Cero Doble

Boom!!!

The tremendous explosion was deafening. By now, Wien had made his third pass through the Ceros of more than twenty Hollows, and the Mutant Hollow had lost his bet.

"Tch, he really is a cockroach that just won't die." Kaslanine, the Mutant Hollow, looked displeased. Although Niji might not win his bet either, Kaslanine had already lost his chance to gain seven more Gillians. It seemed he had fallen another step behind Niji.

"Hahaha, don't be angry, Kaslanine." Niji, the serpent-man Adjuchas, laughed out loud. Though he was trying to console him, there was nothing sincere in his laughter. "It was just a little wager, nothing serious."

"Hmph, I may be out of the running, but you haven't necessarily won either." Kaslanine sneered. The bone spurs behind him began to sway, and the Gillians he had summoned onto the field immediately let out a chorus of shrieks. All their dark red Ceros were promptly aimed in Wien's direction.

"Hey, hey, Kaslanine, we agreed not to interfere." Sensing something amiss with the Gillians opposite him, the serpent-man Adjuchas's expression darkened.

"Hmph, he's just a bug. Let me kill him, and I'll give you three Gillians." His actions exposed, Kaslanine no longer bothered to hide them. The bone spurs behind him swayed much faster, and the dozen or so Gillians all turned their attention to Wien at once.

"Wasn't it seven?" The serpent-man Hollow shook his head helplessly. He and Kaslanine had been at odds for decades and had known each other for quite some time. But neither of them was particularly strong, so they had remained in the Forest of Menos, slowly increasing their Spiritual Power by devouring Gillians. Though slow, the method was very safe.

In fact, as rivals for more than a decade, both of them wanted to devour the other completely. That would allow at least one of them to rise a rank in an instant.

If one of them was lucky enough to leap straight into the ranks of intermediate Adjuchas, he would have the ability to protect himself and venture into the Inner Circle.

But the balance that had lasted for more than ten years had left both Hollows somewhat restless. That was why they were being so particular over this seemingly insignificant wager.

"A bet's a bet. What, you broke the rules and still want to go back on your word?"

"Cut the crap and let me squash this bug first!" Niji's words deepened the malice in Kaslanine's eyes.

The bone spurs behind him swept forcefully through the air, sending out an invisible ripple. The Gillians under Kaslanine's control all opened their enormous mouths at once, and dark red Ceros rapidly gathered before them.

"Tch, what a sore-loser piece of trash," Niji muttered. "Sooner or later, I'm going to... Huh? Hey! Where are you aiming?!"

Hum!

With a hum, more than a dozen Ceros fired at once, their target none other than Wien. But Wien had made ample preparations while waiting for this attack. The moment the ten Ceros opposite him took aim, he had already leaped high into the air and adjusted his position. The place Wien leaped from was atop a Gillian controlled by Niji, the serpent-man Hollow, and the line of attack to that position included Niji himself.

With his foot planted on the Gillian's chest, Wien swiftly activated Shadowless Strike. A second before the Ceros struck him, Wien flashed away. The dozen or so Ceros instantly swallowed the unfortunate Gillian, then sped toward Niji in the distance.

Hum!

Another muffled sound rang out, and a far larger Cero shot forth in front of Niji. He had made his move. If he had waited any longer, the aftershocks of those dozen or so attacks would surely have killed him.

A violent explosion rang out once more. Wien did not wait, instead darting into the group of Gillians on Kaslanine's side at top speed and beginning his slaughter. After four rounds of Ceros, all the Gillians had depleted their Spiritual Power to some extent, and they were much slower to gather Ceros again. That was what gave Wien his opening.

Arriving at the feet of the enormous Gillians, Wien sent lightning flashing from his Blade Claws. Using Lightning Strike together with Shadowless Strike, he darted between the feet of more than a dozen Gillians. He did not intend to kill them, but to sever their tendons immediately and rob them of their ability to move. And his reason for doing so...

"Kas... lanine!!"

As the dust kicked up by the Cero explosions settled, Niji, the serpent-man Hollow, burst out of it. Though the dozen or so Ceros had not injured him directly, they had cost him an enormous amount of Spiritual Power. Despite the difference in their ranks, it had been the impact of more than a dozen Ceros, and Niji had barely managed to withstand the attack by using sixty percent of his Spiritual Power.

"Kaslanine! I'll kill you!" The sudden attack had enraged the serpent-man Hollow. His tail swayed at great speed as he charged straight at Kaslanine, the Mutant Hollow.

"Niji! That was an accident!" Seeing Niji rush at him in a fury, Kaslanine could not help retreating a few steps.

Though the gap between their Spiritual Pressures was not great, in terms of fighting ability, he was still somewhat inferior to Kaslanine. If he fought Niji to the death now, he might not die, but he would inevitably be injured.

No one knew whether a death match between them would attract other Adjuchas. One careless move could lead to both their deaths, and that was not the outcome he wanted.

"That bug deliberately lured the attacks over to you!" Kaslanine argued in his own defense. His words made Niji, who was charging toward him at great speed, pause and instinctively look at Wien among the Gillians.

"My lord!" Sensing the gazes of both Adjuchas, Wien spoke up at once. "Lord Niji, quickly, order our Gillians to attack the ones on the other side! This is the best chance to get rid of them!"

"Hm?" Niji had not considered that, but he did possess Intelligence. Though his level of development was not among the highest, after a few seconds he understood the meaning behind the words of this low-ranking nobody.

"That's right. Why didn't I think of that?" Realization dawned on Niji, and he immediately ordered his Gillians to gather Ceros. Taking advantage of the moment when the opposing Gillians had spent their strength and had yet to recover, he sent more than a dozen Ceros sweeping straight toward them. A series of crashes followed as they fell. In a single attack, Kaslanine's Gillians were almost completely wiped out, and the two or three that remained were no longer much of a threat.

"Hahahahaha!" Seeing the situation on the field change so drastically, Niji could not help bursting into laughter. "Kaslanine, you brought this on yourself. Hmph, we've been fighting in secret for more than ten years. It's time to settle this!"

"Niji, what are you going to do?!" Kaslanine shouted, somewhat afraid. He was not cut out for fighting in the first place. Now that he was outnumbered, how could he not be afraid?

"What am I going to do? Kill you, of course! That way, maybe my Spiritual Power will break through from the lower rank to the intermediate rank in one go! Hahahahaha!"

Niji laughed wildly as he closed in on Kaslanine. At the same time, the Gillians behind him stirred and began walking toward Kaslanine.

"Niji, you want to kill me?" Kaslanine was so furious that he laughed instead. "Hmph, do you dare kill me? Don't forget, I have that lord backing me!"

"That lord?" The one who spoke was Wien. He had already left the area affected by the fighting, concealed his Spiritual Pressure, and hidden beside the Gillian he had been pursuing all along—the big fellow who had just been one of Niji's Gillians.

"Could the ruler of the Forest of Menos be nearby? I wonder what rank that lord he mentioned is."

"So what?" Niji said, neither alarmed nor angry. "Once I devour you, I'll be a hair's breadth from reaching the intermediate rank. Then I'll flee to the Inner Circle. No matter how capable he is, could he possibly teleport to the same area as me? Besides, would the Lord of the Forest North really hunt me down, safe and sound as he is, for a piece of trash like you? Hahahahaha! Be a good boy and become part of my Spiritual Power!"

With that, Niji whipped his tail and charged straight at Kaslanine.

"Niji, don't you dare!" Kaslanine roared, and a Cero as wide as an arm burst toward Niji.

At the same time, Niji commanded the Gillians not far behind him to fire their Ceros again, steadily draining Kaslanine's Spiritual Power. Then he charged out himself, and the two Adjuchas-class Menos Grandes clashed in an instant.

"Good opportunity." Seeing this, Wien smiled faintly, tapped his toes against the ground, and shot forward. Of course, he was not going to join the battle between the Pseudo-Adjuchas Menos Grandes.

With his current fighting ability, he would be lucky to withstand even one attack, and only if the opposing Pseudo-Adjuchas Menos Grande did not use his full strength.

What he was actually going to do was head for the fallen Gillians. This was a perfect chance to remove their masks. Although the two Adjuchas-class Menos Grandes would sense what he was doing, they had no time to pay attention to him now.

On one side was Kaslanine. Though he hated Wien, he had no chance to spare him a thought. And what about Niji, the serpent-man Hollow? Which mattered more, losing the Spiritual Power of a few Gillians or the Pseudo-Adjuchas-class supplement before him? You could figure that out with your toes—though as a serpent-man Hollow, he might not have any.

Besides, it was Wien's shout just now that had made his present feat possible, so he turned a blind eye and let the low-ranking ant benefit. In any case, the ant could not consume that much Reishi. Even if he advanced to Gillian now, what of it? So Niji paid it no mind.

What neither Pseudo-Adjuchas Menos Grande expected, however, was that after collecting more than a dozen masks, Wien tossed only a tiny piece into his own mouth. He stuffed all the rest into the mouth of a Gillian still alive on the other side.

"Woo woo woo woo... Awooo..." The big fellow Wien was feeding let out an excited shriek. The influx of so much Reishi elevated his Spiritual Power once again when he had already been close to advancing.

The next second, his enormous body gave off a faint glow, a sign that he was about to advance. When the glow turned bright and clear and formed a protective cocoon of light around the Gillian, that would be the moment he advanced.

"Tch..." Wien clicked his tongue. "Still a little short?" After some thought, Wien turned his gaze to the surviving Gillians. "Forget it, I'll take care of it all at once." After thinking it over, Wien leaped high into the air and attacked the Gillians that were still under control.

With a single Shadowless Strike, Wien flashed onto a Gillian's shoulder. He casually unleashed Shatter Slash, and a huge head flew into the air. The second and third followed immediately afterward.

When Niji noticed that the Hollow beasts he controlled were growing fewer and fewer, he looked back and discovered that hardly any of the Gillians behind him remained. This infuriated him. But killing Kaslanine was still the most urgent matter, so despite his losses, Niji commanded the last few Gillians to launch one final attack at Kaslanine.

In battles between Pseudo-Adjuchas, both sides rarely used all their strength in a short time. But once a fight to the death began, both sides would expend most of their Spiritual Power in an instant, at an extremely rapid rate. That made the final Ceros of the five remaining Gillians the last straw for Kaslanine. Five dark red Ceros broke through his defenses in an instant and struck him head-on. Kaslanine realized the danger he was in, and the bone spurs behind him swayed repeatedly. Using all his Spiritual Power, he disrupted Niji's final, fatal Cero, sending it off course and past his mask.

Boom...

The tremendous explosion rumbled on. Gravely wounded, Kaslanine had no choice but to flee. Before leaving, he cast a venomous glance at Wien not far away and fired a Cero, much thinner than before, straight at him. It was the last of his strength.

However, an enemy's final counterattack was often the most dangerous.

Was Wien strong? He was, nearly invincible among those of the same rank. But before a Pseudo-Adjuchas Menos Grande, Wien was essentially no different from those Gillians: they were all playthings.

The absolute disparity in rank and power made it impossible for Wien to withstand this Cero head-on. But he had no choice but to take it, because he was now on the shoulder of the big fellow he had been tracking, feeding him the last batch of Gillian masks. If he dodged, the sudden Cero could very well blow apart the head of the Gillian he had been following.

But if he did not dodge, he was even more likely to be reduced to ashes by the Cero.

At full strength, Wien was absolutely confident he could withstand the blow. But from the start of the battle, he had been expending his strength without restraint. After using Shadowless Strike and Shatter Slash one after another, Wien had long since depleted most of his Spiritual Power, leaving him unable to fight back against this sudden attack.

"Tch... After all my calculations, I didn't account for this?" Wien was somewhat annoyed. The attack looked flashy but insubstantial, yet as an Adjuchas's final counterattack, the Spiritual Pressure it stirred up was more than three times stronger than an ordinary Gillian's. Wien did not dare take it head-on.

"Alas... All that effort wasted." With a silent sigh, Wien flashed away with Shadowless Strike Flash. In the face of absolute power, he chose to save himself.

Even though that would waste nearly a year of effort, if he lost his life, he would not even have another chance to try.

Casting a reluctant glance at the Gillian who was about to be hit, Wien shook his head and prepared to flee at once.

However, a second before he left, the Gillian opened his enormous mouth and swallowed the oncoming Cero whole. Immediately afterward, his Spiritual Pressure soared, and a surge of even stronger Spiritual Pressure shot from his mouth in a dazzling pink light. It headed straight for Kaslanine, catching Niji in its path as well.

"That's... Cero Doble? Nel? It's Nel! Not Yammy! Hahaha! It's Nel! I bet right!"

Cero Doble was one of Nel's distinctive abilities and a Cero skill exclusive to her. She swallowed an enemy's Cero, fused it with her own Spiritual Power, and returned it to the enemy at double its original power, dealing greater damage.

Seeing this, Wien's voice grew excited. After such a long journey, Wien's pursuit had not been in vain after all.

But in the blink of an eye, Wien's expression grew grave. Not far away were two Adjuchas they had just offended. If he had tried to protect the unconscious Nel from the two Pseudo-Adjuchas Menos Grandes earlier, it would have been manageable. But now, Nel had fired a Cero Doble straight at Kaslanine and caught Niji, who had his back to her, in its path as well. After such an openly provocative act, Wien would probably struggle greatly just to protect himself, let alone Nel.

However... the facts showed Wien that he had been overthinking things.

When the pink light vanished, the two Adjuchas had vanished as well. It was not that Nel's Cero Doble had killed both Pseudo-Adjuchas Menos Grandes, but that they had both used Sonído to escape before the Cero hit them directly.

Kaslanine was at the end of his strength. If he did not run now, it really would be too late.

And when Niji had to choose between his prey and the dignity an ant had damaged, he chose the former. If he let Kaslanine go now, his losses this time would be far from insignificant.

And so, the two Pseudo-Adjuchas Menos Grandes inexplicably left just like that, leaving Wien utterly bewildered, even though it all seemed reasonable enough.