The Golem Mage

Right now, the only battle left was Alec’s clash with Roderic, who still had Serena Marq backing him up.

“I never expected your team to be such a wild horse. I have to say, you’ve all surprised me greatly,” Roderic said, raising his sword to face Alec again, with his gun steady in his left hand.

Not too far behind him, Serena kept flinging rune scrolls across the space like she was laying down a defensive perimeter, tightening their zone so they wouldn’t be attacked from every angle, and forcing any pressure to come one wave at a time.

Alec watched all of this without rushing forward. Behind him, the black smoke had deepened, no longer a dull grey but something heavier—something alive.

To the low-rank mages in the stands watching, staring into it felt like they were staring into a beast with too many faces, the shapes in the smoke kept changing and overlapping.

One moment, it looked like a furious wolf, the next, a grotesque bat, and then a drake-like monster, looming and half-formed.

Only the low-rank mages were truly affected, due to their weaker mental strength, it made the illusion bite deeper into them, stealing their courage for a few heartbeats.

Mid-rank mages could still feel the presence behind it, and the pressure pushing at their senses, but it wasn’t enough to force the fear of the beast images into their minds.

“Let’s just end this,” Alec said, bringing his hands together as if he was drawing the outline of a tachi diagram in midair as his two flames followed the outline of his hands, his right arm burned with deep crimson fire, flames that went from his knuckles up to his elbow like living blood.

While on his left arm was the black fire, dense and silent, where it burned, the air thinned and bent inward.

Though the flames blazed around his hands, but Alec didn’t look uncomfortable in the slightest, if anything, it looked natural, especially as the wolf tattoo on his left arm began to glow brighter where the black fire clung to his skin.

“No problem then. Let’s end this,” Roderic replied, and his sword brightened with the runic symbols along the blade lighting up one after another.

“Binding patterns ready,” Serena said.

The moment they declared it Alec realised that they were ready for him, as he bent low and exploded forward, with his speed so sharp that it took Roderic a heartbeat to track him, only to realize Alec was already inside striking range, with his right fist driving forward.

The crimson flames roared as the punch came in, Alec didn’t look like he cared that he was charging straight into the rune-scroll array Serena had laid down, he wore a grin the whole way, like he was daring the trap to work.

Roderic was caught off guard for only a fraction of a second before he forced himself to calm, as he raised his sword in his right hand, angling the tip downward, and braced the flat with his left forearm, setting the guard just in time to meet the blow.

Bang!

The impact was brutal on him, steel rang like a bell as Alec’s flaming fist slammed into the glowing runes wrapped around the blade. Alec’s flames weren’t just coating his hands, each strike carried the same weight as a Flaming Fist spell itself, like he’d engraved the spell’s runes into his mind while attacking and in turn transformed his body into the catalyst.

The shockwave burst outward, cracking the floor beneath Roderic’s boots and forcing him back a full step, as the heat poured over him, biting even through Serena’s layered enchantments; he’d managed to stop the first punch, but it only sharpened Alec’s focus.

As Alec didn’t pause with one punch, his left fist followed immediately.

Unlike the crimson fire, the black flames on his left hand made no sound, they swallowed light as they moved, and when Alec swung, it looked like his hand was tugging at the fabric of space itself, pulling the air inward around his knuckles.

Alec’s left fist had been a sure hit, but at the last moment, Roderic reacted again and barely evaded the punch in time for it to braze past his cheek.

Alec’s eyes flared with a faint blue hue as he activated his Mana Eyes to understand what was going on, and immediately he saw it, there was a thin blue rope anchored to Roderic’s back, stretching all the way to Serena.

‘So that was it.’ Alec thought as he realized that link had to do with the reason why Roderic kept reacting at the last possible instant.

Still, it didn’t bother Alec much, as he was confident that if he kept pushing faster than Serena could adjust, the link would eventually snap under pressure.

[> Mid Tier Seal — Pin Lock