Replicus was pleased to see his Unlimited respond to the threat so quickly. He had already sensed them by the time he had shot up as a bolt of Levin into the innocent looking cloud, and just as any good subordinates who knew how powerful their master was, they waited for his orders before making a move.
"Boss, what is that thing?" Grim was the first to speak with an unsettled grimace on his face. He genuinely looked disturbed by what he was looking at.
The ruby red eyes of the enemy were glinting menacingly in their direction after all.
"I'm afraid I also have no clue as to what it is," Replicus replied, donning his persona.
Pherdanta stepped forward.
"Let us cut it down," she said in a cold voice. On her waist which had been vacant before, there were now two swords strapped on. One was a sheathed katana to her side, and the other was thick, red-bladed odachi completely exposed behind her.
"Can we even do that?" Kenno asked while raising his brow to Pherdanta, but he looked just as ready to pounce if given the order.
Replicus was amused. They all had the right mind-set. Allora also did, but she either wasn't able to rush here as quickly as the others because he hadn't given her the completed Granted Armament, or the others had told her to sit this one out.
Either way, Replicus thought it was good that she wasn't here. He wouldn't want her first assignment to be this.
At that moment, there was a striking pulse of energy that dyed a decent portion of the seas black.
...!
Even Replicus was a little startled by the sudden malevolence.
No.
It wasn't as fickle as that.
It was...
"Primus...?" the Penetrator wondered.
The great, dark bird whipped its wings to the sides, which caused massive waves of sea water to be cast from either of its sides, almost leaving the wet land beneath.
In the next moment, the creature was masked in a unseen force, and it shot towards the four so quickly that the surroundings didn't react to its movement until its cruel beak was only a meter away from Replicus!
Anything near the shore was reduced to nothingness, and a cordon of force had thrashed its way deep into the island, erasing anything in its path, and giving way for the seawater to invade!
Yet...
The giant creature, its beak pointed to the Penetrator remained in place. It hadn't moved from its meter's worth of distance from Replicus, but it wasn't the Null Lifeform's doing.
Around him, facing in three different directions, the Unlimited stood, their arms outstretched, pointing with fists ahead.
Because of this gesture, a large, cubical barrier with a sturdy white hue that gave out tiny flakes energy, stood erect around them, guarding their master in addition to themselves.
This was the Granted Compound Seal, a skill from the Unlimited's Granted Armament which allowed them to create a fiercely resilient barrier that used meaningfully woven proportions of Null Life Essence and condensed Mana.
Each of the Unlimited could create one themselves simply by performing the gesture they were doing now, but combining the Seals was the best way to use this skill, as hinted by its name.
The large, dark creature hadn't been able to make it budge or buckle at all, and it was still trying attempting to do so.
Replicus stared at it.
'Why do I get the feeling that this creature is...' he thought, but was interrupted by a zealous voice to his side.
"Boss, you're studying it, right? How about I probe it for you?" Grim said with a confident smile. "Just give me the order, and I'll have it straining itself in a few moments."
Replicus sighed exasperatedly.
This guy's class influenced his behaviour to a terrifying degree. Pherdanta and Kenno looked irked by his enthusiasm.
"Fine. But if you feel like you are about to die, just crawl back to me so that I can get the last blow. Wouldn't want to lose such a special specimen without gaining something in return," Replicus said.
"That's a sick joke, boss," Grim said as he broke the gesture for the Granted Compound Seal, which made the cubical barrier lose a little of its lustre.
The white-haired man flashed through the border of the barrier, and started sprinting on the water.
As he did, he mobilised a great amount of his mana and had it flare from his body with such intensity that it turned him into a human-shaped glow.
"Come and get me!" Grim called the creature which had already begun to eye him with a certain degree of... hunger. Before he knew it, the great bird had flashed from Replicus and the others, and it was following after him.
Replicus paid close attention to it, and then to where it had shot from before – from the immediate water of the sea.
A dark sight met him, now that the view wasn't obstructed.
The seawater was slowly turning black. The inky kind of black.
That burst of Primus from moments ago...
"Strange," Replicus said while scratching his chin.
Grim raced on top of the water as if it was the most natural thing to do, all the while being chased by a massive bird that looked to be made of stone. A delighted grin was on his face even as the wind beat back his skin and hair.
He didn't underestimate his opponent. Not one bit. However, he was going to have a bit of fun with it, after all, unlike most times, he had actually been given permission.
A moment later, the speed of the great creature allowed it to quickly catch up to him, and it opened its beak wide to devour Grim.
It clamped on his figure with a dangerously vicious bite force, and there was even a disastrous force that accompanied the action, but... Grim had not become its meal.
Instead, several hundreds of meters in the skies, the white-haired Unlimited appeared, a grin on his face as he fell horizontally.
The great creature spotted him immediately, and with a furious flap of its wings, which resulted in another discharge of Primus with an inky darkness to it that stained the sea, it rapidly flew to approach him.
Grim, like Replicus noticed the darkness left behind. His eyes, even without him straining them, could see kilometres from his position with impeccable clarity.
'This thing behaves instinctively. It doesn't seem like a Cluster beast or a general beast with a sophisticated set of abilities. Strange. Yet for some reason, even an unguarded strike from the boss didn't leave a mark on its body...' he thought.
It indeed was strange.
Aside from its discharge of Primus, was toughness the only thing this bird had going for it?
But how tough was it really?
Grim's grin grew wider the closer the bird got.
When it was a mere twenty meters away, he gave it a condescending side eye, saluted and then pointed towards it with his right hand – with his index.
Grim then chanted:
"Aggrante."
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