The Magus smirked. He wonder should he transform, but than decided against it.
There's no fun in easy win.
Lightning crackle, he than vanished. He reappeared behind the phoenix and whispered, "Dispel."
BOOM.
A bolt of mana crashed into the phoenix's core.
The fla beging to disperese like it was snuffed out. And the phoenix fell.
But even then… even as its body cracked apart in midair… a single feather drifted downward, still glowing.
The Magus caught it, eyes gleaming. "Interesting."
SWOSH!
The crater glowed white-hot as the phoenix's burning form rise from the feather launched skyward again, fire trailing behind it like a cot in flight.
Its wings stretched wide, arcs of condensed plasma crackling off every motion.
Above, the Magus hovered midair raised one of his palm. On it a swirling black mass begin, it's the relic he taken from the alpha.
BOOM!
The phoenix extended like spears, fire howling in its wake. Its shriek shook the cavern, a sonic wave of defiance and wrath.
But the Magus didn't dodge. Instead, his lips moved—silently.
A spell…
The runes flared into existence in a wide circle around him and the relic, twelve interlocking glyphs that pulsed with a blue hue.
They spiraled outward, layering over the battlefield, forming a do overhead. "Iron Maiden."
CRACK!
The mont the phoenix crossed the outer edge of the glyph, the spell triggered.
A web of dark chains, glowing with runes, exploded into being midair—each one crackling lightning, converging on the flaming beast.
The phoenix roared in fury, trying to twist, to burn, to evade—but it was already too late.
The first chain caught its wing dragging it mid-spin.
Then the next bound its leg. Then its neck. Then both wings!
In seconds, the creature was wrapped in dozens of shadowy chains, each crackling with lightning. Its flas flickered wildly, licking at the bindings—but the fire didn't burn them.
It couldn't. The spell was crafted using the shadow relic than engulf everything.
The Magus descended slowly, boots hissing against scorched stone as the phoenix writhed above him, bound in midair by a lattice of glowing chains.
He looked up, his voice quiet but cold enough to freeze fire. "What can you do now?"
The phoenix scread , defiant but powerless. The flas around its wings muffled like dying stars.
"So that's it, then? Another mindless beast playing with power it doesn't understand." His fingers rose. One of the runes flared, spinning with asured force. "Let's see how good this relic really is."
Below the phoenix, the magic circle ignited. The chained flas trembled as if resisting a tide.
The bird thrashed. "No!" Its voice echoed—a twisted harmony of rage and desperation.
The Magus didn't blink.
The fire vanished with a final shriek. The relic's fla appeared—a rainbow colored fla.
With a dull thud, Inferno's true body dropped lifelessly to the floor.
But the Magus didn't care. His eyes fixed on the rainbow fla. "Not bad," he murmured.
He raised the shadow relic in his hand. The mont it hovered near the fla, runes began to spin—crackling with electricity, and shadow.
Lightning surged. Darkness twisted. The relic convulsed, morphing violently as two forces clashed.
A grin crept across his face. 'So it was true. The myth... the relic crafted to end an entire race. The one relic to command all the elents. The One Ring.'
Then—Swoosh
It reshaped itself into a ring.
Now resting on the Magus' finger, it pulsed. One gem was a void-dark stone, so black it seed to devour light. The other ref with nine shifting colors. Three empty sockets lined the band—waiting.
'One's with Draeven... the other... I already know where it is. And the last...'
A plan quickly ford in his mind, ambition curling at the edges of his lips.
Then he turned, his expression sharpening. With a snap, arcs of lightning burst from his body—then vanished.
In an instant a trillion sparks burst outward. They slithered like silver ants, mapping mana currents, feeding the Magus streams of data in less than a second.
It didn't last long—barely a blink. But at the speed of light, that was more than enough to scan a massive area.
Still, the spell had its limits.
It couldn't tell him everything. The system worked by tracking mana signatures only—and it was far too fast to differentiate or filter every detail. That's why he had to input the search paraters in advance.
What kind of energy. What frequency. What resonance. That was why he hadn't used it to find Ben.
His lips curled again. 'One of them escaped. Probably already outside this bio.' He paused, eyes flicking to the north. 'The last one... still here.'
Crackle!!!
In the next instant, the Magus was gone—launched like a thunderbolt, splitting the stone behind him.
anwhile, Storm were inside his hidden shelter—a rough, spindly structure perched atop the cap of a towering mushroom tree.
The tree itself was thicker and taller than most, rising high enough to brush the cavern ceiling. A perfect hiding spot.
Inside the cramped interior, a dozen Ravagers moved quietly around him. Enough to start again sowhere far from here.
Storm's eyes narrowed as he glanced toward the horizon. 'This bio's finished. The Alpha's dead. The nest is gone. I have to leave.'
He barked a sharp order, and the Ravagers moved instantly, packing supplies, strapping makeshift satchels across their carapaces.
Then— RUMBLE.
A flash of white light pierced through the mushroom canopy, searing across the windows. A mont later, thunder rolled through the air, deep enough to rattle bones.
Storm's pupils narrowed. That pressure. That heat. He knew it. 'No… no, not now—'
BOOOOM!!!
An eruption of fire engulfed the tree. Lightning coiled around it like a serpent, climbing, striking, detonating every step of the way.
The air warped. Bark split and peeled. The scent of ozone and charred fungus filled the air.
Storm's claws clenched. He activated the relic without hesitation.
Wind scread, gathering around him, cloaking his body in whirling currents.
A huge explosion reverberated as another fight ensued. But the result was clear—even after igniting the relic's power and transforming, Storm stood no chance against the Magus.
Lightning was the Magus' elent.
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