"Alright, let's get this done!"
Zecht shouted excitedly as he turned to the elementalist that had returned to his party.
"Yuxia, if you would."
The 4-star nodded and created an earth bridge over the lava moat to the western side of the fortress.
Under Zecht's command, Party 2 dashed through the bridge and made their way toward the moving hill on the west.
Party 4 departed the same time as them.
"The hunt is not yet over, my children! Fly!"
Kinnara shouted to the Garudas before launching to the sky, toward the south where the sound of thunder was echoing from.
Shingg!
A portal opened inside the fortress.
From its resonance, the portal had opened up a pathway somewhere to the east.
"Hurry! I'd rather not waste much mana holding this thing open!"
Vallerynne urged her comrades of Party 3 as she pointed her glowing magic scepter to the portal.
As Party 3 left, I turned to Party 5 that was about to depart from the fortress.
"Be careful of the monster. Its Dark Essence is dangerous."
Andaman nodded back to me.
"We've faced creatures of this kind before, Vice-Master. Its threat is known to us."
"We're also aware of the exploration parties that fell victim to such monster. You need not worry that we would fall to the same fate, Vice-Master."
Lauressia said reassuringly before she teleported herself and the other Tsamudrans away.
Now that all the other parties had set out for their objective, I turned to my comrades.
"Let's go. Be ready to fight any moment."
My comrades immediately readied their combat stances as I prepared to teleport us away.
Lights consumed our party, engulfing our environments, air shifted as space-time was being warped around us.
In seconds the light dissipated and revealed to us a new scenery.
Before I could properly observe everything around us, a giant lightning bolt was charging toward us not less than twenty feet from our position.
Crash! Boom!
The lightning exploded as it struck my dome barrier.
My comrades and I were not harmed whatsoever, but the explosion obliterated everything around us into a crater of dirt, though the surrounding was not that much better before the lightning hit.
Beyond the crater lied a jumble mess of a jungle.
Not a single tree remained standing. Some had broken in half with its bark hanging limply to the side. Others had completely fallen and piled in heaps, buried in dirt, vegetation, and monster corpses.
Our Seventh Circle spell caused this destruction.
And we would continue inflicting more damage before the mission was concluded.
SHRIEEKKK!!!
[Danger!]
[Elder Impiana Lv.48]
The eight-winged creature soared high in the sky.
Orbs of lightning were manifesting around the flying beast. Each orb could unleash just as powerful lightning as before.
Given how fast it reached us from such distance, that previous lightning had already been sent even before I teleported our party.
That must had been proof of the Impiana's foresight.
It would take more effort to bring down this monster compared to the other Impianas we had faced so far.
[Exclusive skill activated! 'Serafina (★★★★)' is transforming!]
A giant pair of silver-feathered wings burst forth from my shoulder blades.
I raised my hand and caused the dome barrier to shine with immense light.
The shining dome flowed into an orb in front of my palm and when I pushed my hand forward, the orb exploded into lances of light which sped toward the Impiana.
A simple mana manipulation which resembled aether magic.
Not as destructive as aether, but strong enough for basic assault. Including blocking magic attacks.
The Impiana saw my assault and unleashed the lightning orbs as speeding bolts.
But the lances of light curved in their trajectories and intercepted the lightning bolts midway, protecting our party.
Crash! Boom! Crash!
What remained of the lances kept charging to the beast and chased it through the sky.
Due to its foresight, the Impiana was able to dodge and maneuver through the lances.
But it was now too occupied to attack us.
"I'll distract the Impiana and bring it to the ground. Scatter and get into position where you could ambush the beast once it fell."
Nodding to my instructions, my comrades leapt to the surroundings and into the jumble mess of a jungle.
I proceeded to fly to the sky and engaged the Impiana. My grimoire kept hovering in front of me as I moved about.
KREEE!
Lightning, whirlwinds, and fireballs emerged around the monster and charged to me.
I flapped my wings and dodged the elemental projectiles, using everything that I had learned from the Garudas.
It still felt odd moving about in the air.
Powerful mages often had levitation spells and even mastered the ability.
Such skill eliminated one of mage's vulnerability which was slow mobility in combat.
So I better get used to the experience.
Kinnara was practically harsh in my training, despite the fact that I was the Prophesied character in their legend.
Perhaps it was because I was the Prophesied that she was harsh.
She wanted to ensure that I truly master the skill of flying so that I would become worthy for the legendary wings bestowed to me by my seal.
I was grateful for her intense training since it helped me maneuvered against the Impiana's attacks.
Boom! Boom! Boom!
The Impiana's assaults were relentless.
Moreover, every move was calculated exceptionally well.
Most of the attacks were simply diversions or a mean to herd me toward certain direction. Each and every one attack was still fatal, however.
And once the Impiana got me to a space where it wanted me to be, a pincer attack was waiting before me, putting myself in a trap.
Boom!
I had to protect myself with an all-around shield whenever I got myself in such situation.
On top of its powerful foresight, the Elder Impiana was a smart creature.
It was almost as if I was facing against another hero.
Swhoosh!
More barrage of magical assaults was coming my way.
I could already see the trap the Impiana was herding me into.
But before I fell into the trap, I teleported myself into an empty space in the Impiana's blind spot.
A lightning bolt was already heading my way not farther than fifteen feet from my position.
Boom!
My barrier intercepted the lightning in time.
That attack was already launched even before I teleported myself.
As expected, the Impiana managed to predict my teleportation and where I would emerge.
[Sister Serafina, should I help? I can help bring the monster down with how you're distracting the monster.]
Tarran suddenly reached out with the communication blessing.
Given his enchanted bow, the archer should be able to strike the Impiana even this far high.
But that was not the concern at the moment.
"Stand down for now. The monster's foresight is quite strong. It will be able to predict your attack and launch a devastating counterattack. You're too exposed and vulnerable to withstand it."
[If Sister Serafina would tell me when to attack, then…]
I nodded to his suggestion.
"That'll do. When I finally injured the Impiana and stunned the creature, I'll want you to fire as much arrow as you can at it."
[You got it!]
I continued dodging more assaults from the Impiana.
Lightning streaked through the sky. Whirlwinds roared. Fireballs blazing.
Other than dodging, I tried attacking the monster back, sending my own elemental assaults.
The Impiana was able to counter every single attack with its own projectiles or dodged them agilely.
I discovered several things from the failed attempts.
There were never any runes visible whenever the Impiana projected its elemental assaults.
The Impiana was not concealing them like what proper mage would do.
Its process of casting those magic was simply unorthodox, different from the sorcery standard. More akin to how a wildling would cast their magic.
I should figure as much given the nature of my opponent.
Though this particular wildling was highly skilled.
It could cast Third Circle spells instantly and in consecutive simultaneous manner.
That meant I could not really interfere with their casting and sealed their magic completely.
The Impiana also had powerful mental barriers, possibly enforced with its foresight.
I could not instill any kind of compulsion that could last longer than a quarter of a second in my current state.
That was just how it was with compulsion.
Though it was a strong sorcery, the magic or anything that could counter compulsion was much stronger in nature.
It was difficult to penetrate a strong mental barrier no matter how powerful I become. Which was why many of the most powerful knights and warriors there were could not be mind-controlled with regular compulsion magic.
That being said, the monster never casted any shields.
It probably never figured out how to cast one.
Perhaps the Impiana focused its defense on body-strengthening instead, which explained the mental barriers.
And I thought I had figured out the extent of its foresight.
I proceeded to cast three spells simultaneously while I dodged the Impiana's barrage.
One of the spells was a mana projection of myself in a position far out from where I currently was.
The second was a spell to suppress my presence.
While the third a rune manipulation spell to make it seem the second one was a teleportation spell to transport me to where the projection was.
Zing!
A copy of myself emerged at the Impiana's flank.
The Impiana's glowing three eyes shined brighter and ignored the hollow shadow.
It instead targeted my real presence that was about to launch a Third Circle assault at it.
Boom!
Our attack collided.
The Impiana continued attacking me as I dodged everything with my flight skill, accurately predicting where I would turn and herded into traps which forced me to shield myself or teleport away to a safer location.
Eventually the glow of the monster's eyes dimmed.
It was then that I teleported myself to another position and summoned another projection of myself opposite where I was.
The Impiana suddenly shifted its head rapidly between us, confused of which one of us would attack.
I readied a Third Circle lightning spell to strike the creature.
The Impiana suddenly turned to me, readying its own assault.
It was then that I channeled my mana to my projection, which already served similarly as a portal given how I constantly warped time and space to connect my mana to it, and unleashed the assault through the copy.
Boom!
A powerful lightning bolt burst from the hand of my shadow and struck the Impiana.
['Serafina (★★★★)' has obtained the skill, 'Eidolon Call'!]