Chapter 568 - Taming the Fourth Year: Journey - 6
"Round two," Ren murmured, electricity crackling between his fingers while his companions dealt with the Gold guards.
But Zhao immediately rose into the air, his wings carrying him to a height that removed him from the immediate reach of ground attacks. From that elevated position, he activated his fusion to the maximum.
Like Lin, he had no qualms about using all his energy the full fifteen minutes of transformation. Ren and the others were the ones who needed to conserve stamina, not him.
His body was completely covered with feathers from his Owl fused with the raptor's scales that gleamed with an intensity close to Ren's dagger, threatening enormous hardness.
The beasts' abilities manifested helping them in becoming practically invisible and completely silent throwing weapons.
His eyes gained telescopic perception that allowed him to track targets at several hundred meters distance.
"Now it's my turn at the offensive," he murmured, extending his wings completely.
With Zhao using his maximum fusion, there were now two "Reptile-Owl" beasts in his body, but instead of manifesting one to be helped, he kept both of them to generate double the feathers.
He began shooting with extreme precision and insane speed.
And they weren't simple projectiles; each one was guided by his enhanced perception, also capable of maintaining the camouflage and silence abilities when thrown… resulting in attacks practically impossible to detect until the moment of impact.
Ren couldn't reach Zhao in time for a second attack before he went up high, and worse, barely managed to dodge the first salvo with small wounds, the invisible feathers passing so close they cut his skin and some strands of his hair.
His recovered perception thanks to the seed's black root gave him back his mana eyes temporarily and allowed him to track the otherwise invisible trajectories, but the speed and number of shots were still overwhelming.
"Taro, cover them!" he shouted while rolling to avoid another burst, realizing that Zhao had decided not to attack only him.
His friend responded immediately, creating earth shields, but the feather impacts were tremendous. The now multiple barriers of earth and mineral that Taro desperately created fell and renewed constantly as the feathers pierced through them like paper.
But maintaining that speed of defense regeneration was exhausting, and Taro could feel his control beginning to fluctuate.
Meanwhile, Mako and Shizu had taken advantage of the distraction to partially recover and then submerged completely into the earth. Their beasts with good regeneration boosts had healed them enough to continue fighting, and now they attacked from below, creating seismic waves and rock formations that emerged without warning overcharging poor Taro's earth control and increasing its complexity.
The girls were wounded but far from being out of combat. However, Liu kept them at bay with sonic roars that traveled directly through the earth, creating devastating vibrations that forced them to maintain distance and constant movement to avoid internal damage.
"I can't keep this up forever!" Taro shouted while creating another shield that was immediately perforated by three simultaneous feathers.
Ren found himself forced to concentrate more on evasion than attack too. Every time he tried to launch fireballs, light rays, or rock projectiles, any element, Zhao dodged them easily in his aerial dance and responded with even more intense salvos.
Ren's air maneuverability using wind elemental control was possible, but consumed too much energy, and without real wings, his maneuvering capacity would be pathetic compared to Zhao's.
It was much better to stay on the ground if he wanted to move fast and have sources to generate more barriers.
'I need something different,' he thought desperately while sliding under a rock wall to avoid another burst of feathers that embedded in the ground where he had been standing and then more in the temporary rock defense generated.
He summoned his bow from his wolverine's dimensional space. The arrowheads were made of materials almost as strong as his dagger, and if he covered them with some minerals, he now knew they would be capable of containing and channeling his electrifying power without dissipating too fast.
He fired the first arrow when his barrier collapsed and as he jumped out of it with a somersault, he ended up not only firing it but also helping by pushing it with air control to increase its speed.
He almost hit with the surprise factor. A trick Zhao hadn't seen him use.
But Zhao forced silent flight, becoming faster for an instant, and used his own feathers to intercept the projectile in flight at the last moment.
"Damn!" Ren hid again and loaded another arrow, this time concentrating more electrical power on the tip.
The second shot was more precise, faster. Zhao had to execute another quick evasive maneuver, but still managed to deflect the even faster arrow since the surprise factor was no longer at its maximum.
Still, with each shot, Ren improved not only his technique but also his understanding of Zhao's flight patterns, the limitations of his silent flight technique, the moments of vulnerability between maneuvers.
For the fifth shot, he had charged the arrow dangerously, electrical energy crackling visibly around the tip. He prepared to launch it with all the thrust force he could generate with an explosion of wind and fire.
But just as he was about to fire, Zhao executed his most devastating technique.
He expelled all his feathers, and when they reached the ground where Ren barely managed to dodge by a hair's breadth from taking incapacitating damage, all the feathers Zhao had launched during the last moments, scattered throughout the battlefield, were called back simultaneously.
The amplified boomerang effect created a storm of converging projectiles from too many directions.
Ren was forced to drop his bow and with it his attack, charging his electrical energy into a defensive pulse and rolling desperately to avoid being pierced by dozens of returning feathers.
His shot was lost, the overcharged arrow firing toward the empty sky without being even close to hitting anyone.
"NO!" Ren roared, frustration exploding in his chest.
The black marks spread even further across his body, now covering his arms completely and beginning to climb up his neck into his face. The energy he emanated became visible, distorting the air around him like heat waves.
Zhao had recovered all his feathers, now having access to his complete arsenal once more. From his elevated position, he observed with growing concern how the black marks consumed more of Ren's body.
'That's definitely bad,' he thought, preparing for the next salvo. 'I need to bring him down now. If he loses control completely who knows...'
The air itself began to crackle with Ren's unleashed energy, while his friends fought to heal from the cuts of the feather storm thanks to Min's healing and barely kept the girls and their hit-and-run attacks at bay.
The stalemate was far from breaking with things like this…
"Use full fusion!" Ren roared.