I'm almost entirely drained of Qi, but I planned for this to happen.

As I watch the red blood drip from the Dark Guard's wound, his sword comes down toward me at incredible speed.

I still have nearly all of my Mana stores left, so I activate my Red Hydra's Buff along with all my perception and stat boosting abilities to bring my next move to its full potential, activating 4 of my newest skills all at the same time.

[Flash][Confusion][Screech][Phantom Step]

Letting out an ear-shattering yell, with a simultaneous flash of light that erupts from my body, the sky fills with a bright white light.

Waves of eerie confusion energy erupt in all directions, and illusions of my body take on the form of purple ghost-like phantoms, splitting off into 3 different directions. One goes to the left, the other to the right, and the other flies upward.

In my main body, I activate stealth with all my leftover mana and airstep backward, then down toward the ground using gravity to my advantage to accelerate my fall, narrowly avoiding the downward strike of the bright orange energy sword that hardly slows down at all despite the barrage of distractions.

I still feel its immense heat and power melting through my mana shielding, burning my armor, and blackening the outer layers of my skin without it even hitting me.

I continue to plummet as the Dark Guard's forward momentum continues.

I swallow another Qi pill and plunder MP crystals while adding wind magic above me to accelerate the fall, getting further and further away from the man in the sky as fast as I can. The large gash and burns left across my chest and all over my arms and legs are slowly healed by my self-regeneration, but I see over a quarter of my health bar gone just from getting close to its soul energy without my Qi barrier up.

Once fully recovered, I hit the empty desert floor with a thud, making a crater over three times the size as the one I made decimating the neighborhood back in the city. I look up into the sky while readying my Qi around my body and into my sword.

Residual mana and Qi are left in the wake of my attack, and it's no surprise I sense the orange man's presence coming down toward me.

However, his rate of descent is surprising.

He looks far less intimidating with a lost limb and blood dripping from his stump of a shoulder, but the calm smile on his face and slow descent toward me is not the sight I was hoping to see.

The fact that he's relying on the Lich King's soul energy, and not able to see Qi in its base form just like me before Monk awakened me, means I have an edge in this battle that I didn't have previously.

Even if his fully charged sword could potentially overpower me, the only way it's possible for him to charge it up is if he lets other portions of his defenses down.

Even knowing this, he floats down and readies his energy blade with a single remaining hand with a creepy grin.

He touches down on the desert sand about 50 meters away.

My eyes dart back and forth, analyzing his Soul Energy flow, and seeing thin spots of shielding where I'm positive I could pierce through if I replicated my last attack.

I grip my blade with both hands and breathe slowly and deeply to wait for him to make his next move... Then, our telepathy link opens while something very strange begins to shift in his Soul Energy Shielding.

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"I didn't know why the Dark One liked you so much... but now it's starting to become clear..."

He takes a step forward while the Soul energy around his body drifts toward his lost limb.

An orange veil of energy covers it, and in a matter of seconds, the outline of an arm is formed in the shape of pure energy.

It doesn't grow back; there is just a manifestation of an arm there, similar to his sword. It's arguably more deadly than the real thing, but in doing so, the other areas of defenses around his body thin out even more.

"You caught me off guard. For that, I'll remember this battle for many years. Not many humans can say they punctured the skin of a double-ranked-up Colossal."

My grip on my sword tightens, and my gaze is locked on its weak points.

However, the energy around its body starts to grow...

Every step forward it takes, more orange energy seeps out from its core like an endless supply.

"A valiant effort, young hunter, but you cannot survive a single attack from my final form. I assure you, the battle is finally over."

The energy around its body becomes equivalent to the density that made up its supercharged sword moments ago.

My eyes widen as I realize I wouldn't be able to pierce through this shielding if I tried. Maybe blocking a few blows would be possible, but the many plans of attack I had swimming in my head moments ago all fall away as the entity's entire Soul Energy Density shielding begins to rise even higher than the supercharged sword.

After a few more steps, it looks as if the energy around him is expanding outward.

Then, a few steps later I'm positive it is.

Along with the expanding energy, his body grows too.

I see large bulging muscles and veins growing all over, striations in his chest and thighs, and thick hair grows on his legs and one remaining arm.

The orange energy's density stays the same, but multiple times more of it comes flowing out from a hidden source, covering its full body in a massive flowing shield.

The manifested sword grows larger and larger, and the fake arm on his left side grows to match his expanding body as well.

I feel the atmosphere crackle and buzz in the growing presence of the monster that slowly walks toward me.

His facial features even begin to shift, and his short hair grows rugged and long.

The slick smile and smooth skin molt into a coarse hairy beard, and two long yellow tusks curve down from the edges of his lips down to below his chin.

His posture grows larger, and his eyes begin to merge together to form one massive eye that stares down at me without blinking as the steps draw closer.

As the creature before me passes 10 meters in height, it's closed half the distance, and I stop trying to guess how much more it will grow.

The rate at which it does isn't looking like it will stop anytime soon.

I take a step back, assessing my options, and try to find some kind of weak spot in its shielding, but the overload of immense power that comes off it is mind-bending.

I can't perceive a single opening.

"So this... is what a level 1000 monster can really do...."

I take another step back, then open up my item storage portal behind me.

Two glossy black wings flap in both of my peripherals, as the glowing Orange Colossal Monster doubles its size again and raises its Soul energy manifested sword high in the air.

The blade itself is larger than a building, and the immense crackling pressure in the air is pushing tons of sand to the side and shaking the ground with every step closer it gets. Waves of aura hit me like tsunamis, and I clash back with my own intimidation aura and shield my mind from the mental pressure using Qi, but it just keeps getting stronger and stronger.

I hear Ember's voice speak in a calm and curious manner through our link.

"You're in quite the troublesome situation, aren't you? Would you like some assistance?"

I respond while staring the beast in its single eye.

"Yes. Let's kill this thing."

A wave of red energy floods out of Ember, and clashes with the aura of the Colossal.

I jump up in the air as Ember swoops down beneath me, and I land on his back.

The enormous one-eyed monster's height surpasses that of multistory buildings, and it swings its sword downward as I stand on Ember's back and we soar up into the sky straight at its attack.

Ember's mouth opens wide, and I watch a wave of shimmering Soul Energy imbued flames erupt out. They're tinted red and flow like water, enveloping the energy sword rather than clashing with it.

The only other time I saw him use an attack like this was when he demonstrated how his Soul Energy worked, disintegrating an entire mountain in a dungeon with ease.

As the flames begin to react with the shielding around the Dark Guard's final monstrous form, I come up with the perfect strategy to defeat this creature once and for all.