Third Person POV
Chihiro was fighting her own battle against the dangerous bird. After her counter to the drill missile attack, she had already closed in on the bird.
She jumped toward the bird and pointed her Wind Blade straight at its back as it was flying away.
Just before she could hit it, suddenly, she heard an extreme sound that burst straight through her ear.
It not only jump-scared her, but she also flinched from the sound. It was sudden—but she was going to hit the bird... right?
The moment she heard the sound, she lost focus as her Wind Blade was disrupted. She hit the bird, but it was just her hands—with no strength in them at all—and then she slipped down as her feet barely touched the bird's back. Although the bird itself lost a little focus from the disruptive and intense shockwave, it only lost a bit of balance before gliding straight back from hitting the wall as its feet slowly rubbed through the wall.
As for where the sound came from—below, on the ground, there seemed to be two fallen stone missiles. So the conclusion was: the two of them collided and caused a shockwave of sound.
"No!" she yelled as she realized.
The shockwaves were still vibrating in her head, but she zoned back in instantly after. She created a cloud below herself as she fell on her knees—it slowed her momentum and stopped her just before hitting the ground. Then she glided straight back up.
"Ah... That was a close call," she sighed in relief.
The bird had turned back. For some reason, it was now far away from Chihiro.
"Damn this bird..." she muttered as she started chasing it again.
While she was chasing the bird, something started happening to the wall behind her—but she hadn't noticed yet.
From every part of the wall, the same drill-like missiles started slowly forming and spinning at such a fast rate that normal eyesight couldn't even register the motion.
From every corner—starting at 300 and extending upward to 50 meters—missiles slowly formed with only a few inches of gap between each, totaling thousands of them.
These missiles weren't the previous, normal ones. Even the second attack the bird had launched at her wasn't nearly as strong as these ones starting to emerge from the wall.
So how were these missiles forming from the walls?
It was simple, really. Since the walls were created by the God of Absolute to never break, he also added something else.
He ensured that no matter how much of a disadvantage one might face due to the walls being indestructible, there would be absolutely no restriction on magical creativity just because of that. Magic was never meant to be held back by limitations like durability.
The bird used an ability that allowed it to utilize its Earth power not only to create but also to gather ground around it and shape it once it touched flat terrain. Ironically, the limit was exactly how far the walls extended.
But how did that even work?
The ability normally functioned by sucking up the ground's matter into the energy it was using. Normally, it would be impossible to create such a large field from scratch, because it only had enough mana to make a few of those strong missiles.
But sucking up stone from the ground didn't even take a fraction of the mana required otherwise. The only limitation was the depth of the ground beneath it.
Normally, the ability could only reach a few inches down—which made it impractical in most fights. BUT—since the walls were indestructible, or rather, never-ending, as God of Absolute designed them, when the Earth Drill-like missiles were formed, the stone being sucked up was replenished immediately from the infinite layers beneath. Even if only a few inches was the limit, those few inches always had more stone.
The bird took advantage of the infinite floor and wall system—because it was the only one that had the knowledge of how the place was built.
The fact that monsters in this dungeon could think like that—if they were intelligent (unlike the Dreadpaw Titan)—and creative, was proof that the Primordial Dungeon was truly merciless.
But the Primordial Dungeon would never give a trial that was completely impossible by all conditions—so there was still a way out of this situation. It might even be easy.
The way the bird could save itself was simply by undoing its magic of Force.
The bird had the ability of Force—it could create any type of force from its attacks. That's how the drills were so strong. Simply by undoing the Force, the missile would lose all its momentum the instant it was undone, and it would cancel itself out.
Unfortunately for the bird—and fortunately for Chihiro—the bird had already used up almost all of its mana on that attack. Even if the stone was pulled from the ground, it still cost nearly all of its mana due to using both Force and the Earth Domain.
More than halfway through the room, Chihiro immediately noticed when the mana pressure suddenly skyrocketed from behind her.
Her eyes glowed in amazed fear at the phenomenon she saw—it really looked crazy.
"What in the actual world is that?"
Chihiro's mouth was wide open as she froze—midair.
She was aware that if she couldn't stop the missiles, she was as good as dead.
The missiles were halfway from launching, so going back to stop them was the dumbest move. The only way to reach the spot in time would be by ground, but she didn't have enough time to prepare herself, jump down, and run at full speed. It required too much focus—and if she let her guard down, the bird would launch the missiles the second she started focusing her mana.
The way Force worked was like fire—when fire is lit, it could be extinguished. But the user of the fire couldn't just undo the extinguish. Chihiro was aware of this—because her power was quite similar to the bird's.
Ironically, she was a physics student before. So she obviously understood the mechanics of her power by the laws of physics.
Chihiro's power was Weather itself. She could manipulate the weather around her, which allowed her to create things like water through moisture. The Force used on the missiles was way too immense for her to just erase with regular tornados.
"What a coincidence. I never would've thought I'd get to use the newest technique I discovered I could pull off one day... I guess I'm utilizing it here after all."
The technique she was referring to was using both moisture and tornados to hypothetically create a waterspout on land.
The pressure behind the missiles was still too intense for that alone to stop them completely—even if it was a waterspout.
So, she decided to abuse her power again. Literally.
Her power over Weather allowed her to manipulate the concept of temperatures in some scenarios—which applied here.
Simply by making the waterspout's water boiling hot, the remaining Force in the missiles would be completely canceled out by the sheer heat.
The only consequence was that using three abilities at once wouldn't be easy. And since this was a new technique, using it without burning too much mana would be difficult. Worst-case scenario, her theory might fail entirely.
"But I'm not the one who'd give up so easily," she said boldly.
The missiles launched.
Chihiro had already prepared her mana flow. She immediately extended her arm in a casting motion to release the tornado.
From her hand, a small, nearly invisible tornado formed and flowed down to the floor—smoothly and swiftly. The moment it made contact, it instantly became gigantic.
Chihiro closed her eyes. The bird was still flying toward the opposite wall, somehow unaware that she was no longer behind it.
"Moisture and Temperature Manipulation—Boiling Waterspout Tempest." That's what she called her technique.
The giant tornado slowly turned into a waterspout made of extremely hot, boiling water—hotter than even fire, due to the sheer pressure the waterspout contained.
The tornado stood right in front of Chihiro like a shield. Her hair whipped around from the wind, and she could feel the heat of the water and the pressure of the mana surrounding the Boiling Waterspout Tempest.
The bird immediately turned around to see Chihiro doing something that would stop its plan—but it was already too late.
The missiles slammed into Chihiro's technique. All the stone missiles that made contact with the waterspout instantly slowed down and eventually stopped completely. Then they started spinning around the waterspout and being boiled down by the heat. Some missiles passed through, splashing water as they went.
All in all—everything was cinematic. Too cinematic-looking.
And then—she undid the waterspout, aware it wasn't needed anymore.
The bird was flying straight at Chihiro as she landed on the floor.
It was furious—and completely tired out.
It had lost its mind as it rushed at her in sheer anger.
Chihiro turned around and said, "A monster is a monster, no matter how sane or intelligent it might be," she yelled at it.
She extended her right hand and created the Wind Blade a second before the bird reached her.
Then, she instantly dodged—smoothly moving to the right and avoiding it. The bird was extremely slow.
And then—she beheaded it without hesitation. Smoothly.
She did it so fast that no blood splattered around. The bird hit the ground, the head falling a little farther than the body, and then blood began flowing from both the head and neck.
Chihiro sighed, slowly settling herself down after everything.
"I don't know what is happening, but I think it's over," she assured herself, falling to the ground in relief.
Suddenly—after a minute of catching her breath—she heard a voice that would shock her...