The rest of the messiahs quickly got to their proper position, stepping closer to each other, calming their minds, and steadier their posture. The death of their leader was unexpected, but if they didn't want to die, then they should work with what remained. They yanked their hands forward, forming a circle of runes in mid-air under the pretext of rings in their fingers. They hover there with their hands in the middle of these runes. Each hand had a few circles of runes, but when they became entangled together, the runes fused to form one larger structural rune circle below their feet.
The mana flared up dozens of meters around them, turning frantic as if the world turned ablaze.
Two of their runic enchantments became one, forming a structure meant to empower the messiahs with mana. It was a highly efficient formation meant to increase the workforce of mana by 2 to 3 fold. 2 people were better than a singular one, after all.
People under this structural rune formation will be able to use spells with a higher degree of power, and mana would be easier to recover and use. This did matter to anyone. Be it Handlers or the beings with the cores. This formation was messiah's specialty, but with their leader gone, its effectiveness won't be the greatest. The more of those special rune formations would entangle with each other, the more powerful the fusion would get.
Murai was a bit farther from them to see it, but he felt the tides of mana in his close proximity. He began to ponder on the next course of his actions.
They turned serious... Great. but it was a bit too late for that when their leader is probably the core of their formation. It doesn't mean it won't be easier, however. A direct approach to this fight may be a mistake, but I want to see where I am at the moment with my shaping and body strength. First, this formation is annoying. Should I try to mess with it, or deal with it in some other form? It doesn't look that weak, since it comes from the external links on their hands. They are decent, as far as I feel things with Mana Detection. Their rings or bracelets hidden underneath their sleeves should be problematic to strike directly.
Such runic formations are complicated, but it is understandable to see them stored in treasures instead. That means they aren't that confident in their own abilities, which makes them less of a threat, or this is their primary strategy no matter what? Well, less threat of what? They are still tough opponents, for humans.
With the uncertainty about his action, Murai still chose to walk back to the forest path, revealing himself. As he did so, he was watchful over the two messiahs, who remained in the circle for some reason and didn't move.
Underneath their feet was the formation known as the Grand Enchantment Circle. It was a structural rune formation made up of hundreds of smaller runes, leading to 20% more effectiveness of the mana, and at least a 30% increase in the might of any spells. This was a more powerful formation level than their usual one. It was in their possession only because of the Encounter, and nothing else.
Per Razmund's or someone else's order, Helpers, or regular dogs under the Centralis Kingdom got powerful external items for protection and accomplishments of this hunting. The spot of their target was the Seventh Death Forest because they knew created this opportunity for themselves. It was quite a bothersome place, but it was for them and their enemy alike. And because of the importance of the Encounter for the Centralis Kingdom, many treasures conveyed a certain desire to achieve great results.
That was what?
Murai didn't know the details, since each side of the Encounter had a distinct task with unique chances, missions, and rewards. As for what Razmund had, it was a good variable to think about. He did his best to use the Centralis Kingdom to his advantage, creating a threat to Murai on a scale that was quite large.
One way or another, the topic of the Encounter was a huge deal in this world and nothing moved it better than ego and greed. A better chance always invovled getting more people to one side, and they didn't have to be Helpers. The Centralis Kingdom knew it and used its vast amount of experience and resources to get things going. Why would they do that for Razmund alone was another question altogether.
Murai would never guess some answers, since his own unique side was less than powerful. After all, he realized that Razmund did create quite a mess for him, but the world and rules, with Gods aside, complicated things. The rules, reason, and parts of the Encounter were always chaotic Murai was yet to know how much mess Lordis - the true maker of this Encounter - created, and pushed at him after unveiling unique circumstances around him and Razmund. In this case, Razmund was a mere toolkit to move things better, while Centralis Kingdom may be the true enemy. It wasn't directly stated, but Murai for sure guessed some things. His Major Task involved them, because of the gift from Pachi, but Encounter didn't. Later parts could, but the present one was already plenty of an issue.
For him, knowing the plot of this mess wouldn't change his approach to it any better. Murai didn't even know that Celia and Lia will soon reach this place as well, albeit only Ceila can directly help him. He didn't even view them in a good light, because Vermilion had some plans with him behind the scenes, causing Murai to simply refuse it, and not care about it, even if he should.
The part of the Helpers was peculiar, but if he was alone, none will help him. Ceila would, but one needed to be close to the Encounter originators to start. It also didn't mean Lia can't do anything, even when she butchered the 1st part of the Encounter. 1st part Helpers were prohibited to help in the 2nd.
The 2nd part would be a great opportunity to indirectly cause some damage to the Centralis Kingdom since the notion of the Encounter didn't talk about them, nor were they part of the rules. They were variables that were just forcing things up, acting around the complicated rules that they knew. Centralis Kingdom will lead more forces outside of Helpers, leading to skirmishes that didn't move along the orders of the gods, but they didn't need to.
After all, it wasn't outside of the rules to affect the surroundings of the balanced rules to affect the Encounter sides. It may create lackluster solutions and further chaos, but it was perfect to make things more interesting. No rules will be broken, as the rules themselves were in gods interest, while too many variables hiding around the rules weren't breaking them. It was a clever tactic of the Centralis Kingdom, while the gods and Encounter rules won't create troubles for them. It could backfire if their own situation would become too forceful, but even then, it was hard to tell what would happen. That was at least the notion of the Encounter surroundings, with more things hiding behind the scenes.
Lia planned to make quick ambushes, butchering a few squads every once in a while, outside of Seventh Death Forest's perimeter or inside of it. She didn't want to get involved too directly, fearing the involvement of rules that were weirdly convincing on making things difficult for Murai.
Which exactly?
Murai was a loner and had nothing and no one to his name. Encounters usually involved similar sides of power, but this one invovled Razmund. A prominent member of the Centralis Kingdom which was a force known as an absolute unhinged Tier A Domain. It created this mess, while Lia was high level enough to not touch things she shouldn't, that didn't mean she can't do things that the Centralis Kingdom does. That was to become a variable dancing on thin ice, while the dangers from above weren't small. If she would be touchy with Razmund himself, the rules already viewed her as part of Murai forces.
It was a complicated force and an opportunity for Murai and Razmund respectively, yet neither side knew the information about the other. It made sense, after all. A messy adventure where two sides had to achieve some results would need to involve strategies, and not be a little clash. It was up to Lordis's ploys.
Who was Murai? He may be outside of the norm in many things, but he was still an Anatidae Panacea who lived for less than a year. Let alone his level, his proficiency with many things was dozens of times worse than Razmund's. So wanting him to feel comfortable with hearing the notion of this Encounter was anything but rotten to their rules. It shouldn't happen, yet it happen because some things were forced up.
Will of the Battleworld was vague in terms of the Encounter, and not even Lisa was aware of a lot of things hiding behind the scenes. Particularly Razmund's case and the whole picture of Lordis, which she observed in a limited way. She was trying to hide from the Vermillion church, the moment she woke up, so she wasn't comfortable until Murai got to this forest. Now, the Encounter started.
It was as much of a huge deal as the messed up situation he got himself before. To go directly against the Centralis Kingdom was suicide. It more resembled the likes of Divine Punishment, or quite tough God's Trials instead, but considering the circumstances, Lisa thought this was much bigger than Murai in itself. Something was hiding underneath this. She was sure of it since it wouldn't make sense otherwise. Something was using Murai as a starting spark to make bigger plays and it wasn't as small as Lordis. That, she was sure of, but voicing it out loud wouldn't do a thing. She wanted to live, and Murai had no choice but to continue, creating his own sensible mission in his heart that would deal with this mess.
This was the best comfortable desire that put his mind at ease. An excuse to think of the present, rather than the future or the past.
Lisa understood a lot of things, leading up to her unpleasant death but it wasn't as simple. The scheme around this world moved against something greater than she was able to touch, so it ended her life. Now she had quite a terrible time considering her desires. Her hope turned to another disaster, and she feared the hidden reason for this Encounter would be her last End. She held limited hope for Murai's achievement, and even if his Soul and Will were incredible, she had some doubts of she can take it.
After all, Lisa knew one specific piece of information that even Vermillion church should understand. They forced themselves upon him, creating validation for Centralis Kingdom to force things up. It wouldn't be surprising, as Vermillion was another lofty god with some ploys and desires upon this. Encounters led up to the Mortal War, then to Holy War, and ended in Divine War. But each stage of this caliber could take time, and involve a few nations, and a lot of politics. Races, hidden forces, and all kinds of guilds would fight for the sake of the Battleworld, while the Encoutner would become negligible, but it would be a necessary spark. The wars were a blessed chance, as well as a chance to get one's name to echo throughout the whole world.
Lisa thought a lot about the possibilities of this Encounter, but Murai held different habits over terrible situations. He believed in mental habits. Creating a notion in his mind that this was just another thing to solve, he was much less nervous about it. It was a terrible and clever lie, which spoke to his mind. The timing may be terrible, but maybe he could get something out of this bad luck.
He always thought like that in lives that weren't pleasant, or normal. Gaining something out of the misfortune was the first step to forming some calmness. The other was to cater to his mind with other things. Like battles, for example, and butchering the reasons for his bad luck. That may be a form of luck as well, albeit a rather strange one.
Walking towards his fight, Murai gazed towards the messiahs who were quite average mages, if not below that. It was because of the equipment that they possessed quite significant power, while neither of them held the Mana Core, it didn't make them weak. The mana around the world was plentiful, and thanks to their runes, they weren't weak.
Hm? They seem calm enough. With two of them forming this Great Enchantment, are they close to the power of their dead leader? I wonder, but I am unable to guess it right since I killed the leader as easily as eating a chicken. Murai chuckled inside, yet didn't voice anything.
He remained walking forward with a sneer visible on his face. A duck's sneer, which wasn't something fearful, but the messiahs were nervous since they knew the degree of danger invovled in this Encounter. Their leader died in a flash of an ambush, causing problems for their overall power level as a team. The cause was this duck before them.
“W-what are you smiling about, blessed demon?” Porik shouted, asking nervously and forming two flaming balls in his both hands. “Eat this you damned animal! Scorching Shot!” he shouted and shot those two shots twice the size of Murai at him. The heat enveloped the surroundings, and Scorching Shots moved fast approaching Murai who was still 10 meters away. The proximity of their Grand Enchantment took around 3 meters around them, so he was quite far from them.
Murai wasn't surprised by this attack, as he expected this sort of thing from this kind of formation. They had some experience in magic, and an agitated and fearful mage - per the use of his Soul Read - was obvious to attack. Porik feared him, as Murai saw it. He spent a couple of moments considering this spell that was one class higher than the Flame Shot. He can use his own, creating a fight of flame against his flame but it would be hard. The degree of heat of this Scorching Shot was twice, or thrice more powerful than his Flaming Shot, so that meant he would lose. The two of them were even bigger than his whole body, so Murai Conjured nothing out of his Flame but Shaped a Mana Blade.
A sharp-looking, 2-meter-long long and slightly curved blade emerged right beside his head, siding with his beak as if it was an extension of himself.
Side by side, it almost looked as if the beak was the one controlling the blade, but that wasn't the case. Murai was the one controlling every inch of this blade with his mindful Shaping. His core improvements with his Shaping were much bigger than the Flame since training in the new affinities would take more effort at the start.
As for the Sharpness, it was an easy thing to cater for. All Murai did was train the Mana Blades for 3 straight days before it upgraded along with his Mana Blades. He cut the trees at first, feeling that they would be good enough for the 1st tests. That was for 1 day before he went up towards the mountains. Under Iris's catering and physical help, he managed to reach the mountains where, instead of trees, he began to shatter and cut into mountains made of tough stones.
That sort of training was very familiar to him, so he reached Grade C in the Sharpness in less than 3 days before moving to other things. It was a great reminder to him that training worked wonders in this world, even though it was shitty. Finding that he may progress outside of some dangerous situation was great, and Iris also acknowledged it, by explaining the basics. Although, for the Beast Core, it was a different story.
He figured the methods of his past didn't work on it. Mana of the World didn't cycle throughout the Beast Core that great. It was probably because of his unfamiliarity and his bad control. It was still uncomfortable, so he didn't reach any success in upgrading his Beast Core. As for the abilities that came from the Sharpness, Murai wasn't able to reach much further either. IT only created higher efficiency in Shaping the Mana Blade, and turning it sharper, thus more powerful. He also catered to small things like arrows, smaller blades, and even javelins, but neither of these things created an ability on their own. Iris said that this would take time and circumstances. What did it mean was simple. Time, effort, and challenges.
The core of the Sharpness was a Proper Mana Blade anyway. It got quite stronger, so that was at least some power he gained since he couldn't move all that much in the last week.
As for other, more intricate and possible techniques, Murai hoped to buy or found some specific and certain magic tomes. He didn't want to be bothered by his own comprehension of something that he wasn't used to. Using the tomes would be faster since he didn't want to waste too much time focusing on complicated shaping that could cost him weeks of time.
So, for now, he found satisfaction with his core abilities.
Mana Blade was a fundamental core of Sharpness. It was there to cut, and that was it.
It reached level 8 for now, with the might of the Sharpness at Grade C, ensuring that it reached a better Shaping comfort. Conjuring speed also increased, and the Shaping of the Sharpness smoothened things up. Usage of all of these things was always prone to this system under the Will of the Battleworld. When a certain threshold was reached, it informed him of new things and comprehensions, with a following boost from the world.
All things mattered, but some were deep and on another level depending on familiarity with the ability. Everything was subjected to the level of comfort, training, and fusions. Be it his own body, and magic in general. It was the usual stuff, albeit the terms of having it said to him in those robotic voices weren't the usual. Murai found it somewhat appealing since the core of the magic was still a bit outside of this Battleworld system.
Murai was quite something to train with this ability to the current level. It meant he focused a lot of attention and care on the Shaping of Mana Blades and their movements.
It wasn't like he could grab it with his hands, and swing it like a proper battle mage. He couldn't do so, obviously, so he hoped for the best with his mental fortitude and his own talents. His mentality was the Shaping in itself. His mind can control any adjustment to his Beat Core by Conjuring the mana under his mediocre methods. This was as mental as Shaping, while the human battle mages focused on more physicality but it wasn't always the case. It was a preference. Even a human mage would wield mana like Murai, but they had hands. Things such as density, toughness, and shape of the spells or magical weapons mattered under their hands.
Of course, it didn't mean that Shaping was limited to one thing and one thing alone. Any mage could make things levitate with their Shaping, but it was prone to talent. The base view of the Shaping the Conjured mana was more of a steady way of the magic. Things such as making rocks and metallic weapons levitate were more of an aftereffect.
The form of Murai Shaping was only levitation, which was under the fundamentals of Shaping. Murai long ago underwent this sort of handling of the mana, so he wasn't unfamiliar with it. The majority of the battles in the Somalis Dungeon were won thanks to his Shaping along and experience. It also didn't involve his unfamiliarity with the Beast Core, since the Shaping partially involved his soul and mentality. Conjuring depended on Beast Core.
For the time being, Murai was curious and wondered if his Mana Blade can blast these Scorching Shots to oblivion, or not. So, he tried it, just because he felt confident in himself.
Lisa, hiding from behind the messiahs was also curious since she didn't know the limits of Murai's talent or strategies.
Unexpected as it was, Murai moved his Mana Blade, swiping it diagonally right into the Scorching Shots. He struck them with the sharp edge and it didn't stop them, nor cleaved them in half. They exploded instead, shattering the flames of the Scorching Shot apart and creating a wild explosion. Murai felt the heat and sudden flame push to his face. He wasn't even able to quack. It thrust him away like a pebble since his weight was small, and the flames enveloped him with searing force. He flew far, reaching much further into the forest than before.
His attempt to grasp his own ability ended up as a splendid failure.
“Huh? Is... that... What?” Porik asked in woder. “A Scorching Shot was enough or is it weak against the flame or what... What?” he turned to his left, asking in confusion f it was the case.
“We are up against a Blessed, idiot. What do you think?” The other messiah argued. He was yet to start any spell.
“That we are fucked?”
“Are you seriously asking me that?”
“Yes. Should I pull...”
“Shut off. This freaking demon is right beside our back.” The other man shouted, turning his attention to the curious-looking Lisa who was eyeing them both. Her appearance was that of a demonic lizardy thing. She can change her appearance on a whim since it was a minor ability she was able to do thanks for being a Soul Render.
In fact, Lisa was able to do a lot of stuff in this current form of her Path. Shapeshifting was one of them, but it wasn't as lifelike as she would like. She was still like a ghost, with a Sona that made her body.
Her basic form around the mana still prevailed and overall physicality would always prevail one way or another, making her a ghostly figure that can change shape. Her current appearance was that of a 2-and-a-half-meter tall demon, Vipera. A ghost version of that beast, however.
Although the two messiahs were aware that soul forms were common and bothersome things in this Seventh Death Forest, they didn't know that this one was special. Lisa was no residual soul from death, but a proper Soul Entity.
Each of the messiahs was aware of the dangers residing in this place, so thanks to the treasures they got from their superiors, they were confident.
“Freaking shit... It can change shape? Meeting a Vipera in this part of the forest wouldn't be possible. They should be rare in this part of the section.” Porik complained again, turning himself to face Lisa.
Lisa heard their words but remained in her appearance and ploy as a Vipera. It seemed she wanted to pounce at them all, and her wide-open ghostly jaw wanted to devour them both. Alas, she knew she couldn't do that, since she can't. Souls in this forest can kill the living as they wish, but her own power wasn't reaching the threshold where she can fight these men. Not yet.