser and my Divine Right arrays grows, I'll have all the proof I need of my victory whereas he will have none of my humiliation!' The Elemental Ruler had no idea that communication amulets were a thing.

The white cores were recording everything from different angles to study the fight later. They had no intention of releasing the videos but that was because the Prime Engine was their ally, not a lost city.

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