Above the boundless sea of magma on the Purgatory Sulfur Plane.
Benjamin stood suspended in the air, a faint halo surrounding him.
He raised his right hand. A newly forged crystal rested in his palm, its structure far more complex and precise than those from his Level 2 days, glowing with dim blue runic light.
This was the prototype of a Level 3 Rune Artifact he had developed by combining a Level 3 Wizard's elemental control with a deeper understanding of the Spirit Energy Law.
He locked onto an empty stretch of sky far in the distance, and a thought stirred.
Whoosh!
An intensely condensed, blazing white sphere no larger than a fist shot from the crystal's tip. It silently tore through the dark-red sky stained by sulfurous smoke, moving faster than the eye could follow.
Several seconds later, at the edge of his vision, the blazing white sphere suddenly expanded!
That patch of sky seemed to be viciously clenched by an invisible giant hand, twisting the surrounding atmosphere.
Then, a terrifying halo over a hundred kilometers in diameter erupted, as though a miniature sun had been forcibly created above the plane's heavens—one that would exist only briefly!
Extreme light and heat burst forth in an instant, bleaching the vast magma sea below white.
Only afterward came the delayed roar, as though it would rip souls apart!
A visible circular shockwave spread frantically in every direction from the halo!
Wherever the shockwave passed, it tore open a massive vacuum zone in the sky, completely vaporizing and clearing away the sulfur clouds.
The once calmly flowing magma sea below was forcibly pressed into a huge depression by the terrifying pressure descending from above. Dark-red lava waves hundreds of meters high rose around its edges and surged outward, crashing against the surroundings