Drin cast his spell combo and disappeared from his position. In the next moment, Hiram felt a distinct mana signature surrounding him.
Loads of black shadow-element chains sprouted Hiram's shadow and climbed on his legs. They first bound his legs and stopped him in his tracks. Then they climbed on his body and bound him to a still position.
The contact the chains made with Hiram's armor started showing cracks. The armor developed mud-crack-like scales on its surface as if the entire moisture had been sucked dry because of coming in contact with the shadow element.
"Aaaaargh! Release me if you dare, human!"
Hiram yelled while getting angry. He had broken these shadow element chains easily when Drin was in the Ace rank without having to cast the armor spell on himself. But after the human ranker's rank upgrade, the Ogre Lord had come to realize that Drin had gotten way stronger than he had anticipated.
Approach. Grab. Punch.
Drin appeared out of nowhere in front of the Ogre Lord and grabbed his chained arm. He then pulled the monster toward him before jumping over his head. While coming down on him, Drin punched the monster's back with his hands coated in black shadow flames.
Drin did all this in one swift motion, linking all his moves seamlessly. As a result, Hiram was on the ground before he could understand what had happened to him. The shadow chains that had bound him tightened around his body some more. And more shadow chains sprouted from the ground, securing the Ogre Lord in his current position.
Drin knew that Hiram was suffering less damage than what he was inflicting on him because of the monster's armor. So he decided to increase his damage output by delivering multiple attacks at once.
Shadow Flames!
Drin lit the ground beneath Hiram with his shadow flames. He then coated his hands with even more shadow element mana and strengthened the flames. As a result, the flames reduced in size and got darker than usual.
Drin sat on Hiram's back and started punching the back of Hiram's head and neck The monster was still down and unable to get up. With each of his punches, the Ogre Lord's earth-element armor was chipping away bit by bit. Although Hiram was recovering it using his earth element mana, his recovery rate was slower than the amount of damage Drin was inflicting on him.
Boom! Boom! Boom!
Drin's punches were heavy and cracked the ground beneath Hiram's face. His armor developed even more cracks on its surface, indicating that he was unable to keep up with Drin.
The human ranker was tired himself. He had beads of sweat on his forehead. This would be the first Ogre Lord he would finally be able to kill.
Drin was reminded of the field boss of the Titus tournament that was also an Ogre Lord. He had steered away from the monster at the time. And now he was preparing to finish off a monster of the same level. He was quite happy with his progress.
He was also reminded of the winner of the Titus tournament as he kept on punching Hiram. For some reason, the guy was absent from all the missions the White Raven guild had conducted in Monster Canyon so far. He was assigned to different tasks by Agatha that weren't related to normal missions.
Drin thought that it was such a pity he wouldn't be able to fight off Tuan fairly now that he was in the Adept rank. He also wondered if the guy could keep up with him.
Boom! Boom! Boom!
Drin's sweat ran down his cheeks and dripped on Hiram's back as kept on chipping away at the monster's armor with his punches. He finally was able to see the back of his head that was not protected by the armor after throwing countless punches.
"You could have told me about Bigua and I would have made things easier for you, you know."
Drin said while raising his shadow-element fist over his head one more time. This was the finishing blow he was going to inflict on his opponent. Hiram laughed even harder in his battered state before managing to utter what he wanted to say.
"Haha. it is already too late for you. Let's die together!"
Drin narrowed his eyes when he heard that. In the next moment, he felt a dangerous sensation encompassing him. Someone else had suddenly interrupted his duel with Hiram.
A shadow was cast over Drin and Hiram both as something approached them from above the sky. Drin looked above him and saw a huge mass of purple water shaped into a fist approach him at breakneck speed.
This was a spell cast by someone very proficient in the water element. Plus, he was way stronger than Hiram, possibly someone who was a quasi-Monster Overlord.
Drin could not run away from this massive fist made of a huge mass of water, which was going to engulf the nearby area. And the mana density of the giant fist was strong enough to depress the entire region about three feet into the ground.
Drin looked at Hiram and understood what he was saying. In the end, his escape plan resulted in something he had always hoped to achieve. Summoning someone else from his tribe to help in the rescue.
Bigua had shown himself after sensing the signs of battle near his tribe's region.
Unlike Hiram had previously thought, Bigau had not come here to save him from the human ranker. Hiram was planning to try overthrowing Bigua's rule when he was strong enough to do so. So Bigua had no sympathy for the guy. But his loyalty to Bigua had compelled him to act.
Bigua was a crafty monster, to begin with. He chose to kill Drin in such a way that his future troubles would also be silenced. This was killing two birds with one mighty purple fist.
Drin smiled when he understood the inner politics of the monster tribe to some extent. He was still on top of Hiram's back, who was delighted that he would be able to die alongside his opponent.
Drin brought his face closer to the Monster's Lord's face and whispered his words into his ears.
"I am afraid you will have to embark on your final journey without me, Hiram.
Bye and well fought."
Saying that Drin activated a rare long-range spell that had also been upgraded with his rank up.
Shadow Switch.
In the next moment, an Ogre Lord's body was crushed under the huge mass of purple fists.
