Vile Evil Hides Under The Veil

'Doesn't this make the spell close to the beast contract spell?'

Eren asked as he saw Altashia suddenly using her movement spell with his enhanced perception. She could also use her way of the elements to strengthen her movement spell, allowing the spell to achieve greater results. It would have been tough for him to follow her movements even if it was him on the ground without his time-element spell.

'Yeah. The beast contract spell is inspired by a lot of ancient spells. You can say that it is a nerfed down version of the spell you are seeing.

The beast contract spell requires the ranker to kill the beast in order to harvest its soul instead of summoning its consciousness outside its body. As a result, the beast contract spell is easier and faster to cast.'

Eren processed all the information Layla had given him and understood it completely. Layla paused for a bit before continuing.

'The main advantage of the spell Rodrick has performed is that you would never become your beast's bottleneck. It would have its own growth as a ranking entity. Plus, unlike the beast contract spell, the beast's body and the beast itself don't rely too heavily on the caster once the spell has finished its successful execution.

So both variants of the spell produce almost the same results. But the way they go about it is different.

My master's era didn't have the beast contract spell. Personally, I feel that the feat of the ranker who came up with the beast contract spell after studying many such spells and extracting optimal parts of them is tremendous. I would have liked to meet them and exchange notes.'

Layla concluded and let the matter rest. It felt like she needed someone to discuss research matters with. So she was looking for ways to expound on these subjects with the only guy she could talk to.

Eren also focused on Altashia's fight. So far he had found no opening in Altashia's battle style that he could exploit. But that didn't mean that he should stop looking.

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"Hm. What I think doesn't matter. Let's test it out, shall we?"

Altashia swung her weapon at the water wyvern from a close range. A significant amount of wind and fire mana had been imbued in the slash along with her mastery of the elements.

Roar!

The water wyvern had a huge gaping slash on its neck. It cried in pain when Altashia got below its neck without any fear and launched her weapon slash at its seemingly unprotected area.

'Strike first. Strike hard. No mercy. Good going, Al.'

Eren praised Altashia for her move. But that didn't change the fact that he was going to criticize her for not striking Rodrick when his spell wasn't finished.

Things would have ended pretty abruptly. But the beast was already preparing to take flight when Altashia approached her. Her attack couldn't stop it or Rodrick from getting airborne.

Altashia was pushed back when the wind generated by the beast's wing hit her directly as she was standing right below it. That prevented her from attacking the beast once again.

Roar!

Another draconic roar was released by the water wyvern as it attempted to fix its half-chopped neck with the mana from its surroundings. Since it was airborne and had gained a sufficient altitude, Altashia's threat had been greatly reduced.

Since it was a mana body, the beast didn't take long to fix itself. Plus, some of its body parts started to show draconic scales on them– indicating that the beast was stabilizing in its new vessel.

The beast flapped its wings repeatedly as he stared at the human who had hurt it. Although this was its mana body, it could still feel pain when it was injured.

Roar!

The beast released a deafening roar at the human who had attacked it. It made a grabbing motion towards her with its front limbs that had clawed at the end where its wings had joined.

Altashia felt a dangerous sensation around her. But before she could act on it, the shape of a giant claw made of water-element mana appeared around her with her in the middle. The manifestation of the claw was so instantaneous that Eren couldn't believe it wasn't preplanned.

'Heh! Why do you think dragonkind is respected and feared no matter which era or race it is. Its ability to cast magic far surpasses your imagination. And this is just a wyvern we are talking about.

Hehehe! No use telling you right now I guess. Just know this. The dragons aren't a mythical class for nothing.'

Layla spoke up as if she understood Eren's state of mind. He also realized that the little witch had another intention. She wanted him to forgo the thoughts of playing smart with Eliza.

"Riptide!"

A giant wave of water was formed in front of Rodrick before it picked up speed. As it travelled forward, it transformed into a blade slash. The shape of the blade slash resembled a crescent moon.

Rodrick wasn't sitting ducks either. He knew Altashia wasn't someone who could be defeated solely by cheating. Her existence alone was enough of a cheat. So he sent one of his weapon-based spells her way to prevent her from escaping from above.

The claw had five fingers that looked like five giant pillars that stood around Altashia. The ground beneath her had been converted into an icy surface that soon looked like it too was made from the water wyvern's dragon scale skin. No human or ordinary demon beast could achieve this level of detail in such a short time.

Yet, Altashia flashed a light grin as she looked up and saw Riptide coming from her. Eren had a feeling she had been through a lot worse for her to act this way. When you face someone much stronger than you, your sense of danger is altered.

Eren concluded that Altashia had met up with her version of Eliza.