Soul of Searing Steel

The lightning leaped through the atmosphere in less than a split second as the ‘fist’ of the humanoid thunder emitted light that was as bright as the sun in the narrow cave of the mountain. The magic energy in the surroundings seems to be activated by that strike. Instantly, everything went chaotic, and a small anti-magic area is formed.

Without any special mean, none of the magic power within this range would be able to react with any other external element.

However, before the fist landed on Joshua, the warrior’s entire body emitted a blinding golden light. Pure vitality energy began to resonate with the heart, causing the Combat Aura on the surface of his body to form an aura that repels any sort of external element regardless of whether the power could hurt him or not. The palm of the humanoid thunder instantly collapsed into large pieces of light particles. A silver sword flashed horizontally across the atmosphere of the air, cutting the humanoid thunder in half.

“As expected, one moment of oversight would cost a life when facing an elemental living being.”

So what really happened just now? The warrior temporary activated his ‘Avatar’ in order to gain immunity against all magic effect. From there, he evaded a deadly strike from the humanoid thunder that he cleaved in half, just a moment ago. Joshua quickly deactivated his Magic Immunity and instantly grabbed onto his giant axe as he positioned himself into the right posture then advanced on. Along the way, he had to push away the humanoid thunder that was slowly going back to its original form.

In nature, there is no existence of any sort like the Thunder Elementals. The power of thunder is so insanely powerful it could destroy everything. There was not even the slightest possibility that such an existence could possess wisdom or even will to begin with—however, under the runes that are wielded by the mages, the impossible has become possible. Generations of mages have gone through tremendous amounts of hardship in researching, causing the light of wisdom to glow. Hence, the lightning obtained life, and the Thunder Elemental was born.

Similar to Rock Puppets, Thunder Elementals were also regularly used by superior mages in defending the mage towers. However, there was a vast difference in the strengths and weaknesses of both Rock Puppets and Thunder Elementals. Even the weakest Thunder Elementals were never weaker than a Gold-intermediate being. Furthermore, their bodies and their speed are their greatest weapons. The speed of a lightning is far beyond the agility of a body made of flesh and blood as a non-solid body would be free of the restraints that a body made of flesh and blood would have. Ordinary warriors will not stand a chance against such enemies. Only a champion who has mastered ‘Avatar’ and the skills to make himself immune to magic powers could.

Because the magic energy in the atmosphere of the air was extremely dense, the regeneration ability of the Thunder Elemental was incredibly fast. It behaved like the white blood cell of the Thunderous Mountain. It did not show even the slightest hesitation as it once again took shape and charged at Joshua to complete its mission.

The warrior looked strangely calm. He even lowered the greatsword and the greataxe which were actually the transformation of Ying and Ling. He did not move a muscle and seemed as if he had no intention to attack nor defend against the assault of the Thunder Elementals. He just stood there as if he was allowing the enemy to do anything to him.

If the enemy was a human being, he would definitely have hesitated after seeing Joshua’s behavior. How could a Thunder Elemental observe the expression and behavior of its enemy? Its very own existence was to eliminate destroyers from the outside like Joshua. So it did not hesitate at all despite the strange behavior of the warrior. It was just carrying out the order of nature.

Just five meters in front of Joshua, the Thunder Elemental could not move forward anymore no matter how hard it tried. It felt as if there was an invisible wall standing between it and the warrior.

“It’s just a puppet after all. It has no wisdom at all.”

Feeling itself being intercepted from fulfilling its duty, the Thunder Elemental increased its strength. Instantly, light began to spread into the surroundings. The greenish-white lights shone intensely as the shape of a cage slowly revealed itself. Joshua stood right in the center of that cage made from his own Combat Aura. He looked at the sparks of the thunderbolts that were being directed straight towards the ground. Then he shook his head in disappointment.

The attacks of the Thunder Elemental was predictable. Its mind was too simple. The warrior could not believe that the Thunder Elemental had fallen into the trap so easily. If it was a human being, he or she would never have done that.

Thunderbolt Cage is a self-invented technique by a player who used the Combat Aura of thunder and lightning in the game. He used the strong plasticity of his own Combat Aura and his ability to change electrical conductivity to create a cage that can fully conduct electricity based on the theory of the Faraday Cage¹ . The cage can be used to defend against some lightning attribute boss attacks. However, the warrior did not create a true Thunderbolt Cage. Although Joshua did not wield a lightning Combat Aura, he was able to temporarily create something similar out of his own Combat Aura and attain a similar effect to the Thunderbolt Cage.

Even a lightning that possessed a life will definitely not be able to violate the most fundamental law of the world. The Faraday Cage that was made from his Combat Aura was enough to isolate the thunder attack from the Thunder Elemental. The cage could even temporarily trap it.

The lightning continued to flash in every corner of the cave. A scorching scent and ionized odor filled the air in the cave. As endless flows of electrical surged around him, Joshua lifted the great sword in his hand as he looked at the Thunder Elemental which was trying its best to unleash its full power in an attempt to break through the barrier in front of it. The warrior thrust both his legs against the ground as he vanished into thin air.

The speed of the warrior is far beyond the speed of light. The basic instinct of the Thunder Elemental alarmed that its life is threatened, the monster rapidly took a few steps back in an attempt to rid itself of the imprisonment of the cage created by the warrior. However, the silver greatsword had already flashed across the entire body of the Thunder Elemental from the top of its head all the way down to the bottom at an imposing momentum. Everything happened so fast that even the agile Thunder Elemental could not respond to the attack. It was split into half straight away as the Combat Aura of the warrior is unleashed. The magic circle embedded in the living core of the Thunder Elementals has been completely destroyed in an instant.

[10/30]

The wind kicked up by the greatsword has even distorted the light and magic energy all around him. The shockwave of the strike struck at the wall of the cave, followed by a loud band that created a long trench that was a few meters long on the surface of the wall. The warrior leaned on that momentum as he began charging his strength while the Thunder Elemental was still dispersing into light particles. He was ready to strike his sword at the rock wall before him and make himself a path that leads straight towards the location of the Thunderous Mountain’s energy core.

However, the warrior seems to have forgotten something very important—this was no ordinary cave.

This was the inside of the Thunderous Mountain.

Upon noticing the purging system failing to purge the invader out of the body, the merging Golems instantly wielded its powerful magic energy to begin their assaults.

The magic energy that carried the resemblance of a tidal wave flowed everywhere from the peak of the mountain. The magic energy then converged at the central core of the mountain. Suddenly, Joshua is shocked to notice that lightning began to bloom out of the air all around him. Hundreds of scattered light particles resulted from the dispersing of the Thunder Elementals were expanding. Along with each breath the warrior took, the magic energy that was surrounding each of the light particles grew into something bigger and stronger.

If one Thunder Elemental could not get the job done, then let’s bring out hundreds of Thunder Elementals to finish the job. The true monster was not the boss in the game—they do not listen to reason.

Joshua was able to instantly understand the intentions of the enemy. He grabbed tightly onto the weapons in his hands as the tension of the situation rapidly built up. The half-baked Faraday Cage was no longer able to resist that amount of Thunder Elementals. Other than cursing the Thunderous Mountain quietly for not being reasonable, he only had one last choice left.

Before these Thunder Elementals could take their form, the warrior must destroy their energy cores.

Without wasting another second, the warrior immediately stretched his legs as he began charging his strength. He did not show even the slightest hesitation as he charged his power up, ready to charge forward. The moment he was done charging up, the warrior instantly burst himself out and charged for the rock wall in front of him.

The surface of the rock wall that isolated the energy core safely deep within the Thunderous Mountain is as tough as steel. The silver surface of the wall gleamed under the shining magic Runes. The wall was incomparably smooth. Joshua aimed the greataxe in his hand and swung the axe towards the wall with all of his might, showing no mercy at all.

The greataxe charged with red Combat Aura was strong enough to destroy everything. The sharp saw teeth on the edge of the blade came in contact with the surface of the wall, as friction followed, causing many sparks to burst out from the contact point between the blade of the axe and the surface of the wall. With a series of deafening noises, the rock wall split opened and a huge crack appeared down its middle. However, there was still quite a small distance between the rock wall and the energy core. Meanwhile, hundreds of Thunder Elementals took form and were almost ready to launch their full assault on the warrior.

The warrior did not panic. Once again, he launched his attacks at the enemies in a calm manner. The silver-white great sword was charging up with rippling waves of energy. The blade of the sword cut through the runic rock wall like cutting through butter as it vibrated at a frequency so high that anything that came into contact with the blade would shatter or be destroyed. Once again, the runic rock wall that is almost as tough as the adamantine metal sported another crack.

This time, the hole in the wall was big enough for a person to go through it. The violent surging of magic energy gushed out of that giant hole in the rock wall. The Thunder Elementals that were still forming halfway instantly completed the formation after they are exposed to the sudden upsurge of the magic energy that came gushing into their surroundings. However, because of the unexpected sudden interference by the magic energy, all of them went completely out of control for a moment as they began laying waste to everything in their surroundings.

Hundreds of Thunder Elementals unleashed their own powers at the same time. The scene seems just like as if the world is about to come to an end. White blazing lights of lightning were seen flashing over and over again in the vicinity as everything within the area is reduced to ashes and dust.

However, everything that is currently happening in the vicinity did not affect the warrior who has already crossed through the wall into the other side of the wall.

Meanwhile, on the external side of the Thunderous Mountain.

A voice suddenly came into the mind of Black.

“Creature with the bloodline of an Elder Dragon.”

The voice sounded pure and sacred. Every word the voice spoke carried along with a series of echoes. The voice sounded as if a group of people was saying something at the same time. However, the voice only echoed back and forth within the mind of the draconic horse. “Do you truly wish to assist your master?”