Chapter 225: Whirlwind
"Arlok!"
Ruvian’s voice rose above the deafening chaos.
"Crack the ground open below that thing!"
Arlok slid to a stop, boots carving shallow furrows across the dirt as he stared at Ruvian in confusion.
"Huh? What do you mean!?"
Not far away, Yerin and Shima caught the order as well.
Both of them spared Ruvian a brief, puzzled glance — unable to understand what he was planning, before their attention snapped back to the Bloodvine as another wave of thick roots surged toward them.
"Just do it!" Ruvian shouted.
Arlok blinked, then gave a carefree shrug.
"Ha, sure. Whatever you say!"
Without another question, he bent his knees and jumped high into the sky. The ground almost seemed relieved to be free of his weight as his powerful legs launched him nearly five meters into the air.
For a fleeting moment, he remained suspended against the pale, oppressive sky, his broad figure reduced to nothing more than a dark silhouette before he plunged toward the earth like a falling meteor.
The instant they realized where he was headed, Shima and Yerin sprang away from the landing point without hesitation.
"HAHAHA. Here comes the Stonebreaker’s Kiss!"
His laughter echoed through the air before it was swallowed by the impact.
Boom!
The head of his massive poleaxe that was enchanted with a spell crashed into the ground with enough force to shake the surrounding terrain.
[Groundbreaker].
The hardened soil split apart with a thunderous crack as jagged fissures spread in every direction, tearing through packed earth and stone alike while chunks of rock were hurled into the air.
Without wasting the opportunity Arlok had created, Ruvian immediately gathered the mana within his Spellcore.
Then, he cast [Whirlwind] after he stored his katana into his dimensional storage.
The air around the Bloodvine slowly began to move.
At first, it was nothing more than a gentle current that circled the creature. Then, the slow current soon became a spinning stream until countless layers of wind wrapped around the Bloodvine.
Within seconds, the wind roared to life. It grew faster and faster, turning into violent torrents that howled around the massive creature.
Ruvian gritted his teeth.
The strain was clearly written across his face as he fought to keep the spell under control.
He had never cast this spell before.
The only time he had ever seen it was during the Ashway Bazaar, when Silvena used it before his very eyes. He knew better than anyone how demanding the spell was. Even Silvena, someone who had long mastered Wind Affinity, had struggled to keep it under control.
Yet he had no other choice.
He had to make it work here.
His control might fall short, but he possessed far more Mana Essence than before. If raw control was lacking, then sheer mana would have to make up for it. On top of that, his Wind Affinity had already reached the Intermediate Stage.
Taking everything into account, he should be able to pull it off.
By the time the wind reached its crescendo, it had transformed into a tightening gyre of a raging storm. The roaring vortex twisted faster and faster, swallowing everything within its reach as it unleashed an overwhelming force.
Then, he clenched his hand and commanded the storm to rise.
The violent vortex answered him, dragging the creature’s countless crimson roots upward together with enormous chunks of soil and stone. The earth itself seemed to be ripped free as the massive root system was slowly torn from the ground and lifted toward the sky. (+1,000PP)
The sight was nothing short of monstrous.
Everyone stood frozen in shock as they stared at the gigantic spell unfolding before them. No one could believe that such a massive vortex had been cast by Ruvian.
’...’
At the same time, a thin stream of blood trickled from Ruvian’s nose. His face had gone pale as nearly every drop of mana within his Spellcore was squeezed dry.
The Voidspawn’s writhing body was slowly torn free from the shattered earth, rising higher and higher.
Soon, the entire creature hung helplessly within the heart of the raging whirlwind. Its countless roots thrashed wildly in the air.
’Damn it... this is draining far more mana than I expected...’
He gritted his teeth before shouting at the top of his lungs.
"Now! Destroy every piece of earth still clinging to those roots! The heart-core should be hidden inside one of them!"
The command was all they needed.
Arlok leaped forward first, slamming his poleaxe into the mass of dangling boulders. Yerin’s blade came next, the flames searing through thick coils of dirt-packed vine, burning away stubborn clumps in showers of embers.
Shima jumped even higher — dashing past them, kicking on the available stone boulder, her falchion charged with crackling arcs of lightning, slashing the root with brutality.
Horren — hanging back just far enough to keep his aim — drew the condensed wind arrows and destroyed the boulders cleanly.
They worked without pause, without waste, until nothing but stripped roots remained.
Then, Horren’s final attack split the last boulder and from within spilled a red light.
It was the Bloodvine Strangler’s heart!
A crystalline core the size of a clenched fist, its surface like polished glass yet veined with threads of living crimson that pulsed in slow rhythm.
The moment the heart revealed itself, Ruvian did not allow a courtesy of hesitation.
He rapidly cast a single [Magic Missile].
The projectile screamed across the air with the blistering speed of a fired bullet. The core heart didn’t even have a heartbeat’s worth of time to recreate its limbs before the spell reached it.
CRACK!
The entire heart violently ruptured, bursting into a rain of crimson shards as the incandescent streak of light bored straight through it, obliterating the core without leaving so much as a fragment intact. (+1,000PP)
[You have slain a Bloodvine Strangler!]
[You have received +3 Mana Resonances!]
*****
A tangled mass of blackened vines, still clinging stubbornly to the carcass of the Crestbeak Fowl, plummeted from the grey-stained sky and struck the earth with a wet thud.
The impact rippled through the brittle soil, sending a weak tremor underfoot. After the battle, the air was thick with the smell of faint, sickly-sweet taint of corrupted blood.
The creature gave a small, spasmodic jerk of muscle, refusing to admit its own departure. The movements grew weaker with each passing moment until at last the creature lay still.
’That... that turned out very well.’
Ruvian panted, trying to catch his breath.
"Oh hell, that was easy," Arlok muttered, his tone carrying a hollow dissatisfaction. "I didn’t even get to have fun."
From somewhere off to his left, Shima’s voice cut in, sharp enough to draw blood. "Says the one who got thrown halfway across the clearing before the real fight even started."
"Hey! Your warning was damn late!" Arlok shot back.
Before the exchange could sour further, Yerin ended the arguments without needing to raise her voice.
"Enough. We need to move now." Her eyes swept over the clearing. "The noise might draw the other Voidspawns. We can’t afford to bleed our mana on anything unnecessary. We still need to refine what’s left before nightfall."
They all nodded and agreed with her.
Ruvian inpected his [Mana Essence].
[Mana Essence: (987/5,000)]
’Damn... that single wind spell took almost all my mana.’
When he looked up, Yerin was watching him — her expression was impassive, but somehow edged with a soft glint of approval.
"Ruvian, quick thinking back there. It seems you’ve honed your wind craft well enough to bring out that much force in one cast. That was a clean one," she said, her voice calm.
Ruvian let out a tired smile.
"Thanks."
Yerin smiled, then she looked at the others. "For now, we did well. Let’s extract the shard from it and be gone from here."
Horren rolled up his sleeves with resignation. The fabric bunching just below his elbows as he stepped closer to the carcass.
Crouching beside the Crestbeak Fowl, he drew his knife, and stared at the unnatural bulges and ridges, searching for the telltale seam where the shard would lie hidden within.
The smell was heavy and oppressive, a clinging mixture of iron-rich rot and that faint, almost sweet undertone unique to Void corruption.
From a few paces away, Shima frowned as she looked at the corpse.
Then, the knife met something that was not flesh.
His hand moved past the deep cavity of the creature’s insides before his fingers closed around something cold and unnaturally smooth.
When he drew his hand back into the grey light, one shard sat in his palm, glistening wet with the remnants of their prison.
It was white in colour.
A Wretched-Rank Voidshard.
Horren turned the shard over in his palm.
"Alright... I got it."
Then, he channeled his mana into the bracelet before pressing the Voidshard against its surface. The white shard instantly dissolved into countless motes of light, swallowed whole by the artifact in the blink of an eye.
Later, a translucent projection immediately sprang to life above the bracelet, its glowing letters hanging in midair for everyone to see.
[Horren’s Points: 60 Pts]
[Squad’s Points: 60 Pts]
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[Chapter 225: Whirlwind]
Plot Points= 14,305
