Chapter 148: Steel Cataclysm (5)
Deep within the Land of Broken Spears, the headquarters of the Endless Sea Council army stood firm.
News traveled swiftly. Commander Shaquille had already learned of the Fire Scorch tribe’s assault and the emergence of the Fire Scorch King.
Shaquille’s amber eyes narrowed with a complex expression.
Things seemed to be unfolding just as he had anticipated—the Fire Scorch tribe had launched their attack on schedule. Yet the reports from the front lines left him perplexed.
“No changes in troop composition?” Shaquille frowned, incredulous.
Though the Fire Scorch tribe’s forces appeared simple, their units had undergone numerous improvements after repeated devastating wars with the Holy Council.
The arms race between the two sides had once been fierce. Though the Council army, with its superior resources and technology, ultimately prevailed, the enemy was no simple foe. How could they have spent decades without developing any new, targeted tactics or units?
“Using old units... does this mean they’ve given up?” Shaquille closed his eyes and took a deep breath. “Have they abandoned victory? Is that it?”
He glanced at the communication crystal on the table, ready to contact Gale.
Unfortunately, Gale was already locked in battle with the Fire Scorch King.
Despite the king’s provocations, Gale remained unmoved, speaking in a detached, almost routine manner, attempting to reason with him.
Truth be told, Gale’s dry recitation felt more like a provocation than persuasion...
Meanwhile, the teleportation arrays within the War Great Tree activated repeatedly, transporting large numbers of soldiers and mages for reinforcements.
The War Great Tree shifted entirely into a defensive stance. Its vast canopy, blotting out the sky, saw its dense leaves wither and fall rapidly; the bark darkened and dulled, and the trunk shrank swiftly, shedding all its knobby growths.
The ground collapsed within a radius of several dozen kilometers, caused by the tree’s root system—tens of times larger than its body—contracting rapidly.
The tree’s volume shrank to less than a third of its original size, yet its defensive strength increased more than tenfold.
On the now-bare trunk, the Fire Scorch King struck a punch while dozens of flaming spears materialized behind him, thrusting toward Gale.
“Time to get serious, mighty spirit...” The Fire Scorch King observed the changes beneath him, realizing that Gale’s defensive posture since his appearance was likely out of fear of damaging the War Great Tree.
But the Fire Scorch King cared little for this. Two hundred thousand Fire Scorch warriors continued to surge forward with a suicidal fervor, attacking the fully defensive War Great Tree relentlessly.
“Damn! Have these guys lost their minds? Two true king-level monsters are fighting here!” In the War Great Tree’s control room, the burly man who had been burned to a mummy form had recovered, though the large hole in his chest remained unhealed. It did not silence his boisterous voice.
Alongside the vast central formation diagram, hundreds of mages frantically manipulated the arrays.
“The root contraction is complete; stealth mode activated,” an elderly mage declared.
Above the central formation, the tree’s root base had transformed into a massive spiral drill bit.
Simultaneously, the enormous canopy began to twist and fold, retracting entirely into the trunk.
“Excellent!” the elven officer nodded approvingly.
Watching the War Great Tree slowly sink underground, the Fire Scorch warriors and even the Fire Scorch King were left dumbfounded.
“Hmph, don’t think this is a simple retreat,” the burly officer sneered. “Just wait—we will return!”
The Fire Scorch warriors exchanged glances, then without hesitation leapt into the massive pit drilled by the War Great Tree.
This reckless abandon was extraordinary, leading the officers inside the War Great Tree to believe these outsiders had been cursed with a dimming aura, reduced to low-level monsters.
“Well, I’ve said all I needed to say, and now the most hated task is no longer necessary.” Suddenly, Gale seemed to breathe a sigh of relief, slapping aside the Fire Scorch King’s punch with one hand. His entire body erupted with a fierce shockwave, annihilating the flaming spears aimed at him.
---
“Hated task?” The Fire Scorch King froze, watching the man before him whose demeanor had suddenly shifted. His clenched right fist trembled involuntarily.
Gale’s seemingly simple slap contained a strange power.
It seeped into the Fire Scorch King’s body, causing his fist to shake incessantly, though it appeared to have no other effect.
“I don’t like destroying property,” Gale said, lowering his head as the air around him warped. “But I just can’t control my emotions... especially when facing a formidable foe like you, I always...”
Facing such a powerful adversary, the Fire Scorch King felt a conflicting sensation.
On one hand, he acknowledged Gale’s strength—that was normal.
On the other, he instinctively found Gale... cowardly?!
“...So scared~~” Tears welled up at the edge of Gale’s mask.
He was actually crying!
“Can we just stop fighting?” Gale sobbed violently, his shoulders trembling, his whole body shaking uncontrollably. His voice was thick with tears. “I want to go back and watch the swimsuit competition replay. I really like Miss Artoria and Miss Li Mei. Watching them makes me forget the cruelty of this world... So, can’t we just live in peace?”
“You...” The Fire Scorch King was speechless at such an obvious plea.
He’d fought dozens of top-tier heroes—arrogant, ruthless, aloof—he’d seen them all, but never one this pathetic.
“If you don’t want to fight, that’s easy,” the Fire Scorch King sneered, charging toward the deep pit. “Get lost.”
He lacked enthusiasm to face such an opponent.
“No, you can’t.” Gale stepped before the Fire Scorch King.
“Peace, I want peace,” Gale said, clutching his chest. “Only peace can make me feel safe.”
“I agree,” the Fire Scorch King raised his right fist, knowing that despite Gale’s timid appearance, he was still a powerful adversary who couldn’t be avoided.
The Fire Scorch King’s fist struck Gale’s mask—but Gale remained unscathed.
A strange vibration dissipated the king’s power, forming ripples of distortion around Gale’s body, making him appear blurred.
“Leave,” Gale said, pointing to the inside of the Fire Scorch King’s right elbow joint.
The move bore no lethal intent; the whole sequence was seamless. The Fire Scorch King didn’t even see what Gale had done.
Yet the power behind that fingertip strike was undeniable.
Boom!
A terrifying crack echoed from the Fire Scorch King’s elbow joint, like a building collapsing.
A finger-width dent appeared inside the joint, waves of force rippling across his skin, crushing the entire elbow.
Gale’s single-finger attack had shattered the Fire Scorch King’s elbow joint!
The king quickly retreated, carefully analyzing the power behind the strike...
“The force was almost equal to my previous punch.” Flames erupted from his elbow, rapidly healing the injury. “A counterattack technique? And the way the power transmitted is very unique—intense layered vibrations. That’s why the damage pierced through skin and muscle straight to the bone. Combined with the residual force from that slap... high-frequency vibration! He can decompose and recombine my attacks with high-frequency vibrations and then strike back!”
Now the Fire Scorch King roughly understood Gale’s attack style, but merely understanding was useless. The key issues remained: what was the root of Gale’s power, and how to counter it?
---
“Leave, Fire Scorch King. I’m really scared of you, truly. So, can we just coexist in peace?” Gale trembled as he pleaded.
“Peace?” The Fire Scorch King sneered. “You have no idea what we’re up against!”
His body temperature surged rapidly—five thousand, ten thousand, twenty thousand degrees in moments.
Heat waves swept through, the temperature climbing relentlessly. Even the Fire Scorch warriors on the ground began to falter.
“Try this, strange hero!” The Fire Scorch King crossed his arms, no longer radiating heat but conjuring a blazing fireball between them.
With a thrust of his hands, the terrifying orb, estimated at over a million degrees Celsius and trailing a purplish-red flame, shot toward Gale.
“Are you kidding me...” Gale was terrified, the fireball’s sheer heat threatening to boil his insides even from a distance.
“If I take it head-on, I’ll die. Run!” Gale instinctively wanted to flee, but realized something—
If he ran, the fireball would plunge straight into the pit drilled by the War Great Tree.
“No escape, then...” Instinctively wanting to protect the Council army’s soldiers, Gale resolutely stood before the fireball.
I’m going to die!
I don’t want to die! I don’t want to run! I can’t run! What do I do?!
I need help...
Boom~~~
The fireball struck Gale directly. The terrifying heat and shockwave exploded outward, creating waves of scorching heat.
A massive fireball over a hundred meters in diameter hung in the air.
The intense heat forced the Fire Scorch warriors to retreat beyond the barrier. Though the Fire Scorch were highly heat-resistant, this was no shame—this was the power of a king!
At the explosion’s core, the Fire Scorch King was naturally unafraid of the searing temperature. Though the shockwave knocked him back over a hundred meters, he remained unharmed.
He could even sense everything engulfed by the flames, including Gale’s condition.
The heat and pressure Gale endured after being hit were terrifying—equivalent to taking a nuclear strike to the face.
Yet his body wasn’t shattered. He remained frozen midair in the exact posture at impact, utterly unmoved by the shockwave.
Within the Fire Scorch King’s fiery perception, although he could “see” Gale, he could not “touch” him!
It was as if Gale were but a mere illusion...
“What is this...?” The Fire Scorch King was baffled by this strange phenomenon. “Spatial magic? No! The power behind my attack can shatter weak spatial fragments, and... there’s no unusual spatial fluctuation.”
While a true king like Dais could annihilate tens of kilometers of space with a punch, shattering small spatial modules was easy—as was creating spatial tools with small pockets of space.
If it were a highly stable, large-scale spatial refuge spell, there would be intense spatial fluctuations, which made the king’s confusion all the greater.