Chapter 374

In the next hour, due to the existence of the Hunter's Mark, any damage Gao De dealt to Gao De would receive an additional damage bonus.

More importantly, Gao De would find it easier to discover Gao De's whereabouts.

This was very important for combat in a water environment.

"!" Gao De sensed the existence of the Hunter's Mark, his eyes widening in anger, staring fixedly at Gao De.

It was just that Gao De hadn't removed 【Disguise+】 yet, so he was still wearing Hake's appearance.

"If you have the guts, show your true face!" he shouted angrily, half-truthfully.

"As you wish." Gao De smiled slightly and actually responded.

Subsequently, with a thought, he removed the disguise, and his true figure, clothing, and even face were revealed.

Gao De instinctively widened his eyes, wanting to see Gao De's appearance through the night.

Now!

Gao De thought to himself, his eyes instantly becoming as sharp as an eagle's.

In his spell star sea, a cantrip model had been triggered.

【Flash】!

Flash was just a cantrip, a functional cantrip.

But that didn't mean it wouldn't work on a second-circle mage.

As long as it was used well, even a cantrip could have miraculous effects.

For example, right now.

An extreme flash erupted, instantly spreading to the surroundings.

The light was so intense that one couldn't look directly at it.

Gao De had already closed his eyes in advance.

But Gao De couldn't react in time; his eyes were instantly stung with pain, tears fell immediately, and he entered a dazzled state.

The light flashed and disappeared.

Gao De opened his eyes again, looked at Gao De, who was instinctively blocking his eyes with his hand, tapped his fingertips lightly, and magic fluctuations rippled in the air.

Two energy beams shot out like electric arcs, flickering with a faint light, exceptionally conspicuous in the dark night.

【Eldritch Blast+】.

Gao De, who had entered the dazzled state, couldn't see Gao De's movements clearly, but it wasn't hard to guess that Gao De would definitely take advantage of the situation to attack.

So he took a deep breath and plunged into the water without hesitation, learning from Gao De's previous actions to dodge.

Whether it was the strong resistance of the water body or its effect of obstructing vision, it would make underwater a temporary safe place.

However, the two energy beams of Eldritch Blast didn't lose their target because of Gao De's dodging.

They were like two torpedoes with thermal sensing, following Gao De into the water area, and finally hit Gao De accurately.

The automatic locking effect of 【Eldritch Blast+】 undoubtedly had miraculous effects in such a low-visibility situation.

Sizzle! Bang!

Two completely different sounds rang out, like two claps of thunder exploding underwater.

This represented two different attributes of damage being blocked by the Shield spell.

Clearly it was just one spell, but in the end, it caused two segments of damage with different attributes.

Eldritch Blast didn't have the spell effect of two-stage damage.

The construct effect of 【Winter's Arrival】.

The force damage of Eldritch Blast itself and the cold damage attached to Winter's Arrival totaled two segments.

"You are a first-circle mage!" Gao De finally recovered from the dazzled state.

He had no time to think about why Gao De's spell could hit him so accurately, but emerged from the water and shouted fiercely at the pitch-black water surface.

Gao De's voice echoed on the sea surface.

【Eldritch Blast】 was just a cantrip, but if cast by a second-circle mage, under the dual higher-circle casting, the power would definitely not be so weak.

However, it was clearly one level higher than the 【Eldritch Blast】 cast by a mage apprentice.

Therefore, Gao De's mage level was obvious; he was definitely a first-circle mage.

However, this discovery made Gao De feel shocked and uncertain.

He never expected that a first-circle mage would dare to challenge him, a second-circle mage, alone.

What kind of heaven-defying act was this?

As a Sea Hai Shao Bing mage, he should understand the suppression of low-circle mages by high-circle mages even better.

As his thoughts raced, Gao De took the time to add a first-circle abjuration spell, 【Absorb Elements】.

It was only two attacks, but Gao De, as a first-circle mage, had already made his 【Shield】 teeter on the edge of collapse.

He saw it; Gao De had many means and was unusually cunning in the water. If he launched an attack, he might not necessarily succeed.

In this situation, taking the time to add abjuration spells to himself was undoubtedly the most cost-effective.

First, there was no possibility of the spell missing.

Second, after higher-circle casting, a first-circle abjuration spell would take a lot of effort for a first-circle mage to break, even if he stood still and let Gao De show his skills.

This was equivalent to standing in an invincible position.

The logic was sound, but Gao De actually felt very aggrieved:

As a second-circle mage, facing a first-circle mage, not being able to crush him quickly was already very shameful, and now he was even in a situation of passive defense.

But this was really a helpless choice.

He was already a second-circle mage, but because he had only been promoted for half a year, he hadn't mastered second-circle spells.

Under normal circumstances, a first-circle spell under higher-circle casting was enough to deal with a first-circle mage.

But the water environment was special, and many spells couldn't be used in this situation.

The first to bear the brunt were the fire-type spells with the highest destructive power among low-circle spells, such as 【Burning Hands】 or 【Flame Slash】.

Actually, they were those spells with obvious spell trajectories.

With inconvenient vision and Gao De being able to hide in the water at any time, it was very difficult to make spells with trajectories hit.

The more special the environment, the more it tested the depth of the mage's own spell library.

And this was exactly Gao De's strength.

For Gao De, this was his disadvantage.

A mage from a grassroots gang might have much richer combat experience than an academic mage, but in terms of spell reserves, he was definitely far inferior.

Therefore, Gao De was now quite embarrassed with no moves to make.

Of course, he had another choice, which was to hide his head and swim to the shore under the protection of the abjuration spell.

Once he reached the shore, there were many ways for him to deal with Gao De.

But the problem was, Gao De wasn't sure if Gao De would follow him to the shore.

And he had a reason that he must take Gao De down—if Gao De brought the news back to the Sea Sentinels, he would be finished.

"Right, the boat!" As his thoughts raced, Gao De suddenly thought of the key point.

Get on the boat first; at least there would be a foothold, unlike now, soaking in the water with nowhere to exert force.

The small boat had been cast with 【Grease】 by Gao De, making it slippery and difficult to climb; he had already failed once just now.

But this wasn't a big problem; as a mage, there were plenty of means.

Gao De thought to himself and triggered the spell model.

It was still 【Water Impact】, but this time, his target was himself, and he controlled the force, only providing thrust without causing damage.

With his spell, the seawater began to churn, forming a water vortex.

The water vortex carried powerful force, rushing up from bottom to top, just like a water column sprayed by a whale, lifting Gao De high.

Gao De adjusted his posture slightly in the air, like an elegant flying bird, and landed on the small boat.

Slap!

But before Gao De could be proud, Gao De had already snapped his fingers lightly.

An instant later, flames suddenly burned on the small boat.

The intensity of the fire spreading was unprecedented.

This was the linkage of 【Spark】 + 【Grease+】.

Under the ignition of Spark, the grease that originally covered the small boat was instantly ignited.

The fire spread instantly, enveloping the small boat in a sea of fire, licking every plank of the boat.

The planks gradually turned black and deformed under the high temperature of the flames, making a crackling sound.

He got on the boat, but it was gone in an instant.

Gao De's expression changed slightly; facing this raging fire, he had no choice but to jump and enter the sea voluntarily.

But as soon as he entered the water, a fierce vortex had already rushed toward him.

The vortex was like a huge, rapidly rotating funnel, stirring up layers of waves in the seawater.

In the center of the vortex was a black shadow; Gao De couldn't see the specific appearance clearly in this murky seawater, but it already made his hair stand on end.

A water beast!

He finally realized that there was still a water beast in the water!

It was exactly this water beast that had overturned their boat at the beginning.

It was just that after falling into the seawater, this water beast had suddenly disappeared, and combined with Gao De's urgent offensive, Gao De had temporarily forgotten the existence of the water beast under this rapid rhythm.

Tuanzi's speed was extremely fierce.

The water area was at most half a home field for Gao De, but for it, it was a true paradise.

Its body was surrounded by a faint blue halo, triggering the water flow to rush fiercely toward Gao De.

The triggered water flow was like a surging tsunami, and its momentum was also overwhelming, almost no different from the spell 【Water Impact】 that Gao De had cast to attack Gao De earlier.

But he wasn't as flexible and quick to react as Gao De, and he couldn't dodge this strike at all.

Boom!

The impact of the water flow made his body roll everywhere, and he could no longer control it; he even accidentally inhaled foul-smelling seawater through his mouth and nose.

Before he could feel disgusted, Tuanzi had already crashed into him head-on.

With a bang, the 【Shield】 finally shattered.

And under the impact of the water flow, Gao De's body had completely lost its balance, unable to attend to both ends.

Without a doubt, this was the best combat opportunity so far.

Gao De wouldn't miss it.

When he ignited the small boat, he had already dived into the water, relying on the underwater movement ability granted by Ocean Touch to approach the small boat at high speed.

Now, the distance between Gao De and Gao De was only ten or twenty feet.

He keenly captured the shattering of the Shield spell and directly unleashed his ultimate move at close range.

A trace of silver light flashed, shooting out from Gao De's ear like a meteor.

That was an extremely thin silver needle.

But in reality, its name was Blade, not Needle.

【Ice-Sealing Blade+】.

The only first-circle attack spell Gao De currently mastered, and after integrating Ice Sha, its power had far exceeded that of a first-circle spell.

This was his trump card spell.

Invisible fluctuations spread.

The needle-like Ice-Sealing Blade was like electric light, carrying biting cold, flying fiercely toward Gao De.

The cold light flew, aiming at Gao De's heart.

Gao De's pupils shrank, and seeing the Ice-Sealing Blade coming, he was terrified.

He twisted his body with all his might, his muscles tense, every muscle working to the best of its ability, fully exploding his potential.

The effort wasn't in vain; the Ice-Sealing Blade aimed at his heart finally deviated slightly.

With a whoosh.

The Ice-Sealing Blade passed through his body.

Drops of blood splashed out, spreading rapidly in the dark seawater like blooming dark red flowers.

But this was just the beginning.

Gao De's expression changed again and again.

He only felt a continuous stinging pain coming from his body.

The Ice-Sealing Blade also had two segments of damage; the first segment was piercing damage with a power of 15 degrees, and the second segment was cold damage with a power as high as 32 degrees.

And under the blessing of Winter's Arrival and Hunter's Mark, both segments of damage had an additional 10 degrees of cold damage, turning into 4 segments of damage.

4 segments of damage could trigger the Hunter's Mark four times, causing four times of additional damage.

One spell, 8 segments of damage!

8 segments of damage, all of which could receive the power bonus of 【Winter's Arrival】 as high as 37%.

The total power of this one spell was already so high that it didn't belong to the first-circle level at all, enough to make any first-circle mage look on in despair.

Severe pain instantly invaded his mind; Gao De's face was as ferocious as a ghost, his expression distorted.

However, he didn't die; one could even say he became lively because of this intense stimulation.

A mortal body should not even be able to withstand the damage of a cantrip, so how could it withstand such a terrifying spell?

This was because Gao De had added 【Absorb Elements】 to himself early on.

This spell could capture part of the incoming energy and reduce its effect.

And Gao De's Ice-Sealing Blade, except for the first segment of piercing damage which was physical damage, the other seven segments of damage were all elemental damage, and mainly ice elemental damage.

This happened to hit Gao De's strength.

Compared to first-circle mages, second-circle mages would gain the ability of "Elementalized Body."

That is, the magic power in the body radiates to the body, and the mage can choose an element to strengthen the body, thereby gaining resistance to the corresponding element.

Mages also have regional differences; mages in coastal areas must mostly be good at water elemental spells.

Therefore, when promoting to the second-circle Elementalized Body, Gao De chose the water element without hesitation.

The ice element is a variant of the water element; although the difference between the two is not small, after the water elementalized body, he still possessed a certain degree of additional resistance to ice elemental spells.

Absorb Elements + Water Elementalized Body, under the dual protection, allowed Gao De to hard-resist Gao De's fierce and unparalleled spell.

"Die for me!" Forced into such a situation by a small first-circle mage, Gao De's blood surged, and he burned with anger.

He stared fixedly at Gao De's figure, which could only be seen as a blurry outline in the night, and a shadow flashed across his eyes.

【Cause Fear】, a first-circle necromancy spell!

Awakens the fear in the heart of a creature within range that can be seen; the target must perform a mental resistance check.

If the resistance fails, the target will fall into a state of fear.

Resistance success—how could it be a resistance success? A second-circle mage casting this spell on a first-circle mage—there was no possibility of a first-circle mage successfully resisting.

The result was the same as he expected.

Gao De was like being fixed by a hold spell, suddenly fixed in place, and then his body began to tremble slightly.

This was a manifestation of falling into fear.

"Seeking your own death, a Sea Hai Shao Bing mage with a bright future doesn't want it, and plays with his life with me!" Gao De gritted his teeth, every word sounding like it was squeezed out from between his teeth.

He kicked his legs, using the buoyancy of the seawater to rush forward rapidly.

In his hand, a dagger had already appeared.

The dagger was wrapped in a layer of blue energy shimmer.

That was the power from Gao De's 【Ice-Sealing Blade+】.

【Absorb Elements】 could not only absorb part of the attack energy but also store it for use in the next melee attack.

Gao De held the dagger, carrying full anger and killing intent, and stabbed it toward Gao De's chest, who was still in a state of fear, without hesitation.

Clang!

A sound of metal clashing rang out; the hard touch made Gao De briefly stunned.

But he reacted quickly; in a flash of lightning, the dagger had already slashed downward...

Subsequently, Gao De's face stiffened.

He looked down in astonishment.

Gao De's fingernails had become extremely sharp and slender at this moment, like a sharp weapon, directly inserting into his body from his chest.

【Primal Savage Strike】.

A golden symbol flashed across Gao De's left eye.

The Mandola Magic Eye, which had been activated since the beginning of the battle, helped him establish Gao De's character model and insight into the other party's weaknesses.

After he fell into a state of fear, Gao De didn't choose to add abjuration spells to himself but chose to attack.

A very reasonable choice.

But the unreasonable part was that the time Gao De fell into a state of fear was really too short.

Therefore, Gao De, who had no protection, was hit.

Without protection spells, the water elementalized body couldn't provide even a trace of protection against 【Primal Savage Strike】.

"Ah!!"

Gao De let out a painful groan, his voice full of despair and unwillingness.

Bloodshot eyes first surged in the whites of his eyes.

After that, his eyes went black, and his body collapsed straight back into the water.

Seawater quickly submerged his figure, leaving only ripples.

(End of chapter)