"Master has told us about this defensive mechanism, but it is still impressive to directly bear witness to it," Spring Crown said.
Jack had asked Paytowin during the world tournament what those stone face statues around this place were for. Paytowin said he didn't know. Jack then asked how many were these stone face statues as he saw plenty of them while he was walking around the edges of this place. Paytowin informed that there were a total of twelve.
Jack could only see three colossal golems from where he was, but he had no doubt the other nine had also risen. The ones he could see started to look around, no doubt searching for enemies. Two were stomping at something on the ground, the other one was swatting around at those who flew in the sky. The eyes of this one suddenly shone. They then fired bright beams.
"Hah! That's what you called doesn't matter? You people are done for! You better pack up before you get squashed like a bug," Jack said to Spring Crown.
Instead of answering, Spring Crown pointed to the sky.
Jack was not a ten-year-old who turned his attention away when his opponent was pointing at something. He first moved away from Spring Crown at an angle where he could still see Spring Crown and the direction where Spring Crown was pointing at. Spring Crown stayed put and didn't show any intention to attack.
Jack caught something floating far away in the sky where Spring Crown had pointed. His superb eyesight allowed him to identify that floating thing. It was a person. It was Master!
Master was lifting his hand high. That hand was holding something. Jack had a bad feeling after seeing it.
The thing held by Master broke apart and released a blue shockwave. This shockwave radiated out an incredibly large distance. When this shockwave came to them, Jack cast Magic Shield and held it before him.
The shockwave passed him by but he didn't feel anything. No damage nor any impact force. When he was confused, he caught sight of Paytowin's Brave King. The techno golem had been damaged by Arlstraxx's gravity bombs, but it was not enough to destroy it. It had been moving again when the gravity field from the bomb ended, but after the shockwave passed. It dropped flat to the ground and stayed still.
"Don't… Don't tell me that shockwave is…"
The shockwave finally reached the colossal golems in the distance and confirmed Jack's fear. When the shockwave touched the colossal golems, each one of them shut down and became still.
"That was a legendary consumable item that Master had prepared for the contingency if those defensive statues were activated," Jack heard Spring Crown's words.
"The Anti-techno Pulse Bomb!" Peniel uttered. "How did Master get his hands on that legendary item?!"
"Why didn't they just give him the name for what it is? A bloody electromagnetic pulse bomb. Damn that Master, he is truly hell-bent on destroying this place?" Jack turned to Spring Crown. "What is Master's objective for invading the Council of Virtus?!"
Spring Crown shrugged. "I'm just a goon who carries out orders. I am not privy to such information."
Jack caught sight of something in the sky again. A very large runic symbol was forming above Master.
"Me… Mega spell!" Jack uttered after watching the scene.
In the meantime, with Brave King malfunctioned, Arlstraxx was more free. Arlcard and the others were having trouble. The situation was turning for the worst, Jack couldn't hold back anymore. He activated Life Burning Art and transformed into the supreme dragon. He was intent to finish off Spring Crown fast. But instead of facing him, Spring Crown had retreated far away using the Enhanced Charge.
"I'm not playing with you anymore. I can see that I'm not your opponent," Spring Crown said as he continued to flee. Jack was astounded again by Spring Crown's ability to read the situation.
Since Spring Crown was evading him, Jack didn't want to waste time chasing the guy around. He returned his attention to Arlstraxx, helping his minions. He still had one attention on the sky, though. Master's mega spell was cast at an incredible speed. Even faster than Duke Alfredo when Jack first saw such a mega spell in the past. Even if Jack used his dragon flight and flew to Master, he won't be in time to disrupt the spell casting.
One rune formed after another. When the spell formation continued after the sixth rune, Jack was astounded. Seven runes mega spell? It was the same level as Duke Alfredo's mega spell. Then another rune appeared.
'Ei–Eight runes…?'
"Master has learned an eight runes spell?" Jack uttered with disbelief.
"Impossible!" Peniel said. "Outworlder has a restriction. A spell with eight runes can only be learned after their levels reach level 70. No way he is level 70 already by now. He must be using a legendary-grade magic scroll!"
The eight runes mega spell formation above Master was completed. The sky above turned red and cloudy. A thunderstorm was heard from the gathering clouds.
"Peniel… What spell is that…?"
While Jack asked the question, many large fireballs shot out from the clouds in all directions. After the first wave, the next wave of fireballs came out again, and again.
"Me… Meteor Shower…," Peniel answered after seeing the spell.
Waves after waves of meteors with blazing trails crashed to the ground and caused great explosions. The explosion covered a large area. Natives with basic grades below level 50 were obliterated immediately. Elites survived the explosion, but the meteors didn't fall in just one wave. The second wave came and bombarded the place again, taking out the surviving elites. Then the third and fourth waves came and reduced the special elites to a critical state. The fifth wave took them out.
A meteor fell not far away and hit a group of fighting natives. Peniel noticed the damage it inflicted was around 50,000. She said, "Magic scrolls usually contained spells of only the first level. His intelligence stat must be off the chart to produce such high damage."
With five classes and four that focused on magic-based classes, Jack wasn't surprised by this.
"Madman! Does he not worry about hitting his own people as well?" Jack uttered.
He then noticed one meteor coming their way.
"F*ck! Everyone, moved away!" Jack exclaimed.
They were still fighting Arlstraxx. It was not easy to disengage. He was about to cast Magic Wall again, but a golden figure suddenly shot at the incoming meteor. The resulting impact caused the meteor to explode in the air. The golden figure then landed near them.
"Mihos!" Jack called out.
Arlstraxx looked at this new arrival with wariness. Although Mihos was twenty-one levels below him, the golden champion was a mythical grade. He himself had dropped to almost 60% HP. After he lost the protective fog, he received full damage from all attacks. While for his opponents, he had only managed to kill that ice demon. The vampire and the brute beast still had half their HPs. The most annoying was that outworlder. Although that outworlder had the least HP, he was also the most difficult to hit. It was almost like the outworlder could detect where all his attacks were coming from.
Looking at the situation, if this new mythical-grade opponent joined the fight, even he would be in peril. The one outworlder that was supposed to be his ally had run away without any heads-up. Not that he had any expectation from that outworlder from the start, though.
Arlstraxx cast another torrent of bone arrows to beat everyone back before he floated up to flee.
"Wait!" Jack flew up chasing after him.
Arlstraxx was surprised. Was this outworlder so stupid that he dared to come after him alone?
"I have a message for Fear!" Jack uttered.
"How dare you say his name so casually!" Arlstraxx uttered with anger. His bone whip lashed out at the same time. Jack was ready, his Magic Wall appeared. Though the Magic Wall was destroyed with one hit, Jack was unhurt.
"Master has deceived your God! There is no real world other than this. Ask Fear to go look for Greed if he wants a better explanation!" Jack didn't think Arlstraxx would be peaceful enough for a long message, so he just said his piece in a hurry and then flew back down to where the others were. Arlstraxx looked at him with a contemplating expression before resuming his retreat.
After the enemies left, Mihos asked, "Where is Paytowin?"
Before anyone could answer, the door to the shrine turned intangible again. Paytowin walked out from there.
"Paytowin, Callan summons your presence!" Mihos uttered after seeing him.
"Me? What for?" Paytowin asked.
"I don't know. He sent me to pick you up with haste. His holiness is waiting in the main temple."
"All right," Paytowin nodded. He looked around and found Brave King who was motionless on the ground.
"Master used some kind of EMP tool. It disabled Brave King as well as the defensive giant statues you have activated," Jack informed.
"I know, I was controlling the defensive giant statues from inside the shrine. Damn that Master! He has a countermeasure for our defensive mechanism all along."
Paytowin accessed his techno golem interface and reverted Brave King to a small mechanical ball. He might need to bring it to a repair facility later. He suspected what happened to Brave King was the same as if it was destroyed.
While they prepared to leave, they saw several shadow portals appear out of thin air and more of Fear's cults came out of them. This batch must have been waiting until Master used his Meteor Shower scroll before they made their entrance.
At the same time, Master floated down and cast a spell. Jack's sharp eyes saw the spell formation numbered seven runes. Once the spell formation was completed, a gigantic dark portal appeared. As it did, innumerous shadow creatures poured out of it.
