The Golem Mage

Chapter 851: Completing The Second Level 2.

Out of its speed state, the Golden Lion King’s body was fully exposed, as Alec stood poised, both hands gripping his Changdao, and the moment the beast emerged, he thrust the blade forward, aiming straight for its skull.

Caught off guard, the blade pierced deep, but not completely due to the Overlord beast defence, the Overlord’s eyes widened with fear as it began to claw and bite at Alec in a desperate attempt to retreat, hoping to dislodge the blade.

But the weapon, already impaled in its head, was greedily absorbing its blood, weakening the beast and clouding its judgment.

With every drop drained, the force behind the blade intensified.

Alec released his left hand from the hilt, summoning his bone katana and driving it into the creature’s neck, he maintained steady eye contact as the beast gasped its final breaths, one blade devouring its bone structure from below, the other draining its life essence from above.

Its efforts to re-enter speed mode failed repeatedly; Al because Hunter stood nearby, casting magic nullification to prevent any escape, the lion was completely countered—helpless, and eliminated with ruthless precision.

The moment its spiritual essence vanished, and the remaining three Overlords sensed its death, though they were still locked in battle, they wasted no time fleeing for their lives, none willing to suffer the same fate.

The first to escape was the Winged Falcon Queen, but she was swiftly pursued by Magnito and Legion, as Alec had made it his mission to purge the forest of the old overlords and restore balance before he starts entering the third level of the Beast forest, as he was paving way for four new Overlords to rise.

As for the Ice Serpentine Lord, it failed to slip away unnoticed. Titan, still in his base human form, conjured an ice skateboard beneath his feet and gave chase, as he had already marked the serpent as his prey.

The Shadow Wolf Alpha overlord wasn’t stopped by golems, but by Alec’s own shadow wolf, which had grown from being a low-rank omega, it had long expressed the desire to challenge another potential alpha of its kind and now, it finally had its chance.

Now in the Beta rank and firmly within the Tier 6 realm, Alec’s shadow wolf had grown more powerful than any shadow wolf of he same realm due to the system’s help, though the strongest wolf in a pack is traditionally called an alpha, but the true Alpha rank and its evolutionary benefits starts at the Tier 7 realm where they awaken alpha rank skills and spells.

The current Overlord wolf was merely a potential alpha—an aspirant—and there’s an old saying: two alphas cannot coexist.

So Alec had no intention of intervening, he let his shadow wolf handle it alone, knowing that if it could defeat when devouring the Overlord’s beast soul, it would gain a significant chance at refining the mid-rank beast quite easily as it was responsible for its death.

The moment Alec gave permission, the wolf was overjoyed, the tattoo on Alec’s back, which represented the shadow wolf, began to shift and writhe—then, in a burst of dark energy, the beast leapt forth from Alec’s back and as it landed, it expanded to its full size.

With black mist swirled beneath its feet as its soul form slowly fused with physical matter, though both wolves shared the same bloodline, but Alec immediately sensed that his shadow wolf’s lineage felt purer, likely due to its continual absorption of other wolves’ souls.

By draining their essence, it had gradually refined its bloodline, strengthening itself and fuelling its progression to higher realms, this was why, despite being of the same species, noticeable differences appeared in their forms.

“Don’t worry. Go make sure the others don’t survive. Midnight and I will handle this,” Alec said to his golems.

As they quickly split up, heading in pursuit of the Ice Serpentine Lord and the Winged Falcon Queen.

Once alone, Alec took a moment to compare the two wolves, though they stood at equal height, his shadow wolf’s fur was much darker- sleek, pitch black, almost as if a swirling black hole was embedded in its hide, constantly drawing in the surrounding light.

That was the impression one would get upon staring at it too long, its fur so dark and consuming it seemed unreal.

On top of that, grey flame-like wisps flickered above its claws, unlike the Overlord alpha, and it radiated a distinct aura of bloodline suppression that bore down on its opponent.

Realizing it had no way to escape, the Overlord shadow wolf lunged at Alec’s shadow wolf, and the clash began, as they darted across the terrain, black lines swirling in their wake, dark bombs erupting at intervals, but as the battle progressed, the Overlord wolf began to understand a painful truth: the creature before it not only had stronger defence but outclassed it in nearly every skill.

It had always believed itself the pinnacle of its race, having easily dispatched any other shadow wolf which had challenged it for its position as the overlord, but now it was the one being overwhelmed, and every cunning tactic it attempted failed—nothing could give it an edge.

And as it got desperate, it detonated a dark bomb against the ground to blind Alec’s soul shadow wolf, then attempted a surprise attack from behind, but when its claws dug into the shadow wolf’s form, it didn’t feel flesh, It hadn’t felt the satisfying resistance of flesh, only the eerie sensation of its claws passing through nothing.

Moments later, dark lances materialized around the soul shadow wolf it had attacked and pierced through its body, which began to fade as it was attacked revealing it to be a shadow doppelganger, deployed during the dark bomb’s cover to mislead the soul shadow wolf.

This wasn’t even the real attack, as the Overlord’s true body emerged from the front, swiping at the wolf’s neck with fierce precision, but just as it launched the strike, a chilling presence appeared behind it.

It never even got the chance to turn.

As the real soul shadow wolf materialized silently and unleashed a dark Qi-infused slash that cleaved cleanly through the Overlord’s neck, ending the battle in an instant.

Even in death, it struggled to believe how easily it had been fooled, all this time, it had assumed Alec’s summoned wolf lacked intelligence, thinking it was nothing more than a created being with no deep beast instincts, it had used the smokescreen to toy with what it thought was a lesser foe, only to realize too late it had been outplayed at every step.

It had used the smokescreen to play around, sending a shadow doppelganger with about fifty percent of its power to launch a surprise attack from behind, expecting the soul shadow wolf to be distracted, that way, its real body could deliver the critical and final strike unnoticed.

But it never suspected it was being lured into a trap, overestimating its cleverness, the soul shadow wolf had cast its own shadow clone spell and hidden within the very smoke the Overlord created, waiting patiently for the real body to appear before delivering the true killing blow.

Ironically, the very spell the Overlord cast had paved the way for its death, the soul shadow wolf had clearly been learning from humans, and the Overlord’s simplistic trickery was no match for its growing cunning.

Once the battle ended, the dark mist around the soul shadow wolf swirled back into Alec’s back, reforming into the wolf tattoo.

[> Midnight has leveled up.]

And not just Midnight, Alec began receiving notifications from all his golems, confirming that the other two Overlord beasts had also been eliminated, that was when Alec heard scuffling behind him and turned.

“We’ve come to help, Alec!” someone shouted loudly.

Recognizing the voices, Alec eased his stance slightly.

But when Arthur and the others reached the clearing and saw the battlefield littered with the remains of fallen beasts—still slowly being absorbed by the reshaping forest, they realized they might not have been needed after all.