Chapter 133: Death Cloud

"It's gravity magic!"

As if every inch of skin was pressed by a refined iron ingot after being suppressed, the sound of bone and flesh pulling and colliding came from all over his body.

That terrible experience, which felt familiar yet was countless times harder to endure, made Cornell recall his roommate who specialized in gravity magic when he was studying in Huan Cai City.

At that time, it was precisely because he endured the gravity spell the other party cast on him and used the standard staff issued by the academy to knock the other party's head crooked that he won the bed far from the toilet.

Now, many years later, as a 9th-level Mage specializing in the "Conjuration School" who was one step away from the boundary of "Transcendence,"

in this remote corner far from human habitation, located on the frontier of the kingdom, in a dark cave where perhaps no intelligent creature had ever set foot,

he once again experienced that heavy pressure from "gravity."

"Creak..."

The crisp sound of bone and teeth grinding came from beside him.

He subconsciously swept his peripheral vision.

And was stunned.

At some point, the Orc, who had also been affected by the silver-white device in the center of the distant cave and had been subjected to several times the gravity,

was already on all fours, pressed half-prone on the ground, as if it had truly become a wild beast on the wilderness.

"No, this isn't right!"

In his mind flashed the Orc's expression, which was twisted and deformed due to overexertion while trying to support its body, as well as its veins bulging, muscles swelling, arms and thighs, and five fingers deeply embedded in the muddy ground...

Even if the other party's body weight and muscle density were several times higher than his own.

But at the same time, as a "Barbarian" who fought with anger and physical body, the Orc should have possessed a more powerful bearing capacity and strength.

If even the other party was suppressed into this state, there was no reason he could still stand on the spot, and even spare the mind to observe the surroundings.

He would have long since been pressed to the ground, unable to even lift his head.

"Could it be..."

The rational thinking cultivated by years of Mage career allowed Cornell to remain calm even when facing this sudden, eerie scene, and he analyzed the situation on the field almost instinctively.

Forcibly turning his gaze, he looked to the other side of the team.

Facing dangerous enemies, he, who was protected behind the others as a spellcaster, could clearly see the state of the other members of the squad.

The human warrior, wearing heavy armor and holding a reddish-brown longsword, still stood at the very front of the team.

Silent, motionless, it seemed as if there was no difference from just now.

Only the iron boots deeply embedded in the mud under his feet, and the metal iron sheets compressed and deformed at the thin edges of the armor, showed what kind of exaggerated pressure he was bearing.

Even more so than the Orc.

And the tall, blonde Elf had also lost his past ease and freedom, turning from a bird flying in the forest into a loach in a mud pond.

His body was hunched, his right arm trembling and supporting himself on the stone wall to the side, and his five fingers, which had once been fair and without a trace of dirt, were now splashed with foul-smelling, thick, dark green moss liquid.

Much better than the Orc Volga, yet not as good as him.

After a sweep, in the entire team, it was actually he, whose physical strength was the weakest, who was least affected!

Reflecting the silver-white iron ball rotating out of thin air on the distant altar in his crystal eyes,

Cornell thought to himself:

"Could it be that this special equipment capable of casting large-scale gravity magic also possesses the ability to distinguish between friend and foe, and adjust the degree of spellcasting according to the actual situation of the target?"

The hunched Goblin wearing a black robe, standing quietly on the altar, only a few feet away from the silver-white iron ball, yet seemingly unaffected, with the corners of its clothes swaying lightly with the energy fluctuations, also seemed to prove his thought.

But the next second, as his mental power extended outward, two streams of azure light flashed in the depths of his eyes.

On Cornell's face, an expression of "incredibility" suddenly appeared, which he had not seen for many years since he graduated from the academy and became an advanced professional.

"How is this possible!?"

"No... no magic particles!?"

From a "Mage Apprentice" who couldn't even recite incantations smoothly, to a legendary "Archmage" at the top of the school who possessed his own Mage tower and even a floating city.

Almost all Mages on the Aifala Continent had a fixed spellcasting process.

Through meditation to exercise mental power, memorizing spell models, connecting to the Magic Net to transform the chaotic and irritable primitive magic in the air into gentle magic that could be driven by the spellcaster, and then injecting it into the spell model to complete the spellcasting.

Some also needed to be supplemented with special materials, or specific gestures and incantations.

Simply put, it was "building the framework," "positioning nodes," and "energy release."

In this whole process, perhaps because of the spellcaster's own talent, experience, ability, or relationship with the Goddess of Magic, the specific details were different.

But in essence, they all involved the guidance and mobilization of "magic particles."

Even for cantrips like "Light" and "Fire Arrow," it was the same.

But right now, this "magic equipment," which suppressed four advanced professionals in an instant and clearly had a very high quality and level, did not have the slightest sign of inducing magic.

It was as if it had cast some kind of illusion of gravity magic on everyone.

No!

Even for enchantment-type spells, they couldn't escape the manipulation of magic.

For some reason, that absurd illusion that had just passed by flashed in Cornell's mind again.

The metal iron ball in front of him, which was pure silver and rotating with stone dust and blood, was definitely not a creation in the material plane.

It didn't even touch the edges of the few outer planes he was familiar with.

It was from a stranger realm that even gods could not touch:

—Outside the Crystal Wall System!

The ancient secrets he had read in the deepest part of the academy library when he was young surfaced in his mind in an instant; the tragic divine war, the Goblin main god who disappeared and reappeared, the Goblins whose physiological structure and racial nature had undergone huge changes, the terrifying rumors from the edge of the continent...

The thoughts seemed complex and chaotic, and his mind circled round and round.

But in reality, the time that flowed through the real world was also just a fleeting moment.

In the peaceful daily life outside of adventures in the past, he might have had the leisure to carefully study the operation mode of the device itself, observe the fusion details of those runes and metal, and even the craft aesthetics of the iron ball's own form.

But at this moment, only one thought remained in Cornell's heart.

"Destroy it!"

"Quick!!!"

Forcibly straightening his board, which was bent under the action of gravity, he shouted almost like a roar.

At the same time, as if wanting to smash the staff in his hand, his right hand gripped the staff shaft tightly, lifted it, and dropped it suddenly.

"Bang!"

Accompanied by the sharp sound of the staff tail colliding with the ground.

Magic shock!

The spell model, which had already been prepared during meditation last night, operated suddenly, and the precious magic purified by the Magic Net was crazily injected into it as if it didn't cost money.

His spirit condensed as if it were solid, and his attention was highly concentrated.

Locking onto the target,

Release!

Hum—

A mass of yellowish-green, thick gas suddenly rushed out from the top of the staff, surging and rolling, expanding and forming, turning into a huge sphere with a radius of twenty feet like a cloud.

The surging mist struggled and bit like a living thing, but under the drive of the spellcaster's mental power, it maintained a basic cloud-like form, and at a speed that seemed slow but was actually extremely fast, it flew toward the direction of the altar.

5th ring,

Conjuration school,

—【Death Cloud】!

"Sizzle..."

The fishy smell like rotten eggs mixed with the pungent stench of sulfur; the turbid, murky miasma of yellowish-green cast a pitch-black shadow permeated with the breath of death on the ground under the reflection of the stone walls on both sides.

That near-liquid toxic slurry vapor, as long as ordinary people got slightly close, the highly corrosive and fatal toxin would permeate the skin and erode the flesh and bones.

It was like the Grim Reaper's scythe harvesting life.

The huge influence range meant that it could not be precisely positioned; as long as the direction was roughly locked, it could advance steadily;

the special miasma like an abyss swamp allowed it to possess both the ability to corrode solid equipment and cause fatal damage to living things;

and the liquid cloud-mist form itself made it very difficult to be blocked.

Under the current situation of bearing gravity pressure, mental power being difficult to maintain concentration for a long time, and needing to destroy the gravity device behind the enemy while containing the enemy,

it was the spell that Cornell could think of as the most suitable in his spell list.

"Ding!"

A green light containing rich life breath suddenly flashed in his peripheral vision, and a fierce yet gentle breeze brushed across his cheeks, lifting his indigo-colored ramie robe.

Golden long hair fluttered violently behind him, and there was no longer the previous ease and freedom on the Elf's face.

Replacing it was the solemnity like an ancient tree, with thorns intertwined from deep in the dense forest.

Bursts of clear wind rolled around his body, and the invisible heavy pressure covering every inch of his skin seemed to disappear into nothingness at this moment.

They were all veteran adventurers close to Transcendence, and the number of times they had brushed shoulders with death could be counted with two hands, and the various dangerous missions they had completed were countless.

Just this little difficulty right now, naturally, could not make them sit still and wait for death.

In fact, before Cornell roared to point out the target to everyone, and even before his staff had fallen,

his teammates had already exerted their respective abilities, forcibly recovering their ability to act under the gravity pressure.

"Roar!!!"

Carrying a wild and manic aura, an invisible sound wave swept through the lair.

The expanding and wriggling muscles seemed to want to break out of the green skin covering them, and stinging bright red blood seeped out from the pores.

The Orc Volga roared wildly, as if some kind of invisible aura rose up as the anger in his heart surged, wrapping his physical body, and slowly stood up from the posture of being on all fours.

At the very front of the team, the silent human warrior suddenly took a step forward.

The iron boots were still deeply embedded in the mud, but the head that had been lowered due to gravity suppression had already been lifted.

The cold eyes in the hollow of the streamlined helmet stared remotely at the black-robed Goblin in the distance.

In just a few breaths, he had relied on pure physical strength to adapt to the doubled gravity around him.

The battle was on the verge of breaking out.

And it was only until this moment that the hunched Goblin, wearing a black robe and having a thin body, finally finished its pious hymn to the "Sacred Object" bestowed by its main god.

The turbid eyes under the shadow of the hood stared at the few human figures under the altar ahead.

"Profaners."

"Bestow... death."

Arms like withered branches slowly spread upward, as if embracing some invisible existence in the air.

Rumble—

It was as if the mute button had been pressed again; the originally incomparably quiet lair was suddenly filled with some kind of complex and noisy roar.

That was a redundant torrent formed by the sharp whistling of countless Goblins.

Bound in the stone walls of the lair, the green-skinned Goblins in countless caves like beehives surged out like a tide.

The excitement and madness in the air almost condensed into substance.

The pus-green light gradually took shape between the black-robed Goblin's palms, its lips moved, and the obscure and difficult-to-understand strange language echoed between the stone walls.

Withered fingers gripped lightly, and the green light turned into illusory raindrops, falling into the tide formed by the Goblins.

"Creak."

A stagnant sound that made one's teeth ache suddenly sounded in the air.

That was the sound of rapidly expanding muscles and bones rubbing violently.

The craggy torso expanded at a speed visible to the naked eye; at the cost of lifespan, the power hidden deep in the bloodline was excavated and stimulated.

Growth, expansion...

Those Goblins that only reached the height of an ordinary person's thighs, after being hit by those pus-green light spots, in just a few seconds, were rapidly pulled up to the level of an adult's chest by the expanding muscles and bones.

The surface of the skin was even covered with a layer of disgusting dark green light.

And at the same time, the 5th-ring "Death Cloud" that was suffused with magic particles and cast by Cornell when the battle just started, that mass of yellowish-green, huge cloud mist, also drifted to the front of the black-robed Goblin amidst corrosion and whistling.

It did not dodge, and there was not the slightest defensive action.

The black-robed Goblin still maintained the posture of standing still on the altar, motionless.

And just when the toxic slurry vapor of the "Death Cloud" was about to swallow it.

The silver-white, rounded gravity device above its head suddenly accelerated its rotation, and invisible energy fluctuations surged.

As if a miniature black hole, those toxic gases bonded and guided by magic seemed to have encountered some kind of natural enemy.

They were rapidly absorbed and dissolved, becoming faint.

The torn cloud mass emitted a faint phosphorescence amidst the collision of mist wisps, and deep green light halos flickering with collapse and dissolution flashed inside.

In the blink of an eye, this five-ring spell, which condensed a large amount of magic and was cast by a 9th-level Mage, was about to completely dissipate under the erosion of the iron ball's gravity fluctuations, becoming a star-dust gas ring revolving around the ball body.

Cornell, who had not paid attention to the situation on the field since releasing the spell and had turned to focus on chanting the spell, also finally completed his pre-spell preparation.

Suddenly focused!

The yellowish-green cloud mass that was about to dissolve in the distance condensed in an instant under the action of the spellcaster's mental power, and a blurry pattern was vaguely constructed between the cloud wisps.

And at this same instant, the totem-like patterns on the surface of the chest armor of the Orc Volga beside him also burst with silver light.

5th ring, Conjuration school, 【Teleportation Circle - Type VI Improved Version】.

Hum—

Silver light flickered.

An Orc covered in blood droplets, filled with rage, whose muscles were swollen to almost their absolute limit.

was teleported into the green cloud in front of the black-robed Goblin.

Through the divine art previously cast by the enemy, it could be confirmed that this hunched Hobgoblin wearing a black robe and having a body much thinner than its peers should be a priest serving their main god "Maglubiyet."

It probably also belonged to the "War Domain."

Without a doubt, it was a long-range spellcaster.

In this situation, being suddenly approached by Volga, who had the "Barbarian" profession.

Even if it couldn't be beheaded on the spot, it could at least cause some trouble and distract the other party's attention.

Letting the blonde Elf, who had already disappeared from his side and had now come to the altar with the breeze, gain a precious opportunity to attack.

Whether it was to destroy the silver-white device that kept releasing gravity fluctuations, or to carry out a beheading plan, attacking from front and back, and...

"Screech."

Cornell's thoughts froze instantly, and his face, which had become slightly pale after continuous spellcasting under heavy pressure, suddenly became incomparably stiff.

He only saw the Orc Volga, who had been teleported to the front of the enemy and was rushing toward the other party while roaring wildly.

At this moment, it suddenly stopped on the spot.

On the left side of its chest was a bloody, huge hole that could see through to the front and back.

Correspondingly, in the palm of the black-robed Goblin, which was as dry as a withered branch, there was also a heart that was constantly pumping blood and beating.

(End of chapter) ===== CHAPTER 134 =====