Vol 9. Chapter 36: Left Fist, High Damage; Right Fist, High Damage
Vol 9. Chapter 36: Left Fist, High Damage; Right Fist, High Damage
The Sky-Surge Shell slammed into Poseidon’s back. It caused brief paralysis and also inflicted moderate damage on him.
Immediately afterward, two figures slipped through a gap in the Raging Sea Prison and landed one after another beside Tiger.
“Master, are you alright?” Leon asked.
Tiger rolled the arm he’d just used to brace his blade in a block—only for that single strike from Poseidon to leave it numb from heavy injury. He shook his head.
“I’m fine. Just a bit pathetic-looking. If I were younger, I could actually trade a few moves with that thing.”
When Tiger was young, he still hadn’t reached the level where he could easily contend with Dragon King-class battle power. But with the right twists and pulls, it wasn’t impossible to fight.
It was just that he was old now, and his physical functions were far worse than before.
And what was more, after transplanting an alien dragon body, he was facing the same “mana shortage” problem Leon once had.
Even so, Tiger could still trade blows with the controlled Poseidon.
He could even fight for a while, take several heavy hits, and still stand up afterward to chat with an easy, relaxed air.
When it came to base stats, the old man was still in a league of his own.
“Father?... Is he being controlled by that Demon Eye?”
Claudia had naturally come together with Leon.
She stepped forward, her eyes full of worry as she looked at Poseidon. The expression on his face was wooden, his eyes dull and empty. All they could hear were low growls pouring out of his throat, like a beast.
“Demon Eye?”
Tiger frowned. “What is that?”
“Atos left more than just a shard of his Demon Sword here. He also left behind a Demon Eye.”
Leon explained.
“All this time, the Demon Eye never made any move at all, and we couldn’t find any trace of it. Until a few days ago, the three places where the Demon Sword Shard was being kept—Sky City, the Thunder Dragon Clan, and the academy—all experienced extremely similar environmental anomalies and energy fluctuations. But the Sea Dragon Clan doesn’t have a Demon Sword Shard, and yet something similar still happened here. So I’m guessing the Demon Eye has definitely shown itself on the Sea Dragon Clan’s side. And its activity triggered resonance in the Demon Sword Shards, which is what led to all those abnormal phenomena.”
After listening to Leon’s explanation, Tiger’s brows knotted tighter. He stared at Poseidon ahead and said in a low voice:
“Poseidon... Why did it pick Poseidon in particular?”
After trying and failing to communicate with Poseidon, Claudia gave up on persuasion as well. She picked up Tiger’s doubt and answered it instead.
“Because given the overall situation right now, taking down the Sea Dragon Clan is the most cost-effective option for that Demon Eye.”
Leon still hadn’t fully figured it out, so Tiger asked directly:
“Senior, why is this happening?”
“First, the Sea Dragon Clan is far from the continent, and far from most other dragon clans and races.”
Claudia continued:
“So if something happens here, it’s hard for others to notice right away. That gives the Demon Eye plenty of time to grow.”
“Second, based on the information Leon gathered during this investigation, when creatures infected by the Demon Eye bleed, that blood can spread through water currents, eroding the surrounding environment, and even turning it into something corrupted. And the Atlantis waters where the Sea Dragon Clan is located are the largest sea region on the Samael continent. If it corrodes this place first, then a large-scale transformation into the Void will be an outcome that’s almost impossible to avoid.”
As she spoke, Claudia pressed her lips tight, then slowly breathed out, adjusting her breathing before she continued:
“Finally, the Sea Dragon Clan’s foundations—you should all know this. Things that look like rare treasures to outsiders might just be tonics passed down from our ancestors to us. So if the Sea Dragon Clan falls, the Demon Eye will have abundant reserves as backup supplies.”
Claudia’s analysis was reasonable.
This wasn’t some “shoot first, draw later” situation—nor was it an after-the-fact, half-baked plan.
Before this, no one would have imagined the Demon Eye would jump out at this moment, and no one would have thought in this direction.
It was only after the Demon Eye actually began to act that everyone could judge its reasons and motives from its behavior.
Now that they understood the underlying logic of how it caused trouble, it would be easier for Leon and the others to prepare in advance and target the Demon Eye.
They wouldn’t be running around blindly like headless flies anymore.
“I think I get it.”
Leon stepped forward and raised a hand, gathering magic.
“But no matter what, we still have to drive the Demon Eye out of Senior Poseidon’s body first. If you don’t...”
“It’s fine. I’ll cooperate with you.”
Claudia’s tone sounded flat, but it carried a suppressed fury.
“A fight where you can’t completely kill the enemy—you probably don’t have much experience with that. So I’ll support you.”
Seeing Claudia in that state of mind, Leon relaxed a little.
Then he turned to Tiger.
“Master, do you want to go over to wife first?”
“Kid, what, you looking down on your master? I’m old, not dead. I can still fight.”
On Leon’s side, the approach was simple: fight first, and solve the trouble in the middle of the fight.
Claudia, on the other hand, was the definition of absolute calm and rationality. She wouldn’t be like her younger sister Charlotte, trapped by childhood memories of her father’s choking sobs.
After waking the Sea King earlier, she had already made her decision in secret—to save her father with force.
As for Tiger, the old man was past his prime and his magic reserves weren’t much, but his real skill was still there.
So fighting together with Leon and Claudia wouldn’t make him a burden.
Once they agreed, the three of them stepped into position.
And with the current enclosed barrier already expanded, when Leon and the others surrounded the Demon Eye and fought it inside, it had no reason to be cautious at all.
It bent slightly at the waist and spread its hands. Ghostly purple energy slowly flowed into its palms.
“Since you two have already seen through me twice, there’s no need for me to keep hiding. You want to fight? Then I’ll fight you to your hearts’ content.”
Tiger and Claudia moved slowly to the Demon Eye’s left and right, forming a three-point enclosure with Leon, surrounding the Demon Eye.
“You stinking eyeball—fine, you can’t tell the gap in strength, but can you not even do the simplest math?” Tiger said.
“Three against one, and you still don’t tuck your tail and run. Instead you want to fight back?”
The Demon Eye let out a cold laugh.
“Heh—so what if you’re strong? So what if there are more of you? Do you dare injure this body even a little?—You don’t. Every move you make has to be careful, or else this dragon will die, you know. Tch... this is what’s hardest to understand about you Samael people, and what’s the most disgusting to me...”
Before it could finish, Poseidon’s figure turned into an afterimage and struck first at Leon.
A light flashed in front of him. In an instant, he appeared before Leon, merging energy in both hands and pressing a sphere of light toward Leon’s chest.
“Feelings!”
The blow erupted, kicking up a massive cloud of dust.
Leon still hadn’t counterattacked when Claudia and Tiger rushed in to support.
The two of them attacked from left and right.
Claudia clasped her hands together, then slapped them down onto the ground.
In a split second, a blue magic circle formed beneath the Demon Eye’s feet. Immediately after, water flowed out of it like tentacles, binding the Demon Eye’s hands, feet, and torso tightly, leaving it unable to move.
At the same time, Tiger launched a side assault. His right hand clenched into a fist.
Thin arcs of electricity flickered over his knuckles.
Using thunder magic to reinforce the body was the most basic application of thunder magic—and of course, it was also the most effective way to hit for damage.
Tiger drove a brutal punch into the Demon Eye’s abdomen.
The old man’s left fist hit harder, his right fist hit hard too. After several heavy blows, the Demon Eye really couldn’t hold up anymore, dropping to one knee.
As the dust in front gradually dispersed, Leon stood in place, not having moved an inch.
That point-blank, zero-distance explosion hadn’t caused Leon even the slightest damage.
He walked slowly toward the bound Demon Eye, magic continuously gathering in his hand.
“The feelings we have are something you can’t understand at all. So I don’t really want to waste time trading words with you and trying to make you understand. That would just be wasting my time. But there’s one thing I want to explain to you.”
The Demon Eye slowly lifted its head. Black-red blood seeped at the corner of its mouth as it looked up at Leon, silent.
Leon continued:
“If a normal fight is using a sledgehammer to tear down an entire wall... then driving your disgusting thing out of Senior Poseidon’s body... is a precision surgery. In other words, like you said just now, every move we make has to be careful. One slight mistake, and the surgery fails.”
Leon lowered himself, bringing his gaze level with the Demon Eye’s.
Orange-red lightning stopped beside both of their faces, steady and clean.
“Now, what I’m explaining to you is this...”
Leon slowly raised his right hand.
“Before surgery, there’s usually an anesthesia step. But unfortunately... we don’t have anesthetic here, so we can only... Use physical anesthesia.”
The Demon Eye’s pupils widened.
“W-what?! Leon, are you really not afraid?”
Boom!!
Its words were drowned out by the thunderous explosion.
The Demon Eye’s entire body was blasted away by Leon’s strike. The impact even forcibly tore open the barrier of the Raging Sea Prison.
After flying dozens of meters, the Demon Eye crashed into the sand, rolling several times in a wretched tumble before it barely stopped.
“Damn it... how could it be like this...”
The Demon Eye clutched its aching chest and staggered upright.
“You bastard—just like I thought, you’re nothing but a brute! With you, even if you have power, you don’t know how to use it at all!”
Leon and the other °• N 𝑜 v 𝑒 l i g h t •° two walked up side by side, stopping a few meters from the Demon Eye.
“How did you come to such an outrageous conclusion?” Tiger’s voice was low.
“If Leon wanted to completely destroy you and Poseidon’s body, he could’ve done it with that first move. And the reason you can still squat in my father’s body and talk to us right now...”
Claudia spoke slowly:
“... Is entirely because Leon controlled the power of those two strikes with extreme caution. If he spent even a little less attention on controlling his magic, you would’ve been reduced to ash long ago.”
What made a truly powerful warrior?
Was it brute-forcing through everything with raw stats—or was it the difference Leon had just described between a “sledgehammer” and “surgery”?
A long time ago, he really was exactly as the Demon Eye just judged him—a brute who only knew how to bombard wildly, a “sledgehammer” that rushed in without caring about anything.
But as his combat experience accumulated, along with Noa’s guidance back then, and his understanding of “restrained” power, the current Leon was worlds apart from who he used to be.
Now he had changed from a “sledgehammer that swings the moment words disagree” into a sharp, precise “scalpel.”
Big enough to cut through anything; small enough to flow like water.
He could precisely grasp every single attack he made, so something like “what if I accidentally kill Poseidon” simply wouldn’t happen.
“E-even so, you can’t do anything to me!”
the Demon Eye shouted.
“As long as I stay inside this body, you can’t kill me! Heh... so what if you can control your power precisely? Are you really going to throw away this Sea Dragon King? So in the end, it’s still your disgusting Samael feelings that are helping me.”
It opened its mouth, about to say more... but its gaze drifted inadvertently to a certain point far off in the distance.
Leon raised an eyebrow. Then he gave a cold laugh. He drew his gaze back and fixed it on the Demon Eye again.
“So you want to drag this out with us?”
“So what if I do? You can’t do anything to me at all!”
Leon spread his hands and shrugged.
“Alright. Since we can’t handle you on raw stats, we’ll attack the mechanics instead.”
The Demon Eye froze.
“W-what do you mean?”
Leon lifted a hand and pointed behind it.
The Demon Eye turned its head.
Dozens of Sea Dragon clanspeople had briefly opened a gap in the barrier wall of the Raging Sea Prison behind it.
And from that gap, a silver figure streaked in at extreme speed.
She held a Seven-Color Veil in her hand, dragging a dazzling trail behind her—like a rainbow carved by a falling star—as she shot straight at the Demon Eye.
“Primordial Magic · Soul Verdict!”
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