Birth of the Demonic Sword

Another roar followed the previous one, and silver drops rained on the sky as the Snake freed itself from the starry sky that covered its head. Trails of ice formed wherever the liquid flew, and even the flames couldn't escape those effects.

Snore suffered from that attack too. Its enormous body froze together with the black flames that had surrounded the Eternal Snake's head.

The Snake tilted its head, and the ice around it shattered. Noah could see the effects of his previous offensive, but the result left him slightly disappointed.

Even if his individuality had improved Snore's power, the Blood Companion remained connected to his black hole. Noah's ambition couldn't empower it as it did with his centers of power. It required better dark matter to cross the limits of its tier.

Yet, it still managed to wound the creature. The skin on the left side of the Snake's head had become a mess of cuts and torn tissues after it endured the storm of saber-shaped runes.

That attack had damaged the thick muscles under the skin, but it didn't manage to reach the skull. The Snake's eyelid had also protected its left eye, but the creature had to sacrifice it during the process.

Green blood flowed out of those injuries, but the shards of ice that had fallen on the ground soon floated toward the Snake's face and covered the wounds.

Part of the also ice flew toward the tail to cover the various injuries and large cut. It didn't take much before blood stopped flowing out of them.

Noah could use that chance to attack, but he wanted to inspect that innate ability. According to Shandal, the Eternal Snakes had an incredible vitality, but that only explained part of what they could do.

Also, Noah knew that his current prowess had a time limit. He had already launched many attacks and fueled his puppets with his ambition. His individuality couldn't do miracles. Its effects had to end at some point.

Still, he couldn't help but show a wide smile when he stared at how he had damaged the Snake. The invasion wouldn't crush the lower plane as long as he wielded that power.

The ice slowly changed color. It previously was mostly silver, but it gradually turned dark-green to match the shade of the Snake's scales.

It also changed shape. The ice transformed into actual pieces of skin that fixed the injuries.

Noah remained speechless at that sight. The new tissues were no different from the actual skin of the beast. It seemed that the vitality of that species didn't apply only to the amount of energy that its specimens carried.

'This is the evolution process of the magical beasts!' Noah exclaimed in his mind when he understood the basics behind that ability.

The ice that had fixed those injuries had come from Noah's frozen abilities. The Snake had taken control of the energy that they contained and used it to patch its skin!

Noah's mind became silent for an instant before a tide of ideas surged inside it. His creation consumed his mental energy to give birth to a series of designs that attempted to replicate that innate ability.

It wasn't his first time meeting similar abilities, and he had even wielded a similar one in the past. Yet, he had never seen something so immediate and in line with the qualities of the magical beasts.

The Eternal Snakes could use the energy that they captured to fix their injuries in seconds. That went far beyond the normal absorption process of the magical beasts!

'Destroy others to recreate yourself,' Noah's expression became solemn as he thought that, but his instincts soon forced him to put those ideas in the back of his mind to focus on his opponent.

The Snake was livid. It inspected its tail and released angry roars when it saw that its ice didn't make the severed piece regrow.

The creature spilled more ice in the surrounding area to create more materials for its ability, but no number of shards was enough to regrow its tail. Their color didn't even change when they touched that body part.

'I can't play around much longer,' Noah thought as corrosive smoke started to come out of his skin.

The Snake turned to look at Noah once it gave up on regrowing its tail. Its eyes radiated intense anger, and silver liquid fell from its open mouth.

The growls that came out of it didn't make any sense when they reached Noah's ears. The Snake was simply expressing its anger with cries that had no meaning in human words.

The fiendish armor formed around Noah, and a corrosive cloud immediately appeared around him. Dark matter also came out of his chest and recreated the dark world.

Snore reappeared behind him, and Night hid inside the darkness to wait for a chance to attack. Noah was ready to have his last exchange with the Snake, and he didn't care that his remaining power might not be enough to kill it.

Noah raised his sword, but his survival instincts suddenly began to scream and forced him to perform an evasive maneuver. He entered his dimension and sprinted upward, but a shockwave hit him before he could reach his destination.

A dense pressure interrupted Noah's technique and flung him in the distance. His bones released screeching noises as he did his best to oppose that force and stop himself.

Noah didn't even know what had hit him. His dark world didn't sense anything, but an attack had almost landed on him. The shockwave that it had released had even been enough to interrupt his movement technique.

Noah managed to stop himself after he flew for a few kilometers, and the scene that appeared in his eyes made his mind grow cold. A large chunk of the terrain in front of the Snake had disappeared. Part of the sky right above it had turned into a wide fissure that led to the void.

A long crack had opened in the region too. The fissure started from the Snake and continued until the land nearby.

As an expert in the magical beasts' field, Noah could identify what had caused that change in the environment. He could see the maimed tail of the Snake pointing at him, but he found it hard to believe that it had been capable of that destruction.

Moreover, that attack didn't cause the usual mindless destruction that most magical beasts would create. It had focused the spot where Noah had been just an instant before, and that had given the blow far more power.

'Don't tell me that they can use techniques,' Noah thought as he recreated the dark world. The Demonic Form had survived the shockwave, so corrosive smoke had already started covering his figure.

The black hole spun faster as Noah focused on the Snake. His fourth center of power worked together with his desire to see the attack, and a large amount of energy flowed in his eyes while they remained fixed on his opponent's body.

The Snake didn't hesitate and leaped toward Noah. The terrain under it crumbled under the physical strength that it released to jump, and its massive figure became hard to follow after it left the ground.

Noah could see everything with the empowerment caused by his black hole. The Snake used its flexible body to act as a whip and surpass its limits during its offensive.

Its head shot forward when it was about to reach Noah. The momentum that it carried created cracks wherever it passed.

Noah had to sprint again to dodge that attack, but the same pressure forced him outside of his dimension.

When he could focus on his opponent again, he found that his dark world had fallen in the void connected to the crack opened by the Snake's bite and that a layer of ice had spread from its mouth.

Then, he noticed that his feet had fallen prey to that innate ability.