76 The Fight Continues!

Seeing the state of the Scarlet Lion, Ark had a feeling that he would have to go all-out if he wanted to beat this beast. Holding his strength back would only get him killed, and who wanted that? Well, except for his opponents, and a few other people. The lion didn't wait for even a second before it started attacking once more. It called on the fierce fire mana once more, but this time, it was preparing a much larger move. Ark would be stupid if he just stood there and watched it happen.

He could've tried to interrupt the lion's magic, but since he wasn't too sure of his body's capabilities, he would rather use the one thing he was sure of, his magic. Since his opponent was going to use a fire attack, Ark started to accumulate tons of ice mana. The ice element was one of his strongest elements, and it restrained fire, making this one of Ark's strongest weapons against this foe. A couple of seconds quickly passed, and the lion's expression was getting fiercer and fiercer for every second that passed.

The lion suddenly shifted its head, staring at Thufrat in the distance with glee, Ark was surprised, and quickly followed its line of sight, only to discover that Thufrat was fine. It quickly hit him that this beast was more intelligent than he thought, and a scorching aura quickly approached him. A vortex of fire was making its way quickly toward him, and Ark didn't have much time to react. He mustered all the ice mana he had accumulated and put up a defensive barrier in front of himself.

The fire and ice clashed with a loud sound, and the ice managed to keep the fire at bay for the moment, the fire wasn't leaving though, and Ark had to keep feeding the ice his mana to sustain it.

"Crash!"

All of a sudden, the ice shattered into thousands of pieces, scattering into the air. Through the ice, the lion came flying over. Ark didn't manage to muster much defense before the lion appeared before him, swiping at him with its claws. This attack wasn't imbued with any mana on the surface, but it contained a scary destructive power nonetheless. Ark took the claw attack head-on, but since he didn't manage to accumulate any power of his own, he was sent flying.

A fairly deep scar was left on his abdomen, and Ark was bleeding profusely. The pain was excruciating, since the lion had imbued Ark's body with its fire mana when it had made contact with its claws. Ark got back on his feet as quickly as he could, and he instantly dodged to his left.

Woosh

The scarlet lion flew straight past him as he dodged its next attack. The lion didn't leave him any room to breathe after he had been injured heavily, and it just attacked once more instantly. Ark activated his Envoy Of Holiness skill after retreating for about 50 meters. Enveloped by sacred light, Ark tried his hardest to suppress his injury. He couldn't go all-out, he needed mana to attack after all, but he still stopped most of the bleeding, and mended the wound considerably, alleviating some of his pain in the process.

The battle on the other side was looking a lot better, but it was still looking rather grim. The guards of Morgana could barely hold off a single shadow warrior face to face after they had gotten serious. Thufrat was trying his best to contend against the other four by himself, but even after using his bloodline's ancient power, he was still being suppressed, and it was only a matter of time before he fell.

One of the 4 shadow warriors suddenly leaped off the ground and into the air without any warning whatsoever. The figure of a shadow floating about in the air was rather ethereal, but no one had the time to appreciate the beauty behind this moment. The shadow brought out a short sword from his own spatial bag and stabilized himself up in the air. After a moment of silence, the sword came swinging down. An abnormal sword aura took form and speeded toward Thufrat. This strike of absolute darkness was awfully powerful, and Thufrat thought of dodging.

Before he had the chance to finish his thought, the 3 other shadows appeared to his sides as well as behind him, trapping him with only one way left, forward. Thufrat didn't hesitate, and even though he had fought bare-handed up until now, he finally took out his warhammer from his spatial bag. He swung the hammer as soon as it was out of the bag, and he put almost all of the remaining mana he had into this blow, if he didn't he would die for sure. Earth mana oozed out of the warhammer, and the outer layer even shone with a brown hue.

The hammer's force split the air apart, and a sound that would normally rupture people's eardrums echoed as it explosively made its way toward the darkness. Earth and darkness soon collided in mid-air. No sound could be heard, but a blinding light shot out in all directions, directly blinding everyone present. Ark obviously noticed such a sight, and he nervously watched the event unfold. After colliding with each other, a clear winner emerged, Thufrat. The earth didn't give up against the darkness, and with the help of its tenacious nature, it kept going after eradicating the darkness. The shadow warrior was already resigned to his fate, the only comfort he could find in his death was that his killer would soon follow him.

Ark was happy when he saw this and heaved a sigh of relief, only to realize something a second later. As the light dimmed down, Ark could finally see Thufrat. But instead of the triumphant expression he was expecting, he could only see one of pain on his face. When Ark's eyes worked their way down to his stomach area, Ark's expression darkened. A tempestuous aura appeared around him, weighing down on his surroundings. If you looked at Thufrat's back, all you would be able to see was the hilt of a dagger that shone with a dark light.

Ark's eyes reddened, it was time to kill!