Dark clouds gathered above the battlefield, shrouding the entirety of the arena in a veil of darkness. The winds began to rage and even the sea itself mimicked the intensity with aggressively bobbing waves. Elem gaze turned to the Siren. The creature’s blue eyes had changed with the weather and were now as intense and foreboding as the budding storm itself.
“If this is what it takes, so be it. This has taken far too long,” Zorya remarked amidst the flashing lightning. The young master hadn’t finished her sentence or two sky-high whirlwinds formed besides her Summon, raging like a pair of bloodthirsty predators.
Although the coalescence of rain, thunder and winds looked imposing, Elem wasn’t worried in the slightest. The Siren’s storm may have worked extremely well against Hotto’s monstrous snail but he knew that it would be far less effective against the Summon. While the Lou Carcohl had been massive and robust, it was still a relatively slow Earth Summon, especially compared to his quick and nimble Kappa. If anything, the attack was likely just a sign that the Unagi Master’s was growing desperate.
The whirlwinds bludgeoned across the battlefield, dragging rocks and water along in its violent wake. Worried shouts and hushes rose from the stands but the Kappa remained calm. The creature immediately dived into the water and skillfully swam through the raging currents, before reaching the other side of the battlefield where it landed a well-timed headbutt in the Siren’s face.
Zorya’s Summon staggered back, allowing the Kappa to follow up with a combination of slashes. The Siren let out a pained shriek but somehow managed to maintain its focus and blew the Kappa back with a gust of wind. The Kappa hissed, annoyed that it wasn’t able to stop the Siren. It then launched a beam of water from its skull but the Siren was too quick and evaded the attack with ease.
Elem ordered his Kappa to keep the attacks coming. The Summon launched beam after beam, which were each evaded by the Siren. Their opponent graciously danced in the wind like some ungraspable spirit and yet Elem hoped that he wouldn’t need much to finish the match.
Zorya looked tired. Her eyes carried a frantic expression, her breathing had fumbled into a sequence of irregular panting but she wasn’t done yet. The Master still fought with a sense of tenacity and drive that Elem hadn’t encountered before. Others would have given up by now; but not Zorya. She was a warrior- Elem knew that. She was a duelist who would win no matter what. This was the mentality that separated masters like her from regular summoners.
The Kappa was about to launch another beam when a sudden flash lit up the battlefield, followed by an earth shattering boom.
Elem nearly fell to his knees, his eyes were blinded and his ears buzzed with a high-paced beep but those seemed like minor inconveniences compared to the pain. His entire body felt like it was engulfed with flames, causing his muscles to twitch and sending a burning sensation over his skin. Something unimaginably powerful had just hit the Kappa.
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‘Lightning!” Elem uttered, realizing that the tempest had intensified.
Sheets of heavy rain now obscured the entirety of the stage to the point of near darkness and the winds now carried boulders as if they were just small rocks. And on top of all that, Elem and his Kappa now had to worry about lightning bolts chaotically flashing about the battlefield.
“How does she have energy for this?” he mumbled frantically.
Given the abundance of electricity-conducting water, it was a small miracle that the Kappa had even survived the strike and he worried that at this point, one more thunderbolt could end the match in Zorya’s favor.
This was the moment to step up, Elem thought to himself. Feeling the pain take hold of him, every fiber in Elem’s body wanted to forfeit the match but he knew that he had to keep pushing with everything he had. All the sacrifices he made, all the battles he had endured, it would all be for nothing if he gave up now.
He focused on the waves of chaotic energy crackling through the atmosphere. Perhaps there was a way for him to use the tempest to his advantage?
“Of course!” Elem shouted. Of course he could! Through Master Flame’s method of external cultivation, he could harness the storm’s power and use it to power up his own Summon.
Elem took a deep, deep breath. His Essence nodes were weak and exhausted but the storm was so powerful that he didn’t need much to sap up its energy. It only took him a few cycles of cultivation before he felt the raw Essence poured into his frame. At first, the energy came gradually but quickly expanded with the intensity of a flooding river.
The Kappa’s eyes lit up and Elem swore he even saw the creature grow a few inches in size. Even its trademark hissing sounded a few octaves deeper as it rushed towards its adversary. All considered, the lightning had not only damaged the Kappa, it had also angered it and now the Water Summon was hungry for blood and ready to stomp the mermaid into the ground.
Encouraged by Zorya’s shouting, the Siren tried its best to keep the Kappa at bay, sending an arsenal of boulders, waves and gusts at the charging Summon. However, the Kappa moved even quicker than it had before, evading each of the hazards without breaking a sweat. Bolts of thunder began to rain down all around the sprinting Kappa but also narrowly missed their target each time.
It dived through a charging wave and then leaped up a flying boulder before landing atop the Siren. Zorya’s Summon tried to wiggle from the Kappa’s grasp but the turtle-like creature dug its claws deep into its shoulders, stopping it from escaping.
“You’re not going anywhere,” Elem murmured, secretly surprised by the speed of his own Summon. “Water beam! Now!”
A deep blue light gathered around the Kappa’s dish-shaped skull, illuminating the rainfall with a mystical hue. The Kappa took a few seconds to charge up, waiting until its skull was overflowing with pure energized liquid. It then pulled the Siren closer and pressed its concaved dome against the opponent’s chest.
Zorya, the proud master of the Unagi School, watched as her Siren began flopping and squirming even more frantically, its fishtail desperately slapping against the Kappa’s back. They knew what was coming next.
A blue beam poured from the Kappa’s head straight into the helpless Siren. The creature let out a high-pitched screech so loud that it drowned out even the lightning and the gusting winds. Its screams continued for short while, until the light grew so bright that it filled the entire arena.