Chapter 50: True Awakening III
"AWAKEN!" was the word that reverberated within every single elemental particle.
At the moment, I felt a deep pain within the right side of my chest, exactly where the mana heart was located. It kept pulsing with pure mana, sending that pure mana thought my mana veins and out of my pores.
Every single element within my body that had been trapped within whenever I would eat or even breath, froze for a second before shooting towards my mana heart, completely ignoring my mana veins and arteries in the way.
The energies seeped into the mana heart at the same time, right before I had lunged myself towards the enemy that had hurt someone I cared for. Colour returned slowly into the surrounding, allowing the sounds to return and the movements to continue.
When time finally started again, I looked at the shell shocked sobbing Rak and said with a monotone voice "Take her away and use a healing tonic"
Rak didn't seem to hear me so used the best method to wake someone up.
SLAP!
When Rak had finally woken up from his daze, he looked at me while tearing up and trying to day something that was inaudible between his sobs.
"Go heal Gen using the tonic in the dimensional amulet before I crush the heavens and earth on top of your head." I half growled half demanded
Rak seemed to understand even with his broken state of mind. Getting up by kicking up his feet, he ran straight towards Gen and took her as far away from the area as possible
"So is this what you wanted? To hurt people for no reason? oh yeah, you did say you wanted to against me when I'm not holding back, right?"
My words didn't seem to provoke him, but me not even looking at him while saying those words had annoyed him from the start. He glared at me while growling loudly and exclaiming "You weak half human b*tch! Don't insult my honor! LOOK AT ME WHEN I AM SPEAKING!"
His roar moved in waves and sounded the whole area, informing anyone who was watching how angry he was.
"Honor? Half human? Why would I look at trash?!"
Even though My words were said in a calm monotone way, every single word was coated in fire and venom.
"YOU BITC-"
Before he could even finish his sentence, I felt something inside me change. My Mana heart had instantly doubled in size and turned a browny yellow muddy colour. Suddenly, out of nowhere, every single earth particle in my line of sight started to shoot towards me at incredible speeds. They all entered my mana heart before bursting outwards in a 500 meter large aura the same colour as my mana heart.
I felt a connection with every single particle in the ground and air. From the dust in the air to the dirt and stone on the ground. I could feel all of it in those 500 meters.
The oversized lion stepped back unconsciously as a threatening aura had started to put pressure on him. My once Golden eyes and hair had turned a yellowy brown and my weight had almost doubled, making me almost 800 kg.
As I walked towards the terrified lion, the ground started to sink at every step of mine. The pure destructive power seeping out of me made the lion take out his wings and try to run away. The moment I saw this though, I used of the weakest techniques I knew.
Earth bullet was a basic technique anyone could learn, yet I when held my index finger towards the lion who had tried to fly away, the only thing I muttered was "Earth bullet barrage". Thousands of pebble sized rocks floated into the air and shot towards the unsuspecting lion with speeds multiple times faster than the speeds of sound.
Due to the thick fur and tough physique, the lion did not get hurt, yet the sheer amount of earth pebbles hitting him was able to ground him once again.
When the lion had touched the ground again, he had flapped his wings almost instantly to get altitude once again, yet all he would have heard in the moment would be the clap of my two extended arms moving towards each other before my two palms would collide. In the split second before my palms collided, I mumbled under my breath the word "Crush".
Instantaneously, The ground caved in before being launched upwards towards the lion. Before the winged lion even knew it, large clumps of both dirt and rocks were raised in the air and moved toward him with speeds that surpasses its own by several folds. The clumps of dirt and stone completely buried the lion within a huge clump which had a diameter of 50 meters.
Yet, the moment I started to compress the stone to crush the lion within, it had started to flare up with blue and black flames. In a few second, the huge clump had turned into a large ball of magma flaring blue and black every now and then until it broke apart.
"YOU ARE TRULY FOOLISH TO THINK MERE PEBBLES CAN KEEP ME FROM MOVINGS! NOW THAT YOU HAD SHOWED YOU ALL, I'LL SHOW YOU MI-" The lion had chocked on its own words when it realised what was about to happen. A Huge influx of the aura that i had exploded outwards started to be absorbed into my body, yet the pressure on the lion only increased as every hair on its body had stood up.
Completely absorbing all the particles into my body, My hair had went back to being golden yet my Mana heart was still a yellowy brown colour. Just as the lion was trying to get rid of his doubts, he finally felt it.
Huge amounts of air particles had encircled the whole 1.5 mile long lake and the surrounding 500 meters of that lake. My mana heart then once again, doubled in size, now being 4 times larger than it originally was, taking up more space within my chest than my real heart.
The influx of air particles were directly absorbed into my veins, arteries, body and mana core before erupting with an Emerald green aura. The clouds and winds started to become ferocious, howling while almost ripping the trees in the surroundings out of the ground.
"W-what?! WHAT DID YOU DO?!" Hollered the oversized lion, which I just ignored.
Using the wind around me, I created multiple air blades that slashed through the air and went straight towards the lion. While trying to dodge my attacks for all sides, he had failed to realise what I was doing right in front of him until he heard my voice
"Air sniper barrage"
Many extremely compressed air bullets were released, immediately hitting the speed of sound and surpassing it in less than a second. The 20 different bullets travelled through the air with a whistle before hitting their opponent on a second later. 10 bullets aimed for each wing, immediately taking the advantage of being able to fly from the winged lion.
The bullets pierced right through the wings and left gaping holes within. Blood splattered everywhere while the lion howled in pain, as if he was a dog.
"How does it feel? Does it hurt? Are you suffering? Do you feel the coldness of death gripping to your soul?" I taunted with a mocking look and sarcasm coating all my words. Right now I was flying above the lion using my air affinity to push me up by solidifying the air under me and allowing me to stand on it.
The lion grunted before trying to charge at me by jumping from the ground, when I just moved a little upwards, completely out of his range. Before the lion knew it, he was in the middle of a extremely powerful vortex of wind that had started to tear off all his feathers while creating shallow wounds all over his body.
"I guess I should finish you off then huh... Weakling" I snarled before raising my blade in the air and slashing downwards, sending a blade of air towards the neck of the lion.
"ENOUGH!" The lion roared. Losing his feathers and getting constantly cut had clearly angered him quite a bit making me chuckle. I choked on that chuckle when a pulse of darkness shot from the body of the lion, destroying to vortex and my air blade while pushing me back from the sheer force.
Black majestic wings sprawled from the place of the destroyed ones, creating flame like wings outlines in a pitch black 6 inch hue that allowed me to see the blue wings within. The wounds immediately healed and the his fur flared up like flames, sending another gust of darkness and fire to push me even more back, but not as much as the first time.
When the emerald green aura had finally weakened a little, it started to seep within my body at a rapid rate, going from all the pores in my body to the mana core in a few moments.
Another kind of pressure had started to take over the area this time, and this was due to the fact the emerald aura hadn't completely been sucked into my mana heart yet since it had become full. That is when I felt the water element connect with me, while the surrounding temperatures dropped by several degrees.
---
Raknom's POV
---
The moment Pandora had told me to take Gen and run before healing her, I felt almost obliged to do so. The sheer amount of killing intent seeping from her body was so immense that I would probably make normal humans faint. The moment I had gotten far enough from the warzone, I put gen down and took out all the tonic I had before choosing the best one of such a deep wound.
I quickly chose on of them, forcing her to down it quickly to start the healing process while trying to wrap here wounds with bandages so she does not lose any more blood than she had already done. I was no expert on the field nor did I have enough experience to fight well against high advanced beasts and above.
Finally, when I started to wrap Gen's body with bandages, an enormous emerald aura flared from my left side, forcing me to look. There I saw Pandora, in the air, exuding so much emerald mana that even when I was almost a mile away, I could still feel the pressure. It felt like someone had just put the weight of a whole horse on my back and told me to walk to another kingdom without rest.
I started panting for breath while the emerald aura had already started to change the battlefield drastically. Air was coming for all directions, creating something similar to a hurricane. Trees near the storm almost got ripped out of the ground from the weight of the storm while I tried my hardest to hold myself and Gen down.
"Is that her awakening?" I muttered while looking at the 500 meter wide aura and directly towards the girl with now green eyes and hair.
A few minutes later of trying to stabilize Gen's condition while also keeping myself updated on the latest advancements on the battlefield. I couldn't help but sigh in both envy and relief. Relief because Gen wasn't dying anymore, while envy was towards the little girl with emerald hair and eyes who was completely destroying the lion.
Just when I was about to celebrate when I saw the last slash going towards the throat of the lion, It burst with a darkness energy enveloping it, creating new wings for itself and finally, sending Pandora flying backwards. Another darkness pulse was sent, and this time, It had hit the surroundings.
Just when I was about to create an earth barrier, A huge wall made out of compressed earth was created in front of me. Unbeknownst to me, this whole time a huge yellow furred and white maned wolf was watching me, and had finally decided to take action.
"You're with her right?" Asked the wolf while pointing towards Pandora who had absorbed back 2/3 of her air affinity.
"Y-yes" I muttered, barely loud enough for the giant white winged wolf to hear.
"Good, I'm going to heal your friend here before I let you two run away. If she can't stand when she is healed, I'll just have to protect you until she does. I should be strong eno-"
Suddenly, The yellow and white wolf was cut off by an enormous aura enveloping the entire lake and what is beyond it. Trees started to shine with a calm blueish silver colour while the air had become noticeably cooler. In the middle of this chaos stood a little girl, Barely 4ft 8, with light blue hair and bright cyan eyes. The frown on her face made her seem ferocious, while the aura exuding from her could only be described as 'terrifying'
"ANOTHER ONE?!" I Blurted out in shock of watching two awakenings happen simultaneously. While having two different affinities at your awakening is rare, it does not make someone stronger, but rather, it makes them weaker unless they can use both elements together to create something unique. Right now, Pandora was using the air affinity that she had not absorbed for some reason with the aura of the water element. Usually, People don't exude auras unless they were at least at the supreme stage which was one stage at or above the Peak Advanced Rank if you are lucky
The Silvery cyan aura made the entire remaining waters of the lack freeze while the clouds started to turn and rumble. Thunder could be seen crashing onto the ground, as if it was representing the power and fury of its summoner.
The suppressive aura froze for a second, before being redirected towards the lion exuding darkness energy. The darkness energy was able to keep the aura at bay, but not the freezing temperatures it carried nor the small hails coming down from the sky with extremely high speeds and strength.
While the lion was being tortured, the yellow furred White winged wolf started to heal Gen and had already finished by the time my attention had been taken off the battle.
"Icicle dome" Spoke Pandora grabbing my attention once again
Hundreds if not thousands of icicles surrounded the lion and started to shoot at random times. The lion had started to use more and more mana to destroy the ice before it finally roared and let a pulse of darkness take care of the rest of the remaining icicles.
For the first time since the second round started, Pandora had moved in to fight at close quarters. She held a sword in her right hand almost twice the size of her, yet she moved it with such precision and speed it would make you swear that it was weightless. Pandora was in no way a good swordsman, she was average at best and that is for kids who are in their 3rd out of 5 years at the academy.
While all her movements looked nimble and flowed like the air to the untrained eye, To someone who had spent a portion of his life learning swordsmanship, her movements were wasteful, her form was wrong, and her feet positioning was so bad that she would trip over her own feet as if she didn't know how to use her body correctly. The only reason she is good at fighting is because of her recovery from mistakes, her amazing timings and her amazing physique that not even I could compare to.
From the fight with the lion, her use of swordsmanship is full of openings yet none of them are being used against her, nor is she being punished for leaving openings. Right now in close quarters they both seemed to have the same power, speed and skill. Pandora took advantage of his huge body to attack from blind spots while the lion used his huge body and his affinity to darkness to repel her whenever she would almost inflict a fatal wound.
After 5 minutes of watching this nonstop, a voice of female resounded from behind me as both me and the wolf reacted by looking at the source. There sprawled on the ground laid a beautiful women with an amazing figure and an amazing personality. She was someone who I dreamed of marrying in the future instead of being one of my flings. She was the women I loved.
"Holy shit! Did Pandora awaken?" She inquired, flabbergasted at the fact it happened prematurely without the need or help from a priest. What also seemed to have startled her was the sheer pressure Pandora was exuding which was like nothing either of us have actually felt before from someone who had just awakened.
The moment she had asked that question, Pandora's hair had went back to gold and so had her eyes, yet, the emerald aura from the air element remained while the silvery blue had been completely swallowed into her body.
"WE SHOULD HELP HER! WHAT ARE WE DOING SITTING IDLY!" Gen shouted worriedly
"no need" Muttered the wolf in a voice barely loud enough for us to hear before he continued by ordering us to "Look". The wold was pointing his paw towards Pandora who was in the middle of a half frozen lake while the lion had started to charge at her with his full speed.
"NO NEED?! WE NEED T-" Gen was cut off by the most thick aura I had ever felt in my entire life. It wasn't thick because it was powerful, but rather, the mix between immense bloodlust and fire mana spread throughout an entire section of the entire forest.
A Pale blue flame enveloped her body as her eyes and hair took the same colour as well. He mana had seemed to double every single time she awakened a new affinity which was obviously an anomaly. The remaining emerald aura seeped into the body of my student while red particles became visible and started to follow the emerald auras lead.
"W-w-w-wait.... That's impossible... Three elements?!" I shouted
A few seconds away from getting attacked by a carriage sized darkness infused lion, A pale blue burst of mana sent ice that had turned into water flying into the air before vaporizing. If not for the wolf, I don't think I would be able to protect myself, let alone Gen.
Trees started to burn with blue flames as Pandora stood at the bed of the lake, motionless yet threateningly. Not a single speck of water remained as even the earthen wall that the wolf had put up started to heat up slightly.
I stared at the blue flames in envy, wondering when I would be bale to do such a thing, Yet before I could finish my thoughts, a bright blue lights shone throughout the entire lake area.
"Blue Flame's symphony" Said a distorted voice coming from Pandora
"{Blue Flame's gluttony}"
The monotone distorted voice reverberated throughout the land before the only voice I heard was "Oh sh*t! We gotta flee, I cant protect you from that one!" Exclaimed the wolf in a panicked state. The wolf quickly grabbed Gen as I jumped on top of its back before we all flew much higher than what was comfortable. Since Gen was now with me on top of the wolf, held her tightly, almost scared that if let go she might almost die again.
"look..." Said the wolf
"wha- HOLY SH*T!" I Shouted before Gen had the same expression.
In front of the oversized lion flew two huge blue serpent dragons, both being 10 meters long, flying directly towards the lion. Unfortunately, since the lion had a strong affinity to fire, It was easily able to override and destroy the structure of the dragon, leaving nothing but a tsunami of blue flames going towards the lion.
The lion opened its mouth, clearly suing its remaining mana to use a final spell that should end everything.
"Monarch of shadows" muttered the winged wolf
A giant, 15 meters long was created from shadows and had submerged from the shadow of the lion itself
"Phoebe had used forbidden magic to strengthen his darkness affinity. May the gods forgive him..." Said the wolf empathetically
---
Pandora's/Atlas' POV
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I Stood there with eyes filled with shock, yet it did not last long until I refocused. The words of the flame were repeating over and over again within my mind. The huge shadow thingy was barley even a thing. It looks large and monstrous, yet at most, it's mana consuming and easily beaten with some attacks. I can always attack the summoner too.
I rushed towards the shadow monster overlooking from 15 meters up top. I brought out My Light Brigade trying to use it to block attacks from the monster while being ready to kill the lion in a single shot. The blade was fully enveloped when I used 'Blue Flame's symphony - Blue Flamed Blade'
I attacked with all my might for several minutes, yet after 10 minutes of slashing or trying and failing to get to the lion, my aura subsided and seeped into my body.
"F*CK! JUST A LITTLE MORE!" I shouted
I was only able to use so much mana from a specific element due to my aura what will only come out to this extent either when I have a large enough mana heart or during my second awakening. In reality, getting such a large mana heart was almost impossible, yet I had a feeling that I might be able to master this technique in the future to become able enough to use such tremendous amounts of mana, no matter the size of my mana heart.
When my aura finally seeped into my 16 times larger than the original mana heart, the strength almost left my body and pain resounded from deep within me.
"HAHAHAHAHA! I'VE WON! I'VE FINALLY WON! I SHOULD HAVE TAKEN YOUR ADVICE ON SHUTTING UP EARLIER OR I WOULD HAVE WON BACK THEN TOO! WHO'S THE WEAKLING NOW?! WHO IS THE PATHETIC ONE NOW?!" The lion was taunting me over and over again, yet I did not have the energy to retort
Deep within my mana heart, major changed were happening! Having 3 elements in a single mana heart was something only elves could do, while four was near impossible unless you wanted to explode inside out.
Instead of exploding, the elemental particles traveling within my blood, nutrients, water molecules and cells all reacted to the changes in my mana heart. Slowly, my original weight of 800kg had not been dropped to 600kg. Even though I was really heavy, my body felt as light as a feather and as nimble as the wind without the need of gravity fields.
My body was burning hot yet as cool as the winter at the same time, almost like the desert and the tundra had decided to coincide yet not interfere with each other. Every particle within my body started to merge with their counterpart, earth's being air and fire's being water. Those two who had fused would then fuse again, creating a really weird colour that represented the fusion between all four elements.
For a few milliseconds, a miniscule amount of light energies left my body and nullified the darkness energy of the giant before seeping back into my body and going straight into the particles. The moment it went inside the particles, everything started to change. The weird mixture of many colours turned into a magnificently beautiful gold that exuded a divine hue.
My soul flame started to expand within my own body, seeping some of its conscience into the mana heart, compressing that mana heart to becoming a quarter of the size it was before, yet 4 times larger than its' original counterpart before the whole awakening.
Without me even realising it, my soul flame had expanded into an area so large it was unknown how large it had truly become. I felt the soul energy being sapped at an extremely slow rate. Even though I would not lose the permanently expanded soul energy since it could be replenished, the temporary energy would be lost forever while if I were to run out of soul energy, I would die.
Days went by and my body had started the reconstruction process where my body would break down just to be fixed using the Elemental energies within my body just to be broken down again.
What felt like years, which was actually just weeks of torture, passed while every muscle, organ, tissue, cell and DNA would be destroyed just to be rebuilt with the golden particles and destroyed over and over again. Every time the cells would be rebuilt, they would be must tougher and stronger while having a stronger connection with the other cells within the same tissue. Tissues would work a lot more efficiently with each other to make the organ more efficient. Those organs would then works better with the whole body while the nerves and nervous system become more and more responsive.
As the brain is broken down and rebuilt, the mind becomes much quicker while things can easily be processed. This also makes everything slower in my point of view, making the pain last longer and a lot more painful than it would usually be.
Finally, after what felt like a month passed while the world around me was frozen, I had finally come close to running out of soul energy when a golden soul flame which became darker when nearing the core appeared once again.
"Greetings! This is probably the last time in a very long time we will get to talk like this. Yes, I stopped time for a month but I burnt up a little bit of your permanent soul energy capacity to increase the time to a whole month. No, you cannot do the same thing because you don't have half the brain or soul manipulation skill I do. Your body had been destroyed and rebuilt over and over again, leaving nothing except your soul. Your body is brand new and is no longer human, but I can't tell you what race it is because I don't know myself."
"Finally, your physique should be strong enough to handle the lion while your divine aura which is naturally exuded from you should be able to kill the shadow thing... Don't try using any Divine spells unless it is extremely needed or you have at least the Basic mastery of the divine aura. Use normal magic like you usually would since you cannot use divine magic unless you will it. You will understand what I mean eventually. Anyway, this is farewell for now, we shall meet in a few years"
I stood there with my mouth half open while I tried to process all the information I had just gained as the flame then disappeared and the world around me started to return back to being full of colour. Even though my body was at the top of its condition, my mind isn't doing too well, especially after a whole month of torture. The pain was so bad most people would rather die, yet I was nothing compared to actual emotional pain. Every single burst of pain would remind me of my childhood back on earth, raising my rage, wrath and anger within me.
The moment colour fully returned to the world, my unrestrained divine aura erupted out of my body, destroying the darkness of the spell as well as nullifying the darkness element within the lion.
"W-what are yo-u?" Questioned the lion with terrified expression.
"The grim reaper, cuz' Ima abouta' take you to the after life" I replied with a smirk and inner cringe.
"The wha-"
I sent my divine aura to my fist, which was enveloped in a golden vortex that smashed onto the lion's forehead, even though I was almost 100 meters away.
I had used the Divine spell 'teleport'. It covers my body with a golden aura before distorting space around me and allowing me to appear where I wanted to. It felt like more like a reflex than actual spell.
The moment my fist smashed into the forehead of the lion, it went flying towards the forest. Right now, my awakening aura was still active, allowing the to teleport right behind the lion. I clasped my hands together tightly before smashing downwards with all my power.
Even though my body was no longer 800kg, it was still 600kg while my semi-Divine body game me an extra power boost. The power the left my clasped hands sent quakes around the forest as every tree in a 50 meter radius was completely destroyed or thrown out of the ground.
The lion whimpered from the pain of having a crushed limb, but more and more darkness started to flood his wounds since he was not under the effects of my divine aura. The lions jumped as far as it could from me and tried to conjure a darkness-fire ray. The moment I saw this, a psychotic smirk filled my face ear to ear.
"What is your name?" I asked
"Phoebe..." he growled
"Pandora" I chuckled at his demise
"Then, we shall see who the winner is after this clash, right?" I asked while smirking
"WINNER?! F*CK OFF AND DI-" his sentence was cut off when the ball of darkness energy he had blasted toward me stopped mid air. I stood there as I used the remaining specks of the Awakening energy and a little bit of my soul energy to stop the time around me in a 40 meter radius.
Before the oversized lion could say anything or even realize what happened, a voice from his right, sent shivers down his spine. It was my voice, and the word I had muttered was-
"Goodbye"
The golden awakening aura was half swallowed into my mana heart and half sucked into my fist. My fist turned a bright gold right before smashing into his right torso and vaporizing it with a large pulse of divine energy.
Phoebe howled in pain as he fell onto the floor, this time lifeless as a corpse. The moment he reached the floor, the divine energy from my fist seeped into my mana heart, while the divine energy in the area vortexed towards my mana veins and arteries.
Overwhelming pain overtook my mind, soul and body, making me collapse in an instant.
-- Gift
received