Chapter 86. Approaching Climax

Chapter 86: 86. Approaching Climax

The jungle around them no longer looked like a forest.

Most of the taller trees had been reduced to splintered stumps.

Broken branches and scorched leaves littered the ground in uneven drifts.

Craters from repeated impacts pocked the earth, and the air still carried the sharp scent of burned sap and cracked stone.

What little canopy remained hung in ragged pieces, letting harsh shafts of light cut through the smoke.

Mira stood with her axe planted in the dirt, chest rising and falling in heavy pulls.

Sweat and blood streaked the side of her face.

Amber was in worse shape.

Her blood-red gown hung in tatters, one stocking completely gone, both arms trembling from continuous output.

Fire still flickered weakly around her knuckles, but the glow was thin and unstable.

Envy floated a short distance away, black battle dress untouched, not a single scratch on her pale skin or the silver accents of her attire.

She regarded the two women with the same mild annoyance one might show a pair of insects that refused to stay crushed.

Amber’s breathing stayed ragged.

’There’s no other way. Not against something like her. I have to use it if I want to have a chance of defeating her.’

The thought of her incomplete transformation brought an immediate, frustrated sound from the back of her throat.

The flaws were still there. The risk was still there.

She had never managed to hold the full form without her mind fraying at the edges.

Memory pulled her backward without permission.

----

An open training ground under a sky that never quite matched any known season.

The air had been still that day, heavy with the residue of high-level mana.

The woman stood several paces away, posture perfect.

A formal mantle draped her shoulders, the fabric shifting between a starlit night sky and an iridescent void that seemed to drink the light.

Her figure was a precise hourglass, waist cinched tightly by a wide geometric belt of dark crystal that created sharp, almost architectural lines from shoulder to hip.

Elegant rimless glasses rested on her nose.

Several ornate rings of glass-like crystal adorned her fingers.

Her hair was gathered in a tightly braided crown, a few strands floating as if gravity had only partial claim on them.

Her eyes were geometric gold, faceted and unreadable.

Amber had been on her knees that day, chest heaving, the aftermath of a forced transformation still crackling across her skin in unstable sparks.

Every muscle of her body ached and her vision swam.

The woman’s voice reached her with a faint spatial echo, as though the words arrived from several directions at once.

"Transformation is not a matter of mana volume or physical reinforcement alone. The mind must be prepared to accept the change, or the form will reject the user. You are still forcing it with willpower instead of understanding. That is why it still remains incomplete even after so many trials."

Amber had gritted her teeth and forced herself to stand, fire sputtering around her fists.

"I don’t need understanding. I need power that works when it counts."

The woman had watched her without expression, the floating strands of hair drifting in a nonexistent breeze.

"Then you will continue to break yourself against opponents you cannot reach. Return to me when you are ready to listen."

The memory released her.

---

Amber’s eyes refocused on the present.

Envy still hovered above the ruined jungle floor, waiting with that same casual disdain.

Mira glanced sideways, reading the shift in Amber’s posture, but said nothing.

The decision had already been settled.

Amber’s fists tightened.

The residual fire around them flared once, unstable but brighter than before.

She would use the incomplete form.

There was no other path left that led to victory.

----

Far from the shattered jungle, the main battlefield told a harsher story.

Human rankers were beginning to fall behind.

Mana reserves that had seemed sufficient at the start of the engagement were draining faster under constant pressure, while the demon side only seemed to gain momentum.

Wounded adventurers staggered back toward the rear lines.

Fresh demonic reinforcements pushed forward wherever the human formation thinned.

The air itself felt heavier with the scent of blood and scorched earth.

Lily kept her focus locked on the horned general astride the Hell-Boar.

She had no attention to spare for the larger picture, yet the shifting balance of the field still registered at the edge of her awareness.

’The line is thinning already. If this continues, the center will collapse before we can even finish our own fights.’

A pressurized lance of water slammed into the general’s cleaver and threw him from the saddle with a heavy, wet impact.

The massive boar staggered sideways with a furious squeal.

Lily planted her staff hard into the cracked ground.

Abyssal Spring

The earth beneath the general erupted.

High-condensed water exploded upward in dozens of needle-thin, high-speed pillars that converged on him from every direction at once.

The impacts landed with rapid, overlapping thuds that sounded like a drumroll of breaking bone.

Blood sprayed across the dirt in fine red mist.

A raw, animal scream tore from the general’s throat.

Nearby lesser demons hesitated, many already turning as if ready to flee the moment their leader fell.

The water mist slowly cleared.

The general stepped out of it on his own two feet.

His skin had turned completely black.

Open holes marked his left shoulder and the center of his chest, yet no blood flowed from them.

Two long horns now curved upward from his skull, thicker and sharper than before.

He rolled one shoulder, the motion casual, and smiled at Lily with open amusement.

Lily’s grip on her staff tightened.

Her expression remained calm, but the calculation behind her eyes sharpened.

’So the first form was only a shell. This will take longer than I wanted. Tsk...’

On the opposite side of the central field Lina finally cut down the last of the purple skeletons.

The grueling exchange had left her breathing hard, red gown torn at the side, but her spear still glowed with residual mana.

The necromancer general stood several meters away, already beginning to form new skeletal hands from the surrounding corpses.

Lina did not give him the chance.

She drove forward in a straight, high-speed blur, spear aimed at the center of his chest. Necromancers were supposed to be weak in close combat.

The tip punched cleanly through flesh and bone with a wet, decisive sound.

The general only smiled, a slow, sinister curve of the lips.

"You should have gone for the HEAD."

He spoke a short phrase in a harsh foreign tongue.

Two massive black hands erupted from the ground and seized Lina’s legs, yanking hard.

She was slammed backward onto the dirt with bone-jarring force.

At the last instant she drove the butt of her spear into the earth and used the weapon as a brace, bleeding off enough of the impact to keep her ribs from cracking.

The hole in the necromancer’s chest closed in seconds, black flesh knitting together as if the wound had never existed.

The ground shook.

The general’s body swelled and elongated, bones cracking and reforming with a series of wet, heavy snaps.

Within moments a fifteen-foot-tall black brute stood in his place: hairless, eyes pure black, thick veins of darker shadow pulsing under the skin.

Muscles like carved stone flexed as he fully rose.

Nearby human rankers broke ranks at the sight and fled in open panic.

Lina pushed herself back to her feet, spear ready, expression twisted in pure annoyance.

’I’m not suitable for this kind of demon. Where the hell is Amber and Mom? Those two are taking their sweet time while I’m stuck babysitting a walking corpse.’

Near the center of the field Dean and Ryn were still on their feet, blades and fists cutting through the lesser demons that kept pouring forward.

Dean’s knuckles were split and bleeding; Ryn’s shorter frame moved with desperate speed, sword flashing in tight arcs. Both were tiring, yet neither gave ground.

Aira still clung to Kael’s neck, soft body pressed firmly against his exhausted frame.

Kael’s voice came out rough in exhaustion.

"Eira... no, Aira. You need to get off. Demons are coming."

She only tightened her arms and rested her cheek against his.

"No.... Dad,Don’t worry. Those demons are weak. Sister Seraphine can handle them, right, Sister?"

She added a small, deliberate wink in Seraphine’s direction.

Seraphine’s crimson eyes went flat and cold, the look of someone already measuring where to put a blade.

Without a word she turned and walked straight toward the advancing demons, blood-forged dagger already in hand.

Brianna and Tina had rejoined the fight as well, vines and arrows cutting down whatever came too close, but the numbers were simply too great.

More human rankers lay unmoving across the torn ground than either of them wanted to count.

The line was folding.

A D-plus ranked demon noticed Kael still on one knee, completely drained, with the girl wrapped around him.

Greed and opportunity flickered across its face as it started forward, weapon raised.

Lust’s pink eyes tracked the movement.

She lifted two fingers in a lazy gesture.

The demon and the two lesser officers flanking it froze mid-stride.

Stone gray raced across their skin from the feet upward.

In less than a second all three had become lifeless statues, weapons still raised, expressions locked in the moment of their last intent.

Lust lowered her hand and returned her attention to the wider field, expression unreadable.