D.I.O - CH 304

*** The Light Goes Out II ***

“No one shall be deemed worthy to be in a position of forgiving me.”

Instantly, Arthur’s body turned to a beam of light once more.

“Nobody.”

Arthur disappeared. And soon, the heaven and earth were divided. It was a blow like the wrath of a god tearing the world apart, but in a world that was being split in two, the main target, Tan, stood steadfast. Utilizing powerful defensive spells and muttering Draconic Language spells, Tan scattered Arthur’s strong qi light attack.

Bang! Creak!

The heavens and earth were instantly filled with light once more. In a one-on-one battle, Arthur had no other choice but to be pushed back; however, once many other Masters participated in the battle, the battle became more even.

Moreover, there was the added benefit that Arthur could conserve his power.

‘Hmm, it seems like they’re digging in for a long battle.’ Tan thought.

Even though the ongoing battle was tense, Tan possessed an overwhelming advantage. Although the Masters’ attacks were landing, Tan wasn’t suffering any significant damage. Additionally, Tan wasn’t planning on conducting a battle of attrition.

The only restriction that Tan faced was the level penalty.

Unfortunately for the Masters, Tan’s mana levels, his magic power capacity, didn’t seem to be particularly limited. Even though he consumed a tremendous amount of magic power to maintain the storm-like environmental conditions, it still seemed that he had an inexhaustible supply of mana that he could pull from.

And that wasn’t all.

Tan was created by the Creation God himself to execute the role as the universe’s Enforcer, and though Tan had fallen from grace, he was still able to pull from the bottomless pool of mana that existed throughout the universe; it was like his existence itself was as a draconic spiritual pathway. In truth, if he continued to expend his current levels of mana consumption, he’d be able to maintain this state for an entire year without breaking a sweat; in other words, Tan wasn’t burdened or restricted by his magic power levels. Even if the battle wasn’t going his way, it was just a short-term annoyance rather than a perceived threat.

On the other hand, what about the Masters?

They were holding up relatively well, but those with low power were being swept away by Tan’s attacks and were dying one by one. Since they suffered an absolute loss in their exchange with Tan, it was difficult to see the Masters gaining the upper hand with their measly numbers, as only tens of hundreds of Masters were present, especially since their cumulative power levels as a group were constantly decreasing.

‘Just what are they aiming for?’

Puzzled, Tan steadily blocked the oncoming enemy attacks and counterattacked to deal with a couple other Masters. Since many of the Masters had already died once, even if they reappeared, it was difficult for them to effectively muster a proper attack at the same level as before their death.

‘Hmpf. They seemed to be reviving at a steady rate… but there is a limit to the Gerult they can handle. They should be reaching their limits fairly soon.’

Once Tan had this thought, he started completing another spell chant.

Whoosh!!

From high above the sky, five or six fighter jets flew into the airspace above the battlefield with a roar. However, since the fighter jets couldn’t get close to Tan and the Masters, as the shockwaves and constant explosion of spells didn’t make the airspace conducive to flight, the fighter jets flew a safe distance above the chaos and dropped something onto the battlefield.

Boom! Boom!

Although these objects were released hundreds of meters above the ground, they slowed down several times in the air and safely landed in the battlefield; it was 12 Masters. For the Masters, such a feat wasn’t that surprising, but Tan’s eyebrows twitched when he saw the newly arrived Masters, as he felt that something was off about them.

“Those guys are…?”

“Don’t you dare look away while battling me… Ha!”

Hanma shouted out loud and charged toward Tan, but Hanma soon found himself stuck in the ground like a nail hit by a hammer. Hanma’s face twisted into a frown.

“Ah man, the ground is too soft!”

“What do you mean the ground is soft? It’s asphalt! Don’t be stupid; maintain your space control ability! Is reinforcing your physical body the only thing you learned as a life force user?”

Hanma grumbled with a puzzled expression at Jeros’ scolding words. Jeros was sitting cross-legged with closed eyes to regain some of his expended magic power.

“It’s hard to maintain space control continuously… but… are you meditating in the midst of all this?”

“Of course. Didn’t you see my post about [Recover anywhere! Properly utilizing meditation during battle] on the user discussion boards? It’s been the highest viewed post this month. I gave lectures at all kinds of universities to state the importance of this mindset and ability, so of course I’m able to meditate under these conditions.”

“Hmm. You’ve been quite active haven’t you… Ack?!”

Crack!

Hanma yelled and raised his hands to defend himself, but a falling crystal shattered both his arms and pulverized his head. Since Hanma had been immobilized on the ground, he was an easy target for Tan.

Whoosh.

Hanma’s figure disappeared after changing into particles of light; however, he soon reappeared in a normal state right next to where he had just disappeared. However, possibly because of the mental shock he received from his sudden death, Hanma looked slightly dazed.

“Hey, are you okay?”

“Ah? Ah, yeah, I’m okay. My stats have been reduced so much that if I revive one or two more times, I don’t think I’ll be of any help…”

Hanma looked up at the sky with a strange expression on his face. Tan, who was floating in the sky, had a perpetual magic storm emanating from his body.

“… What’s the matter… Have you lost the will to fight because you keep dying? Do you want me to place a healing buff on you?”

Hanma shook his head when he saw Jeros’ concerned expression. It seemed that Jeros was concerned that Hanma had received some sort of mental shock due to his successive resurrections.

“Ah, s-sure. I’m okay. It’s just that…”

“Ack!”

Search tinyurl.com/2p9emv8w for the original.

At that moment, a Master level user, who was attacking with his bow from the outskirts of the battlefield, was hit by a falling bolt of lightning and collapsed. Of course, this type of scene happened several times, so neither Hanma nor Jeros were surprised by it, but that didn’t mean they were blind to the seriousness of the situation. Since they were veteran fighters, they knew exactly where they stood in this battle.

“We need to do something. We need to strike a decisive blow or deploy a combat method that doesn’t cause us to sustain so many casualties.”

“Huh? Ah, ah… right.”

“… Hanma?”

Though Jeros was raising a serious concern, Hanma still had a somewhat aloof expression. It was as if Hanma was looking at something far away; his pupils were out of focus.

“Hmm.”

Hanma, who had been ignoring Jeros’ gaze, crouched down. Then he looked at Tan floating in the sky before putting strength into his legs.

“The Eight Ways of Fighting.”

Boom…!

His muscles twitched and a sound resounded out like iron being forcefully bent. His thigh muscles swelled, and steam rose from his body.

“Earthly Thunder Strike.”

In an instant, Hanma’s figure disappeared. And immediately afterward, the ground he had stood on exploded as a tremendous roar reverberated throughout the surroundings.

Whoosh!

“Oh, that idiotic madman! Why did he do that right next to me!”

After deploying a defensive barrier to block the shockwave of Hanma’s move, Jeros clicked his tongue. Even so, Jeros maintained his gaze on Hanma as Hanma went up into the sky.

“What the hell is he planning to do?”

Tan wasn’t an opponent that one could successfully attack by simply flying at him at a high speed. In fact, weren’t all the Master users’ previous attacks, which took advantage of Tan’s gaps, all blocked and hit with counters?

“What a headstrong fellow,” Tan commented.

Indeed, Tan instantly recognized Hanma’s oncoming attack and fired out a shockwave attack. Hanma flew up at a speed faster than a modern bullet, but since Tan was a transcendent being who could recognize such an approach in an instant, Hanma’s attack was essentially useless.

However, at that moment…

Boom.

In an instant, right before being neutralized by Tan’s shockwave attack, Hanma changed directions. His timing was so perfect that even Tan couldn’t respond properly!

Bang!

The Twelve Ways of Fighting. Utilizing a sky-walking skill to quickly change direction, Hanma approached, punched out, and struck Tan’s defensive barrier. And in an instant, Hanma reached out and ‘tore’ Tan’s swaying defensive barrier.

“This… son of a bitch!!”

Rumble!!

When a thunderbolt thicker than a human torso hit Hanma, Hanma, who was tearing through the barrier, couldn’t withstand the attack and fell towards the ground. However, Tan wasn’t able to land a killing blow on Hanma. Although Hanma died a little while ago and had his overall stats reduced, Hanma, as a life force user, had somehow increased his stamina stat.

Due to this newfound opening, the other Masters fiercely attacked and pierced through Tan’s gaps.

“Yap!”

As Bruce rode on his Black Unicorn and passed Tan by, his sword qi, which had been trapped in his sword since it had been impossible to land a blow on Tan, spurted out like a whip and struck Tan’s defensive barrier. Ilyia, who had succeeded in opening the Earthly Gate (7th Gate) of the dagger, something she had done for the first time in her life, pierced a hole in Tan’s defensive barrier with the dagger’s aura powered sword qi.

– Get off me!

In the end, Tan, who couldn’t stand the attacks any longer, activated a Draconic Language spell and shook off all the approaching Masters. He looked in disbelief at the Masters, who were flung in all directions.

‘They’re… growing…?’

That was exactly what was going on. The Masters were growing at a tremendous rate while fighting against him. Of course, this wasn’t the case for all the Master level users. This was because there were a lot more Masters who instantly perished, as they couldn’t withstand his attacks. Most Masters gradually consumed their strength and eventually lost their focus, which made them ultimately succumb to their deaths.

However, unlike [most], some Master level users showed incredible growth during the battle. These Master level users were completely different from just 20 minutes to even 10 minutes ago. There was no doubt the number of Master level users was decreasing, but the remaining Masters achieved a stunning speed of growth; it was to the extent that the Masters’ collective power output didn’t greatly differ from before.

‘Nonsense! Isn’t this something that only happens in some fantasy hero story!’

The scene was literally like something from a fantasy novel. Masters were changing and growing while facing a mighty foe, and that was affecting the outcome of a battle, which should have concluded with Tan as the obvious winner.

“Humanity’s god, we have arrived.”

“Finally, this is the final fight.”

“Sir Arthur…”

Moreover, the newly appeared forces who fell from the sky also got on Tan’s nerves. This was because his transcendent senses were telling him that the 12 newly revealed beings were abnormal.

“Arthur, what the hell are you planning to do?” Tan asked as he looked at Arthur.

This act of questioning was possible because the battlefield was in a momentary state of lull, as Tan had forcefully pushed away all the users who had approached him just a moment ago.

“What do you mean what am I planning to do…”

Arthur raised his sword at Tan. All of a sudden, the Masters floating in the air with magic powered flying shuttle-like mounts or pets surrounded him in a circle and looked at Arthur and Tan, who were facing each other.

“I’m planning to kill you.”

Tan laughed coldly after hearing Arthur’s low voice.

“If you think that’s really possible, you’ll be greatly disappointed. Do you really think that the battle has gone on as a stalemate because our power levels are similar?”

Tan never even considered that he’d be defeated. Moreover, the truth of the matter was, there was nothing to sway him from this perspective.

Arthur had transformed from a pseudo transcendent to a full transcendent by using a non-traditional shortcut, but still, he had just barely stepped on the front mantle of the transcendent realm. Among transcendents, Arthur had entered the lowest level of transcendence; in other words, Arthur had gained 0.00% experience within Level 20, if the Level system was quantified in experience percentage.

On the other hand, Tan was an Emperor Class transcendent power, which was a very rare existence even in the vast universe, and even though he had sustained a downgrade penalty, his overwhelming power, abilities, and skills did not completely disappear. Although there was a limit to the attack power he could generate through those abilities and skills, the fact remained that he could still output overwhelming attacks through his current collection of overpowering abilities and skills.

Even if a transcendent of the same level appeared, Tan was confident that he’d easily win in battle. However, at a moment like this, a kid who managed to become a newbie transcendent through a shortcut method was stating that he’d kill Tan after gathering a bunch of abnormal humans.

Even if Tan was further restricted and faced even worse conditions, he felt that it was impossible for Arthur and his motley crew to defeat Tan.

“You are too full of yourself. You’re too conceited.”

“Heh… Conceited? Am I being conceited?”

Rumble!

The blue spiritual qi arose, and the surrounding air began to vibrate. However, Arthur didn’t flinch.

“Fine.”

While responding, twelve beams of light radiated from behind Arthur.

The ones emitting the light were the 12 Masters who fell from the fighter jets earlier, and the energy qi waves emanating from their bodies were emitted as light to their surroundings.

“Hey, wait a minute. What’s this? Isn’t that Arthur’s photonization?” Jeros commented.

Adol, who was half-covered with his Tower Shield, narrowed his eyes after hearing Jeros, who was watching Arthur and Tan while preparing a spell. As he was also an internal energy user, Adol knew just how abnormal the current situation was.

“To think that there are 12 other people who have succeeded in transforming their internal energy into light…”

It should have been impossible. Only Arthur had succeeded in transforming his own qi energy into light; other Masters couldn’t even think of imitating such an ability.

However, the 12 Masters flying behind Arthur were emitting a light so intense that the other Masters could feel the same intimidating feeling in the 12 Masters’ lights as they did in Arthur’s.

“What the hell is going on? Weren’t those guys just average at best?”