Chapter 271: Daevic Vs. Isaiah (Patreon)

Daevic

The dragon launched himself at Daevic as soon as the System started the match, moving far faster than Daevic had suspected, and Daevic realized there was yet another thing about his opponent which was ridiculous.

The dragon’s movement skill was Empyrean grade and boosted by at least 8 levels from his racial abilities, uniquenesses, and classes, making it almost as effective as a Divine grade skill. Even more terrifying, however, it was somehow 100% mastered even though Daevic knew the dragon was even younger than him, Daevic’s own highest mastery skill only barely passing 90%.

Then, when the dragon got close and used an attack skill on his spear, an absolute power of pure destruction aimed directly for Daevic’s head, Daevic realized he wouldn’t have been the dragon’s match at all without the two cheats his divine relatives had prepared for him.

Only because he was under a state of enlightenment, his perception and reflexes far higher than normal, could he block the 100% mastered attack with his shield, using the resulting momentum to fly backward by more than a kilometer. And, only because the Dragon Suppressing Shield was made of incredibly valuable materials, could he avoid damage from the attack’s power and Laws.

The dragon then charged him again with the same skills and Daevic managed to barely block, the cold rage in his chest slowly growing as he realized he was only able to survive because the Dragon Suppressing Shield his uncle had given him was doing far more than just suppressing his opponent’s stats.

The dragon, reportedly an incredibly skilled fighter back when he was an E rank, was fighting Daevic with a pure straightforward offense like an idiot not because he’d lost his skill from when he was younger or because he was looking down on Daevic’s own skill, but because the Dragon Suppressing Shield was messing with him in a more complicated way than Daevic had realized, not having had the chance to test the artifact against an actual opponent.

First, the lowering of the dragon’s stats was not constant, the amount each stat was lowered fluctuating based on the dragon’s distance from the shield and how much energy Daevic put into the artifact, and, second, the dragon’s skills and racial abilities, at least those relating to his status as a dragon, were also suppressed, altering the energy flow in his body and making his skill usage far less smooth than it would normally be.

In short, to the dragon, the Dragon Suppressing Shield was even more of a counter than the armor Vanar Tedros had used during his two fights against Daevic, making it actually incredibly impressive the dragon could even correctly aim his spear given the level of suppression.

If Daevic gave the dragon time to adapt, his opponent’s usage of his power would only increase during the fight, so Daevic had to end things quickly.

Luckily, under the state of enlightenment, Daevic’s Laws were growing in real time, and, at that moment, his Law Scarab of Thunderstrike advanced to peak grade, helping to boost the power of all Daevic’s skills, including his movement, and the dragon did something both easily expected and, unknown to the man, completely to Daevic’s advantage.

Dragon Drive was the dragon’s core skill, an Empyrean grade berserker skill which drained the dragon’s health to increase his base stats and the power of his energy, but, as a draconic skill, it was suppressed by Daevic’s Dragon Suppressing Shield, so it wasn’t as efficient as it normally would be. Add to this how the dragon would normally use his Dragon Heart racial ability to heal himself of the damage caused by Dragon Drive, a racial ability which was also suppressed, and the dragon’s berserker state provided far less power than usual while also doing more damage to himself.

More important, however, the dragon’s draining of his own health exposed him to the power of one of the two skills Daevic had yet to reveal, No Rebirth Domain.

Summoning out his nine storm spirit snakes and merging them into a hydra like usual, Daevic didn’t then merge them into his body with Spirit Avatar, but instead merged the hydra into his No Rebirth Domain skill, a specialized domain which used the elements of life, death, and lightning to stop an opponent’s healing and transform it into lightning.

This turned the dragon’s rather amazing passive regeneration, one of his greatest strengths, into constant damage instead, lightning filled death energy continuously entering into the dragon’s body with no healing being done, and, if nothing changed, the dragon would just continue to accumulate damage until Daevic won.

Unlike what Daevic expected, however, the dragon didn’t stop using Dragon Drive and go back to trying to kill Daevic without it, but instead doubled down, activating a similar berserker skill built into his Bloodforged Living Armor to boost his power even more. Then he attacked Daevic with seemingly everything he had.

Destruction-filled spear after destruction-filled spear came at Daevic over the next six seconds, and Daevic couldn’t block them all, two of the powerful attacks landing directly on his golden-purple armor, but, still, Daevic fought on.

His Empyrean grade armor had been filled with a large reserve of his own energy and it could completely protect him from any attacks, even ones as powerful as the dragon’s, so long as that energy remained. Meanwhile, after piercing through Daevic’s defensive skill, Storm Armor, the dragon’s two attacks together had only drained a little over 33% of the armor’s energy.

During the next six seconds, however, even with the dragon’s offense starting to slow down ever so slightly, and Daevic focusing entirely on defense, the dragon managed to hit Daevic three times, bringing his armor’s energy reserve down to less than 17%.

Then, with one more hit, the energy reserve was gone.

Daevic was hit again, and this time he felt it.

Even without the energy reserve, his armor still blocked the dragon’s spear, but the power of destruction, the multiple Laws fused together by the power of chaos, managed to partially bypass his armor, and Daevic felt his insides twist.

Then, even while blocking over 90% of his opponent’s attacks, he was hit again, and then again.

Still, the dragon was in a bad state, almost 18 seconds of berserking while taking more damage instead of being able to heal not doing him any favors, and his offense was becoming slower and slower.

The dragon was stubborn, however, and just kept attacking, playing right into Daevic’s hands, so, even as Daevic was hit again and again, to the point he even vomited up blood and had multiple holes in his torso, he couldn’t help but smile, even managing to advance two more of his Laws to peak grade Law Scarabs in the process, his No Rebirth Domain doing even more damage.

Then, when he almost couldn’t take it anymore and, to the outside world, it looked like the dragon was about to win, Daevic activated his last trump card, the final skill he hadn’t revealed to anyone outside his own force, Thunderstrike Rebirth.

The power of lightning, water, and life coursed through his body and, in just a moment, all the damage from the dragon’s attacks was completely healed, the power of Daevic’s cultivation technique, Stormlord Rebirth, showing just why it was named as such.

Daevic had returned to his best state, even stronger than the start of the fight due to his Law advancements. Meanwhile, the dragon was on his last legs, though he still stubbornly kept attacking.

By this time, however, the dragon had slowed down enough due to the accumulated damage that Daevic was no longer on the losing end in terms of movement speed, so the dragon couldn’t catch up.

He just continued to accumulate damage, unable to do anything, and, even when he stopped his two berserker skills, he seemed unable to stop the passive healing from his racial ability, so his body continued to absorb more and more lightning filled death energy, and there wasn’t anything he could do to stop it.

Transferring energy into his sword, Daevic then attacked, using his Storm Strike skill through his blade to try and stab into the dragon’s chest.

But then he discovered another of the dragon’s maxed out and incredibly boosted skills, an Empyrean grade version of the Absolute Defense skill empowered by a mix of defensive Laws. With its strength, most of Daevic’s energy was deflected, and the dragon’s Bloodforged Living Armor fully blocked the remainder of his attack.

Still, Daevic now had the advantage, so he attacked again and again, rather easily blocking any of the dragon’s counterattacks, and the damage to the dragon from No Rebirth Domain continued.

The dragon was stubborn, however, still glaring at Daevic with those golden eyes, so the fight didn’t end even as two more of Daevic’s Laws advanced, and it seemed the dragon wasn’t going to surrender, maybe wanting or needing something he could only earn by placing higher in the tournament, not having expected Daevic to win.

At nearly the two minute mark of the fight, the dragon then finally messed up, Daevic’s sword entering through the dragon’s armor and into his chest, right through the Bloodforged Living Armor, the power of thunder blasting right through the dragon’s right lung.

One more attack and Daevic could kill him. One more attack, and those annoying golden eyes would shut for good. One more attack and Daevic would truly earn the praise of his uncles, aunt, and mother.

And the dragon was now in no condition to use his mana to call out and surrender.

Daevic readied his sword, aimed right at the dragon’s heart, but at that moment a mana wave voice emanated out from one of the more minor private compounds of the halo-shaped space station. “He surrenders. Stop your attacks.”

Daevic took a split second to check and realized the voice had come from Nial Gilim, the so called Master of Spacetime, one of the five remaining contestants not confirmed to be under the Heavenly Spark Soul King, along with Daevic, Ren Kimbal, Krysta La’Vordi, and Sword Saint Milan.

Daevic didn’t care about the middle-aged-looking man’s unemotional order, however. The dragon was someone he wouldn’t normally be able to beat, so he wasn’t going to miss this chance to finish him off.

Without any more thought, Daevic activated Storm Strike on his sword and stabbed toward the dragon’s heart.