Cerulean flames—unseen, unheard of.
Among Yuri's trio, none had witnessed such sorcery. Yet here it blazed: Kael's azure inferno, real and crackling with annihilative force.
Kael understood this newfound power intimately.
Fusing with the Ice Essence had mutated his magic. Every flame he conjured now burned cerulean—a glacial fire far deadlier than his former crimson blaze.
"Freakish tricks won't save a Sixth-level corpse!" Marcus roared, bloodlust overriding reason. He lunged, combat aura surging like a tsunami.
Sebastian sneered, triggering his signature spell: "Petrify!" His body swelled, muscles bulging as skin hardened to stone-like rigidity—the same technique he'd used against Amelia. Now a living boulder, each thunderous step cratered the earth.
Yuri had already begun his incantation. Staff raised, he unleashed "Frost Roar!" Winter's wrath descended: howling gales sheathed in ice encircled Kael, a blizzard-born prison.
Unflinching against the triad's assault, Kael completed his own spell. Syllables cascaded like hail: "Vacuum Inferno."
The cerulean flames erupted.
Pressure warped the air—Yuri's group had never witnessed such cataclysmic fire magic. The azure blaze devoured space itself.
Vacuum Inferno. Another forbidden art from The Book of Immortality, its pages now revealing dozens of spells Kael had barely begun mastering. Meteor Swarm and this hellscape were but two.
"The ground—!" Yuri's warning came too late.
Geysers of cerulean fire burst upward as a flaming canopy descended from above. The battlefield became a crucible, ice and flame merging in annihilative harmony.
"Pathetic flames!" Sebastian scoffed, his petrified form striding through the inferno. Stone skin repelled magic—or so he believed.
"Idiot, fall back!" Yuri barked. But the berserker charged onward, oblivious to the azure fire's lethal anomaly.
Sebastian ignored Yuri's warning—or rather, the power-drunk berserker dismissed it entirely. Stone-clad legs pistoned forward, charging Kael with earth-shaking stomps.
Boom. Boom. Boom.
He resembled a miniature titan, cratering the ground with each step.
The cerulean inferno erupted. Flames coiled around him, sealing his path.
"Aaaarrgh!"
Sebastian's scream ripped through the battlefield. "What sorcery is this?!" The azure fire scoured his petrified flesh, agony searing into his marrow. His face contorted grotesquely—a blend of primal terror and rage.
"Burning… like hellfire itself?!" Even his combat aura failed against the flames. Stone skin cracked and blackened. All arrogance vanished; only a whimpering husk remained, thrashing within the azure pyre.
Marcus and Yuri exchanged glances, stunned. Never had they witnessed flames immune to aura suppression—these cerulean tongues clung like cursed parasites, devouring Sebastian despite his frantic efforts.
Only when Kael's mana waned did the inferno subside. What remained of Sebastian collapsed: charred flesh fused with molten armor, unconscious from trauma.
Yuri's Frost Roar had dissolved earlier, its icy barrage obliterated by the Vacuum Inferno. Marcus, sensing catastrophe, had retreated beyond the flames' reach.
One strike.
Two Sixth-level experts repelled.
One reduced to smoldering wreckage.
The cerulean blaze's aftermath left Yuri and Marcus rigid with dread. Kael's cultivation hadn't risen—yet this mutated fire defied all reason.
"Marcus," Kael's voice dripped frost, his gaze lingering on Amelia's injuries. "Weren't you going to rip my head off?"
The berserker seethed with barely contained fury. "Since when did this bastard get so strong?!" Yet despite murderous intent, he hesitated.
"Strike together, or we're finished!" Yuri barked. Kael's cerulean inferno defied logic—its annihilative force demanded their full might.
Marcus needed no urging. Trees splintered as he barreled forward, combat aura blazing.
"Frost Wyvern!" Yuri's staff flared. Ice coalesced into a serpentine dragon, fangs glinting.
Both attackers abandoned restraint, unleashing pinnacle spells.
Kael merely raised his staff. "Meteor Swarm."
But these were no ordinary meteors. Azure flames sheathed each celestial projectile—a cerulean hailstorm raining destruction.
Boom!
The Frost Wyvern collided with the falling stars. Last time, their clash had ended in stalemate. Now, blistering heat met glacial fury—and ice lost.
The cerulean flames scoured the Wyvern's glacial form. Cracks spiderwebbed across its body before it shattered into mist.
Yet Kael still held reserves!
The meteors from Meteor Swarm kept crashing down. Yuri conjured shields in desperation, while Marcus—initially charging recklessly—found himself trapped. The cerulean barrage forced him back, compounded by Kael's Stellar Steps maintaining lethal distance.
Frustration choked both attackers. Two Sixth-level experts—Yuri nearing high-stage mastery—couldn't even graze a hair on Kael's head!
Dancing through the magical onslaught, Kael pivoted. His focus narrowed on Marcus.
Sebastian already lay broken; Yuri posed greater threat. Time to eliminate the weaker link—Marcus wouldn't escape again.
Locking onto his prey, Kael's glacial stare prickled Marcus's instincts with primal dread. Then came the taunt:
"Strutting around with one arm missing—you think you're Yang Guo, the legendary cripple?!"
Magic detonated.