"Red Dragon Emperor! This is the final ultimatum!"
"Take Akatsuki and leave the United States!"
Just then, Magnus's voice sounded from within the steel giant, issuing the final warning.
Seeing through Magnus's true intentions at a glance, Tatsuma couldn't help but let out a light chuckle.
"It seems my activation of Juggernaut Drive yesterday caused you quite a bit of apprehension."
"Since you're so afraid, I'll make an exception and give you a performance."
The moment the words fell, surging and boundless demonic power erupted from Tatsuma, shooting straight into the sky.
The air began to slowly twist, and the ground, affected, began to constantly shake.
At the same time, a chanting filled with a sense of oppression echoed on the battlefield.
"I, who am about to awaken!"
"Am the Heavenly Dragon who has stolen the principles of domination from God!"
"I laugh at the infinite, and I fret over the dream!"
"You lunatic!"
Magnus gave up the idea of negotiating. With clicking sounds, cannons formed on the body of the steel giant one by one.
Boom! Boom! Boom...
Continuous explosions sounded, and hundreds of magical cannons shot out, engulfing Tatsuma.
However, just then, a cold light pierced through the magical torrent, severing the steel giant at the waist.
"I was just kidding, why did you take it seriously?"
Tatsuma appeared next to the lower half of the steel giant and swung his sword again.
Dozens of cold lights streaked across space, and Gram, imbued with the power of penetration, easily cut it into fragments. After that, while the fragmented steel giant hadn't regenerated, he walked up to one of the fragments and forcefully stabbed into it.
Hiss...
The surface of this fragment began to slowly twist, changing back into Magnus's appearance.
"How is this possible! How did you know I was here!"
Tatsuma chuckled. "There's no need to be so surprised, it's not that difficult."
Then he swung his sword to dismember Magnus, and placed a seal on him.
In fact, Magnus's hide-and-seek tactic was quite successful at first. Tatsuma initially hadn't locked onto the location of his main body.
However, when Magnus wanted to stop him from activating Juggernaut Drive just now, he used too much magical power in one go.
Although the time was very short, almost only for a single instant, relying on Senjutsu and Extrasensory Perception, Tatsuma still locked onto the source of that magical power.
Once the enemy's location was confirmed, what needed to be done next became much simpler.
Temporarily sealing Magnus, Tatsuma looked towards MAR in front.
He could sense that Magnus was the only strong individual within MAR. As for his true target, Shahryar, it seemed he was not in MAR at the moment.
"Bad luck." Tatsuma slightly shook his head.
However, this result was within his expectations, so Tatsuma wasn't too disappointed.
Entering MAR, Tatsuma quickly encountered MAR employees by following his senses. Due to Akatsuki's blockade, these employees, who were not strong, had no way to retreat at all.
With a few words, these MAR employees surrendered and led Tatsuma to the underground laboratory.
"Tatsuma-sama, this is where the demonic beasts and artificial demonic beasts are kept."
The head of the demonic beast project, opened the door and entered a vast underground space.
This space contained a large number of cultivation tanks, and each cultivation tank had a demonic beast inside.
The variety of demonic beasts was very rich.
There were Water Frogs with frog-like bodies and flying fish-like wings.
There were Bee Snakes, about three to four meters long, with heads resembling wasps and bodies like snakes.
There were even more than ten two-legged flying dragons, known as Wyverns, which were on the verge of extinction.
In addition, there were many demonic beasts that Tatsuma hadn't learned about but looked extraordinary.
"Analyzing the characteristics of demonic beasts, extracting genes and blood to complete replication, and further creating synthetic demonic beasts, this is the usual task of our demonic beast department."
Seeing that Tatsuma seemed interested in these demonic beasts, the head, who had a strong will to survive, took out a stack of documents and explained the research direction to Tatsuma.
However, just then, Tatsuma suddenly raised his hand to interrupt her and asked, "Which area are the artificial demonic beasts placed in?"
"Those few rows of Bee Snakes are all artificial magical beasts."
The head raised her hand and pointed not far away.
The moment her words fell, a cold light streaked across the air.
The next second, all the cultivation tanks containing Bee Snakes were severed, and the Bee Snakes were cut in half, losing their life force.
"Yikes?!!"
The head was startled, her face instantly turning pale.
"Tatsuma-sama, is there anything I did that you are not satisfied with?"
"No, just testing a hypothesis."
Tatsuma opened his trait inventory and glanced at it.
With that one strike just now, he killed approximately 300 Bee Snakes, gaining a total of 249 white traits and 2 green traits.
After verification, it could be confirmed that killing artificial demonic beasts could also yield traits.
"Not bad, your research is very promising." Tatsuma patted the head's shoulder, a kind smile on his face.
"Under normal circumstances, how many artificial demonic beasts can you produce in a day?"
"Uh... in a day, it might be a bit difficult."
"Artificial demonic beasts have a cultivation cycle. Taking the Bee Snake as an example, it takes about a week to complete the cultivation, from embryo to full body."
The head seemed to think of something, quickly adding, "In terms of quantity, there is no limit. As long as there are enough resources, Tatsuma-sama, you can have as many as you want."
"That's not bad."
Tatsuma nodded slightly, his gaze sweeping over the remaining cultivation tanks in front.
"Even if all these things are killed, it shouldn't affect your cultivation of new demonic beasts, right?"
"It won't affect it, but... Tatsuma-sama, if you want to kill demonic beasts, I can help you open the cultivation tanks."
The head pointed to the control panel not far away. "These cultivation tanks are made of special materials. If you destroy them all, new cultivation tanks will need to be prepared to cultivate demonic beasts."
"Then go and open the cultivation tanks."
"Please wait a moment!"
She quickly ran to the control panel and began tapping on it.
Clicking sounds echoed, and the cultivation tanks slowly opened starting from the first row, the demonic beasts inside waking up from their sleep.
However, the moment these demonic beasts opened their eyes, a ball of purple flame appeared in front of them.
The flames from Incinerate Anthem had an extremely high temperature, engulfing the demonic beasts in just an instant.
Three minutes later, the demonic beasts in the underground laboratory were completely wiped out.
Tatsuma opened the trait inventory again and began organizing his gains.
There were many types of demonic beasts in the underground laboratory.
Besides the Bee Snakes, which were relatively weak and mostly gave white traits, there were also high-level demonic beasts like Wyverns, which were powerful and basically gave blue traits.
Selecting all the traits and fusing them with one click, Tatsuma gained a total of 804 blue traits.
In addition, when he defeated Magnus just now, he obtained a red trait.
[Mechanical Expert (Red): When learning knowledge in the field of electronics and machinery, the speed increases by 2000%. When using machinery, no malfunctions will be encountered.]
"Not bad."
Tatsuma showed a satisfied expression.
One red trait and over eight hundred blue traits, just one step away from upgrading to a new gold trait.
Coupled with the Sacred Gear on Magnus, this trip wasn't in vain.
"Speaking of which, I should prepare for the ritual."
Thinking of Magnus, Tatsuma found an empty space nearby and began setting up a magic array on the spot.
Unlike special Sacred Gears like Incinerate Anthem, ordinary Sacred Gears disappear after the host dies. To preserve a Sacred Gear, preparations must be made in advance to strip it away.
Having the experience with the Boosted Gear, Tatsuma had some understanding of how to strip away Sacred Gears.
In just a few minutes, a massive magic array was formed in the underground laboratory.
After that, Tatsuma activated teleportation magic to summon Magnus, who was left outside, inside.
Having lost his limbs and his power sealed, the heavily injured Magnus was currently in a state of unconsciousness.
Placing him on the Magic array, Tatsuma unequipped the Devil-related traits and Sacred Gear traits, and activated Divine Art.
A moment later, a large ball of light rose from Magnus's body.
Tatsuma raised his hand and integrated the light sphere into his body.
[Detected external power, convert it into a gold trait?]
[External power converted successfully, congratulations on obtaining the gold trait: Unknown Dictator ]
[Unknown Dictator (Gold): When activated, allows free control over steel, machinery, and electronic equipment.]
Following several prompts, Tatsuma successfully acquired his third Longinus.
Opening his storage space, Tatsuma took out the remains of the steel giant. This was one of the spoils of war he had collected after dealing with Magnus.
Activating the power of the Unknown Dictator, the steel giant's remains slowly melted, turning into a mass of black liquid metal floating around.