Chapter 23
As Ruel stared at the reborn Edari, the information he had about her crossed his mind.
She was an ancient beast not fully suited for combat—at most, she would have served as a powerful support with her skills.
Most of her skills revolved around weakening or strengthening and these skills especially stood out when Edari was in her domain.
Fortunately for Ruel, this was merely the place where Edari had been sealed for centuries—she had never fully claimed it as her domain.
One thing had allowed this beast to last so long against Ruel: the blessings Nocten had bestowed on her back when he was a god.
Those blessings evolved her to what was a Sun Qilin, granting her abilities like Ruel's boost under the sun or even improving abilities like Fractured Reflection.
Normally, this would have been something to worry about, but after exhausting Edari's one time use reborn skill, Ruel was taking the stage.
Edari was smaller now, with reduced mana quantity and quality, but she had gained agility in return.
But Ruel, a skilled scout, was also agile.
The tension between them was thick—the silence before the inevitable storm.
Edari dashed forward, radiant and wild, flames trailing behind her like a comet.
Ruel reinforced his limbs with mana and barely ducked under the sweeping swipe of her horn.
The horn, coated with an aura of hot mana, left a disturbing heat.
Edari didn't stop and pivoted with that motion, using her flame wretched tail to crush him.
However, the heat, which should have disoriented Ruel, did little to faze him, giving him the chance to bounce back and block with his sword.
Still, his hand ached under the surprising pressure as he slid back a few meters.
'Calm down, Ruel. Don't let fear stop you.'
Reinforcing his thoughts, Ruel channeled Cold Touch through his sword, the silver blade freezing slightly.
He darted towards Edari, a misty trail left in his wake.
He swung his sword diagonally upwards, clashing with a golden horn with a loud clap.
Prepared, he tried increasing the gravity specifically on Edari and moved his leg to land a kick on her.
A solid kick that dented the Qilin's dragon-like scales, but Ruel also felt his bone ache.
'Damn! Nocten was right—a blade is the best thing to use.'
As Ruel tried to adapt to the pain, Edari seized the moment to launch another attack.
She opened her mouth and released a sonic attack.
Golden sound waves enveloped the center of the cavern.
Ruel expected a whole lot more damage from this, but it didn't affect him as much as he thought.
The realization brought a smile to his face—one that vanished immediately as an alarming light covered his sight.
Ruel was too slow to react to this. Thankfully, he still had Muriel, who was prepared for this, to intercept the bullet.
'I see why Nocten was worried about this skill now,' he thought with a grit of his teeth.
Now positioned at a distance, Edari's horn acted like a cannon, firing bullets of sun.
Despite their power—particularly in the day—they didn't consume much mana. This was due to Edari's expertise in controlling this ability—her signature ability.
'This was going to be painful.'
How the fight went after this depended on how Ruel handled this.
Wearing an expressionless look, Muriel launched as much sun arrow as possible to intercept the sun bullets.
Although some were intercepted, the sheer number of bullets remained alarming.
Ruel's focus peaked. His senses strained to detect each bullet, and his body pushed itself to keep up with his perception.
As the bullets reached, he moved with awkward motions trying his best to dodge.
He tried to run, tried to jump, tried bending which was a stupid move, leaving him exposed to the following attacks.
"Face it head on." Nocten was forced to interfere.
Ruel's concentration was disturbed, thankfully, his body reacted on its own and slashed at a bullet that came for him.
With an exhale, he did as Nocten said and faced the bullets head on.
Ruel did something drastic—he began taking some bullets head-on so he would have a better chance to react to others.
His pain resistance also helped him a lot, giving him the opportunity to cope well.
By the time a few minutes of this stalemate passed, Muriel had left the battle due to low mana.
Her light, once a guiding star behind him, now flickered no more.
Similarly, Edari was low on mana.
Ruel patiently waited for an opportunity to open up, and when it did, he instantly closed in on Edari.
His focus was still heightened and his body almost moved on instincts as he wielded his frozen sword.
Activating one of his Rare-ranked longsword's effects, he unleashed feints that caught the weakening Edari off guard, giving paths for slashes to hit.
Then after three successful slashes, the longersword's second effect turned the blade hot.
But Ruel's cold touch weakened that effect, instead the longsword's surface was glistening with ice and the feints made of heated air mixed with cold mist.
Although hard, Ruel channeled his Cold Touch into the sword well.
The slashes Ruel left froze Edari's surface, reducing the effects of her healing.
As Ruel seemed to be getting stronger, Edari was weakening.
The Father of Ice moved with unwavering focus.
He appeared all around Edari, who forced out every ounce of power to try and counter.
Soon, the ice on her body had spread, linking with each other, making her body slow and cold.
Ruel's wounds bled freely. The aching could no longer be ignored—his movements slowed.
All around him was a cold ice that dwarfed the subtle heat Edari's horn and tail was emanating.
With a deep exhale, he intensified the surrounding gravity.
Edari fell to the ground, her legs weak to handle the weight.
Ruel stared down at Edari, meeting her calm, unflinching eyes—eyes that seemed to welcome death.
'You've suffered right? I hope I am ending your suffering.'
The thoughts crossed Ruel's mind as he calmly stabbed his sword into Edari's neck.
Edari died.
Her body slumped, the flames dimming, and silence fell over the cavern.