"Release…limit."
**BOOMM!!
A burst of pure unattributed energy was released from his body, spreading out shockwaves that flattened all the buildings within a fifty-metre radius of him.
Luke's aura began rising higher and higher, breaking past the intermediate stage of his level, reaching the peak of the Grandmaster level….and surpassing it entirely.
The full power of the 'Sword Saint' was revealed, making the undead dragon nod repeatedly to itself before saying.
[So that's where your strange confidence is coming from.]
It flared its death aura wildly, locking eyes with the Sword Saint and continuing.
[Oh well…since we're all about releasing limits.]
The undead dragon's power instantly increased, showing that despite the fact that it was injured and weakened, it still possessed a great deal of strength left.
Its left inferno sight turned a deep blue colour, with one-fifth of the right changing to a similar colour while the remaining four-fifths remained red.
[I said I was an Irregular when I was alive, but I don't recall saying I lost that status upon my death.]
The moment it spoke, it grabbed the tower beside it and uprooted the building from the ground, tossing it like a projectile towards Luke who threw out his fist and punched it to smithereens.
A giant claw coated in death energy emerged from within the rain of rocks, slicing through the air as it made its way towards Luke's body, but the man instantly jumped backwards to avoid it before placing his hand on the sword on his sheath.
However, the sword he grabbed, was not the one he had used earlier to knock the undead dragon back, but the other sword, a sword he had not used in quite a while.
He unsheathed the very long, slim, straight and sharp dual-edged blade, made of a strange folded steel-like material and was held by a grip wrapped in high quality, ruby red scaled leather.
The blade had a broad, curved cross-guard, adding just enough weight to make sure the blade sat firmly in the owner's hand and protecting those same hands as well.
"Blade of Lost Saints."
In response to the name he called out, the two ornamental orbs on either side of the cross guard lit up with a small red glow, right before Luke infused his aura into it and activated his skill once more.
"Laser Sword."
The pillar of bright red light erupted from the sword, shooting straight towards the undead dragon who gathered energy in its mouth and launched it out as a blue beam shot through the sky.
**KAABOOMMM!!!
The laser sword and the dragon breath collided with each other, resulting in an explosion that turned everything nearby to rubble, leaving a deep depression of a few metres deep in the ground.
Both Luke and the undead dragon were knocked back by the shockwaves, however, they were relatively unharmed and only looked at each other before resuming their attacks.
The dragon swiped with its claws multiple times, sending out three-pronged death aura slashes towards the Sword Saint who swung his sword and blocked each slash with relative ease.
**BAAAMM!!
Sword and claws collided with each other, cracking the ground underneath as the force of the clash was far too great for the already weakened earth to withstand.
The undead dragon swiped its claws with speeds uncharacteristic of a creature with such a large body, but Luke did not seem surprised as he calmly blocked each slash with ease, not forgetting to toss in his own attacks once more.
Seeing that its claws were not working, the undead dragon abruptly turned its huge body around and swung its tail towards Luke, slamming his body with it and sending him flying.
Despite this, the sword saint flipped in the air and landed on the ground, before kicking off the ground with enough force to crater the earth beneath his feet and charging forward.
Unexpectedly, he suddenly threw his sword into the air, clenching his fist as a magic circle appeared around his wrist.
Just when the undead dragon was about to take advantage of its magic resistance to tank the spell, it noticed that the magic circle around Luke's wrist…had four rings!!!
'Tier 4 Magic? So fast… Wait…it's a flame spell.
There's only one fourth-tier flame spell that can be cast that fast!'
The undead dragon's thoughts only took half a second before it instantly began to activate defensive magic spells.
Luke on the other hand, momentarily closed his eyes, reopening them wide a beat later as a fiery aura surrounded his entire arm.
He then punched forward, activating one of the most powerful Flame Magic spells out there.
"Brachium!"
**KAAABOOOOMMM!!!!
The fist collided with the undead dragon's magic barriers, shattering through nearly a dozen barriers like glass before its momentum finally began to reduce.
Nevertheless, it was still plenty powerful, enough to shatter through the rest of the barriers in 2 seconds and collide with the claw of the dragon behind it.
A cloud of smoke and white flame rose up into the air, clearing up to reveal that everything within a radius of dozens of kilometres had been reduced to scorched earth.
Buildings, roads, and every other structure were instantly turned to dust by the explosion.
And the end result of this explosion…was that the undead dragon lost its entire left forelimb.
'Good thing my 'Irregularity' was related to elemental resistance…I would have lost more than just a forelimb if it was not.'
The undead dragon thought to itself as it used a great deal of death energy to forcefully regenerate the missing limb.
A cracked bone burst out of the spot where the limb once was, followed by rotten flesh that squished about while wrapping around the cracked bone.
The area around the joints was also regenerated, and after doing so, the dragon flexed the forelimb's claws before turning to Luke who was only staring at it silently.
Seeing the fiery aura that still surrounded his fist and the grin on his face, the undead dragon instantly realised Luke was trying to make him exhaust his death energy reserves.
It quickly swiped its claws across the air, generating multiple magic circles as the ground cracked open to reveal a flood of water that surged forward, sweeping across the scorched earth and forming a new lake as the wave surged towards Luke.
Streams of pressurized water shot up and shot towards s him, dozens of water javelins launched themselves, along with water whips that tried to bind his limbs all at the same time.
Even so, Luke jumped up and dodged all these with finesse landing atop the flood of water before using magic power on his feet and sliding across it like he was riding a wave.
[Hoh…it seems your water magic mastery is not too far behind your flame mastery.]
The dragon casually remarked as it manipulated its magic power and influenced the forces of nature.
[You're good with flames and water, how about lightning?]
**RUUUUUMBLE-!
The climate changed.
Dark clouds gathered in an instant and covered the sky above the entirety of the city of Paglad, and a strong wind blew under the darkened sky.
**CRAAAAACK!
There were bright flashes of light as lightning struck down from the sky. Dozens of lightning bolts descended towards the ground and the flood of water that Luke was sliding on.
The sword saint rose his foot and stomped it downwards, releasing magical shockwaves that parted the flood of water and made him land on dry land.
Stomping his foot again, the ground trembled as dozens of earthen pillars shot up into the air, colliding with the incoming lightning bolts and exploding on contact.
Suddenly, a large shadow was cast on the ground from above, causing Luke to gaze up into the sky and lock eyes with the giant dragon who had taken flight while he was handling the lightning.
Sensing the energy condensing in the dragon's maw, Luke stopped limiting the power behind his Brachium and muttered to himself.
"Sorry Charles, but it seems this city is done for."
Those were the last words he spoke before the beam of blue light descended from the sky and crashed right onto where he was standing.
***KAAAAAABOOOOOOMMMMMMMMMM!!!!
◇ ◇ ◇
[Death Magic: Withering Rain!]
The Demonic-fused Eighth Finger's voice rang out, followed by the appearance of a double-ringed magic circle in the air, from which a hail of pitch-black condensed magic bullets rained down on the ground.
Duke Charles and Ralphie moved in zig zags, dodging the rain of condensed death magic while occasionally using their weapons to deflect the bullets towards the magic circle they emerged from.
A giant golden cross construct of divinity crashed down towards the earth in the distance, only to be perforated by dark orange beams of aura fired by the Dullahan King who was combating the Paladin Heinr.
Sir Czac on the other hand, was dealing with the droves of undead who had lost most of the buffs they enjoyed due to the domain of death, while Eliza and the other paladins took a break from the battlefield as they had overexerted themselves the most.
80% of the grandmaster level undead had been dealt with, but not without a few causalities on the side of the coalition force, and now they were simply rounding up the ones left.
Even so, the focus of most of the combatants was on the battle happening in the distance, where the Third and Fourth of the Ten Great Swordsmen combated the Demonic Fused Eighth Finger of the Demonic Hand.
[Lemure Creation.]
Dozens of transparent flying skulls, all surrounded by rings of black flaming energy silently moved through the air and released a terrifying amount of blood thirst from behind the two men, triggering their survival instincts and making them reflexively turn their attention backwards.
The short moment it took them to realise that they had been tricked was enough for the Eighth Finger to quickly call out the name of another spell.
[Spirit F-]
"Hello?"
[…what?]
"A Vortex?"
**BOOOMMM!!!
The Fused Eighth Finger's spell casting was interrupted by an expected but unexpected third party, right before a swirling mass of magic power slammed into his body and knocked him down onto the ground.
"…It's about time you began meddling."
Duke Charles spoke lightly as he took advantage of the Demonic Hand Executive's fallen state to send out a few slashes of condensed water magic, dousing the spirit flames that the Eight Finger was about to shoot towards them, followed by Ralphie who blitzed in and decided to add a touch of ice to the mix.
"Cryo Explosion."
**CHINK! BOOOMMM!!!
The man's body was encased in a thick layer of hot ice that exploded right afterwards, propelling large shards of ice in all directions.
Ralphie rose his hand and a ribbon of blue flames appeared around them, before gesturing for them to fire towards the Eighth Finger who flapped his wings and hurriedly took to the skies.
That decision proved to be unwise as the shards of ice shot through his wings and punctured large holes in them, from which thin layers of ice began spreading out to freeze the entire wing.
[Tsk…Corrupted Recovery!]
"Blade Cannon.
Vindiction's Strike."
Evan's voice rang out as he launched multiple fist-sized aura bullets which were accompanied by projected slashes of aura, along with a beam of golden aura that emerged from the black-gold portal that opened up right behind the Eighth Finger.
[Necrotic Traversal!]
Updat𝒆d fr𝒐m freew𝒆bnov𝒆l.c(o)m