The Runic Alchemist

The explosion was much bigger than Damian had calculated. Even Tristan and the others rushing at his golem to assist in the fight, which barely lasted a minute, were blown several meters back by the shockwave. Damian himself had to unsheathe his sword and bury it deep into the snow to avoid getting swept away, despite being the farthest from the blast.

Even Vidalia and Moondancer paused their battle for a moment to brace against the shockwaves that rippled through them. Rebalancing himself, Damian glanced up at the center of the explosion, where white and black smoke billowed in a mushroom cloud. Once it cleared, the first thing Damian noticed was the massive charred crater in the otherwise white plain, and in the middle of it stood a man.

'Goddamn bastard is still standing...'

'What the hell did you do?'

'Ah... Focus on your own thing.'

'You used 5% of my mana in a single spell!'

'Oh... Sorry about that.'

As more smoke cleared, Damian finally saw the face of the man who had survived the biggest explosion he'd ever unleashed in his life. A smile crept onto his face—it wasn't a clean escape after all. Threadripper's thick aura armor was cracked all over, and burns marred his now shirtless upper body, revealing his chiseled muscles.

He looked exhausted and enraged, clearly having to rebuild his aura armor multiple times to save himself from the powerful blast, which left him with some serious burns. His sneaky surprise attack had worked. Damian had to say the guy was pretty naïve if he thought he wouldn't use everything in it's arsenal to defend himself.

"You bastard!!" Threadripper roared, glaring at Damian. Honestly, he couldn't blame the guy.

The others, recognizing the tension, quickly gathered beside Damian, getting quickly on their feet to face the monstrous man together. For the first time in his life, Damian was actually happy to see Aramis's annoying face besides him.

"Hurts, doesn't it?" Damian mocked as he pulled his sword from the snow. "Next time, be more cautious, or this 'bug' will crush you, and not even your ashes will remain."

For a second Threadripper had a very dangerous smile on his face then suddenly he screamed in uncontrollable fury. The others, who were supposed to be protecting him, now stared at Damian as though he'd just signed their death warrants. Well, taunting him might not have been the smartest move, but it was definitely worth it.

Unleashing his oppressive aura without restraint, Threadripper cracked the crater beneath his feet even further and launched himself at Damian and the ragtag group of second-rankers beside him.

Igniting his short sword with black aura flames spell, Damian readied himself to face the beast of a man. Threadripper's first strike, a single straight attack at high speed, took the combined efforts of Damian, Tristan, and Aramis to block, their crossed blades barely able to hold the blow. The force alone sent all three flying back.

Before Threadripper could continue his rampage, Lysandrea unleashed the trump card spell stored in her runic bracers. As the pugilist unleashed punch after punch with aura-laden arms to distract him, a huge golden runic circle formed near Lysandrea's arm. She enveloped herself in golden, glowing armor of pure light element. Even her already aura-coated sword was now bathed in solid golden light.

Threadripper flooded his surroundings with aura, keeping both of them at bay. He swung both his swords simultaneously, sending two gigantic, blindingly fast arcs of energy toward the duo. Even with her armor of light defying the logic of normal spells, Lysandrea had to use both hands—and much of her body—just to divert the absurdly powerful aura arc.

It sent her spinning into the air, where she took a casual backhand punch from the enraged Threadripper, launching her hundreds of meters into the snow, her armor dissipating into ethereal dust as she lay unmoving where she fell.

'Yeah, she's not getting up anytime soon,' Damian thought grimly. Wasting no time, he pulled out five runic scrolls at once, barely managing to hold them, and spread them on the ground. Threadripper, seeing his tricks, immediately sent the pugilist flying with another arc of energy and continued his charge at Damian before he could unleash his spells.

The two beside Damian understood their job well—despite knowing they stood no chance against the rampaging monster, they bought Damian the precious seconds he needed to activate his spells. He had started the process long ago, but gathering enough mana and forming the runic circles was excruciatingly slow, and Threadripper was awfully close.

Damian knew the others wouldn't survive even a single hit from the enraged warrior, but fortunately, he didn't get the chance to witness it. His first spell activated, drawing in enough mana—it was one of five from a single scroll.

It was a simple defensive wall spell, but Damian immediately took control of the runic circle with his threads, altering its parameters and pouring Vidalia's mana into it like water. He created a massive, thick wall between them. As expected, Threadripper roared in frustration and hacked away at the wall with his colossal, razor-sharp aura blades.

Damian had to focus intensely, with eight mana threads connected to the runic structure, continuously pouring in mana to reinforce the layers of the defense.

Finally, another runic scroll gathered enough mana to activate. Damian took control of it, and thankfully, this spell was far stronger than the wall—it was his signature invisible box.

Threadripper, lacking any mana-sensing tools, barely dodged the weaker spells earlier. Damian, pushing his focus to the breaking point, managed to slide the black runic circle under Threadripper's feet. Blood oozed from Damian's eyes and mouth as he nearly blacked out, but with one last desperate push, he activated the spell.

An adult-sized invisible box, with ten times the normal strength of his usual invisible boxes, sealed the crazed, burned swordsman off from the world. Threadripper's ridiculously powerful aura blades were as useless against it as their earlier efforts to fight him one-on-one.

Damian had successfully captured the beast of a man.

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