Once six layers of Enhancement had been applied to the Symbol of Extraction, Michael utilized Extraction immediately.
He created tens of tendrils of Extraction that were as thick as his upper arm. The tendrils of Extraction shot toward the strongest Kitsun that had already been injured while the rest shot into the surrounding area where they tapped into the streams of ambient energy.
Michael didn't show any mercy as he willed the tendrils of Extraction to annex the streams of ambient energy in the surroundings and both the energy and lifeforce within his enemies.
The lifeforce soothed his splitting headache and eased the pain in his right arm, while the extracted origin energy was annexed and put to good use by conjuring more tendrils of Extraction.
Feeling a tremendous amount of energy surging through every cell in his body, Michael began to stride toward the ever-expanding Cloud Domain of the Kitsun Lord.
He merely turned to Zira for a second to give her a short notice, "My Soultrait allows me to devour the energy in my enemies and surroundings. Don't think too much about the restrictions created by the Cloud Domain and give your best to kill this piece of shit."
Zira stared at him in shock, her mouth wide open. She thought that Michael's Soultrait had been something otherworldly, only to realize that her naive mind had fooled her.
Michael didn't possess only one powerful Soultrait…but multiple!
The envy in her eyes intensified as realization sunk in. There was nothing she could do about that. Zira had always been jealous of those born with a great innate gift, and powerful Soultraits. Her innate talent wasn't bad, but it wasn't good enough to allow her to outweigh the disadvantage of possessing a trashy Soultrait.
"...Alright. We'll pay attention," Zira mumbled once she got back to her senses.
But by the time she replied, Michael had already walked past her, his golden tendrils infiltrating those who had been injured by her and her people.
Michael didn't leave much behind once his tendrils of Extraction brushed past his enemies. But that was only given. Extraction was a 6-Star Soultrait with six layers of Enhancement.
However, Michael didn't bother sparing a glance to the enemies around him anymore. He focused on annexing as much energy as possible to apply two more layers on Enhancement before he reached the Cloud Domain.
The Cloud Domain was even larger than Michael expected. It was more than 50 meters in height and easily crossed the majority of the battlefield by now. That meant the Cloud Domain was more than a kilometer in width and length at this point.
'Now I understand why everyone was so worried about the Cloud Domain. This is truly deadly. If not for Extraction, I would have been forced to run away.'
Those with Soultraits and Willpower far stronger than the Kitsun Lord would be able to use their energy to use their Soultraits, but the Kitsun Lord was at the Peak of the 3rd Tier and he was about to evolve to a Higher Lifeform by advancing to Tier-4. His Willpower couldn't be weak, and his Soultrait was certainly on the stronger side as well.
Therefore, nobody had been able to defeat the Kitsun Lord until now. That was about to change.
"Follow me!" Michael commanded Zira and the Valyr following her.
"Hold tightly," He said to the Elemental Empress, who tightened her grasp over his arm.
Michael didn't look back at Zira and the other Valyr to see if they were following him, but dashed straight toward the Cloud Domain without any hesitation. The tendrils of Extraction retracted and Michael used the energy he gained to release the Dome of Extraction.
The Dome of Extraction was activated immediately. It devoured the energy that maintained the Cloud Domain and freed the oxygen that had been held hostage by the black cloud.
The Dome of Extraction could only extract the energy of the Cloud Domain wherever they touched. Thus, the Cloud Domain could still expand even though Michael began to extract it from within. But that was not a problem.
Michael began to expand the Dome of Extraction using the energy he drained from the humongous black cloud. This resulted in a pleasant chain reaction. First, the Dome of Extraction continued to expand rapidly. But most important was the second effect wherein the Cloud Domain stopped expanding.
Deprived of some of its energy, the Cloud Domain was forced to subside the energy it had just lost, resulting in stagnant growth. The moment Zira and the Valyr noticed this phenomenon they followed Michael's trails and charged inside the Cloud Domain.
At first, they didn't believe that Michael would be capable of creating an opening to strike the Kitsun Lord, but he proved them wrong – fortunately. After they hesitated for a quarter of a second, they pushed inside the Cloud Domain and reached Michael's Dome of Extraction. The golden dome continued to expand, repelling the Cloud Domain all while devouring its energy rapidly.
At some point, Michael noticed that thousands of Kitsun ended up getting caught in the Cloud Domain as well. He sensed them and a snort escaped his lips. Not even the Kitsun could escape the same fate as their enemies. They required oxygen to survive and suffocated in the Cloud Domain.
Only the Kitsun Lord could survive in his own humongous domain.
"If you're already dying, you might as well turn into my War Rune's nutrition," Michael said before he invaded the inside of the suffocating Kitsun with threads of Extraction. The threads of Extraction protruded from the edges of the Dome of Extraction, and invaded the enemy, draining them slowly until death was all that was left.
Michael was not sure how much time passed before they reached the center of the Cloud Domain. However, once they did, his Dome of Extraction had reached a radius of more than a hundred meters. That was not enough space for 1000 Valyr to fight against the Kitsun Lord. But it was enough space for the Valyr to move in and out of the Cloud Domain without having to fear dying from the lack of oxygen.
The Valyr moved in small groups of 50 members and began to initiate powerful attacks. They took Haro Ki by surprise as the Kitsun Lord didn't expect anyone to be able to overpower his Cloud Domain.
He was already aware that the unknown Lord could repel the weakest state of his black cloud, but he never believed that his Cloud Domain could be repelled and devoured that easily as well. The Cloud Domain was his strongest power; an ability that required the sacrifice of 5,000 Kitsun to be manifested in the first place.
This ability had never failed him. In fact, it always exceeded his expectations!
The Cloud Domain once reaped more than a hundred thousand lives, including the life of a Lord he fought for months before comprehending the true power of the Cloud Domain.
It was not a power one could take lightly because the Cloud Domain could cover entire battlefields once nurtured.
The Kitsun Lord couldn't believe that a power surpassing the Cloud Domain existed in this part of the Origin Expanse. He had never seen anyone with a power like that. It didn't make sense, even less that the user of this power was a mere Lord between the Low and Mid-rank of the 2nd Tier.
How powerful must a Tier-2 Lord's Soultrait be to surpass the true power of his Cloud Domain – manifested by a Lord who was just about to cross the border to the 4th Tier?! What was going on? Who was this guy? And why did he have to appear just before he evolved to a Higher Lifeform? Couldn't he have waited...just a few more days?
That was not fair...
Michael had no idea how depressed and furious the Kitsun Lord was. He didn't really care either way.
All Michael cared about was maintaining the 100-meter radius of the Dome of Extraction while continuing to extract more and more energy to prepare for his final attack as well.
He was certain that the Valyr could deal with the Kitsun Lord now that the Cloud Domain posed no lethal threat anymore. Nonetheless, Michael wanted to be the one to kill the Kitsun Lord. For one, it was a part of revenge that he owed his subordinates who died in the Elementals Cave. But there was also the vengeance he promised the Elemental Empress.
Michael wanted to show the Elemental Empress that he would always keep his promise and that she didn't have to worry about getting disappointed. He would make sure that this would never happen!
Following that, Michael manifested a huge Glacicle Sword. It was more than ten meters long and two meters wide. Right after the Glacicle Sword manifested, Michael shrouded it with Reinforced Sword Qi.
However, instead of using the Reinforced Sword Qi as he usually did, Michael used the Qi to compress the Glacicle Sword as much as possible. The ten-meter-long sword was compressed into a one meter long blade. Once the Glacicle Sword was compressed, Michael used Glacicle once again to shroud the compressed Qi Glacicle Sword with another layer of Glacicle. Following that, the Glacicle Sword expanded to its former size, only for Michael to use Reinforced Sword Qi once again to compress the Glacicle Sword a second time.
Michael repeated this cycle several times all while hoarding more energy. He watched as the Valyr inflicted several deep gashes all over the Kitsun Lord's body. But in exchange for inflicting injuries, the Kitsun Lord was given a handful of openings to kill the Valyr opposite him.
The Kitsun Lord killed almost 50 Valyr while Michael prepared his final attack. That was a lot more than Michael expected, especially since the combat prowess of almost all Kitsun was ranked Inferior.
Once the Glacicle Sword had been compressed over and over again and coated in several layers of Reinforced Sword Qi it looked like a refined blade of a humongous two-meter-long broadsword. The ice shone like polished steel, which glowed even brighter as Michael used the majority of his hoarded energy to apply seven layers of Enhancement on both the Symbol of Reinforced Sword Qi and Glacicle to finish up the final layer of the highly compressed enhanced Qi Glacicle Blade.
The energy utilized to create this attack was more than most Peak Tier-3 Awakened could hold in their storages, and the time was more than enough to create numerous killing attacks. However, Michael didn't allow anyone to rush him, not even the mind-throbbing headache that had been haunting him for quite a while now.
Michae raised his hand slowly. He retracted the Dome of Extraction in one go before using the entire energy he had just retrieved to supply Extraction. He coated the highly compressed enhanced Qi Glacicle Blade with the Power of Extraction.
In the next instant, his hand shot down in a straight line and the Qi Glacicle Blade burst forth.
"Get out of the way!!" Michael shouted at the top of his lungs as his vision blurred.
Drained of energy, all Michael could witness was the Qi Glacicle Blade cutting through everything in its way.
It froze everything in its path. The blazing trails left behind by the Valyr extinguished at once, and even the flaming hair of the Valyr flickered violently in an attempt to survive the freezing hell that had descended all around them.
The highly compressed enhanced Qi Glacicle Blade released menacing pressure all of a sudden, just before Michael used the last bits of energy and willpower within him to use Spirit Disturbance on the Kitsun Lord.
The Kitsun Lord roared loudly, trying to use Cloud Domain against the Valyr around him to push them away and move aside. But before he could even attempt to do so, multiple new wounds appeared all over their bodies. A quarter of a second later the Glacicle Blade arrived.
The tip cut straight through the center of the Kitsun Lord's chest. He couldn't even resist anymore.
In the next moment all the Valyr around the Kitsun Lord could see was blood, followed right behind by pure terror plastered on the Kitsun Lord's face.
"That can't be…"
Suddenly the Valyr screamed out in pain. The Glacicle Blade cut through the Kitsun Lord and sliced him in two right before bursting apart, releasing a terrifying amount of highly enhanced freezing mist.
The freezing mist shrouded the vicinity at once. It was just about to freeze a few Peak Tier-2 Valyr and even three injured Low-rank Common Tier-3 Awakened to death when Michael retracted the freezing mist more as an instinctive move rather than a planned decision.
Right after, he slumped to the ground, his back drenched in sweat. Breathing heavily, all Michael could feel was the energy influx of the Kitsun Lord reaching his War Rune. It was much stronger than any energy influx he had ever obtained before.
'Maybe I will reach the Mid-rank of Tier-2 once I've digested everythi–...' That was all Michael could think of before the world around him turned dark.
