Chapter 15 - Go Go Mage Ranger!

I have made many preparations for when troubles come albeit not as serious as this one. I know that this particular lecturer is bad news in some way but I don’t know in what way. Still, a mage needs to be always prepared for everything so I do my best in preparing even for the worst scenario.

Well, not really. If I were to think too much about things that might happen in the future, I would never have enough time for my present. So I just prepared myself if this lecturer suddenly went violent and made some plans from that assumption.

Never thought that what would really happen was far beyond my wildest imagination. But in a way, my preparation for the worst is still somewhat viable in the current situation.

I mean even if the target turning into a fleshmancer demon is unexpected, I still make preparations to face a tier 4 being with a few underlings. If there are multiple tier 4 beings or stronger, I will immediately escape.

For tier 3 and below? My favorite lightning magic could be said to be unrivaled in this class. I can easily neutralize no matter how many enemies if they haven't reached tier 4.

Also, if there is a single tier 4 knight, I am screwed. Period. I might be able to survive for a few seconds in an open space but the assumed conflict location was in my classroom. In a narrow building. There's no way I can face a tier 4 knight in such a narrow space.

So, yeah. Even if my enemy is a tier 4 fleshmancer, after I learned that it could not catch me with my newly invented movement technique, I am confident that I can win the battle. I might need to pay a heavy price for that though.

And my signal is the signal to deliver the coup de grace.

"Grrh, are you calling for reinforcement, brat? Wait until I'll show you how I devour them. I will let you experience true despair"

Yes, I am calling for reinforcement. And no, I already know the basic knowledge about fleshmancer so I won't give you any chance to replenish your stock. How? By making my next combo a touch of death basically.

I keep running around while biding my time. I am waiting for my mage squad to be in position. How can I know that? Well, it will be answered in time. And speaking of the devil. Here it comes.

An earth spike comes flying from the demon’s blindspot. It misses the demon as it is chasing me with inhuman speed.

“Oh, is that your lackeys coming back? They shouldn’t have come back because they will also be sacrificed now. And hah, what a pathetic aim. Might as well surrender and let me send you to our lord’s place!”

“Yeah, yeah, whatever. Have you not felt tired yet?”

“Kid, I will make your face show despair sooner or later!”

Honestly, I don't feel like bantering with the demon anymore. I could try digging some info by provoking it but running away from it lowered my focus on doing anything else. Ah well, I can think more about it later. Let's just finish it for now.

Other basic element magic attacks keep on coming one after another. The order of attack after earth is metal, nature, ice, then light. If I'm not wrong, earth and metal were the first to arrive because they also mastered their version of elemental movement technique which I use now. I of course taught them about the concept of elemental movement technique but only earth and metal managed to master their own version of it. Those two are basically moving around by controlling the earth under them.

The other could also use their own version of elemental movement technique but in their case, the technique costs too much to feasibly use. It sounds logical because earth and metal, which is the advanced form of earth element, could just move the earth underneath without any extra cost while for nature, ice, and light, they need to conjure the element first before moving them.

Even worse, In light's case, he needs to compress the light element with a lot of effort before the light element could affect other things physically. So intangible elements simply do not have a good affinity with this movement technique.

So it is almost impossible for him to learn the technique. Or rather, very inefficient to be precise.

And by the way, light also seems to be the latest to come. He is in no way slow. Maybe because he needed to heal someone on the way?

Anyway, everyone has gathered. It is time to end this.

I make a sharp turn and dash directly to the demon. And of course, I don’t have any intention to clash with it in melee.

“Huh? You are coming at me? Good, come, Let me devour you!”

“Sorry, not interested”

“Hyaah!”

The demon tried to catch me as I am getting close to it. It Even uses it’s tentacles to catch me. Great chance!

Those extended tentacles should be out of it’s mana shield range. I can shock it from here.

“Lightning!”

“AGAGAGAGAGA”

As expected, the electricity in the lightning magic managed to run amok in the demon’s flesh from its tentacles. Not only the tentacles, the demon’s body is even spasming from the shock. What the hell? So this is still you wa shock in the end. My favorite magic.

I immediately go behind the demon and shoot 5 consecutive lightning spells toward its unshielded tentacles. I am trying to buy some time to channel my ultimate magic.

“Lightning barrage!”

“H-h-h-how!? ARGAGAGAGAGAGH”

Okay, it is time to channel my ultimate magic now. This is a race. Will the demon recover and catch me or will I complete my spell first?

So my ultimate magic is my emergency countermeasure against tier 4 magicians. I don’t know how strong I need to attack the mana shield to break it so I just, once again, depend on my knowledge from my previous life. I hypothesized that a mana shield is as strong as a tank armor. And what do I need to do to break through a tank armor? The answer is an anti-armor shell.

With my trained mind that can cast 10 basic magic control training routines at the same time, I begin dividing my focus into several things. One is to create a shell for my explosive with earth magic with extra enchantment from mana shield routine. Two is to suck the air from the surrounding into the shell and compress it as much as I can. Three is to keep watch on the demon so I could react if an emergency happened. And lastly, is to ignite the air inside and let the shell explode.

Yes, I am making a HEAT shell with magic. The most devastating thing on earth that I knew of course is a nuclear bomb. But my mind is not strong enough to emulate the chain reaction on the atom to cause a nuclear explosion. Not to mention, the blast would also swallow me. I will need a lot of other miscellaneous things to prepare if I am going that way. It is not as simple as saying ‘I am atomic’ or something.

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So yeah, an atomic bomb is not feasible. The next best thing for weapons of mass destruction would be either a napalm bomb or a conventional bomb. But as my purpose here is to break through armor, the best conventional bomb is the anti-armor shell more popularly known as high explosive anti-tank shell or HEAT shell in short.

HEAT shell works by focusing the explosion of the shell at one point. And when all of the energy created by the explosion is focused on one point, the resulting force could easily overwhelm thick tank steel armor with ease. The smaller the surface area, the larger the pressure created by the resulting force from the explosion.

So what I am doing right now is basically just re-creating HEAT shell with magic. The shell for the shell will have a ‘weaker point’ in the front to focus all the force forward. As for the explosive fuel, the best I can get now is the oxygen and hydrogen in the surrounding area so I just compress the surrounding air as much as I can into the shell.

Lastly, for the trigger, I need to put a fireball that has been covered by another magic shell to prevent an accidental explosion and just throw it as fast as I can to the demon.

But just as I fully focused on compressing the air around. The demon is showing signs of recovery already. The damned thing is just far more durable than a cockroach.

“Resistance… is… futile!”

“Resistance is useful”

The demon started to channel fireballs again in its hands. My spell is not yet ready and it is already almost done casting its magic. What should I do?

With all my focus concentrated on finding ways to win, something suddenly clicked. I have basically finished the shell. I only need to make the primer to trigger the explosion. What do I need to trigger the explosion again? The answer to that is fire!

I don’t need a primer! I just have to shoot my magical HEAT shell to collide with the demon’s fireball and it will be triggered!

Seeing that the demon is about to shoot its fireball, I throw away all hesitation. Eff it, we ball!

“HEAT Shell!”

I make a punching motion with my right arm while screaming the skill name. Yes, it is cringe. It is the behavior of those people sick with eighth-grader syndrome. But screaming a skill name like this could help people focus more. It won’t have any illogical miracle effect whatsoever but it gives the illusion of confidence. The belief for success. I need every little bit of these factors to win.

BOOOOOOM!

An earsplitting explosion occurred soon after. It sounds louder than many small explosions from earlier. I succeeded in triggering the shell to explode. I immediately jump into a prone position to minimize damage just in case. This move is just too mainstream to not do. Better be safe than sorry, right?

After the shell and the demon’s fireball collided, the weak point in the front of the shell immediately shattered and the compressed air inside immediately tried to flow out from the high-pressure shell which immediately touched with the tongues of fire from the fireball. Highly concentrated oxygen and hydrogen immediately combust when they touch fire and the fire immediately flows back inside the shell like a salmon swimming against the current. And when the fire finally reached the core of the concentrated air, it immediately exploded and all the force created from the explosion tried to escape from the hole in the front as the other direction was blocked.

The explanation is quite long but it actually happened in a blink of an eye. Now, all that focused force directly punches at the demon’s mana shield. And the result is…

CRACK! TINKLE!

Success! Not only did I manage to break the demon’s mana shield, but the resulting explosion still had spare force behind it to directly pierce through the demon’s torso, resulting in a grotesque hole in the middle.

That kind of wound should be fatal for an ordinary human, but my opponent is a nigh-invincible fleshmancer demon. I need to keep chipping away at its health points until I can confirm its death!

So without further ado, let’s continue this touch of death combo into the next move. I give out a signal again but only by screaming this time.

“Go go mage rangers!”

I scream aloud while pointing at the demon. Now I wish I also had that high-electricity guitar rift as background music to increase the mood. But alas, there’s no sound recorder or player in this world… yet.

After I gave my signal, Multiple ice lances immediately fly toward the demon. But it didn’t get blocked by its mana shield now. Those ice lances instead pierced through the demon’s flesh and freeze the demon’s flesh starting from the area that are close to the stuck ice lances.

The demon hasn’t even finished freezing yet and other things come flying again to it. It is now multiple wood lances instead. But the wood lances do not seem to be aimed perfectly like the ice lances from before as most of the wood lances ended up getting stuck in the ground around the demon. Only one of the wood lances managed to hit the demon and stuck in the inside of the cavity that was exploded open by my magical HEAT shell.

Those wood lances seemed like a dud for a moment but after a few moments, the wood lances started to let out some plant sprouts all over it and those sprouts immediately grow into thick vines and strangle the demon.

There should also be paralyzing poison contained in that strangling vines magic but I feel that it might be useless to that demon. A lethal poison might grind its health point down now that I think about it but too bad nature bro still hasn't learned that much about poison so he only has the one needed for the army's daily need which is to capture baddies alive if needed.

Next, several flying saucer-like things come spinning to the demon. Those flying saucers are actually chakram and those chakrams are flying straight to the demon's limb joints. The entangling roots from before actually turn the demon into a nice stationary target for the chakrams and as a result, the demon gets all its limbs severed by the chakrams. There is also one chakram that lodges itself into the demon's forehead which makes a fantastic grotesque scene like it is a fatality move from that famous kombat game.

After the metal chakrams, the earth before the demon gradually bulges upward and starts to take the shape of a giant mallet and it comes down with a big swing towards the demon.

SMASH!

Ooh, brutal. Tenderizing the meat while it is still alive. That should do some damage to the demon.

And lastly, we have light boy, my secret weapon against those demons and evils. All he did was just converge the sunlight from 100 meters around the demon to focus on it. Making it look like an ant that got burned by a kid holding a magnifying glass.

SIZZLE!

"ARGH!"

Who's ordering roasted demon here? Your order is almost ready.

Light bro not only focuses the sunlight but also imbues the sunlight with his light attribute mana and it works super effective against the demon.

The demon's body is melting like candles but it still has enough strength to scream. As expected with the demon famous for its vitality. It is exceptionally sturdy. I wonder if its vocal cord is still intact from all the damage it suffers from. It has reduced into a large slab of smooshed melted meat and bones after all. Yet it is still alive nonetheless.

No other way then. It seems like I can't avoid paying the heavy price I mentioned before…

The demon starts regenerating its body immediately after the sunray magic stops. It finally stops screaming after it recovered a bit more humanoid torso shape but it is still breathing roughly. And soon it starts laughing again.

"Haha. Hahahaha. HAHAHAHAHA! I am immortal! You can't kill me! Nice try but I am still alive. You better finish me fast or I will regenerate to full health again and at that time, I will make you wish you never born. Oh? You are already spent from just attacking me together one time? I am disappointed HAHAHAHAHA"

"You are already dead"

"What?"

While the demon is distracted by my companion, I stealthily sneak up close and start preparing for my coup de grace move. My shadow has surrounded the demon and sharp jaws starting to form on it. After the demon made the perfect reply to me, the shadow turned into a gaping mouth that immediately bite the demon and swallow it whole.

Yes. This is my finishing move. This is my coup de grace. Flesh devour. And the heavy price I have to pay is going to come at me soon.

Without wasting any time, I immediately sit down in my meditation pose and start circulating my mana. Soon enough, murky and disgusting mana started to form inside my meridian and I circulated them all through my dantian and meridian again and again to purify it. I can hear the angry voice of the demon in my head and I can feel that my entire body is being pummeled by invisible fists. The pain is not only on the surface of the skin but also from the depth of my body. This is it, the last dying struggle from the demon. But it's not only you who is in a dying struggle, demon, I am also in my dying struggle here.

I can devour your god, so it would be a joke if I can't devour you.

It is time for our final kombat!