Birth Of The Crafts-God

From the outside, apart from the minor injuries inflicted by William and the others which amounted to nothing for a monster this big, the Satcthalle seemed to be fit and in good condition. However, when Lucas decided to change his 'vision' and sense the monster's breathing and energy movements, he noticed that there was a clog.

This meant that the Satcthalle's injury wasn't an external one but an internal injury.

From his experience, Lucas was also able to surmise that the Satcthalle got the injury from two possible experiences. The first was while trying to forcefully break through to the next level. As for the second, it could have been from a severe injury sustained during a difficult battle. While the mark might have healed, there was a hidden trauma that birthed a latent injury affecting the Satcthalle.

'This is better.' Lucas thought as he slowly exited from the darkness.

After concluding that the Heart of Silver's maturity time rhymed with the exact time he received the mission two weeks ago, Lucas was able to estimate the time it would take to be completed.

There were ninety seconds left and if he wanted to get his hands on the Heart of Silver, Lucas had to begin making his moves.

Meanwhile, William sighed upon reaching the same conclusion regarding the Satcthalle as Lucas did. While it was a thing to celebrate about, William had intended on using the Satcthalle to injure Canza and prevent him from competing for the Aión source. But with the Satcthalle's current abilities being weaker than its true power, the plan couldn't work again.

To put this into perspective, the team of four were like a group of fifteen year old kids armed with blades while facing off against a professional Mixed-Martial Arts (MMA) fighter, which in this case is the Satcthalle. The MMA fighter had the stature, aura and ferocity of an MMA champion. At first glance, nothing seemed wrong and it was clear that the group of kids would lose even though they were armed. The difference in power, battle experience and more was so vast that the best the kids could do was to put the fighter on guard and delay their inevitable loss.

However, just when all hope seemed lost, the strength and skill displayed by the MMA fighter just happened to be the same as an average adult. It was almost as if the fighter had lost most of his knowledge and skills about Mixed Martial Arts, essentially cutting off his fangs.

Although the MMA fighter still remained the stronger contemporary of the two sides and the most likely victor, the battle would be much tougher for him as the kids held weapons. Also, the group of children would now have a slight chance of victory even though it was very little. In fact, it was even possible for one of them to hold off the MMA fighter for a short while.

That was exactly the same as the situation that played out now.

While this might have seemed advantageous to the group, it ruined William's plans.

'No matter. There's less than ninety seconds now.' William snuck a glance at the countdown dimly displayed on his communicator.

"Aren't you going to help yet?" Cassie roared at both William and his bodyguard.

Thirty seconds had gone since Canza took on the Satcthalle alone, yet neither William nor his bodyguard had provided support.

"We can't just rush in right now. It's clear that your captain is in an unsteady state. He might accidentally get struck by our attacks or end up seeing us as enemies."

William calmly replied with a nonchalant face. His eyes remained fixed on the battlefield, but it was obvious that he had no intentions of helping Canza, even without a justification, much less now he had one.

"You!"

Cassie's expression turned violent as she glared at William. If it weren't for the fact that she was outnumbered, she might have charged after him.

"You should know that I'm telling the truth. Don't forget that your boss goes by a unique nickname in the freelancer circle; 'the Wild dog'." William smiled.

Cassie froze following which a mixture of emotions flashed on her face. But in the end, she gritted her teeth and ignored William.

He was right.

The nickname 'Wild dog' wasn't just to make Canza appear intimidating or ferocious; instead, it aptly described a certain flaw in his character. The more challenging a fight was, the more absorbed in the fight Canza became. But this was a problem because once Canza became so engrossed in a battle beyond a certain threshold, he would become a wild animal that failed to differentiate between a friend and foe.

Many said that this characteristic of him was born during the failure of his first mission where his teammates all died and he was the only survivor. It was said that in a bid to survive, Canza developed a unique complex mimicking that of a wild beast, in order to survive in the wild. This personality of his was hidden most of the time and only revealed when he was in a challenging position, which usually meant during tough battles.

By the looks of the situation, Cassie was able to deduce that Canza was currently in his 'Wild dog' state, which meant that William's decision was the right course of action. If they hastily interfered, chances were that Canza would get caught in the attack. Once that happened, he would promptly begin battling them which would lead to the collapse of the temporary alliance and give the Satcthalle the upper hand.

*Bam*

While Cassie was lost in her thoughts, Canza suddenly failed to dodge an attack from the Satcthalle and was immediately struck by its two metres wide hoof.

He crashed into the ground and spurted out blood —a sign that he had suffered severe internal injuries from that attack.

"Roar!"

The Satcthalle proceeded to assert dominance as it made its voice be heard within the entire cavern.

"Tch."

Seeing Canza, who was finding it difficult to stand up, William snorted before waving his hands in the direction of the Satcthalle.

Black clouds appeared in mid-air and entangled the beast, trying to keep it on hold. Those were the black aura tentacles from before but in a slightly different form.

Due to William's inability to perfectly wield his superpower, the black tentacles had the obvious weakness of being less stable away from him. When formed close by, William could control them perfectly and their integrity was on par with a vestige. However, when he summoned them out of nowhere from a distance of over ten metres, the tentacles would be unstable and appear like a roiled billow of clouds. But since it was still formed from stellar energy and a superpower, the black clouds were still quite tough.

The black clouds held down the Satcthalle as it struggled to resist. William exerted his entire strength in an attempt to pin it down, and just when it seemed like he had succeeded, one of the clouds snapped and dispersed.

In the next second, the other two billow of clouds were forcefully dispersed by the Satcthalle's retaliation.

"Roar!"

Countdown: 75 seconds.