27th of Season of Air, 57th year of the 32nd cycle

What now? Reality had shattered Newt’s plan of pitting two monsters against each other. If he fought Magmin head on… Newt hesitated, but since it was the only way left, he considered the situation.

He was one layer weaker than Magmin, a negligible difference. As for the battle itself, Newt had a speed and maneuverability advantage, and with his ancestral spear he had reach on his side as well.

Magmin was almost certainly sturdier than Newt, and within the confines of its realm, the serpent had an endless supply of spiritual energy, so the battle needed to be short. Entering a battle of attrition meant death by constriction.

The alternative is to skulk around, drawing energy from the environment and cultivating, but Magmin might find me while I am in a trance. If Magmin surprised Newt while the youth was in his helpless state, Newt was as good as dead. The risk was greater than confronting Magmin while unaware of his enemy’s power.

Newt retreated from the realm barrier. Whatever happened, mobility was Newt’s advantage and having his back against the wall countered his strength. Newt reentered the maze of flames, his ears out for Magmin’s deranged hisses.

He checked his spear, and the flames of Magmin’s realm had no impact on the weapon forged for cultivators relying on fire-attributed techniques. The spear was lighter than Newt would have preferred, its tip a short point of steel, barely a finger long.

With earth-attributed spiritual energy saturating his body whenever he used any fire techniques, Newt had an abundance of strength, and he already knew he would prefer heavy weapons once he had earned enough spirit gems to buy himself a proper weapon.

But I don’t have to limit myself to fighting with a spear alone. I know eight spell formations. Camouflage, energy gathering, defensive, object locking and unlocking, and endless maze spell formations he discarded as likely useless. Newt considered the trapping spell formation, which used the ambient element to immobilize the target, but piling more earth energy on top of Magmin’s probably formidable defenses would likely make the giant serpent impervious to physical harm.

That left illusion and killing spell formations. Given the environment, the killing spell formation would most probably produce attacks of earth and fire elements, to which Magmin was highly resistant. But an illusion spell formation might do the trick. Newt stroked his chin.

I could set up a spell formation to replace me with a giant pterodactylus flapping its wings. Such a crude thing wouldn’t fool a human, but it should be more than enough for Magmin, especially since the pterodactylus is his heart demon.

The more Newt entertained the idea the more he liked it. When fighting heart demons cultivators had no need to protect themselves. If they failed, they tried again and again, focusing on offense until they succeeded. The last thing a cultivator worried about when facing their fears, guilt, and insecurities was their realm permanently collapsing because they were already dead.

On the other hand, if anyone met anything new and unexpected inside their spiritual realm, they would certainly act with caution, raising all the defenses they could muster out of reflex, if nothing else.

An illusion will do nicely.

With a plan in mind, Newt went downhill until he found what he was looking for, a four way crossing with enough space for him to carve the string of runes into the ground. Newt struck the searing rock with his spear over and over again, chipping its surface.

He constantly circulated earth-aligned spiritual energy to enhance his body, yet despite the enchantment and the strength granted by his realm, Newt took hours to etch the twenty-odd runes and connect them with intricate lines.

The spell formation drew the ambient spiritual energy and an image flickered into existence. Newt found the end result horrible. The illusion was of the lowest tier. It had no sound, no smell, and the illusory pterodactylus did not follow the logic of any science known to man. It flapped its wings like mad, never moving from its spot. Only a fool, or someone suffering from a severe case of pigheaded single-mindedness and burning hatred for giant pterodactyluses, would be deceived and even that would last no more than a handful of moments.

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Which suited Newt just fine. He planned to end the fight with a single strike, putting all his weight and earth energy he could summon behind one blow. It would have to be enough, otherwise, Newt would lose the element of surprise. He would have to flee and hide using the few spell formations he knew.

Newt’s backup plan was to advance his realm, cultivate the tenth layer, and then break through, all the while hiding under his beginner quality spell formations. While he was uncertain what would happen, he believed increasing his cultivation beyond the limits of the realm should either eject him, or give him the edge over Magmin.

It won’t come to that. He assured himself, and stood in the center of his spell formation, illusory pterodactylus overlapping with his body.

Newt waited, hours passed, and he grew drowsy, almost falling asleep on his feet. A sudden shriek snapped him awake. Newt looked up and saw a giant terror. The oversized pterodactylus had grown even bigger, its wingspan nearly matching Magmin’s new length. The behemoth’s body was fifteen feet tall, its giant beak large enough to swallow Newt hole.

Newt shuddered when he caught the heart demon’s gaze. That which was once bloodthirsty voraciousness had evolved. There was a glint of malicious intelligence in those eyes, and the implication terrified Newt. Any heart demon he allowed to grow along with his realm would evolve like the giant pterodactylus and become an exponentially more powerful monster.

What will the heart demon from killing Uncle become after it reforms? Will it reform? Newt hoped that if it happened, it would be something easier to manage than it would have become by advancing together with him.

The pterodactylus shrieked again, the wind produced by its sail-sized wings buffeting Newt as the giant hovered in place. The flames reached up, tall enough to keep the creature at bay, and while it eyed Newt and his illusion, the behemoth did not dare approach.

It shrieked again, its sharp, toothy beak locked in what Newt perceived as a mocking smile. Then, the giant flapped its wings and took off, leaving Newt behind.

“The pterodactylus cannot reach me here,” Magmin hissed its mantra, and Newt froze, “it fears flames, but because of my realm’s confusing shape I cannot be certain I have eliminated all of them.”

The muttering stopped. Magmin glared at Newt from a dozen feet away, its eyes wide open, its pupils narrowed into black vertical slits.

“Impossible,” it hissed. “I will strangle you! Grind your bones into mush! You will pay for your arrogance.”

Magmin threatened, but remained in place, too afraid to make the first move. Newt opened his mouth, and the illusion mirrored him. Then he laughed, doing his best to mimic the pterodactylus’s high-pitched shriek.

“You,” Magmin bellowed, throwing itself forward, its head raised three feet above the ground. It opened its jaw, revealing flaming fangs over a foot long. The titanoboa burst with speed, slithering towards Newt almost faster than he could sprint without using Fire Burst. It covered the distance in a blink and its jaw snapped closed around the illusion’s wing with the sound of a steel door slamming shut.

The mass of flesh towered above Newt as flames burst beneath his feet. He dodged to the side as the massive head fell to the ground. Magmin hissed in rage, and Newt pounced at it just as its lower jaw struck the igneous rock with a rumble.

Newt stabbed forward with his spear, aiming at the golden eye, and in it he saw a reflection of a pterodactylus’s beak about to stab the pupil. Magmin smiled and Newt’s hair bristled. At the last possible moment, flames burst beneath his left foot. An instant after Newt jumped to the side, the titanoboa’s heavy tail smashed into the ground from his flank.

The shockwave blasted Newt back, shrapnel of broken granite pattering against his reinforced skin as he tumbled to the ground.

“You’re mine!” Magmin hissed, once again pouncing towards Newt with a gaping maw. Newt created the burst of hot air behind his back, propelling himself sideways an instant before the massive jaw smashed into the rock again.

Even without Granite Crust, Magmin’s head was tough enough to smash apart granite.

Newt tumbled and rolled before jumping back to his feet. The illusion was gone, Magmin had pulverized at least a quarter of the runes from the runic array, but it no longer mattered. The titanoboa had gone berserk, and only thought about annihilating the foe before it.

Magmin lunged towards Newt, its maw open wide, but the serpent struck to the ground and Newt saw his chance. Instead of dodging, the youth jumped forward. He thrust his spear into Magmin’s gaping maw, but instead of stabbing, he placed the spear in vertically, tip up, as if trying to jam the jaw open.

The jaw pressed down, spear digging into the serpent’s flesh, and blood sprayed, but there was no stopping the bite’s momentum. The maw closed a quarter of the way, and Newt sent a blast of hot air in front of himself, flying back out of the maw.

The jaw closed with a crack as the spear pierced through Magmin’s skull and burst out of the hole in a red spray, flying into the fire. Magmin writhed. Its giant body coiled and thrashed, and Newt fled from the wounded snake, chasing after his spear, so that he could finish the job if Magmin survived.