Vile Evil Hides Under The Veil

'Fuck. I guess some things don't work out according to plan. Maybe I see the situations and assume things that fit my logic.'

Tuan self-reflected for a brief period before turning around to see Wilder coming at him with a wide smile on his face. He disappeared from his position just a moment before Lily pierced the guts of his afterimage and charged ahead to meet the barbarian.

Sedated Perception

Stunning Speed

Total Control

Fire Steps

Fire Wings

Fireball

Fledgelings of the Flame

Tuan didn't hold anything back and sent his mana circuits on overdrive. In the next moment, he was airborne with wings of fire attached to his back.

Lily was met with a pair of two 2-meter long fire snakes that hissed at her before she could pursue their caster. She smiled after seeing the two snakes coming for her. She disappeared from the scene using her assassin class specific spell, not leaving any trace of her behind that could allow the rankers present here to track her.

Lily thought Tuan managing to detect her at the time of the flying shoe artefact was a fluke. So she decided to test that theory again. The animated spell contained the consciousness of a real snake extracted from higher consciousness. It couldn't detect her presence on its own unless its caster was aware of it either.

Too bad, Eren was still aware of her position, thanks to Alephee. The fledglings acted like real snakes and attacked the air as if it were empty. A moment later, an invisible human figure was seen on fire because the snakes had encircled her body with their trunks.

Swoosh!

The snakes' bodies were slashed into multiple pieces before the invisible figure jumped from its position. The mirage of invisibility was snatched away from Lily as she materialized herself not too far away from her previous position.

A volume of smoke was coming from all over her body. She was unscathed. But Tuan's fire element mana had affected her runic clothes, making them catch fire. She would have gotten some burns if these mana-strengthened runic clothes weren't on her.

'Haah! I guess I need to take care of these damn snakes first.'

Lily gave up on sneaking up on Tuan while he was battling with Wilder. She took a glance at her opponent and clenched her fist before running towards the snakes. She had meant at her disposal to take care of animated spells after all.

********************

"You won't win this battle. I suggest you give up your claim on that artefact and walk away from this mess. Even if we would fight it out eventually, it doesn't have to be today when you are less prepared."

Ketsu addressed Katalina while not uttering a word from his mouth. His sound-element spell allowed him to produce sound from any point in space where his mana sense could reach.

'Tuan was right. It's no fun being targeted. The fun starts when you target your opponents and take things from them instead of finding ways to keep their hands away from yours.'

While she was looking at her shoes, Katalina thought to herself that she had become fond of them lately. She hmphed in response to Ketsu's statement and attacked him once again using her flying slashes. This time though, she didn't stop sending her attacks at the ranger. He was trying to keep his distance from her with his ranger specific spells that were more effective in the long range.

She flew in the air using her artefacts and approached Ketsu. The latter was made aware by his mana sense that the flying slashes were closing in on him before his eyes could even perceive them. Just then, he saw Katalina flying. Before he could think of a strategy to deal with any more incoming attacks heading his way, he found out that the close combat expert had appeared right above his head.

Katalina had used an inscribed spell on her artefact. She felt glad that the spell worked exactly as she had hoped and caught the ranger off guard. Usually, she would struggle with the ranger class which was common among the close combat experts. Her shoes helped her overcome this weakness.

Swoosh!

Katalina delivered another series of flying slashes toward Ketsu before appearing behind him. She then used another spell at her disposal and generated two wind-element cannons to fire at Ketsu.

Katalina forced Ketsu to face the flying slashes she had executed in the very beginning. The ranger used his movement spell and disappeared from his position. He was soon about to face the flying slashes with the disc-shaped sound-element barrier he had generated in front of him.

Just then, an owl's hoot was heard. Ketsu looked back to see Katalina standing at his previous position, pointing upwards. Her contract beast was approaching Ketu at critical velocity with its talons stretched. It also released a rain of wind-element shrapnels that looked like its feathers.

Katalina saw Ketsu generate the second disc-shaped barrier above him to save himself from the owl's feather-shaped shrapnels. He was just about to strike his first barrier when the wind elemental slashes at him. The next moment, shrapnel struck his second barrier.

Ketsu had his hands full. He was about to change his position when he sensed the wind-element cannons firing a pair of compressed balls of white mana from two different directions.

"Oh, fu…"

A mana blast occurred at Ketsu's position. Katalina showed her opponent as well as her fans that she hadn't reached this stage through sheer luck. She was capable of overwhelming other competitors if they dared to mess with her.

To her surprise, however, she saw Ketsu still standing firmly at his place. He was injured. His blood was starting to come out of various places on his body.

The compressed ball of wind-element mana released needle-like shrapnels that had pierced his natural ana defence to some degree and ruptured his skin all over his body.

"You… you almost had me."

Ketsu commented while holding his pierced shoulder with a hand, which was leaking blood. His other hand was placed over his heart.