Destruction and Harm
The fight continued.
The flame tornado protected Emma from the the shadow clone and Melissa from getting close, but it also prevented Melissa from getting close to Emma.
Melissa is actually worse off compared to her opponent despite similar ranking and the stalemate, and her grim face showed how bad it was.
'I failed to get close! She's more powerful than I imagined! I should've used [Shadow Domain] at the beginning! I didn't think she would go all out at me!'
Melissa is an [Assassin] who prefers to sneak up on opponents and kill them in one strike or severely injure them before finishing the target off. Most of her skills pertain to that mindset and not facing an opponent in an open area in the middle of the day.
Compared to a [Mage] who will likely possess many attack and defense spells, Melissa does not have spells but rather skills innate to her class which do not require chanting but produce similar effects to spells.
[Shadow Daggers], [Shadow Clone], and [Shadow Trap] are the only two attack skills she has. Half of her other skills are for support, defense, and hiding. Except for the support skills that involve hiding and her attack skills, her defense skills do not have as many levels since she has not bothered to invest in them much.
Furthermore, this is during the day when her skills are the weakest.
That is the weak point of the assassin class.
They are terrible at open-space combat during the day but are terrifying at night when searching for their target to assassinate.
If this fight were to happen at night, Melissa would be way more powerful and dominating.
'How do I get out of this stalemate and regain my advantage?!'
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Emma's thoughts began to deteriorate as her anger consumed her.
Foreign malicious thoughts entered her mind trying to compel her to let out all her anger against this person. Thoughts she never had before trying to break through her sense of justice.
[Attack her!]
[Cripple her!]
[Kill this person! She can't join our group!]
Emma tried to resist but these thoughts consumed her mind.
Her eyes gradually turned bloodshot.
Her magus aura soared even further despite her standard magus going into her spells. Strangely enough, the [Fire Tornado] and [Flamethrower] intensified in power.
The heat of the fire tornado was becoming so hot that the ground was beginning to melt. The flames coming from her [Flamethrower] spell were starting to turn into bright plasma.
Melissa was forced to retreat even further under the intense radiant heat.
Emma finally snapped and chanted another spell.
The winds gathered around her feet and rotated.
"[Flight]!"
The winds lifted her up off the ground and she descended up the tornado and out the top before stabilizing at around a few hundred feet in the air.
Melissa watched this with a grim face. This was the last thing she hoped would not happen.
With Emma able to fly, the chances of defeating her are now slim to none. It is exactly like a fighter plane in a war. Those who dominate the skies dominate the battlefield below.
"[Wood Extraction!" Emma chanted another spell into existence with this one being a large elemental wood spell.
The nearby trees and foliage surrounding the prairie field and the surviving prairie grass rapidly turned grey as they wilted. Their vitality was being extracted out of them!
An invisible energy rippled throughout the air and was pulled into the spell, which transformed the energy into standard magus which flowed into Emma.
Emma's aura rapidly grew within the span of a few seconds, reaching the level of beginner S-Rank and showing signs of going further. Her power had almost tripled.
The fire tornado dissipated along with its corresponding spell and the other spell.
"Wait! I surrender!" Melissa was now very scared of Emma and wanted the fighting to end.
Emma seemed to not hear as she rapidly chanted another spell.
"The battle is over! Melissa has lost! Emma is the winner!" George walked up and loudly announced.
Emma seemed to be too lost in her hatred to care. She raised her hands in front of her and a giant complex spell appeared with a sinister glow.
George narrowed his eyes at her in suspicion.
He noticed a small amount of demonic red mixed in with her aura.
His eyes widened slightly and his expression darkened.
Multi-colored lightning wrapped around the spell as the air vibrated.
Emma's giant aura began to drastically shrink and dim as tons of standard magus flowed into the spell. The spell itself rapidly glowed brighter as a bright ball of energy appeared at the tip.
"[Shadow Escape!]" Melissa's face turned to horror as the smell of impending death filled her mind. She injected all her energy into her escape skill to flee the area.
"Get out of here Melissa! Knock out the other members and evacuate them now!" George yelled.
Melissa turned into a shadow and fled at her fastest speed towards the spectators. She almost arrived instantly and appeared behind the three party members. Reaching into her shadow, she pulled out a bottle of gas and shattered it.
The members furiously coughed as they inhaled the gas, quickly falling over and losing consciousness. Melissa wrapped them all in a single large shadow and fled the area.
"Return to your senses!" George's iris' glowed a bright demonic red as his [Aura] was released in epic glory. His long hair floated into the air around him.
George's [Aura] seemed to surpass even Emma's as the ground around him turned to dust and melted. Demonic lightning whipped around him like snakes as his aura seemed to reach the heavens. The size of his aura extended hundreds of feet and even put out the surrounding fires.
The ground began to rise in many pieces within his [Aura] as if gravity was turned off. Bullet shells and metal pieces from the demonic war also rose as well.
George's demonic aura rapidly grew without any signs of stopping until it collided with Emma's and began to push her aura back. However, it was too late.
"Die! [Laser Beam]!" Emma screamed as she channeled all her energy into the spell.
The spell released a giant beam of energy which approached George at insane speeds. The heat and light itself was too intense and it burned everything in the vicinity!
"[Everchanging Item]!" George unsheathed his dagger with his right hand and raised it above his side level to his shoulder with the dagger facing up.
The dagger released a gentle white radiance as it turned into a liquid form and molded into a normal-looking sword. The radiance became red as demonic magus flowed into the weapon.
George retracted his right hand and grabbed the sword with two hands. He raised it above his head and continued raising it until the sword was facing the ground behind his head.
His [Aura] merged into his sword as demonic magus flowed in like a giant tide of energy.
The density of the demonic magus reached a tipping point and turned into demonic red flames which wrapped around the sword and obscured the metal. The flames soared in size and height before rapidly stabilizing all in the span of less than a second.
The flames vaporized the ground behind him and created another dust cloud.
"This should be enough right?"
George watched the approaching beam of energy which had now arrived less than fifty feet from him. Without hesitation, he swung his sword at full force above his head and in the direction of the ground.
"[Slash]!"
The metal part of the sword within the flames glowed a brilliant radiance as countless hidden engravements lit up.
Shockwaves destroyed the area as the sword descended faster than the speed of sound. The air in front of the flames turned to plasma from the sheer speed.
All of the demonic flames left the sword and condensed into a crescent-shaped flaming blade before the sword hit the ground. The flaming blade flew at the energy beam and cut it in half.
Within less than a second, the entire laser beam had been cut in half.
Most of the energy from the flaming demonic blade had been lost, but it was still enough to slice Emma's spell in half and impact her.
The rebound knocked the breathe out of her as she was catapulted further into the sky.
*BOOM!*
The entire area became engulfed in explosions and shockwaves that destroyed everything as the split laser beam impacted the ground. The sword impacted the ground and created a giant explosion of dust and debris.
Leaving his sword imbedded in the ground, George instantly vanished and appeared next to Emma.
He directed a knee kick to her stomach, causing her to vomit everything out of her stomach.
Emma's aura disappeared as all her remaining standard magus dissipated. The hate in her eyes disappeared and her eyes rolled back. She lost consciousness.
With an indifferent frown, George directed some of his aura and demonic magus into her body. This was possible because she had exhausted all her magus energy. Otherwise his demonic magus would have injured her.
The pulse of energy through her body forced out a demonic glowing orb of energy which made screeching sounds. It tried to flee but George grabbed it with his hand.
[Kekekeke! You may have defeated me, but how long do you think you can keep me suppressed?!]
The demonic orb sinisterly laughed but George only stared at it with his usual indifference.
He extended his hand and the sword imbedded in the middle of the crater below trembled. With a *swoosh* sound, it flew into the sky at a high speed and George caught it with his other hand.
[Wait, what are you doing?! No! Stop it! Anything but th-]
George placed the orb against the blade of the sword and slowly cut into it. The orb made screeching sounds of pain and agony as it was split in half.
The orb broke apart into demonic magus which George sucked into his mouth.
He indifferently looked at the unconscious Emma and then the devastated lands below him.
The place looked as if a nuclear bomb had gone off. Fires and smoke filled the air. New scars and craters were everywhere. The wreckage from the war had melted from the heat.
It was as if a new war had started.
George's weapon had returned to a normal-looking sword now that the runes on the sword had disappeared. With a single glance at his weapon, the sword turned to a liquid and reformed back into the same dagger.
He sheathed it and sighed out many of his emotions.
"Once again, I've caused destruction and harm. Maybe I shouldn't have accepted this mission."
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Notes:
* I though I'd give a display of Emma's powers to prove she is not as weak as she seems.