Chapter 1561: The General Locks In!
’Did he deflect Uyuniya’s attack to me?’ Sila had thought after being sent flying by the blow. He’d crossed quite a large distance before plummeting to the ground.
The attack had left a ghastly hole in him, but it wasn’t the hardest thing to recover from.
Part of the make-up of Sila’s body composed of the flesh of a beast that had super regenerative abilities. That much would have been enough to keep him from dying to Uyuniya’s blow, but the regenerative ability had evolved when the Stolen Angel’s body was mixed with his consciousness, and when Serenity had used it as a vessel temporarily.
Now, Sila could hasten and refine the healing process by rallying Null Life Essence into the damaged parts. Even if he couldn’t quite do this on his own, however, his entire body spotted Null Life Essence anyway. It reacted automatically, reinforcing his healing effectiveness and speed.
Thus, the Tower General had risen, ready to get back to the battle almost immediately.
However...
BOOM!
An enemy seemed to drop from the sky and land right in front of Sila. It didn’t wait for him to get a good look and rationalise its sudden appearance, though. The Tower General cursed and leaped up high into the sky before a sharp, humming ray of dark red energy blasted laterally against him.
’What in the world?’
Sila barely managed to avoid it. He spun in midair after it passed and landed upside down, on his hand, surveying the enemy.
’It’s different from the others.’ Like Uyuniya, he was able to tell at once.
The creature was indeed a giant skeleton with old, scarlet armour, but it looked a lot more threatening with all the dense tendrils of Undeath flowing out of it. Its helm was...odd. It looked like a scarlet pot without any grooves or seams covering the creature’s head entirely... save for one large circular opening in the middle.
This was where the jet of concentrated Undeath had spawned from.
The creature immediately charged at Sila, the energy around its body sharpening. It looked to be the equivalent of a Form User, given its choice to attack empty-handed.
Sila didn’t shy away from the challenge. Fighting Rias with Uyuniya hadn’t allowed him to completely indulge in his selfish desire to go all out with his Form Using techniques, but now was his chance. Besides, he had a skill he had yet to use. Kintar would likely complain if he didn’t try it at least once.
[Tamed Knuckle: Charged Frenzy]!
When Sila met the odd creature, he went for a tackle, hugged the creature’s waist, and power-bombed it into the ground. It retaliated at once upon hitting the dirt.
Clutching both sides of Sila’s head, the undead monster brought the General’s face close and released another jet of Undeath energy.
...!!!
Sila had mobilised Null Life Essence to guard himself from the front, but to his surprise, the humming beam wound around him, hitting sharp angle after sharp angle until it struck Sila’s back.
A furious explosion rocked the Tower General. It was almost as potent as Uyuniya’s blow with Void Clot. As one could expect, it violently ripped apart his torso from the back.
...But not before Sila activated [Tamed Knuckle: Charged Frenzy] and dropped his fist at the Undead monster’s face with a vengeance.
A concentrated shockwave warped again and again through the enemy and the ground, flush with traces of excess vermillion quality mana. The ground split off in recurring rings, as though several giant steel rings of different sizes had been pushed onto Aigas and pulled to extract circular rings of dirt.
As simple as it seemed, the skill was powerful. It essentially turned each one of Sila’s attacks into unblockable shockwaves that ignored the opponent’s defences. They struck the inner, vulnerable elements within the opponent instead of their armour, growing stronger with the distance they were forced to travel.
Sila had seriously debated using this skill when Rias and Uyuniya were close. It worked so fast and was so potent that it would target anyone near the epicentre of his strikes. Repeated use stacked the effects to no end too and he had yet to find if it had a ceiling.
...But none of this actually mattered, it seemed.
The undead monster was completely unharmed.
...!!!
Sila scowled. The undead enemy whipped out its hand and caught him by the neck. It then clutched his wrist, pulled, and suddenly, the two had traded positions. A flash of red shone within the hole in the undead monster’s helm once more. It took a full three seconds to charge while Sila struggled. He recognised then that the beam could be adjusted. If it could already damage him severely when it was casually sent forth with barely any charge time...
’This is...needlessly troublesome!’ Sila thought. He grabbed ahold of the creature’s neck as well, just as it finished charging its beam. ’We should have known that kid is actually pretty smart. It’s not just him who’s immune to mana related attacks now. Everything produced by that twisted deer in the sky is also immune.’
And indeed. This was why his skill had failed just now.
The deer head had been engulfed in flame before it spat out a new body for Rias. That had been the sign of its evolution.
...But Rias wasn’t the only one capable of evolution.
Sila’s yellow eyes shone with a mesmerising glow as he made contact with the undead monster’s spine. Fractions of time infinitely too small for the average living being to define barely passed before the Tower General did... the impossible.
His two eyes crossed the distance between them and merged in front of his face to become one large eye!
Null Life Essence gathered within the eye, condensed and fired just as the Undead monster Sila was fighting let its own beam rip towards his face.
The clash of classic beams was stupendous. The hard crust of dirt, the air, the mana and even space was rent by the impact. Their forces crashed outward in a super shockwave, but they were in no way equal.
Skullius had explained to the Tower General that indeed, Null Life Essence was stronger than Undeath energy, as was Voided Death. Thus, there was no need to fear in a contest where both were condensed and harnessed in a similar fashion.
...And Sila had just created a scenario like this.
With his eyes – Dellan’s eyes – he copied the physique of the Death Knight and inherited its ability to fire off energy from the eye socket bordered by its helm. This ability wasn’t inherently an Undeath ability, of course. It was the ability of whatever creature was initiated into the realm of Liches in a life prior.
And thus...
WAAAA!
The Undead monster was sent flying off following the beam struggle, its helm melted off from the condensed flash of power. The blast Sila had just released was no weaker than a Triplefold standard Aggrante!
As it wasn’t enough to destroy the enemy, though, Sila grinned and prepared to go all out with all his new abilities.
Yes, his body had been the Stolen Angel.
Yes, he had unique eyes that had once belonged to a guardian of the Tremur Forest.
But beyond all that, he was Serenity’s Free Marauder. What exactly did that mean?
Well, the answer to that was tied heavily into the reserves of Null EXP Sila possessed. The Tower General decided to have some fun... with the Null Verse’s variety.