Xerxes took a long, deep breath of relief; his usual consternated face dissipated as a mask of relief and triumph washed over it.
He watched over the beast as its body began disintegrating. Xerxes stared at the beast, then looked down, knowing that no help would come. It was as hopeless as he once was.
The stain of his original defeat was being cleansed, and at this point, he didn't care about questioning whether or not it was right to be happy about taking the life of another.
Whether it was a beast or a human—it didn't matter, because this was what he had trained for, and this was what he felt was his right.
A right of accomplishment and victory that no outside force could sway.
He crouched down, sheathing his sword. Xerxes observed as the particles of mana began concentrating into a soul shard. This was something unique to beasts; humans, elves, dwarves, and daemons didn't have this natural response.
He waited, and finally, the mana formed a diamond shape, radiating with mana that felt comparable to the Orc's soul shard.
"This is it. This is the power I need to keep moving forward." Xerxes picked up the soul shard from this mana beast and the other mana beast he had first killed.
Raising a hand over the soul shards cradled in his right arm, he drew upon the mana within them. There wasn't much resistance in absorbing the power.
Mana began replenishing the reserves expended through the battle. As Xerxes' head tilted back, the power he gained filled him with an ecstasy foreign to the other soul shards he had claimed before.
Xerxes couldn't differentiate between the two reasons: was it because he felt accomplished by killing them, or was it that the power of beasts was so satiating?
He suspected it was rooted in both, but he didn't have time to acknowledge the facts as much as he would have liked, because his senses were heightened from battle, and he could hear rustling within the trees.
Turning his attention to the trees, he didn't waste any time. He took out his sword, instilling the metal with his fire mana.
Not wasting a single second in achieving his goal of killing ten, he threw out an aerial slash of fire that belittled the integrity of the wildlife and trees in its path, incinerating everything as it travelled straight towards the rustling noise.
He heard a guttural shriek of pain, and a mana beast fell forward. It wasn't as brave as he would have thought, because the monster didn't dare approach Xerxes, perhaps after witnessing the massacre of its kind.
Once again, a soul shard dropped to the floor, which Xerxes absorbed. Though he felt as if the nature of this soul shard was different.
This soul shard gave him the impression that it was more physically based, whereas the first one was more mana-based. Nevertheless, taking on more would be pointless; however, he knew Aemon would make good use of them for the barrier's defence.
Xerxes spent the next hour searching for beasts. He was starting to suspect that the beasts were becoming fearful of the power radiating from him, so he tried a different strategy.
Another trick used within the outpost was a simple one.
When people were on the brink of death, their mana would fluctuate, and this attracted different beasts. Why this was, he didn't know, but he had seen this method work time and time again, so that is what he did.
Suspecting that he was far out of the range of his original battle with the two mana beasts, he started using this strategy, standing in plain sight for the beasts. There wasn't any reason to hide anymore.
Aemon watched Xerxes from afar, commenting on his strategy to Leiya, "It seems as if Conrad has been teaching him well about the different strategies we use. I wish he was taking after me, though; it would be nice seeing him use mana more. Is it in fashion to use the sword nowadays, my sweet granddaughter?"
Leiya raised a questioning eyebrow. "Grandpa, I think people just have their strengths and what they're more comfortable with. You're an old fart, so was it more in fashion to use the sword back in your time no?"
Surprised at her insult, he defensively said, "Of course it was more in fashion to use the sword. That was purely because mana wasn't as well-known as it is now. And to call me an old fart—where has my sweet Leiya gone?"
Leiya sounded exhausted. "Can we just focus on Xerxes for now? I think his strategy is working. I hear the beasts, and I think there's a lot more this time."
Leiya was correct. Xerxes also picked up on it; there seemed to be heavy thuds coming from all directions. Did I attract too many? he asked himself.
He got an answer fast. All around him, he saw the viperous scarlet eyes of several beasts.
Xerxes prepared himself, holding mana in one hand and his sword in the other. By his rough estimate, there were more than five but fewer than eight.
But what he couldn't prepare for was something that even surprised Aemon, with how Xerxes would deal with it.
A large tree was hurled out of control towards Xerxes' back. He didn't have time to fully evade it; it was coming too fast. The best he could do was to get hit by a less dense part of the tree.
He leaped towards the right, where more twigs and branches were. Despite moving, the power still felt punishing as Xerxes skidded through the dirt, his skin shredded from his arm as blood poured from the wound.
It wasn't over just like that. A beast leapt, aiming to impale Xerxes' skull with its onyx claws. Xerxes required agility, thus activating the goblin soul shard and raising his blade, placing the hand filled with mana on the flat side.
The weight of the attack hammered down as Xerxes' expression grew dark. This was potent, more so than he expected, but there were more beasts to come.
I need to use 'Hell Storm,' Xerxes urged himself. To set up the attack, he poured his strength into pushing the beast back. He roared as he drove the beast back, and with the hand instilled with mana, he aimed it at the beast as consecutive fireballs shot from his hand.
The fireballs began tearing through the enemy's body as it became limp and dropped to the floor. But Xerxes sensed a palpable amount of mana forming from his right.
His eyes widened as two mana beasts were gathering mana in their mouths, one of fire nature and the second of wind.
Xerxes didn't have the luxury of thinking about what to do, and he knew he would have to act daringly. Combining the power of the orc soul shard and the goblin soul shard, his body strengthened considerably.
The amalgamation of wind and fire, travelled towards him, and if he didn't use a tactical spell Aemon had taught him, he would meet his end again. Drawing flames around both of his fists, Xerxes punched into the ground, forming a wall of debris in front of him.
The brunt of the attack hit against the wall, and Xerxes noticed another beast running from his left-hand side. The debris would only hold up for so long and the beast was going to reach him in a few seconds.
He knew one beast was shooting out a gale-force wind and the other a powerful flame. If he moved in the direction of the wind, he would get pushed back, and it would allow him to use that momentum when landing against the floor to deliver a powerful attack.
This prompted Xerxes to have a strategy around it. A dangerous one.
Nevertheless, he went through with it. Xerxes quickly cut the wall that was acting as a lifeline, just as the beast from his left approached. This killed two birds with one stone successfully.
The beast from his left directly fell into Xerxes' trap and got incinerated by its allies, while he twisted mid-air, catching sight of his landing point—a tree.
He barely found footing, bending his knees with all his strength. Then, like a coiled spring, he launched forward, focusing all of his strength within them. He moved so fast, he wasn't sure if the beasts would realise they would meet their end.
"DIE!" he screamed as he slashed across, killing both beasts as they fell to the floor like every single one of them.
He stabbed his sword into the ground, resting a knee as his breath ragged. He had only killed four in this battle, and he knew there had to be at least one more.
Observing his surroundings, he couldn't see anything, but his normal senses weren't the only thing he could rely on; he could sense mana too.
Closing his eyes, he felt a small radiation of power seeping roughly 15 metres to the left. Not only that, he sensed one 20 metres behind him.
"The one ahead of you has been channelling its mana for quite a while. It would be wise to avoid the attack," a female voice said within his head.
Xerxes was puzzled. Who exactly had said that? It couldn't have been Leiya. The voice resembled the same one he had heard when he first arrived in the fallen kingdom—a voice he didn't know the origin of or who it belonged to.
"Who are you?" he asked, but he was left with no response. The voice had saved him once, though. He had a strange feeling of connection to it that he couldn't shake, so he chose to follow it, allowing him to ask questions later.
Xerxes stood up and started running in an arc shape towards the beast that was charging the mana, as per the voice's advice.
Sure enough, it was. If Xerxes hadn't picked up on it, this would have caught him by surprise, but because of the voice, he was easily able to pick it off with little resistance.
That put the count of kills at nine in total. There was just one left. Xerxes didn't waste any time.
He felt the reserves of his mana dwindling, his strength fading, and his vision getting hazy. He didn't have the strength to keep this output up and use both soul shards in union.
With a deep breath, he located the final beast. Summoning the last vestiges of his power, he channelled mana into his blade. Fire surged along its length, the heat nearly unbearable. The weapon itself threatened to melt in his grasp.
Xerxes drew back his arm and carefully pointed out where the beast was. He then threw his sword like a boomerang, and the sword swished through the air like a javelin, landing straight in the beast's head, killing the very last beast in style.
The thud of the beast confirmed it had met it's end and that was all Xerxes needed.
His task was complete. He had killed ten beasts and was ready for what was next.