The tortoise snapped his head up to stare at Lumi, and within the tortoise’s eyes, Lumi could see a clear emotion within.
Fear.
And it was a perfectly valid reaction. Who wouldn’t be afraid of your opponent, who you had been suppressing thus far, suddenly gaining an inexplicable burst of power, and damaging you when they had previously been unable to do so?
The tortoise, for just a second, glanced at the orb of equilibrium. What... was that?
It was generated inside of itself. And yet when it moved, the orb had not moved with him. It was a magical construct locked in space, unchanged by physicality. To prove its theory, the serpent sent out a flying scale, and as expected, the scale flew through the orb, neither the orb or scale interacting with each other.
Neither was damaged from the test.
The Black Tortoise made a preliminary assumption. The orb only caused damage at the moment it came into existence.
Lumi took a deep breath. Within Convergence, there were various skills that used to be locked under INT requirements.
This would be his first time using them.
There was no reason to give his enemy any more time to freely analyze him, nor any reason to let his convergence run out without him doing something. He immediately teleported next to his orb. "PUSH!"
A twilight force wave shot out from Lumi’s front, generating an immense pressure. Unlike physical objects, this magic indeed interacted with his own orb, causing it to shoot outward violently, crashing into the tortoise’s face directly.
"Hrrrrrrrrrggg-" It couldn’t help but groan out in pain at the unexpected damage. Its massive frame shifted backward several feet from the force of the impact.
It couldn’t understand it. When exactly was the orb corporeal or not!? The rules made no sense.
The serpent lunged immediately, protective of the Tortoise. This time, Lumi felt no reason to waste his time dodging. Dodge to do what, waste the extremely limited time he had during convergence? What a joke.
"Torment." Lumi tracked the velocity and trajectory of the orb, and began to generate it midair. The serpent saw the orb began to generate-
But it could not dodge. The orb was not an attack being shot at it, where it could have time to react. It would be complete in milliseconds on its future location. Despite a desperate attempt to shift to the side, it was entirely futile as the orb was conjured directly inside the serpent mid-lunge.
However, that alone would not stop the serpents from advancing. Despite suffering massive damage, damage was damage, momentum was momentum.
"Push!" Except, of course, if Lumi violently pushed it away. The serpent’s trajectory shifted violently back to where it came, but it was worse than even the serpent could even imagine.
The serpent was pushed back into the very orb that Lumi had previously generated, and that orb was also pushed alongside his spell, and thus despite the orb being behind the serpent, it found itself once again being damaged by the same orb.
Hiss! Hissssss!
In rage, the serpent repeatedly and mindlessly flooded the air in his general direction with invisible poison mist.
"Nrrrr..."The tortoise groaned in anger as it unleashed another water pulse. Lumi locked eyes with the beast. Did it think this was a joke? A water pulse?
With Lumi’s eyes full of magic staring at the Black Tortoise, for a moment, it even stepped back in apprehension. It then steeled itself. Even if the human had stronger attacks, it could not dodge this attack, could it!?
"Void Sphere!" Being in Convergence did not stop him from casting ordinary spells. He had the boosts from both Light and Dark mode, allowing him to use Dark spells with the Dark Spell passive, doubling the rate of hits and achieving what was a 50% damage bonus. With the increased power of his Void Sphere, it was able to cut a clean line through the water pulse, allowing Lumi to be unscathed from the water.
Lumi controlled the Void Sphere in the direction of the Serpent and Black Tortoise, which looked on in horror. The Serpent immediately went inside the Tortoise’s protective shell, and the Tortoise leaped back on the spot.
It did not dare take the spell if it didn’t need to. It was an entirely unknown spell to it. The last time it took an unknown spell, it had its insides damaged! How could it risk it again?
Boom!
It never forgot what it was doing. Even if the water pulse was ineffective, it still cast the lightning.
It landed directly on Lumi, causing him to grit his teeth and groan. Yet, he was not even remotely dissatisfied. The absolute moment the tortoise leaped, he grinned instead as he instantly stopped channeling his Void Sphere.
"Stupid." Lumi couldn’t help but mock. Perhaps Lena was rubbing off on him. "Torment!" He instantly cast torment to manifest on the exact trajectory of the tortoise’s leap. It could not teleport, and thus after jumping, it couldn’t avoid the effect.
"Urrrgh..." It instantly groaned in pain from the strike. It reeled back in pain, and instantly confirmed something from feeling itself. What damaged it was indeed the initial impact.
Still, it could feel its insides being shredded with every strike and it knew it had to do something. But what!?
Lumi did not give it time to think. It was time for him to try his other skill. "Grab!" Lumi ordered his magic with a shout, and the orb which he just made was grabbed within his magical control. Like throwing a ball, he threw the orb at high speeds directly towards the serpent.
The serpent immediately attempted to lunge out of the way, but was hit squarely in its mid-section. It fell flat on the spot upon the tortoise shell. It twitched for a second, before crawling its way back inside the shell.
The tortoise made a low groan, and a frosty air began to emanate from it. Whatever it was going to do, Lumi had no reason to let it do as it wished. "Torment!" Lumi created his orb inside the Tortoise, who took the damage and continued casting.
The serpent, recovered from its earlier hit, came at him from the side this time, clearly furious. Lumi would not let a rogue serpent interrupt his casting. He had intentionally left a large information gap between them.
There was a saying, though he didn’t remember the quote. Every single piece of knowledge gained by the enemy must come at a massive blood cost.
He had already revealed that he could use push to push back objects other than his own orb. He was unsure how the serpent was about to counter it, but he was sure that it was coming at him with a plan in mind.
"Grab!"
Though it was incredibly difficult, grab was able to grab other living beings. The smaller and weaker they were, the more effective. Whatever the serpent’s plan was, it was no more as it suddenly halted mid-air.
It immediately broke out of his hold, but all that mattered was that he had halted its momentum. "Torment!" Immediately, he cast an attack on the helpless serpent who was falling to the floor.
"GRRR~" A low, but loud growl reverbed through the air as the icy winds got faster and colder. Lumi felt the ground under his feet grow moist as water seeped from the ground, raising the water level. Clouds began to swirl, all of which storming, soaking the world.
Boom! Boom! Boom!
Occasional lightning strikes formed, not even intentionally formed, electrifying the ground. Though none hit him, each shock made his muscles seize.
The Black Tortoise locked eyes with Lumi. Lumi stared back.
He was NOT going to waste precious convergence time on attempting to dodge an ultimate spell that he would get hit by anyways.
If his foe wanted to trade blows, then he would trade blows! "Push!" He sent the serpent, alongside the two orbs, flying back to the tortoise.
BOOM!
The two orbs and the serpent crashed against the tortoise. The aftermath was completely unable to be seen, however, for at the same time, the world went white.
Lumi didn’t even register the sound of an explosion. All at once, the world turned into a searing white, as the water had frozen, trapping Lumi within. Immediately afterwards, countless accumulated stormclouds exploded over the frozen earth, sending both countless shards flying, and electrocuting the deadly ice.
Lumi could not feel.
Lumi could not see.
And yet, he knew he was alive. He had predicted this. Under his mana barrier, a large scale attack that wasn’t directly aimed at him, from this Black Tortoise, shouldn’t be able to instantly kill him.
Yet it was the fact that his muscles, nerves, and brain were fried, whilst he was frozen in ice, bleeding all over. He could not possibly find a way to take a potion out of his inventory and drink it.