Michael's kill-count surpassed 1,000 in less than a minute and the count continued increasing rapidly. The azure fireball overhead expanded for a while before Michael willed it to compress.
But that was not the end of it. Michael utilized more fire-attributed origin energy to conjure mythical flames whenever he had some excessive energy stored up. The mythical flames merged with the fireball expanding it once again.
Michael compressed the fireball once again, repeating the cycle over and over again.
Many Huglaiv tried to attack Michael, but that was not as easy as it sounded. Most long-range combatants had already been killed, leaving little to no chance for most Huglaiv to reach Michael mid-air.
Michael had killed most Sorcerers and Archers with the True Extraction Domain the moment he arrived. Unfortunately, some Awakened had Soultraits that could be used against Michael. It was only fortunate that Lilica, Mika, and Opars bombarded them with arrows when they revealed their Soultraits and intention to harm their Lord.
To be precise, Mika bombarded everyone with Rapid Fire, and Pierce, killing various Tier-2 Awakened in no time. He could have used Arrow Duplication, but the Soultrait drained too much energy. Arrow Duplication was more useful against large numbers of enemies as well. It was not useful right now given that Michael was taking care of the masses of Low Tier Huglaiv.
Since his large-scale attack was not required, Mika focused on impaling the Awakened and Summons who didn't die instantaneously within Michael's True Extraction Domain. Pierce and Rapid Fire turned out to be a great combo, as expected. He struck several Awakened who'd been focused on blocking the tremendous power of the True Extraction Domain. They realized too late that a bombardment of arrows whizzed through the golden-coated landscape.
Long-range attacks worked decently fine in the True Extraction Domain. Their power deteriorated, but the projectiles weren't torn apart for the True Extraction Domain focused on the living.
But since the True Extraction Domain focused on the living, no one from Michael's team dared to enter the golden-coated domain. Unfortunately, there was always one idiot. One of the Valyrs wasn't smart enough to understand that Michael's True Extraction Domain didn't differentiate between friends and foes.
There was no friendly fire function given that Michael unleashed as much of True Extraction's power as possible right now.
The idiotic Valyr was ignorant enough to charge into the True Extraction Domain as she pursued a Huglaiv Awakened. Upon entering the golden-coated domain, the flames coating her extinguished immediately. She was drained of origin energy and lifeforce, and her skin was pulled off. The Valyr was dissected alive.
The Valyr screamed at the top of her lungs and she was just about to turn around and escape the True Extraction Domain when her legs caved in. Lokai was forced to jump into the True Extraction Domain, grasp the idiot at her waist, and kick the ground with every bit of strength to escape the True Extraction Domain before it would affect her as well.
The woman wept in pain, but Lokai didn't pay any attention to her after she rescued her. Lokai returned to the battlefield, after making a big detour around the vibrant glowing center of the battlefield. The True Extraction Domain continued expanding, reaping more and more lives in the process.
Not even ten minutes passed before Michael and his subordinates finished dealing with more than 10,000 Huglaiv. The only powerful enemies had been two old-aged Higher Lifeforms. Just like any other Higher Lifeform in the Savannah Region, they were Low-ranked Tier-4 Awakened.
They were much weaker than the Lionheart Commanders.
True Extraction focused on the old Higher Lifeforms. Michael applied Insert as well, channeling the power of True Extraction inside the old Huglaiv, weakening them in the process. Lokai and the Valyrs used the distraction caused by Michael to land the killing blows.
Lokai's Life Conversion had been used more than two dozen times since the battle started. She was overflowing with raw power, nearly tearing her highly resilient body apart. The power she gained was enough to compete with a Lowest Tier-4 Awakened in terms of physical strength and overwhelm him. That was how strong Lokai had grown after using the lifeforce Michael shot toward her now and then in the battle.
Now that the battle was over and the Huglaiv army had been obliterated, Michael changed his target to the settlement. Not much time had passed since they charged at the army. The defenders shouldn't have had enough time to activate all the defense mechanisms yet.
The main settlement's defense was bound to be far from perfect.
Even if it was 'perfect' in the Huglaiv Lord's opinion, Michael didn't see a reason to be worried. Michael had used half of the energy he'd absorbed from close to 10,000 people into a humongous fireball that had been conjured from mythical flames.
He retracted the True Extraction Domain and retrieved the 10 layers of Enhancement used on it before removing the Cursed Seals to lift the severe mental strain. A wave of energy surged out using the remaining energy that hadn't been used up by the True Extraction Domain. All corpses on the battlefield vanished into Michael's War Rune.
Only a moment later, Michael turned to the settlement, his entire focus on the three-story-tall azure fireball. He applied two layers of Enhancement to it and paid attention to the next course of action.
Michael neared the settlement with fast strides. Once he closed the gap to the massive walls guarding the settlement from invaders, he lobbed the humongous azure fireball through the air. The fireball whizzed through the air in a beautiful arc and smashed into the walls right next to the southern gate.
A fierce explosion erupted, tearing the settlement walls alongside the southern gate apart. Huge chunks of stone and other construction materials were flung in all directions right before a deadly heatwave swept through the surroundings. The rubble was propelled forward and transformed into deadly projectiles as they smashed into the surrounding buildings. The building collapsed and transformed into ruins within seconds, whereas the fireball's heatwave reaped countless lives. The wooden structures were burned to a cinder, destroying more of the surrounding area.
Not a single building in the proximity of the southern gate survived the azure fireball's explosion. Everything was destroyed, either burned to cinder, or utterly devastated.
The settlement was in chaos and the southern wall collapsed, leaving a huge hole for Michael and his subordinates to use.
The Berserkers were the first to charge. Lokai, specifically, was the first to move. She was the fastest right now and had still a few minutes of Life Conversion's power-up remaining. She kicked the ground, pushing the soil underfoot aside to reach top speed in no time.
Lokai crossed the distance to the broken wall in no time. She overlooked the searing heat that menaced to burn her hair and skin and leaped through the gaping hole to invade the Huglaiv's main settlement. Hundreds of corpses, mostly of Combat Summons who'd been prepared to face Michael and his people, littered the ground. Some were still alive, but they'd sustained heavy injuries. Lokai took care of them swiftly. She slain them without a shred of mercy. After all, there was no mercy in war.
