Chapter 406: Red Domain
The air was heavy with the stench of vaporized blood and ozone. Tang Lu stood his ground amidst the blackened ash of the dragon, and monsters he had just obliterated, his fiery aura flickering as he assessed the new threat. This was no mindless beast; the humanoid lion exuded a dense, suffocating energy signature that warped the very air around it.
"What are you?" Tang Lu asked, staring at the monster with a slight frown.
"You don’t even know us!! Then just die!!"
The Lion roared at him, a sound so violently loud it cracked the remaining concrete barricades, and shot forward, instantly appearing before Tang Lu.
’Such speed?!!’ Tang Lu quickly leaped backward, his battle instincts taking over, dodging the monster’s attack by a hair breath.
BOOOOM!!
The monster’s massive broadsword smashed heavily on the ground, sending a shockwave of fragmented earth, smoke, and dust all over the place.
"...?!"
Tang Lu landed gracefully on his feet, though his calves strained from the forced evasion, his frown deepening into a grimace: ’We are both Lv500, but why do I feel this thing is stronger than me?’ He thought, as the volatile flames on him flared up defensively.
’Doesn’t matter! I will just burn him to ashes.’ He thought, refusing to let doubt cloud his judgment. He was a Protector of Seoul; retreat was not an option.
"Seems you’re finally getting serious! I should also get serious!" The Lion said, casually placing its massive sword on its broad shoulder as if it weighed nothing.
BOOOOM!!
The two combatants shot forward in absolute unison, breaking the sound barrier, and collided heavily at the absolute center of the battlefield, sending massive spiderweb cracks all over the scorched ground beneath them.
"Die!!"
Tang Lu sent out a rapid, devastating series of fire-enhanced punches at the humanoid lion, aiming for vital organs and joints. Yet, the monster moved with terrifying precision, easily blocking everything with the flat of its giant sword.
"Hehehe! That’s it! Keep going!" It yelled, reveling in the violence, and the next moment, a concussive wave of explosive energy burst out from him, smashing right into Tang Lu’s chest, sending the fiery human flying backward through the air.
"My turn!!"
BOOM!
Using the explosion as a smokescreen, the monster shot forward, arriving directly in front of Tang Lu before he could even stabilize his flight, and swung his heavy blade down on him with the force of a collapsing building.
BAM!!
"...?!"
The Lion was suddenly stunned, its momentum completely halted, staring blankly at the blazing, flaming hand firmly holding its descending sword.
"Attacking me with flames, are you that foolish?" He asked. The Lion had unconsciously imbued the blade with highly combustible energy, feeding Tang Lu’s own affinity. And without giving the Lion a single, fleeting chance to think or correct its mistake, he channeled a localized supernova into his free arm and sent out a devastating punch, striking the monster’s exposed abdomen.
BOOOOM!
The force and thermal impact was absolute. The Lion flew hundreds of meters away like a fired artillery shell, smashing heavily on the ground and carving a deep trench through the earth.
Dust settled over the long trench. From the epicenter of the crater, a dark chuckle echoed.
"As expected of a Protector." The Lion casually shook its head, slapping the side of its mane to remove the dizziness, and stood back up as if it had merely tripped. The charred flesh on its abdomen was already visibly knitting back together, steam rising from the rapid cellular regeneration.
"I love this! This is what a battle feels like!!" It yelled, its eyes glowing with a manic, abyssal frenzy as its muscles grew, literally expanding and tearing through its own skin, pushing its physical strength far beyond its base form.
’That attack has all my strength, but it didn’t even leave a scratch on this thing.’ Tang Lu thought, hovering tensely in the air.
"Come on!! One of us will die here!!!" The Lion yelled. Instantly, the natural blue sky above Seoul violently warped and turned a sickening, blood-red.
"...!!"
Sensing the massive shift in the atmosphere, everyone—the surviving soldiers on the distant walls, and Tang Lu himself—instinctively raised their heads to the sky, all stunned speechless by the apocalyptic celestial change.
"Blood sacrifice!!" The Lion stretched its clawed hand towards the broadsword buried in the dirt, which vibrated violently, rose into the air as if magnetically pulled, and shot back into his firm grasp.
"Atomic Blood Slash."
It raised the massive sword high over its head. The atmosphere screamed as pure, concentrated red lightning shot down from the artificial red sky, smashing right into the blade and supercharging it with destructive energy.
"Die humans!!!"
The Monster screamed, and swung the sword, sending a huge wave of crescent destructive energy blade slicing through the very fabric of space towards Tang Lu.
’I must--’
Tang Lu instantly turned paled, his survival instincts screaming at him to evade, but he couldn’t move. No matter how he desperately tried to force himself, he couldn’t move a single inch. His muscles were entirely locked.
’What is happening?!’
"Foolish humans! Blood Sacrifices freezes any creature who looked up at the red sky. It completely paralyzed your body... And while you remain still, my Atomic Blood Slash, will finish the job." It smirked at them, a cruel, mocking expression of absolute superiority:
"Once you are all dead, I will become even stronger!!" It yelled, anticipating the feast of a Level 500.
"I am not ready to die here!! My friends are counting on me!" Tang Lu screamed internally, pushing his spirit energy to the absolute brink of self-destruction, forcing a microscopic sliver of energy into a single command, gathering all his spirit energy into one hand, then clenched his fists.
"....!!!"
BOOOOM?!
The massive crescent blade of red energy smashed directly into him, rising a massive, blinding cloud of red smoke and vaporized dust.
The Lion lowered its blade, its smirk fading into genuine confusion. ’Huh? My attack should have divided him into halves, and kept moving still it reached their base. Why did it stop?’ It thought, staring intently at the swirling red smoke, which finally cleared, revealing a battered Tang Lu, standing miraculously alive in front of a massive, intricately carved golden shield.
"Under the debuff, you still summoned a legendary class shield, not bad." The Lion lightly shook its head, acknowledging the human’s desperate tenacity:
"But it’s still not enough... That attack, it’s only one. What happens when I use ten, hundred, or even a thousand?" It asked, its voice dropping to a terrifying, absolute calm.
Tang Lu narrowed his eyes to the size of a needle, his heart sinking into his stomach. If the enemy could genuinely send that many, then he doesn’t have a single hope of winning... And under the oppressive sky pressure of the Blood Sacrifice domain, he couldn’t physically move or even cast basic evasion skills; only miraculously summoning the legendary shield under the intense pressure had already drained a massive portion of his energy reserves.
"Okay Humans! Time to die."
The Lion casually raised its sword into the air again, but this time, there was no single strike of red lightning. Instead, the red sky boiled, and hundreds of massive, glowing red sword phantoms appeared all over the sky, tearing through the spatial fabric, their razor-sharp tips aiming downward at the ruined city like the wrath of a god.
"One thousand Atomic Blood Slash!!!" It yelled, and swung his sword downward. With his devastating actions, all the one thousand colossal swords in the sky dropped simultaneously towards the fragile city barricades and Tang Lu.
"This is bad, so bad." Tang Lu muttered to himself, his face entirely paled in genuine, unadulterated horror as the sky itself fell upon them.
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