Chapter 213 - Grand Magic

Allowing the entrapment spell to fade away, Sirius swerved out of the way of a quick strike coming from the beast. The air pressure being sliced apart by the brutality of the strength behind its massive fist could be felt as it caused his black tufts to flow in the upstarted winds. 

There was no technique or refinement to the way it threw its fists--clearly wanting nothing else but to destroy the confident man who stood before itself, holding the same, unchanging smile that irked it to its core. 

"This is how you throw a damned punch!"

Responding in kind with a throw of his own fist, Sirius sent his fist directly against its chest as it narrowly missed him with its own attack, throwing the beast back against a series of trees its heavy body broke through. 

"So small...yet...strong…"

"Who're you calling small?"

Sloth recovered almost instantaneously once again, slithering towards him as it abrasively broke through whatever trees obscured its path. As it raised its fist to the air, Sirius prepared to counter it--only for the creature to stop its attack midway as it used its long tail to swing its body around from one tree to the next. 

Now coming from behind Sirius, the creature opted to use its tail as a weapon, sending the massive appendage against the ground, shattering the soil completely into a crater. Going into the air to evade the attack, the man returned the favor by sending a surge of lightning in the shape of a dragon head down towards the position of Sloth. 

The massive spell unleashed manifested from Sirius' extended palm with a size dwarfing the tallest trees in the region, inhabiting a size not differing from that of a true dragon. 

That bastard seems to be warming up slowly. Or is it learning as it fights? Either way, it's getting annoying, Sirius thought. 

Reaching Sloth, the purple dragon formed of strings of lightning didn't dissolve into an attack upon contact, instead sweeping the large creature into its formless jaws and dragging it back into the air with it. 

I'll end it right here, right now. 

Dissolving his physical form to that of lightning, he carried a speed matching the same element, meeting Sloth midair as the creature fruitlessly attempted to escape the jaws of the magically-formed dragon's maw. Coming in at such a transcended speed, a simple collision of Sirius' fist, which blended the line between solid matter and plasma, thrust Sloth back at a violent speed as the impact carried with it a shock wave that brought the forest into applause. 

Continuing to move at this vicious speed, unimaginable and untraceable, each impact against Sloth came unknowingly as the creature failed to track its opponent, the sound barrier being shattered relentlessly with every movement taken. 

Sloth remained airborne simply by the grace of Sirius' onslaught of what were only simple meetings of his fist to the creature's flesh. Each hit completely shattered the bones beneath its hide, blowing chunks of its tainted flesh away as it regenerated just as fast. 

"Unfair...Unfair...This isn't...Fair!"

Whining out, Sloth was quickly silenced as for the first time during this attack, it saw him. Coming from above its gaze, descending upon it was a fist coiled in such potent mana it felt the air it breathed in shock its own lungs. 

The very moment the gloved knuckle brushed against the smallest particle belonging to its own head, the lightning shrieked out, unleashing a cascading shock wave that followed Sloth down as it was sent down at a speed breaking the sound barrier once more. Landing back down like a smiting from the heavens to the world below, Sirius witnessed Sloth once more wiggle back up. 

Most of its head had been vaporized by the previous impact, exposing only the few nerves remaining as only its bottom jaw remained, its tongue hanging out as it breathed heavily. 

"And somehow, you're still alive...If the concept of death even belongs to a monster like you."

Watching as the top of its jaw reformed from strands of its stygian flesh intertwining in a repulsive manner, Sirius himself once again disgusted yet curious by the process. 

"Monster?...Ah, that's right--"

Before it could finish speaking or regenerating, Sirius snapped himself back into focus, stomping his boot down as he swiped his hand violently through the air. Manifesting from the area in which he moved his hand, a massive outburst of pure, rampant lightning scaled through the bowels of the forest. The unchecked burst of magical energy not only carved through Sloth, but dug its potent reach far throughout the extensive valley of nature. 

The end result of such a quick, violent spell had turned the equivalent of an entire village's worth of the forest into a wasteland which would no longer give birth to verdancy. It wasn't something he took any pleasure in; needlessly desecrating nature, but he began to grow impatient with the antics of Sloth. Though he managed to split its body into half a dozen pieces, he wasn't surprised once the scattered chunks of flesh each larger than a full-grown man began to meet back up together. 

"Can't you just stay dead already?!"

Flinging a pair of lightning bolts triggered by aggressive finger snaps, Sirius yelled out as he ignited a violent explosion of magenta energy, taking a deep breath as he watched the purple and black clouds simmer, eventually fading. 

"Ah...So much...stimulation…"

Once again, it displayed a sudden burst of aggression, springing forward with its unnatural body before unleashing a barrage of hits. Even though none of them connected, Sirius could feel it: the strength, speed, technique—it was all sharper than before. 

This thing…It's likely beyond Phantasm-level. If it was anyone but me, it'd likely be too much, Sirius thought.

It seemed the casual dodging Sirius indulged himself in, simply pivoting and using footwork to evade each strike, angered the beast as it pulled its fist back. Opting for another form of attack, it took in a deep inhale before the familiar fog began to deep from its pores; its cheeks and chest puffing out with the growing mist within. 

"More fog, huh? Didn't I tell you I was sick of that one?"

Taunting the creature, he slid under a low-hanging bunch of branches as the breath of rabid fog unleashed from Sloth's maw. 

Evading the beam of condensed, highly-pressurized fog was easy enough for him, swinging from branch to branch with a heart throbbing with excitement as he could feel the fearsome winds pick up behind him. As the harsh breath met with the trees he bounced to and from, it dismantled them completely, dissolving their form into nothing more than a rain of bark. 

It's continuing to regenerate from everything I throw at it. Normally, I'd like to just go with the idea of there being a limit somewhere, but time is of the essence here. What I need to try is completely vaporizing its entire body at once, he thought. 

Watching Sloth as it crawled forward like an overgrown infant, spewing the malicious mist from its bowels, Sirius continued to circle around it as a path of destruction was left in the wake of the fog. Finally, the assault of destructive breath ended as the beast simply slumped its shoulders for a moment as if regaining its stamina. 

I knew it--a lazy bastard like him can only go on the offense for so long without needing a hard recovery time. This is my chance; I'll give it a hint of great magic, he inhaled. 

Gently falling onto his feet from atop the high-reaching limb of the tree down to the front of the immobile beast, he raised a single hand towards the sky. 

"Hear me, brother of the sun goddess, slayer of the malevolent serpent. Mountains and rivers shake under your authority, just as the knees of the men who stand against you."

"...What...are…"

Starting to move slowly once more, Sloth's flesh crawled over as a hum of magical energy generated from Sirius' form, creating a gentle wind that soon picked up into one of higher ferocity. Keeping his hand towards the clouds, the travelers of the nightly winds coalesced into the center dictated by Sirius' own fist. 

As the mana emanating from the human suddenly spiked, causing the newly brought winds to tug at the trees, threatening the roots which stayed embedded in the soil for decades, Sloth finally regained movement. However, even the malicious beast could recognize the threat posed before it, beginning to retreat in the opposite direction as it witnessed the sly smirk on Sirius' lips. 

The somber, gray clouds spiraled around a growing light amidst the center of the mass gathering within the skies; streaks of lightning flashed through the veil of nebulous formations, radiating with a foreboding magenta. 

"As I utter your revered name, bring your wild wrath down upon the world, ravage my enemies with might unseen. Susanoo-no-Mikoto: Rain Down Upon The World, Your Divine Cataclysm."