While Alan recovered and remained on high alert, the Rune Serpent opposite him also straightened up after a few violent coughs. Golden Knight's sudden death had indeed dealt her a heavy blow, but years of accumulation had gradually pushed the Rune Serpent's body beyond the scope of an ordinary wizard; her physique and magic reserves were probably more terrifying than most magical creatures in the world!
"You're not Thunderbird… you're Alan!" After a few ragged breaths, the Rune Serpent glared ferociously at the man opposite her, who still wore Gerard's face, and couldn't help but roar.
"Heh, the fact that you're only realizing it now proves my acting is quite good, my dear Mother." Seeing that his identity had been exposed, Alan no longer bothered to disguise himself, directly reverting to his original appearance. Then, with a shake of his body, he tore the Silver Spears robe he was wearing to shreds, revealing the black combat suit underneath.
At this moment, Alan wore a pair of high-top tactical boots, a metal belt with a silver buckle around his waist, and a tight-fitting tactical vest resembling a formal waistcoat on his upper body. He held a round shield in his left hand, and with his right hand, he picked up a monocle from his chest pocket and clipped it over his eye, looking at the Rune Serpent before him with a faint smile.
"It really is you. Thunderbird would never use these toys that disgust him. Where is Thunderbird? Why are you appearing in his likeness here?" The Rune Serpent questioned with a puzzled expression upon seeing Alan's true face. Then, as if a light bulb went off, she suddenly widened her eyes and cursed loudly, "Could it be that everything that has happened in the club during this time was your doing? Impossible, if that were the case, how would you know so many internal details of the club? Could it be…"
"Are you just realizing the key point now? It seems your brain isn't working very well…" Alan mocked, while assessing his body's recovery. "Rune Serpent!" Alan roared sharply, "Thunderbird's hatred for you is stronger than you imagine; otherwise, how could someone as arrogant as he choose to cooperate with me?"
"Indeed!" As if confirming her own conjecture, the Rune Serpent's face turned incredibly grim. "Gerald… I didn't expect you would rather collude with outsiders than betray me."
After resolving the confusion in her mind, the Rune Serpent looked at Alan again, puzzled. "No, even if Gerald chose to collude with you, he would have chosen to team up with Golden Knight against me earlier. But how did you realize that Golden Knight and I were setting a trap for you?"
"Tsk…" Alan curled his lip in disdain, "You two thought your acting could fool me? The moment Golden Knight started talking to you, I knew something was off. If you're not professional at acting, don't bother; otherwise, you'll just make a fool of yourselves!"
Facing the Rune Serpent, Alan never intended to tell her a single truth; he just started spouting nonsense. In fact, from his conversation with Peter before his death, Alan had largely sketched out the other party's psychological profile. Whether it was Peter, Golden Knight, or the Rune Serpent, they were all extremely suspicious and indecisive individuals.
Alan guessed that perhaps because she had lived for too long, whenever the Rune Serpent encountered something she couldn't understand, she would always show signs of self-doubt. Just like Peter, who still questioned Alan before his death, she displayed an extremely pathological trait. At the same time, this trait made her less decisive when making decisions, always overthinking things. The advantage of this was that once a judgment was truly made, matters would be handled very properly, with few loopholes. However, an overly cautious personality would make her seem slow to react. This was also why the club's strategies always gave Alan a watertight feeling before, but after Alan found a breakthrough and disrupted this balance, Golden Knight became very hesitant in his subsequent decisions.
Furthermore, the main reason Alan was able to detect that there might be an issue with Golden Knight and the Rune Serpent was because he already knew that Peter and Golden Knight were the same person. And while the method of creating a clone seemed somewhat inconceivable even to him, when he eliminated all other options, no matter how absurd the result, Alan could only accept it.
However, at first, Alan really hadn't expected Golden Knight and the Rune Serpent to be the same person, because in the memories Thunderbird gave him, the other party had indeed grown up with him. Moreover, Golden Knight's suggestion to team up with him to eliminate the Rune Serpent was also within Alan's previous conjectures, and at first, he truly believed Golden Knight was sincere.
But when Alan arrived outside this manor, he had performed a location check, and the coordinates here surprised him somewhat. Because the location of this valley was very close to the Portkey's teleportation destination that Alan had obtained from Peter, almost at the same point, which was a bit inconceivable. Logically speaking, as the club's leader, Peter and the Rune Serpent should not have maintained such a trusting relationship. And the Portkey used for escape must lead to a place where he could feel absolutely safe. Yet, the Portkey's teleportation point was near the Rune Serpent's residence. Didn't this clearly prove that there was something shady between Peter and the Rune Serpent?
Therefore, after learning this information, Alan secretly made preparations and also paid extra attention to Golden Knight. Sure enough, the scene that unfolded earlier proved that Alan's caution was not superfluous.
"Acting? So that's it…" At this moment, the Rune Serpent, just like Peter before her, began to inexplicably reflect on herself. "It seems I need to pay attention to such details in the future. Is this situation a result of my insufficient caution?"
"Future?" Alan couldn't help but let out a cold laugh when he heard the Rune Serpent muttering that word again. "Don't talk about a future like Peter did. Today, you'll just stay here obediently."
"Just you?" The Rune Serpent seemed amused. "While I have to admit you are indeed very capable, you are not Thunderbird after all, and I am not using Peter's body from before. You should carefully consider how you want to die."
"I didn't expect the dignified leader of the club to be wary of her top general." Faced with the Rune Serpent's intimidation, Alan remained unmoved. "However, I'm afraid I have to tell you some bad news: I've already informed Thunderbird of this location. He might arrive at any moment. I wonder if you can withstand the combined attack of the two of us?"
"I have the Fidelius Charm protecting me, so what good will it do even if he comes?" The Rune Serpent managed to maintain a certain degree of calm at this point. "However, just to be safe, I should deal with you as soon as possible. Repel!"
With that, the Rune Serpent suddenly raised her hand, but this time she did not use the powerful single-target spell Arcane Serpent as before, but rather the gravity magic that Alan had witnessed her use on Peter.
"Still trying to use the same trick on me? Naive!" Alan scoffed coldly upon seeing the Rune Serpent cast the spell, then slapped the belt around his abdomen with his left hand.
Immediately after, the Rune Serpent saw eight metallic segments suddenly extend from Alan's lower back, like a peacock fanning its tail. Then, these metallic segments, resembling insect legs, plunged fiercely downward, firmly piercing the floor, as if Alan had suddenly grown eight more legs, anchoring him directly to the ground. Although the Rune Serpent's horizontal repulsive force was incredibly strong and domineering, pushing away all furniture and architectural debris in its path, it seemed somewhat insufficient when facing Alan, who was rooted to the ground. And Alan merely raised the round shield in his left hand, and its built-in large-area protective shield easily blocked the flying stones and other architectural debris in front of him.
"Thunderclap Sword - Meteor of Destruction!"
Seeing that his prepared strategy was indeed effective, Alan drew his sword and slashed, using the same move that had proven so successful against Peter last time. Combining Wild Thunder and Eclipse, Alan had developed various magical sword techniques.
Among them was Pierce, which had astonishing penetration and speed, but Alan dared not use this wave-clash type of move against the Rune Serpent again. He found that clashing waves with a monster whose magic power was bottomless was simply asking for trouble. There was also Storm Blade, which imitated Andre's Blade Storm, except Alan replaced the metal blades Andre used with Wild Lightning sword energy. However, this move also consumed a considerable amount of magic power, at least ten magic points per second for each use, so he did not plan to use such magic during the probing stage. And Alan had also tried Earthwalk, which directed Wild Lightning underground to attack, on Peter before, but it had no effect other than making the opponent fly.
Besides these, Swift Sword was a close-combat move, only effective against enemies within ten meters, so the only ones suitable for the current situation were Blade Array Whirlwind, Meteor of Destruction, and Thunder Carnival. Although Alan had given these three moves distinct names, their effects were actually quite similar: they all shaped Wild Thunder into meteor-like magical sword energy, then launched tracking attacks.
Among them, Blade Array Whirlwind was the largest, roughly the size of a short sword; Meteor of Destruction was next, each shot resembling a large marble with a tail flame; and Thunder Carnival was the most delicate, each shot not much larger than a toothpick. However, because of this, Alan feared that Thunder Carnival would be affected by gravity magic, and since Meteor of Destruction had previously delivered a fatal blow to Peter, he ultimately chose this move.
The Rune Serpent on the opposite side was somewhat surprised that Alan had found a way to counter her gravity spell. But upon seeing him resort to the same trick again, using this kind of splitting arrow-like lightning magic, she couldn't help but let out a cold laugh, "Let me show you what a true gap is… Clone Technique!"
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