Chapter 101
The seal crumbled.
From the shattered circle of runes, a massive arm of twisted, semi-solid darkness erupted, its fingers ending in claws that scraped against the stone platform. The Demonic Mana Beast pulled itself free, its form coalescing from the chaos below—a towering shape of shifting shadow and molten red veins that pulsed like arteries. Its body was not flesh but something older, denser, a mass of compressed demonic mana that rippled with each heartbeat. Two horns curved from a head that had no face, only a vertical slit of burning crimson light that scanned the chamber with ancient hunger. Lava splashed against its emerging form, hissing into steam that did nothing to obscure its presence.
Lucas floated between the beast and Ashely's unconscious body, the Aegis sphere still pulsing around her.
He did not have time for spells. Astral Mode consumed too much mana already, the cyan cloak flickering at the edges as it held. His fists would have to be enough.
The Golden Sphere.
He had used it once before, against the White Tiger, and nearly died. But that was the White Sphere—the fusion of all elements, unstable, consuming. The Golden Sphere was different, being that It was mana given form, with only small amount being the fusion of all elements.
He formed it in his palm. Gold light bloomed between his fingers, solidifying into a blade—not his katana, but something longer, sharper, the edge humming with contained power.
Behind him, Scarlett raised her hand, a spear of black light forming in her grip. Beside her, the blue-haired demon notched an arrow, the shaft glowing with swirling green energy.
They did not move to attack.
They were waiting.
The Demonic Mana Beast
It surged from the seal, its full form rising into the chamber—a towering colossus of compressed shadow and molten fury. Its body was not solid but dense, a writhing mass of darkness shot through with veins of burning red. Each movement sent tremors through the stone. Its arms dragged across the platform, carving trenches deep enough to reach the lava below.
The slit in its face burned brighter as its attention fixed on Lucas.
Demonic Spell: Abyssal Swipe
Its arm swept across the platform. Lucas shot upward, golden blade trailing light, and brought it down across the beast's forearm.
CRACK!
The blade bit deep into the demonic mana, sending fissures of gold through the dark mass. The beast howled—a sound that was not sound but pressure, vibrating through Lucas's bones. Black ichor sprayed from the wound, sizzling where it struck the stone.
The beast recoiled, its arm withdrawing. The golden light in the wound did not fade. It spread, thin lines of radiance crawling through the demonic mass like roots seeking water.
The beast's crimson eye flickered and It understood. That light could not be absorbed. It could not be consumed. It would burn from within until nothing remained.
It pulled back, putting distance between itself and the golden blade.
Scarlett and the Blue-Haired Demon
They circled at the chamber's edge, watching.
Scarlett's spear pulsed with dark light, her red eyes tracking Lucas's movements. The blue-haired demon beside her drew his bowstring, the arrow aimed but not released.
They did not engage, and even if they did, they couldn't win by themselves.
Scarlett had felt it the moment Lucas entered Astral Mode—the weight of his power pressing against her senses, dense and absolute. Her Void magic, so potent in her own realm, was crippled here. The runes she needed to form her strongest spells simply did not exist in this world's foundation. She had burned her one true circle just to survive his first strike.
Without the beast to occupy him, to divide his attention, to force him to spread his power thin—she would be dead already.
The blue-haired demon knew it too. His wind arrows could pierce stone, shred steel, but the mana cloak around Lucas was not stone or steel. It was pure, condensed power, woven by someone whose control over mana surpassed anything he had ever seen. His arrows would shatter against it like twigs against a fortress wall.
They watched for the opening only the beast could create.
Demonic Spell: Crimson Rain
The beast raised its arms, and the molten veins across its body burst outward. Hundreds of burning projectiles shot from its form, each one trailing smoke and heat, filling the chamber with streaks of red light.
Lucas moved.
His golden blade became a shield, spinning in his hand, expanding into a disc of solid light. The projectiles struck it and detonated, explosions rippling across the surface, but the shield held. Each impact sent tremors through his arm, but he did not retreat.
Through the smoke, the beast lunged.
Demonic Spell: Void Claw
Its hand descended, fingers wrapped in concentrated darkness that drank the light around it. Lucas dismissed the shield, reformed the golden light into a spear, and hurled it upward.
BOOOOM!
The spear pierced the beast's palm, golden light exploding through the demonic mass. The beast's arm snapped back, the wound weeping black ichor, the golden radiance spreading through its flesh like fire through dry grass.
But the beast did not stop. It drove forward, its other hand sweeping low, catching Lucas across his side.
CRACK!
The mana cloak absorbed most of the force, but the impact still sent him spinning through the air. He righted himself against the chamber wall, feet finding purchase on a jutting rock.
The golden light in the beast's hand was spreading faster now, crawling up its arm toward its shoulder.
It snarled and slammed its hand against the stone platform, crushing the limb beneath its own weight. The stone shattered. The golden light, cut off from the rest of its body, sputtered and died.
It sacrificed its own arm to stop the spread.
Scarlett moved.
Void Spell: Singularity Spear
Her spear shot forward, trailing black light that bent the air around it. Void magic was not space magic—it was the absence that existed between. Where space magic folded distance, Void magic erased it, creating corridors where nothing else could exist. The spear moved through the chamber in no time at all, crossing the distance between Scarlett and Lucas in the space between heartbeats.
Lucas twisted, his golden blade reforming, deflecting the spear's tip. The black light met gold, and for a moment, the two forces pressed against each other—absence against presence, nothing against something.
The spear shattered, But the impact forced Lucas's guard open.
The blue-haired demon released his arrow.
Wind Spell: Tempest Piercer
The arrow flew not as a straight line but as a current, riding the air itself, shifting direction mid-flight to find the gap in Lucas's defense. Wind magic was common in this world, but this was something else—compressed air given the density of steel, moving with the unpredictability of a living storm.
Lucas caught it with his free hand.
The arrow exploded against his palm, a concussive blast of wind that sent him skidding backward across the platform. His boots carved grooves in the stone. His hand burned where the arrow had struck, the mana cloak there thinner than before.
Scarlett and the blue-haired demon retreated instantly, melting back into the shadows at the chamber's edge.
They had done their part.
The opening was made.
Demonic Spell: World Breaker
The beast's remaining arm drew back, darkness gathering in its palm—not the scattered darkness of its form, but something concentrated, something compressed into a single point of absolute pressure. The air around it screamed as it was pulled toward that point, then pushed away, the pressure differential tearing at the stone itself.
Lucas saw it coming.
He could not dodge. Ashely was behind him, the Aegis sphere still protecting her unconscious form. If he moved, she died.
He planted his feet. The golden blade dissolved, the light flowing back into his hands, reforming into a shield—wider, thicker, denser than before.
The beast struck.
BOOOOOMMMM!
The impact was not a sound. It was the absence of sound, a vacuum that swallowed everything, then released it all at once. The platform beneath Lucas shattered. The Aegis sphere flickered, cracks spider-webbing across its surface. Lucas's arms screamed, the golden shield holding but his body being driven backward, his heels digging trenches in the stone.
He held.
But the beast was not done.
Its wounded arm, the one it had crushed against the stone, was already reforming. Demonic mana coiled around the shattered limb, knitting it back together, pulling darkness from the surrounding chamber to replace what had been lost.
Lucas saw it happening. He understood.
The beast was not flesh. It was mana, and could heal anything, as long as it had power to draw from.
And this chamber was filled with power.
Demonic Spell: Mawof the Abyss
The beast opened its face—the crimson slit splitting wide, revealing not teeth but a vortex of compressed darkness, a gravity that pulled everything toward it. Stone fragments lifted from the platform. Lava surged upward from below. The air itself bent toward that opening, drawn into nothing.
Lucas anchored himself, golden light flaring around his feet, fusing him to the stone. But the pull was immense, tearing at the Aegis sphere, causing it to shudder.
Scarlett and the blue-haired demon did not attack. They did not need to.
The beast's pull was enough.
Demonic Spell: Annihilation Wave
The beast released everything it had gathered.
A wave of pure demonic force erupted from its form, black and red intertwined, consuming everything in its path. The platform dissolved. The stone walls cracked. The lava below was pushed back, forced away by the sheer pressure of the blast.
Lucas stood before it.
The golden shield was all that remained between the wave and Ashely. He poured everything into it—every scrap of mana, every ounce of will. The shield blazed, brighter than before, gold light pushing back against the darkness.
For a moment, it held.
Then the cracks spread.
The shield splintered. Golden light scattered like falling stars. The wave struck Lucas full force, tearing through his mana cloak, ripping the cyan light from his body.
He felt the Astral Mode collapse. The power that had made him invincible shattered, leaving him hollow, empty.
The wave threw him across the chamber. He struck the far wall, the stone cracking around him, and fell.
He landed on a broken ledge above the lava, his body broken, his mana gone. His eyes—his Mana Eyes—flickered, the cyan light dying.
Across the chamber, Ashely's Aegis sphere shattered. She lay exposed, unconscious, her blood pooling on the cracked stone.
The Demonic Mana Beast rose to its full height, its form towering over the ruined platform. The golden wounds on its arm had healed, the light burned away.
It turned its crimson gaze toward Ashely.
Scarlett stepped forward from the shadows, her spear reforming in her hand. The blue-haired demon notched another arrow.
They moved toward the fallen queen.
Lucas watched from across the chamber, unable to move, unable to rise.
His hand reached out toward the golden light that had scattered across the stone. It flickered, dim, dying.
He could not reach it.
The beast took a step toward Ashely.