After seeing Leilin, Marbul's eyes—sharp as blades—locked firmly onto Leilin's figure.
"You've finally... you've finally shown yourself... Leilin!!!"
Marbul spoke softly, but the coldness and resolve in his words made the female wizard standing nearby break into a cold sweat.
In their previous battle, after witnessing Leilin's strength and terrifying rate of growth, fear and regret had gnawed at Marbul's heart like ants.
He regretted it! Regretted not sending more people when they were at Magelie Canyon—to finish Leilin off there and then!
Now, the already grown Leilin had nearly become the Liliter Family's worst nightmare.
From a mere newcomer to someone who could now fight Marbul to a draw—this kind of terrifying growth rate, in the entire history of South Coast wizards, was something only a handful of supreme geniuses had ever achieved.
Marbul could still suppress him now, but given a little more time, even he would have no confidence in doing so.
And when that time came, Leilin would definitely destroy the entire Liliter Family!
Marbul did not want to be the family's sinner, so during this period, he had searched for Leilin's traces like a madman.
He had even risked angering Second-rank Wizards by hunting White Wizards here on a massive scale.
And finally—finally—he had forced this Leilin out into the open.
Marbul's eyes stared fixedly at Leilin, as if he feared that the slightest blink would let Leilin escape and vanish from his sight once more.
"It's been so long! I've been looking for you for so long..." Marbul murmured softly.
"I've been waiting a long time too. This matter truly should be settled once and for all!" Leilin said lightly, his hands clasped behind his back.
This calm demeanor clearly made Marbul somewhat suspicious. Moreover, today's Leilin had an even more obscure and unfathomable aura about him—almost to the point where Marbul couldn't gauge his depth.
But having forced Leilin into the open, he now had no way to back down!
"Die!!!"
With a thunderous shout, Marbul suddenly made his move.
Crack! Crack!
In an instant, his entire body transformed into a purely metallic state. Glimmers of light gathered at his chest, forming the shape of a magical array radiating an earthy yellow glow.
"Metallization! Gravity Magical Array!"
Fully aware that Leilin was no easy opponent, Marbul unleashed every trump card the moment he attacked!
Hummmm!
A ring of earthy yellow light instantly swept across the entire area!
Waves of tearing force originating from the earth's core descended upon the battlefield in an instant.
"Twenty-times gravity!!!" Marbul's eyes turned pure silver as he roared.
BOOM!!! The earthy yellow light surged violently, and a tearing force more than ten times greater than before erupted from deep underground.
Crack! Crack!
The entire ground dropped by a layer in an instant. Small creatures—moles, ants, and the like—were blown apart directly, bursting into clouds of blood mist!
"Madmen! They're all madmen!"
The female wizard happened to be standing at the edge of the array and was slammed to the ground in an instant. Her skin cracked and split continuously as blood gushed out, turning her into a figure drenched in red.
"Are you kidding me? There's no way I'm dying from the aftershock of a wizard battle!"
The female wizard gritted her teeth and reached out to tear off a pendant hanging from her body.
This ordinarily simple action became excruciatingly difficult under twenty-times gravity.
In truth, had she not been an official wizard who had undergone physical modification to specifically enhance her constitution, she would have burst into blood mist just like those animals.
Ssss!
After tearing off the pendant, a ring of green light instantly swept over the female wizard's entire body.
Her wounds healed in an instant—had it not been for the bloodstains still covering her, one would never have guessed she had been injured.
The green glow enveloped her body, and the female wizard immediately felt the weight on her lighten somewhat. She quickly scrambled away on all fours, crawling out of the earthy yellow gravity array's range.
Pop!
Once outside the array, feeling the immense relief wash over her, the female wizard let out a heavy breath before finally getting to her feet.
"That was terrifying! Absolutely terrifying! A battle between top-tier First-rank Wizards—clearly not something we semi-elementalized wizards can possibly get involved in..."
Bang! Bang! Bang!
The sounds of metallic collisions rang out continuously, producing piercing sonic waves.
The female wizard immediately retreated seven or eight steps as if bitten by a snake. Then she saw, within the magical array, two figures crashing wildly into each other.
Everything in their surroundings—rocks, giant trees—anything they grazed past was instantly reduced to powder.
"This is too dangerous! Far too dangerous!"
The female wizard's expression changed, and she retreated another large distance. It was only when the two wizards had nearly vanished from her line of sight that she finally stopped.
"This should... be safe enough, right?"
Even as she said this, a ring of wind-element energy particles remained frozen around her feet, ready for an immediate retreat.
Bang!
Leilin's right hand, now covered in a layer of black scales, collided head-on with Marbul's massive metallic scimitar.
Sparks flew, producing an extremely piercing sound. The void trembled, and dark cracks even began slowly splitting open around them.
Clang! At that moment, the sound of snapping metal rang out from the center of the clash.
The two entangled figures rapidly pulled apart.
Leilin shook his arm. In his palm, he firmly gripped a broken blade tip! In the preceding exchange, Leilin had actually snapped off a piece of Marbul's blade using nothing but brute force!
The blade tip was still writhing in his grasp, morphing into sharp metal teeth that gnawed at Leilin's palm.
Crack!
The metal teeth bit down on the scales, producing a crisp sound—not even leaving a white mark.
During his bloodline evolution, Leilin's innate talent spell—the Komoin's Scales—had also received a tremendous boost. Both physical defense and magical resistance had been raised above 30 degrees. Combined with Leilin's magical enhancements, Marbul's metallic weapons could scarcely harm him anymore.
"Hm? Still daring to resist!"
Leilin raised an eyebrow. Then, the muscles on his right hand swelled. His full strength—over 20 points—erupted at once!
Hummmm!
As his right hand clenched tight, a death scream suddenly emanated from between his fingernails.
Leilin then opened his hand and tossed several irregular chunks of solidified metal—clearly scrap now—onto the ground.
As Leilin did this, Marbul's body across from him trembled slightly, as if he had suffered some injury. As a liquid metal entity, Marbul's soul was actually distributed evenly throughout every part of his body. When Leilin utterly destroyed the liquid metal in his hand, the portion of Marbul's soul residing within it immediately perished.
"You... you're unharmed?! This is a twenty-times gravity domain..."
Marbul stared at the seemingly unaffected Leilin, his face full of disbelief.
Just over ten days ago, when he had used this technique, Leilin could only flee in panic. But now, under the Gravity Magical Array, Leilin was still this agile. This realization, coming right after Marbul had suffered the agony of soul damage, made him all the more wary.
Though he had long recognized Leilin's natural talent, Marbul now realized that Leilin's rate of progress far exceeded anything he had anticipated!
"Gravity, is it?" Leilin looked at the earthy yellow array surrounding him and smiled coldly.
Inside his body, a transparent membrane of energy radiated a faint purplish-red glow, protecting several vital areas.
This was the innate defensive ability of the Komoin Giant Serpent bloodline. Moreover, even without activating this membrane, Leilin's own constitution—now at a remarkable 25.7—was more than sufficient to withstand this level of gravity. After all, his physical body was continuously developing in the direction of the ancient Komoin Giant Serpent.
"Today! You die here!" Marbul's expression was grave, as though he had made some irrevocable decision.
"Twenty-nine times gravity!" he bellowed, his body enveloped in an earthy yellow gravitational halo.
Crack! Crack!
Gravity even more immense than before descended. Even Leilin felt a tremendous pressure, his body growing noticeably heavier.
But the one who suffered far more was Marbul himself.
After unleashing this instantaneous attack, the sound of cracking ceramic erupted from his body.
Cracks spread across his entire form like a spider's web.
"Even if I must stake the Liliter name and my own life, I will destroy you here!" Marbul's nearly crazed face was now filled with a look of sacred resolve.
"So you're going all in?"
Leilin's expression turned serious as well. Though after his second bloodline evolution, his combat power had instantly surpassed the peak of First-rank Wizards, he was still not a Second-rank!
Facing the desperate, all-out attack of a fellow peak wizard, even he had to be extra cautious.
Thump-thump! Thump-thump!
Heart-pounding sounds rang out. Across from him, Marbul's already metallic muscles bulged grotesquely, and his entire frame began to expand in an eerie fashion.
In the blink of an eye, Marbul transformed from an elderly man of normal stature into a metallic colossus over five meters tall.
The surface of his body gleamed with a metallic luster unique to metal. The cracks had grown even larger, as though he might collapse at any moment.
Leilin's eyes flickered. In the transformed Marbul, he sensed wildly unstable energy particle fluctuations.
"You want to take me down with you? Dream on!"
Leilin retreated rapidly, and at the same time, he quickly chanted several broken syllables.
BOOM!!!
Hundreds of black fireballs emerged from the shadows on the ground, hovering densely in midair.
The Shadow Fireballs—already devastating in their original power—had been boosted by Leilin's current elemental enhancement to a terrifying force approaching 60 degrees!
This was nearly the absolute limit of a First-rank