Chapter 379: Paracelsus's Spirits (4)
Chapter 379: Paracelsus's Spirits (4)
“Elemental Burst.”
“Elemental Circle.”
The activation words were whispered softly.
However, the effects were anything but quiet.
First, there was Iris’s Elemental Burst. This was her signature magic, something I had seen several times before.
Of course, its form and power now were worlds apart from back then.
The original version, which forcibly wove three of the four major attributes together to create an explosion, was nowhere to be seen. It was now a form of magic so compressed and distorted that not even a trace of its original attributes remained.
It looked as though a child had haphazardly kneaded clay, yet I could feel everything within it.
It was neither fire, water, wind, nor earth—it was something that existed before it became anything else.
The attributes, forcibly regressed to their primordial state, repelled one another yet refused to separate.
…Perhaps that was why the impact was so staggering when it was forcibly detonated.
Rumble—Boom!
A white-out. For a moment, a massive amount of light burned my retinas, and my ears felt muffled as if filled with water.
The world briefly flickered into a white void.
That was the only way to describe the sight. The result was equally magnificent.
“The spiritual pressure of the large monsters is…?”
Iris wasn't the only one being charged by large monsters.
There were two Behemoths that had turned their heads in horror after seeing their kin hunted one by one, and an Abomination Chimera that was crawling across the ground with deceptive speed.
Three large monsters, each boasting a size comparable to a decent building, vanished in an instant as if they had evaporated.
All that remained were deep craters gouged into the earth and scorched black marks seared into the bottom.
In terms of pure destructive power, it was likely similar to the Punishment I had used in the battle against Ugly Prosperity.
Of course, the power would be even greater now that she had a Dragon Heart… but even so, the fact remained that the magic from back then was capable of wounding a god.
This meant Iris’s magic now possessed a level of power that transcended the boundaries of rank.
The declaration of arrival by these uninvited guests, who had intruded upon those locked in an eternal struggle, was truly loud and flamboyant.
Only one monster had died, but perhaps the power of the newly refined Elemental Burst was too great.
The golems, which had been watching silently because they couldn't tell friend from foe, began to charge toward us all at once.
Their mission was to protect the small cave at the far end… Paracelsus’s workshop.
Whether she was an enemy of the monsters or not, they must have deemed someone of Iris’s caliber a threat to the workshop.
That was when Elisha stepped forward.
Elemental Circle. She had clearly chanted the activation word, yet nothing shot out from Elisha’s wand.
Since it was a name I was hearing for the first time, it was undoubtedly a new magic she had developed while organizing her recent enlightenment.
I watched her back as she took a step forward, feeling anxious that she might have failed, but then I realized.
The Shadow of Elements—the characteristic of the Elementus Core—floated behind her head. The forms of the four major attributes, arranged in a rhombus and glowing brightly, were connected as one and rotating.
I wondered what that meant for only a brief moment.
Elisha extended her wand. Then, without any warning, a wave of fire poured out.
“Chantless…?”
No, the power was too great for that. Conversely, it was too weak to be a spell she had been preparing since earlier.
Countless thoughts raced through my mind, but these questions were premature.
The bodies of the Golem Knights glowed red-hot, but they possessed solid countermeasures against high heat, as they continued to wade through the tidal wave of flames.
It was just as their entire bodies had been sufficiently heated, not just the parts in direct contact with the fire. The pouring flames suddenly turned into a storm of frost, sweeping over the golems from behind.
Whoosh—!
It looked as if the flames that had been spewed out had returned as a blizzard. Before I knew it, the stream of fire from the wand had long since cooled.
Perhaps due to the extreme temperature change, a creaking sound erupted from the golems' joints, which had been moving smoothly and silently until then.
Since golems of that size couldn't possibly lack a repair function, that was likely a temporary phenomenon. But that was enough.
In that brief interval, Elisha’s frost transformed into massive boulders that slammed into the Golem Knights.
Crunch!
I couldn't wrap my head around how it was happening. Just as the fire had become frost, the frost had become rock before I even noticed.
The rocks that shattered upon impact crumbled into wind, lifting the golems that failed to block them and pushing them into the air.
Then, unnatural lightning, generated not from beyond the clouds but in mid-air, struck the falling golems.
By this point, internal issues must have developed, as the remaining golems grew increasingly sluggish before stopping entirely.
Thud, thud.
It was only after hearing the sound of the wreckage hitting the ground that I understood.
That natural transition was the magic known as Elemental Circle.
It wasn't simply firing multiple spells in succession. A single spell was capable of transforming into many.
And it did so with almost no loss of mana.
Elisha’s magic continued thereafter. The Golem Knights were only about the size of a large human, but they were fast and sturdy.
It didn't matter if they approached for melee or bombarded us from a distance.
Every time Elisha flicked her raised wand, storms and flames filled the vision, and the earth overturned, vomiting destruction.
She looked like a conductor commanding a natural disaster.
The Shadow of Elements, which had been rotating slowly, gradually accelerated until the patterns of the constituent attributes became unrecognizable.
Now, the Shadow of Elements had become a single ring of light illuminating the back of Elisha’s head.
Seeing the halo-like image, I suddenly recalled something Elisha had said before.
She had mentioned that there are some magics that allow you to understand the caster just by looking at them. Elisha’s magic was exactly like that.
A massive, unbroken cycle. A sense of surveying the whole rather than just a cross-section of an event.
The total amount of mana producing all these phenomena didn't change significantly. Instead, it raged on, constantly shifting its form according to Elisha’s will.
The elemental magic Elisha envisioned. One who pours out power no different from a spirit, even without one.
That glimpse had finally sprouted.
“Ah…”
This was it. The world Elisha saw and the emotions she felt felt as close as my own.
Even while everyone was pessimistic and said it was impossible, even when she was framed and reduced to a slave.
Elisha had simply walked her path in silence and finally proved herself.
Though there were still many immature parts and her maximum output remained at the level of intermediate magic… it was nonetheless a path that clearly led to a single truth.
Elisha’s joy spread like a wildfire, igniting a flame in my own chest.
This was it. This was the Elisha I knew. The sight of her taking her first step toward her own destination was truly beautiful.
I stared blankly at her back for a moment before she glanced toward me and gave a faint smile.
A smile filled with gratitude and affection for the person who had recognized her and believed in her until now.
I see. Now I think I understand why Elisha and Iris had become even more affectionate after the subjugation of Ugly Prosperity.
Anyone would fall for them after seeing them like this. Just as I was doing now.
However, I couldn't stay lost in sentiment for long. This was a battlefield, after all.
Perhaps seeing the moment Elisha looked back as an opportunity, the golems scattered and charged from all directions.
It felt as if they had diverted all the resources they had gained after Iris took down several large monsters toward us.
Of course, it was a very hasty judgment.
“Do not ignore me!”
Iris, who had prepared her next spell before I knew it, raised her staff. Simultaneously, the sky was covered by unnatural dark clouds.
It was a characteristic of the Thunder Calling class of magic that was familiar to me.
However, what flashed and fell from the clouds wasn't mere lightning.
The mass of power created through the forced attribute fusion I had seen earlier took the form of lightning.
The lightning, which would normally have been a pale blue, was glowing white-hot, and it didn't stop at merely incinerating the target with a roar.
Krak-boom!
Lightning struck every golem that stepped under the dark clouds.
As if precisely aimed, or as if electricity were drawn to metal, every bolt struck without missing, causing grand explosions.
Boom!
The scale was slightly smaller, but it was magic no different from the Elemental Burst she had fired at the large monsters.
It would be impossible for the Golem Knights, who weren't as tough as the large monsters, to withstand Iris’s magic.
While she hadn't organized her enlightenment as firmly as Elisha, it was certain that Iris had also made her own achievements.
Though delusions still clung to her like impurities… it was unavoidable.
To be reborn as a higher, better being, one must overcome a wall, and that wall stems from the karma one has built up until now.
Just as I, who used to only do what was certain, reached out to the impossible for the first time and rose to become an intermediate magician.
Iris, too, would only be able to truly complete her current magic after overcoming her numerous failures and frustrations in the truest sense.
And perhaps she might even reach the realm of an Archmage that she so desired.
The magic Iris had partially realized was of that high a level.
…Is it because my own level has risen? It might be because of the Dragon Heart. I feel like my eyes for discerning such things have improved quite a bit.
Even though I can't see the path to becoming an Archmage myself.
Well. Usually, these problems are difficult for oneself but seem like nothing to others.
I chuckled inwardly and dispersed the mana I had gathered just in case.
It didn't seem like I needed to step in.
In fact, it wasn't long before Elisha and Iris succeeded in clearing out all those golems and monsters.
Though they ended up slumped over from mana exhaustion as a result.
Tucking the two limp girls under my arms, I shouted grandly.
“Our battle is just beginning!”
It was true.
We hadn't even entered the workshop yet.