Yet, when Shang saw the insanely powerful lightning beam, he wasn't worried in any way.
'Seems like I won't be able to use Dusk against the Serpent.'
At that moment, Shang's Colossal Sword was already in a blocking position, and that position was just perfect.
He only angled it a bit more.
'But I didn't expect to use Dusk anyway.'
'Luckily, I thought of this possibility.'
WHOOOOM!
At that moment, a terrifying amount of light gathered around the Colossal Sword, and it all went to the same point.
Shang's body atrophied tremendously.
He had just used up basically all of his life energy, and he quickly converted about 80% of his Mana into more life energy, making his body instantly healthy again.
With the overcharged life energy from absorbing the hedgehog, Shang had essentially used 150% of his maximum life energy just now, which was an insane amount.
However, that meant that Shang wouldn't be able to use Brilliance again as long as he didn't want to fight as a nearly lifeless husk for the rest of the battle. That essentially meant that he couldn't use Dusk. Without Brilliance, Dusk could easily be evaded.
Then, the pure beam of lightning hit the Colossal Sword at the exact point where all the light had gathered.
DING!
At that moment, a humongous wave of light exploded out of the Colossal Sword.
For just an instant, the beam of lightning seemed to pause in front of the sword.
And then, Shang pushed forward.
BANG!
The lightning beam shot at the Serpent!
The Serpent hadn't been prepared for such a fast and powerful attack right after it had unleashed its own.
It could barely move part of its body to the side.
BOOOOOM!
The beam of lightning tore through half the width of the Serpent, leaving a humongous burned hole behind!
If the Serpent hadn't moved to the side by a bit, it would have been blasted into two pieces!
And then, the lightning traveled across its body, severely burning it in several places before it finally used up its power.
However, even worse was the fact that the Serpent's body had seized, making it unable to act for a while.
This was Shang's alternative to Dusk.
If an enemy used a truly powerful energy-based attack, Shang could use this technique to severely injure or even kill them.
Of course, depending on the power of the attack, this technique could possibly become even more costly than Brilliance.
With the light-themed names for all the techniques in the Colossal Sword State, the name of this attack came naturally.
Reflection.
That was the name.
Refraction and Reflection were the two attacks Shang had developed to close the distance between him and enemy Mages.
Refraction was cheap to use and could disperse energy-based attacks.
Reflection was very expensive and could reflect energy-based attacks.
Sadly, these two attacks were only useful against Fire, Lightning, Light, Darkness, and some Wind Affinity Spells.
Earth, Water, Ice, and Metal Spells weren't affected by these attacks.
But that also wasn't an issue.
Shang could just parry those attacks and redirect them. After all, they were simply a mass of matter that was thrown at him.
Shang continued charging at the Serpent, who was still unable to act due to its lightning.
But before Shang even reached the Serpent, he had already swung his sword.
WHOOOM!
Black fire gathered around the sword, and he slashed forward.
Then, a wave of black fire shot directly at the injured part of the Serpent's body!
This attack wasn't nearly as strong as Dusk or even Star Shatter, but it would, at least, make use of Sword's Entropy.
At that moment, the Serpent regained a bit of its control.
WHOOOM!
A humongous wave of lightning shot right at the wave of black flames.
In the Serpent's current state, it couldn't rely on its ability to aim. So, it decided to use a huge attack to block Shang's attack.
In just an instant, the wave of black fire cut through the wave of lightning, but it had shrunk by quite a bit.
The Serpent barely managed to move part of its body to the side.
BOOOOM!
And the attack hit!
Sadly, the attack didn't manage to hit the already injured part of the Serpent, but a healthy part just beside it.
A humongous cut appeared on that part, several meters deep!
Blood exploded out of it, but the Serpent was still in fighting condition.
It was injured heavily, but it could still fight and survive.
And, finally, Shang reached it!
He had closed the distance!
At that moment, Shang was no longer carrying his Colossal Sword but his Great Sword.
Then, Shang did something that no one would have expected.
His entire body exploded with a humongous amount of fire!
The explosion of fire was so powerful that even half of the Serpent's body was pushed away, right into the humongous ball of lightning.
Yet, the Serpent was the controller of this ball of lightning, which meant that it didn't receive any injuries, but the fact that such a massive beast was thrown back by an explosion of fire already showed how powerful that explosion was.
Sadly, the power was dispersed, and the scales facing Shang only became slightly seared.
The Serpent didn't get injured.
However, that hadn't been the point.
After the fire vanished, Shang's body was revealed.
It was a deep blue, and he looked almost like an icy statue.
But his right eye shone with a fire of determination.
And then, Shang swung his Great Sword from one side to the other.
WHOOOOOM!
A terrifying amount of Ice Mana was released!
Yet, surprisingly, it didn't interact with the ball of lightning or the Serpent in any way.
It was almost like the Ice Mana was released into the surroundings.
At the same time, Shang's body exploded with blood, and he had to use the remainder of his Mana to fix it.
He had no more Mana, which meant that any injury he would receive now would stay for the remainder of the battle.
But all of this was worth it.
The Ice Mana surrounded the surrounding two kilometers, with Shang and the Serpent being in the middle.
A terrifyingly cold wind picked up, and the Serpent felt its body temperature drop rapidly!
All the light inside the domain of ice vanished, leaving only a cold, dead, and dark wasteland of icy death.
The Serpent had prepared its ball of lightning to unleash attacks faster.
It had transformed its internal storage of Mana into an external one to get rid of one step to conjure an attack.
And now, Shang had done the same.
His body temperature was also dropping rapidly, and this was just what he wanted.
In this land of icy death, he could release all of his accumulated power without needing to worry about where to Blast with his Fire Blast.
Shang had prepared the battlefield, and he had transformed it into an advantageous one for him.
The cold temperatures benefited him and hindered his opponent.
Shang only used this specific technique against beasts since they couldn't use Mana Step.
Mages could just release a couple of Mana Steps and escape the domain, but beasts couldn't.
That meant that the beasts would be stuck in this domain.
This was the technique that prepared Shang for an unending assault in his Great Sword State.
Everything around him would transform into a dark wasteland of icy death.
He called it New Moon.
