Both sides were smart.
With Lion-Tiger Wounding liable to pounce from the smoke mere inches away at any moment, there was no need to keep playing tricks.
Even so, after each backing away three steps, they still stared fixedly at each other's hands and feet.
They made sure the dissolution and storage speeds of the Totem Armor on their bodies remained synchronized, with an error of no more than half a second or a millimeter.
"Jackal" Kanus shed the liquid-metal-like substance from one claw.
Meng Chao revealed one finger.
Meng Chao's left knee was completely exposed to the air.
"Jackal" Kanus revealed the joint of his left leg.
Thus, it took the two of them a full half minute to complete the armor storage that normally took only seconds, revealing their truest faces to each other.
This was Meng Chao's first time observing the future Doomsday Demon Wolf from such close range.
At this moment, "Jackal" Kanus was not yet the man who would rally the Chaos Faction, command the Turan armies, and stab the Holy Light Faction's heart, liver, spleen, lungs, and kidneys full of holes.
Naturally, he was not yet the figure from the fragments of Meng Chao's memories of his past life—the one in propaganda materials with a majestic beard, a face crisscrossed by scars, eyes sharp enough to tear apart an Armored Airship, an aura shooting into the clouds as though his fangs could pierce the heavens.
The Wolf King who had yet to rise possessed a face utterly unlike his later self, and utterly unlike his own ambitions—a face that could be called "refined" and "sincere."
Rather than an ambitious Wolf King, he looked more like a loyal, hardworking big dog.
Presumably, this highly deceptive face was one of the key reasons the Lion King