Vidaldus and Fukuro moved almost simultaneously.
Without warning or signal, the two shot out from the left and right like arrows loosed from a bow, their speed so fast it left afterimages in the air.
One moment they were on the platform, the next they were upon him!
Fukuro's attack was simple, brutal, and brutally effective.
He didn't charge at Ace in a straight line but in a strange arc.
During his charge, the two rocket launchers on his back activated.
The surfaces of the launchers were covered in heat vents, which were now spewing scorching exhaust flames, pushing his speed to another explosive level!
"Hoot! It's Fukuro's hunting time!"
He twisted his body in mid-air, the two rocket launchers on his back adjusting their angles simultaneously.
The muzzles lit up with a blinding red light.
These were no ordinary rockets; the shells' surfaces flowed with fiery magical patterns!
BOOM! BOOM! BOOM—!!!
Six rockets fanned out.
Three shot straight at Ace, while the other three sealed off his escape routes to the left, right, and above.
Even more insidious, the rockets began to split in mid-flight, each one dividing into three smaller homing missiles.
In an instant, eighteen rockets swarmed toward Ace from every angle like a hive of bees.
At almost the same time, Vidaldus made his move.
The frivolous smile on the rock-and-roll master's face vanished, replaced by an expression so focused it was almost ferocious.
An ostentatiously designed electric guitar had appeared in his hands, its body inlaid with skull decorations.
Its six strings glinted with a cold metallic light in the dim surroundings.
Most eye-catching was his hair.
His long, pitch-black hair, which could already drag on the floor, now seemed to have a life of its own, dancing wildly behind him without any wind. Every strand shimmered with the luster of black magic!
"It's rockin' time, baby!" Vidaldus roared, his right hand violently strumming the guitar strings!
BZZZZ—!!!
Visible purple soundwaves erupted from the guitar like a tsunami, twisting and spreading through the air, transforming into dozens of sharp sonic blades.
These blades spun at high speed, letting out ear-piercing shrieks as they cut through the air.
The very space they passed through seemed to warp slightly.
As he strummed, his wildly dancing hair suddenly shot out, the pitch-black strands lashing out like countless venomous snakes.
Each strand vibrated at high speed, its edges as sharp as blades, kicking up a fierce wind.
The hair and the sonic blades coordinated perfectly, forming a three-dimensional attack net with no blind spots—the blades for a frontal assault, the hair for sneak attacks from the flanks and above.
Rocket shells bombarded from the front, a sonic storm sliced from the sides, and bladed hair attacked from the blind spots.
This was a deadly combination attack, honed through countless drills, that had turned numerous powerful experts into fragments in an instant.
But Ace merely raised his right hand forward.
Dark purple magic of darkness gushed from his palm.
This mysterious and powerful energy quickly gathered, gradually solidifying into a large, dark purple sphere.
The sphere's surface was perfectly smooth, like a dazzling black gem.
The rockets were the first to crash into the space of the dark purple sphere.
And then, they vanished.
In that fleeting moment, it was as if time itself had stood still.
What followed was a jaw-dropping scene—the rockets, which had been roaring forward with menacing momentum, had the immense power they contained instantly disintegrate!
It all happened so suddenly that there was barely time to react.
The thrusters, burning with raging flames, were utterly destroyed like fragile toys, offering no resistance.
Not only that, but the surging magic within them and the terrifying energy on the verge of causing a cataclysmic explosion were also snuffed out, as if choked by an invisible hand, vanishing without a trace.
The entire process was uncannily silent.
There was no deafening roar, no dazzling flash of light, and no devastating shockwave.
It was like a meticulously designed magic trick, silently erasing everything in a way that defied imagination, leaving behind only dead silence and a void.
The sonic blades followed, but the result was exactly the same.
The blades, capable of cutting steel and shattering magic, had their sonic structures collapse on their own the moment they touched the domain of death, dissipating into chaotic air currents.
The strangest was Vidaldus's hair attack.
The magical strands, sharp enough to cut diamonds, began to rapidly "decay" from their tips the moment they pierced the dark purple space—not breaking, not melting, but as if they had weathered millennia, rapidly losing their luster, withering, and turning to dust.
"What?!" Vidaldus's face changed drastically, and he decisively severed that part of his hair.
The moment the severed strands detached from his body, they turned completely to ash, and his long hair was now a whole section shorter!
Fukuro had never seen such a bizarre ability, but his combat instincts made him change tactics immediately.
The rocket launchers on his back charged up again, preparing for a second volley.
This time, he spun at high speed in the air, firing continuously from various angles, trying to find a flaw in the domain of death.
"It's useless," Ace's calm voice sounded.
He raised his left hand, aimed it at Fukuro in the air and made a grasping motion.
"Gluttony—Devour."
An invisible suction instantly locked onto Fukuro.
It wasn't a physical pull but a force acting directly on the source of magic within his body.
Fukuro felt his magic gushing out like a broken dam, turning into streams of dark red light that flowed into Ace's palm.
What was more terrifying was that as his magic drained, the rocket launchers on his back began to destabilize, looking as if they would disintegrate and shrink.
"Hoot! No—!" Fukuro roared, trying to break free, but the suction of the Authority of Gluttony was like a black hole, locking him down firmly.
The rocket thrusters on his back fired wildly, trying to escape, but his body drifted uncontrollably toward Ace.
"Fukuro!" Vidaldus's face was deathly pale.
He knew he couldn't wait any longer, or Fukuro would be completely drained!
He held nothing back, his hands strumming frantically on the guitar.
This time, he played a violent, chaotic piece filled with a desire for destruction.
Each note transformed into a tangible purple soundwave.
These soundwaves interfered, superimposed and resonated with each other in the air, finally forming a rotating sonic drill over two meters in diameter!
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