For several moments, Levi and the man stared at each other, neither side making a move. The air between them was thick with tension as Levi’s magic rolled off him in waves, casting a terrible pressure over the entire cavern. Behind him, he could sense that Liliya was utterly frozen in place, her instincts no doubt on high alert from the sheer overwhelming power that emanated from his form.

  Across from Levi, the man seemed to be completely unaffected. Instead, he was examining Levi with a clearly interested air. “That’s quite the amount of power you’re leaking out there,” he mused. “Wow. You kids are getting scary these days. Aren’t you supposed to be a failure? How did you become this strong?”

  “I ate all my vegetables,” Levi replied. His eyes sharpened as his sight became True, allowing him to directly analyze the magic protecting the man. Beneath the surface veil of reality, he could see a thin, jagged layer of magic surrounding the man like a second skin, geometric in nature. Even now it was continuously shifting and rotating like a kaleidoscopic fractal.

  Hmm…

  Levi took a deep breath and drew back all the magic he’d let flood the cavern, compressing and suppressing it with pinpoint control. The effect was instantaneous; the immense pressure radiating from him disappeared entirely as his presence went to zero.

  While great for intimidation tactics, letting out his magic like that only served to tax his reserves and make him a blaring beacon to anyone with even the barest hint of mana detection abilities.

  The man whistled. “You have some mighty fine control over your mana as well. I can’t sense you at all. That’s impressive.”

  “Yeah, well, you know what they say,” Levi said. “It’s not the size that matters, it’s how you use it.”

  “Ha!” the man barked out a laugh. “True enough. It’s a pity most youth these days don’t quite realize that. It’s always about Level this, high-tier Skill that.” He shook his head. “Even a basic starter skill gained at level 5 can be used to take down a level 500 if used properly.” He paused. “Then again, a skill gained at level 500 does have its benefits. Like this.” A ball of ethereal golden light flickered to life in the man’s hand. “Here, catch.”

  With that, the man casually tossed the ball of light to Levi. Levi stared at the light as it lazily arced through the air, slowly drifting toward him.

  It was beautiful. Sublime. The most gorgeous thing Levi had ever seen.

  The light evoked emotions within him so pure he nearly teared up, memories of a paradise once lost, and Levi somehow instinctively knew that if he just touched it even once, he would attain true bliss.

  …

  Someone like him didn’t deserve true bliss.

  Levi instantly broke the illusion that had ensnared his mind, his eyes narrowed as he stepped to the side, letting the ball of light harmlessly pass by–

  Wait, shit.

  He whirled around and grabbed Liliya just in time before she could hug the ball of light to her chest, roughly pulling her away and locking his arms around her. She struggled against him, but his grip was ironclad. Her skin might be bruised later, but bruises were a far preferable fate than whatever awaited her if she made contact with the light.

  Holding her flailing form tightly, Levi watched as the ball of light sank into the ground and instantly vaporized everything it passed through so thoroughly that not even dust remained. It carved a hole several meters into the ground before finally dissipating, leaving behind curved walls so smooth and polished it was like a master stonemason had been at work.

  Liliya stopped struggling, and Levi saw her eyes widen in horror and realization as she returned to her senses. “What…?”

  “An illusion,” Levi said grimly. “A powerful one, at that.” He released her and turned back to the man.

  Fortunately, the man hadn’t attacked them while Levi was preventing Liliya from gaining a new breathing hole in her chest. Instead, he was standing very still, and though Levi couldn’t see his face, he got the feeling that the man was staring at him with much more intensity than before.

  “You broke through the illusion,” the man said, a baffled bewilderment to his voice. “How? You’d need an INT stat in the high hundreds to even begin having a chance of resisting it.”

  “Please,” Levi said. “It’s only common sense to not trust sparkly mesmerizing lights.”

  “Common sense?” the man repeated incredulously. “It’s a high-tier illusionary hypnosis skill! You can’t resist that with just common sense–”

  As they spoke, Levi had been gathering and shaping his magic within him into multiple different parallel threads. Ordinarily, even casting two spells simultaneously was already considered to be an extremely difficult task.

  Slashing his hand across the air, Levi unleashed four.

  The ground beneath them trembled and groaned as the air between them shimmered and rippled. A small orb of flames formed in front of Levi and from it a thin stream of fire lanced forward faster than sound itself, spiraling arcs of lightning crackling around it. Powerful blades of wind capable of pulverizing concrete blasted at the man from every side as the earth underneath him bubbled and became liquid, the molten earth rushing upward and surrounding his legs. It solidified a moment later into reinforced stone, locking the man in place.

  The man simply stood there, his posture completely relaxed as the magical attacks slammed into him one after another – to no effect. The flames sputtered and dissipated, the lightning sizzled out, and the wind only ruffled his hair.

  “Not bad,” the man said as he stepped forward, the stone around his legs crumbling like wet sand. “Trying to use elemental spells was a nice touch. But my [Sanctum] renders me invulnerable to all magical attacks. I don’t mean to boast, but I don’t think there’s anyone in Koxus better suited for fighting against mages than me. You can’t defeat me with magic.”

  Levi was silent for a moment. Then he smiled. “Was that a challenge? That sounded like a challenge to me.”

  The man laughed. “By all means, interpret it however you wish. It won’t change the result either way. In fact…” He spread his arms. “Give it your best shot. I promise I won’t move a single inch.”

  Levi didn’t need to be told twice. His magic roared to life as he hurled spells at the man as fast as he could channel. Arcane spells the culmination of centuries of research, dark curses that shone with malevolent light, and fireballs hotter than the surface of the sun itself bombarded the man with extreme prejudice.

  The air became charged and laden with mana, so dense and potent that soon the cavern blazed with enough magic to resemble a leyline node. Just the sheer amount of residual energy bleeding off the spells alone would be enough to make the average mage gape in awe.

  Yet, despite all that, man weathered the barrage of spells without so much as a flinch. It was like he was merely enjoying a gentle summer rain instead of the terrifying storm of magic that it was.

  The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.

  “You’re wasting your own time,” the man said pleasantly. Despite the cacophony of noise from all the spells, his voice somehow rang clear and audible. “At this rate, even Ms Volkov over there would have a better chance of hurting me.” He sighed when Levi showed no signs of stopping. “You mages are all the same. When you have a hammer, everything looks like a nail.”

  In response, a spiraling sphere of brilliant green flames struck him in the face. It sputtered out and dissipated a moment later – only to reveal the three Sever and Cleaves that had been hidden behind it, each spaced scant millimeters apart.

  The man’s posture betrayed his amusement as the first two sliced into his neck and chest and did absolutely no damage.

  However, in the split second before the third Sever and Cleave landed, the man suddenly jerked back in panic, abruptly twisting to the side in a burst of speed and barely managing to avoid the head-on blow. As a result, instead of cutting diagonally across the man’s left flank, the Sever and Cleave only struck his left arm at the shoulder.

  A sudden silence descended over the cavern as Levi finally stopped his magical bombardment.

  Slowly, the man looked down at his left arm. A moment passed.

  Then, with a sickening squelch, the arm slid down at the shoulder joint and fell, landing on the ground with a thud. Thick streams of bright crimson blood began gushing out of the man’s open wound a moment later, splattering wetly onto the cavern floor.

  Levi smiled, his eyes glinting with a fierce satisfaction. “So. You were saying?”

  The man continued staring at his open wound for several seconds. Then, he turned back to look at Levi.

  “Levi Ironwood,” he said coldly, all traces of his previous cheer disappearing, replaced by a hard, flat tone. “What did you just do?

  Levi grinned. “I think I just made you break your promise.”

  During his initial combination elemental attack, Levi had observed with his True Sight how his magic had struck the man and not been absorbed like he’d initially assumed, but instead refracted. It had been a simple difference, but quite crucial.

  If the man’s defensive barrier had mana absorption properties, then it would’ve broken his spells down into raw mana and absorbed it. If that had been the case, then even if Levi had aimed at the lines of death on the protective magic, his Sever and Cleave would’ve just been absorbed and neutralized harmlessly before it could actually cut the lines.

  However, Levi had seen that his elemental spells had penetrated the outer layer of the defensive magic – and reflected off the inner layer behind it. Trapped between the two layers, the magic had bounced back and forth millions of times within that infinitesimal space until it finally fizzled out naturally. Though it looked like it had struck the man, the magic had technically never reached him.

  Once Levi had figured out the mechanism behind [Sanctum], it had been elementary to first lull the man into a false sense of confidence by throwing an ostentatious barrage of spells at him before launching three successive Sever and Cleaves.

  The first one had been a diversion. The second one had cut across a death line on the inner layer of [Sanctum], dismantling the skill and creating an opening.

  The third had been aimed for the man’s heart. It had taken his left arm instead.

  “So you did,” the man said. Absently, he reached over to his stump with his other hand and pressed against it with an open palm. There was a sharp sizzling sound, and a second later he withdrew his hand to reveal a cauterized, still slightly smoking wound. During the entire process, his unwavering gaze never left Levi. “My apologies. It is not my habit to break my word.”

  “Happens to the best of us.”

  “No,” the man said. “It does not.” He did not wait for Levi to respond. “You asked who I was. Very well, I shall answer. I am Phantasm of the Crucible. And I will remember your name, Levi Ironwood. This will not be the last time we meet.” He paused. “Your existence really messed things up for me, you know. This card wasn’t meant to be revealed until reinforcements arrived to save Farband, but...”

  Phantasm snapped his fingers and a pulse of magic shot outward. With a mighty resounding crack, the ground of the cavern began splitting down the middle, opening up to reveal a wide abyss. Several wyvern corpses slid and fell into it, disappearing into the darkness below. Debris and rocks rained down from the ceiling above as the walls around them trembled.

  “I hope you have fun with Leroy!” Phantasm said, a hint of cheer returning to his voice, though much more subdued than before. “If you survive, then we’ll see about that exchange of information.”

  “Wait–!”

  But the man had already disappeared from existence as suddenly as he’d appeared.

  Fuck. Levi hated teleporters. He needed to get his hands on some anti-teleportation artifacts as soon as he could. Levi hadn’t even bothered attacking after severing Phantasm’s arm because he knew Phantasm could easily just instantly teleport away; better to hang back and acquire as much information as possible.

  Then he frowned.

  Wait. Who was Leroy?

  “Levi?” Liliya said, her face becoming pale.

  With a sinking feeling, Levi realized that even though Phantasm had already vanished, the walls of the cavern hadn’t stopped shaking. In fact, the tremors seemed to only be getting stronger and more violent, the ground beneath them rolling and swaying like the deck of a ship.

  And, was it just him or was it getting hotter inside the cavern…?

  A tremendous roar suddenly resounded thunderously through the air, so loud and powerful it made both Levi and Liliya stumble back slightly. They quickly retreated to the edge of the cavern, watching as the abyss cracked and widened further before a wyvern emerged headfirst from the darkness below, chunks of rock and debris sliding off its scaly hide as it rose upward. In just a few seconds, it had already filled up most of the space in the cavern.

  Levi looked up. And up. And up.

  The new wyvern was fucking massive, five or six times the size of even the biggest Greater Wyvern. It loomed above them at least a hundred meters tall, and it hadn’t even fully emerged yet.

  “An Elder Wyvern,” Liliya said. To her credit, her voice didn’t shake even a little, though Levi could see how her azure-purple eyes were dilated with fear. “It’s at least level 500. Potentially even more.”

  Somehow, the Elder Wyvern managed to hear her over the thunderous noise filling the cavern. Its ears twitched as it turned its scaly angular head toward them, its yellow slitted eyes glittering with malice as it caught sight of Levi and Liliya below.

  Then it roared.

  Levi immediately flung his hand out, his magic bursting forth and surrounding them in a protective embrace. The terrible sound slammed into them a moment later, so deafeningly loud that had it struck them directly, it would’ve undoubtedly burst Liliya’s unprotected eardrums and caused severe internal injuries in them both.

  However, Levi’s magic protected them. His magic automatically analyzed the incoming soundwaves and broadcasted inverted soundwaves of equal amplitude, canceling out the noise entirely.

  As such, Levi and Liliya didn’t hear a single thing, though they could see how the rocks and debris on the ground were sent flying backward from the sheer force.

  After several seconds, the Elder Wyvern stopped. It saw how Levi and Liliya were unscathed and seemed to only grow more furious. It moved, the scales on its powerful body rippling as it rose up even higher.

  Alright, fuck this. Levi wasn’t going to fight a gigantic behemothic beast inside an enclosed underground cavern. He had approximately zero faith in the continued structural integrity of the supporting walls, and he wasn’t exactly planning on getting crushed to death underneath tons of rock and magical beast.

  He grabbed Liliya’s hand, wrapped his magic around them both, then teleported the fuck out of there.

  They reappeared in the Grove of Embers. It was already nighttime, the moon and stars shining above and casting an ethereal glow over the vibrant red trees. The scenery was honestly beautiful, and Levi took a moment to take it in.

  “That was an Elder Wyvern,” Liliya said in disbelief. “How did the Guild surveyors not detect it?” Before Levi could respond, she was already answering her own question. “Of course, there must’ve been more runic scripts underground to conceal the ambient mana levels. But why? What motive could Phantasm possibly have for this? And what in the world is the Crucible?”

  With a sudden start, Levi finally remembered where he had heard the name ‘Crucible’ before.

  “Who are you? A Grand Assassin? A Shadow? One of the Crucible?”

  That was what Professor Heimler had asked him back when he’d discovered Levi in the Restricted Sanctum. How did Heimler know of this organization?

  “I don’t know,” Levi said. “But I think we have slightly more important things to worry about.”

  Liliya let out a measured breath. “Yeah. I guess we do.”

  Right on cue, the ground ahead of them trembled and shook before the Elder Wyvern burst upward through the earth, the trees around it getting uprooted and soil being upheaved in spades as its gargantuan form rose upward into the sky. It let out another deafening roar, and flocks of birds took flight into the sky for miles around.

  “Okay. I just want it on the record,” Levi said, “that I was not the one who jinxed this mission.”