Shepherd Wizard

Chapter 128

Translator: Pai_

When he first fought a Fallen God, what surprised Turan was not the sudden surge in powerful magic.

Techniques such as slamming an axe into the ground to create a storm of ice, or swiftly gliding across an icy surface, skills whose causality was so difficult to grasp that they defied comprehension.

Those bizarre spells, created by mixing the symbols of various bloodlines to produce far stronger and more unusual results with the same magic power, were by far the most unpredictable and troublesome elements.

That green glow forming before his eyes must be the same.

Therefore, instead of blocking or deflecting the incoming attack, he chose to evade it using high-speed movement powered by the Spirit of Fire.

Was it thanks to the practice he’d gotten while dying multiple times in the Colosseum?

Unlike before, when his movements were excessive, now he could dodge attacks with just the right amount of motion.

Gaining the offensive advantage by circling to his opponent's side, Turan immediately fired the stone he had already loaded.

It was an item made from granite, the hardest among ordinary rocks, prepared in case he ran out of iron balls.

However, just like before, the stone vanished in a burst of lightning before it could reach Cadrum's body.

'So it's not just metal that it melts?'

Unlike earlier, when molten metal vapor had risen, this time, powder and smoke flared up.

Well, truly powerful electricity could even shatter rock.

If even this was being neutralized, then breaking through with ordinary physical projectiles would be difficult.

Turan immediately switched the Sacred Relic to the Sun Bloodline and created a massive ring of light behind his back.

Light of Judgement.

Born from the harmony of fire and light, this was matter yet not matter, and thus it naturally did not interfere with lightning.

A whip of light extended from the ring and lashed out at Cadrum.

“Ugh…!”

As expected, instead of standing tall and receiving the attack like before, Cadrum let out a low groan and stepped back.

As the golden whip passed through the spot where he had been standing, the trees were slashed down and flames erupted.

“I have no idea how you managed to obtain the Mimic’s ability, but-”

Turan ignored whatever the opponent was about to say and continued attacking with the light whip.

If the opponent lost his breath while needlessly chattering, it would only be to his advantage.

However, instead of panicking and floundering like that elder of House Varaha, Cadrum closed his mouth and immediately drew a circle with both hands.

Then, as if reaching out toward the incoming whip.

'He's deflecting it?'

The light whip that touched Cadrum’s hand didn’t burn or slice his flesh but seemed to coil around and then bounced away.

It was a sensation completely different from blocking with magical power, as if the control over the spell itself had been transferred to the opponent.

As the deflected whip flew fiercely toward his neck, Turan quickly withdrew his magic power and extinguished the Light of Judgement.

Then he used the burning trees around him as a medium to create and launch a fireball.

But once again, it was caught by the circle he had drawn with his hand and returned back toward him.

'Is he using my power against me?'

Interfering with someone else’s magic in this way would normally be impossible.

To buy himself time to think, Turan widened the distance, but just like before, Cadrum generated a pale green glow from his hand and shot it toward him.

Quickly twisting his body, Turan felt blood trickle from the side of his cheek and clicked his tongue.

'This is quite the hassle...'

His greatest weapon, the iron balls, were melted, and attacks that ignored lightning were returned by bizarre techniques.

And despite all that, the man himself kept launching swift and threatening attacks relentlessly.

Compared to the elder of Varaha he had fought before, this opponent was superior in every aspect, from combat experience to weaponry and techniques.

At that moment, a loud boom echoed nearby, followed by a gust of cold air.

Ymir, who had been idly hanging back, was walking toward them gripping his ice axe tightly.

“I thought you weren’t going to fight?”

“Seeing how things are going, it looked like this was going to take a while. I can just use up this body and swap it out again anyway, right?”

It seemed he had drawn upon the power of the Berserker, as Ymir’s eyes, staring in this direction, were bloodshot red with bursting veins.

Within him, the symbols of the Berserker and Frost rose and swirled together, but unlike before, they trembled with extreme instability.

Was it, as he had said earlier, because it was a “hastily taken body”?

When Ymir stomped his foot and the ground was instantly covered in ice, Turan immediately anticipated the follow-up attack and flung himself aside.

Ymir, who had been sliding forward as he swung his axe, widened his eyes in surprise.

“What, how did you know?”

“He uses Thought Acceleration. Must’ve learned it from Meisa.”

“No, it’s not that… it just felt like you already knew something.”

Wearing a vaguely uncomfortable expression, Ymir tapped his shoulder with his axe for a moment before clicking his tongue and charging at Turan again.

As Turan shot into the air using Flight Magic to evade, Cadrum launched a dark blue orb at him.

‘That’s…’

Just like the green glow earlier, it was a spell whose identity was difficult to discern.

Fortunately, its speed wasn’t particularly fast, so it didn’t seem hard to dodge.

However, the moment Turan avoided the dark blue orb at a reasonable distance, a thunderous explosion erupted, sending electric shocks whipping in every direction.

Naturally, Turan’s body, within that range, could not escape.

“Khk…!”

A tingling paralysis that coursed through his entire body, he had felt this sensation often while sparring with Meisa.

From a distance, Cadrum was visibly smiling, having confirmed his attack had landed.

What saved him was that even in a paralyzed state, he could still move if he used Flight Magic.

Seeing Cadrum flying toward him, Turan instinctively cast Wind Magic to keep him in check.

“Ugh!”

Unlike Meisa, who didn’t even flinch at such interference, Cadrum reacted more sensitively than expected to the disruption in his flight.

Turan had assumed that if the opponent were a being akin to a god, he must have trained in magic for thousands of years and would be transcendentally skilled.

Yet, before he could even scoff at how crude the opponent's flying skills turned out to be, Ymir exploded upward from below, swinging his axe at him with tremendous leg strength.

Turan once again ignited the Spirit of Fire to evade, but Ymir, as if expecting it, conjured ice platforms midair to change direction.

“Got you-!”

Having already lost his balance during the previous dodge, it was now difficult to move again.

Turan instinctively drew his dagger for defense.

‘Ah.’

Perhaps due to the paralysis from the electric shock not fully dissipated.

The dagger he held with an awkward posture shattered, and the axe was embedded in his chest.

Whatever technique Ymir had used, a brilliant ice flower bloomed over the wound.

“Guh…”

Each petal of the flower was like a blade, viciously tearing apart the spot where it had blossomed, ravaging his upper body.

Had Turan not been a powerful High Noble, or had he lacked the defensive Magic Artifacts such as the Guardian Magic Artifact, he would have been torn to pieces and died on the spot.

As he hurriedly kicked Ymir away and retreated, Ymir landed on the ground and shouted in disbelief.

“What the hell, why are you so tough!?”

“I told you, you can’t kill him!”

Falling to the ground, Turan quickly scattered the Water of Death in vapor form toward the approaching Ymir to make him inhale it.

Even a top-tier noble would find this attack hard to endure if caught off guard, but Ymir merely froze and dropped it with a glance.

“That won’t work a second time, you hydrochloric acid terrorist bastard.”

He might be confident in overwhelming the opponent in a one-on-one fight, but facing both at the same time was completely unmanageable.

If he could just hold out while flying, maybe he could receive help from Meisa or Solif.

“Where do you think you’re going!”

At that moment, as Cadrum reached his hand toward Turan, the surrounding air began to churn wildly.

Even the area Turan had been controlling with Flight Magic was affected.

Clang, crash- as he half-tumbled and crashed to the ground, Turan quickly pushed himself up and drew in a deep breath.

“Sss… ha…”

Was it due to excessive bleeding, or had one of the wounds reached his lungs?

He hadn’t even moved that much, yet his breath was caught in his throat.

As Cadrum approached with unhurried steps, he asked,

“How about it, will you surrender?”

Turan, wanting to conserve even the breath it would take to speak, silently glared at him while struggling to catch his breath.

Beside him, Ymir, spinning his ice axe in circles, pointed at Turan and said,

“But seriously, what is that guy? His magic skills are absurd. Even Meisa, who was deliberately created, isn’t at that level, right? Can something like that just happen by chance?”

“Who knows. Even where we lived, there were talents that surpassed limits.”

“I’d love to use him for my next body-”

“Watch your mouth. People are watching. Use honorifics too.”

“Oh, right, right.”

Cadrum gave a sidelong glare at the flippant Ymir, who had covered his mouth in mock panic, then turned his gaze back to Turan.

“So you won’t surrender after all. I won’t give you much more time. The tide of battle isn’t entirely in our favor.”

Of course, Meisa and Solif were each facing off against large numbers of enemies and were fairly exhausted, but the number of wizards from House Aravion opposing them had already decreased significantly.

In any one-versus-many fight, if the lone fighter is burning through stamina, then the many must pay with their lives.

Capturing Turan here wouldn’t be the end of it, they also had to capture the others, especially Meisa.

In the first place, the reason they had all gathered here was to catch Meisa.

Just as Cadrum tried to finish things off by shaping the green glow into the form of a disc, Ymir, standing next to him, let out a small exclamation.

“What is it?”

“Time’s up.”

He spoke like a government clerk at the end of their shift.

Somehow, the power of the Berserker Bloodline had already been withdrawn, and the bloodshot eyes had returned to normal.

Cadrum groaned with an expression of disbelief.

“You…”

“Well, it’s not like I’m slacking off. That’s just the limit of this body. Still, I roughed him up a lot, so hang in there, yeah?”

With that mocking remark, Ymir’s body crumbled like powder and collapsed.

And rising from it, a single soul.

It seemed to be the side effect of using excessive power in a hastily taken body.

Cadrum blankly watched as Ymir’s soul disappeared toward the snowy fields in the northwest, then sighed and turned his head.

“I’m so damn tired… Why is it that growing older doesn’t mean growing wiser?”

Despite his words, he didn’t seem particularly worried about facing Turan.

If Turan were in perfect condition, it would be one thing, but with him now critically wounded, Cadrum alone was more than enough to subdue him.

It would just be a slightly more bothersome process.

But that composure didn’t last long.

Because he caught sight of Turan’s blood-soaked hand raised and pointing at him.

And above it, a small vortex rising into the air.

*

Turan, who had been fighting a two-against-one battle with the possessed vessels of two gods, Ymir and Cadrum, had determined that overcoming this situation by conventional means was no longer possible.

That was how absurd the amount of force the Aravion-Nagin alliance had invested in this trap was.

If the three of them had been at the same level as Meisa was back when they had just escaped, they would’ve been subdued long ago.

He wanted to ask, just how highly had they evaluated Turan to dedicate such power indefinitely?

But as always, opportunities accompany crises.

Even while being pushed to the edge, Turan observed the symbols of the two gods pressing in on him.

Especially Cadrum, who possessed the same Storm Bloodline as Turan.

Unfortunately, the technique Cadrum favored, which scattered that green glow, couldn’t be stolen or mimicked.

To use that, one needed to combine the symbols of the Airbender, who controlled wind, and the Rapids Bloodline, who controlled water. Turan could only use one of the two through a Sacred Relic.

Even with the Sacred Relic activated, no symbol had appeared in his soul.

However, just a moment ago, Cadrum had used two more spells.

The spell that detonated lightning, and the one that disrupted and controlled the surrounding air.

At that moment, Turan witnessed clouds within Cadrum’s inner world turning pitch black, entangled with lightning as they swirled into a vortex.

That was likely the very thing needed for that spell, what must be the ultimate usage of the Storm Bloodline, where lightning and wind powers merged.

It was slightly different from what the head of House Aravion had once shown when combining four bloodlines, but regardless, since he had seen it, it was now time to put it to use.

Thus, even while being steadily pushed back, Turan silently activated his Spiritual Perception and struggled to manipulate his inner symbols.

Cadrum didn’t notice, since Turan hadn’t opened his eyes.

Fortunately, having practiced for a long time in the hideout, it didn’t take too long.

What he had lacked from the start was not the ability to manipulate the symbols, but the knowledge of how to manipulate them.

Just then, at the moment Ymir left, Turan succeeded in replicating the change the enemy had created.

"You, how..."

Instead of answering his opponent’s muttering, Turan gently laid down the small vortex that had formed above his hand like a feather.

The tiny, finger-length cute vortex rapidly grew into a massive size as it consumed the air around it.

“A cyclone…!”

Horrified, Cadrum once again invoked the power of the Storm Bloodline, generating dark blue spheres around him to block it.

With a harsh grinding noise, the vortex wildly raked against the barrier, leaving marks like the claws of a beast.

‘Wind… has cutting power?’

Of course, no matter how strong the wind was, it shouldn’t have been able to exert such physical force in this way.

Wasn’t that the exact reason he had once given up after trying everything to use Wind Magic offensively when he first awakened the Storm Bloodline?

In other words, what he was using now was magic that, like that of Fallen Gods, manifested phenomena that normally could not exist.

And yet, for some reason, this irrational magic was perceived as something that could happen, and thus consumed very little magic power.

“To think they were playing around with something this fun all to themselves.”

Muttering quietly, Turan focused his consciousness inward.

From the moment the two symbols of the Storm Bloodline interacted with each other, numerous invisible handles had formed inside his mind.

The vortex he had just created was the result of pulling on one that had seemed relatively easy to grab.

In other words, there were still many, many techniques he had yet to try.

*****

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