Chapter 1050: Feeding Frenzy
[Well, this is wrapping up nicely…Screamira, how goes things on your end, girlie?]
[We’re at a stalemate right now…but that’s because I think this Swamp Slaughterer guy is holding back.]
[Ah.]
…
When Zhen Hai openly mocked Gao Zhaozhe Jun, he might’ve been biting off way more than he could chew. Between the two of them, Gao Zhaozhe Jun was an Aether Grandmaster while he himself was a lowly Aether Master. In most other instances of such a match up, the latter would get his ass handed them to them, nine times out of ten.
However, Zhen Hai was confident he was going to be that “one” for a good reason.
He wasn’t fighting alone.
[Alligator’s Death Crunch!]
[Incoming!]
‘I sense it, I sense it!’
Gao Zhaozhe Jun had launched an attack in the shape of a giant alligator’s maw that, if it made impact, would’ve snapped Zhen Hai’s spine like a twig.
Thankfully, due to Screamira’s warning, Zhen Hai was able to respond in kind.
[Abyssal Shark Smash!]
With a swing of his giant shark-toothed club, Zhen Hai launched a water construct shaped like a shark directly towards the incoming alligator maw.
Horrifying crunching sound echoed as the two beastial attacks attempted to overpower and devour each other in a vicious feeding frenzy. Unfortunately, this clash of attacks ended in a stalemate as the two constructs eventually consumed one another before exploding in a shower of light.
Of course, this wasn’t the full extent of the fighting between the two disparate aether warriors.
“Color me impressed! I figured a child of your status would crumble against me, your obvious better!,” Gao Zhaozhe Jun commented moments before ascending into the air to try and land a flying kick on Zhen Hai’s head. The Fallen warrior had attempted to use the aformentioned explosion to try and shroud his accent, but it didn’t work.
“Yeah? Well screw you, Swamp Slaughterer. I’ve fought literal beasts tougher than you!,” Zhen Hai shouted back as he swung his [Berserker’s Fang] around to knock the bastard out mid-flight.
Zhen Hai’s strike was fast, but the Swamp Slaughterer’s reaction time was faster.
Using a bit of aether, the Fallen Grandmaster corrected his orientation in the air so that instead of being directly in the path of the incoming swing, his body was angled so that he could kick off the flat portion of Zhen Hai’s sharktooth club and launch a backwards flip kick against Zhen Hai’s chin.
…
[Yeah, I can’t have you dying on me right now. So I’m gonna interfere a bit here.]
‘Interfere? Interfere how-why does my chin feel heavier?’
…
Against most opponents, this kick would’ve been enough to end the fight with a knock-out at best, or fatality by spinal column tearing at worst. Especially in the case of a Grandmaster fighting against a Master.
“Ow! What the fuck?!”
Thankfully that didn’t happen.
Instead, much to Gao Zhaozhe Jun’s surprise, he ended up injuring his foot after kicking Zhen Hai’s chin!
From an outsider’s perspective, mere moments before Zhen Hai got his chin kicked in, a protective guard made of jagged bones had manifested over the young warrior’s face.
This guard not only diffused much of the impact across a wider surface area, but also served as a form of retaliation due to the aforementioned jagged bones jamming into Gao Zhaozhe Jun’s flesh.
Normally, that shouldn’t be possible due to the aforementioned being coated in aether, but those bones were empowered by [Chaos]. Meaning that Gao Zhaozhe Jun’s defenses were rendered moot on his foot.
And Zhen Hai wasn’t done yet.
…
‘Huh…I just remembered something.’
[What’s up?]
‘Those Aquanatii guys mentioned that my club has a bit of [Chaos] power to it too, right? Kinda like Great Grandauntie Xun Tian?’
[They did mention that, yes.]
‘Huh…I wonder what would happen if I tried to-‘
[Huh? Who’s waking me up?]
‘[What the fuck?!]’
[Oh…interesting…trying to kill the guy who looks like a swamp monster?]
‘Yeah…’
[Going to show you a neat trick then.]
‘Why?’
[Because you got my teeth in your hands…that and it seems if you use this trick of mine, something interesting is going to happen.]
…
“You little shit! I’ll break you to pieces! [Regalia, on]!”
Enraged by the sudden injury, Gao Zhaozhe Jun decided to stop holding back and use his [Regalia] to turn Zhen Hai into mincemeat.
Was it a blow to his dignity and pride as an Aether Grandmaster to use his [Regalia] against an opponent that he knew was beneath him?
Yes.
Would such indignity matter when he could just wash it away with blood and the fact that nobody but himself would know about this shame?
No.
As such, when Gao Zhaozhe Jun’s vaguely alligator-like [Regalia] finished forming, he was all set to crush Zhen Hai to death and probably take a massive bite out of his throat in the process.
Until…
“I’m going to-WHOA!”
He sensed something that caused his hair to stand on end and take several steps back instead of going in for the kill.
More specifically, he sensed that Zhen Hai’s energy had suddenly spiked to levels way beyond that of a normal Aether Master. Not only that, he gave off the feeling he was radiating three distinctive types of aether at the same time.
This wouldn’t have been weird if he sensed this since the beginning of the fight, but because Zhen Hai’s aether had suddenly transformed from being Aquarii aether to being some weird chimeric blend, it was enough for Gao Zhaozhe Jun to know something bad was going to happen.
But alas, this distancing just made him an easier target for what was to come next.
While Gao Zhaozhe Jun was in the process of landing, Zhen Hai had entered a strange looking stance with his sharktoothed club resting across his shoulder in a manner suggesting he was aiming for a heavy chop attack.
That said, the aura surrounding Zhen Hai at this moment suggested that there was definitely something more vicious than a simple slash in store.
While maintaining this stance, arcs of lighting, insidious green smoke and stream of water began to swirl around Zhen Hai in a strange dance. It was if he was in the center of a whirlpool of power that caused these three, vastly different sources of power to intermingle with each other despite having nothing in common with one another.
Eventually, these streams of power began to condense further, taking the form of three distinctive sharks made of lighting, bone and water.
When Gao Zhaozhe Jun finally touched the ground, that was when Zhen Hai lashed out.
[Chaos Art: Feeding Frenzy!]
With a swing of his club, Zhen Hai launched all three of his sharks directly towards Gao Zhaozhe Jun.
“Oh shit!”
Sensing the incoming attack, Gao Zhaozhe Jun immediately threw up a defensive aether shield to try and tank the hits. Unfortunately, it didn’t work.
The first of the the sharks to make contact was the one made of lighting. With a jagged body yet sleek body shape, the lighting shark impacted like a bolt from the heavens and shattered the shield on contact.
The next shark to get in range to attack was the one made of bones.
“G-get away!”
Gao Zhaozhe Jun released a blast of force in an attempt to break the bone shark, which…sort of worked.
The sudden blast had shattered the bone shark into bone shards that more or less flew in a hundred different directions. Unfortunately, several of those directions were in Gao Zhaozhe Jun’s way.
“Gah!”
As a result of his actions, several dozen pieces of bone shrapnel had impaled themselves into Gao Zhaozhe Jun’s flesh, creating several gaps in his [Regalia] at the same time.
“Wait a minute! This weird feeling…the fact that he can ignore my defenses…this is that weird [Chaos shi-”
But before he could finish that sentence and observation, the final shark was upon him.
The last, and largest, of the sharks was one made entirely of water and had the most detail to it as well.
From its large form, Gao Zhaozhe Jun could sense a dense amount of [Chaos] and an even denser amount of aether.
At first, he thought this dense amount of aether was due to the sheer amount of power behind the attack, but then he realized something. This density could only come from another person being right up in his face.
In a split moment, he noticed that directly behind the shark made of water, was Zhen Hai himself. The mad young man had decided to go along for the ride and was now barreling towards him as well, with his sharktoothed club coming down like an executioner’s axe.
Unfortunately for Gao Zhaozhe Jun, despite knowing what was going to happen next, didn’t mean he could do anything about it.
‘Oh…fuck.’
What followed was, well, devastation.
The shark made of water made contact first, impacting Gao Zhaozhe Jun and digging the bone shards in his body even deeper.
And then Zhen Hai followed up with a heavy blow to the torso.
Needless to say…it wasn’t pretty.
