291 The Beginning of the End, Part 2

A wild goose chase occurred. Adrian turned and ran for the nearest building.

Evo was steps ahead of him and was already hiding inside a nearby shop on a strip mall. Upon seeing Adrian head towards him, his eyes widen in shock, and ran to another place.

Jun and Edward tried to regain aggro but it was impossible. The Destroyer was hell-bent on chasing Adrian! Considering the damage and frustration he dealt with the Destroyer, it was understandable why it was chasing after him.

The strides of the Destroyer were short and slow, but it caused the ground to tremble. Jun and Edward couldn't risk getting stepped on, so they shouted instructions to the two people being chased.

"Run towards the marketplace! Take a detour on the stairs and go to the second floor! Let's meet there!" Jun shouted and proceeded to run in the other direction.

Adrian never felt so close to death itself. Every trembling of the ground made his legs run faster. The more it got closer, the more he pushed himself to the limits.

And yet he felt that the Destroyer was catching up.

While losing hope and on the verge of giving up, he heard a loud explosion from behind. A shockwave boosted him forward and helped him escaped getting trampled under the Destroyer's foot.

Evo was ten meters ahead of him, returning from his throwing posture to a running one. Before he turned, Evo didn't forget to remind Adrian on what to do.

"Run faster!"

"Roar!!!"

Tremble. Shake. Creak.

Adrian finally arrived at the stairs that lead towards the second floor. Evo was already running upstairs and breathing roughly due to overexertion. With one last look, he turned to the Destroyer as he climbed the stairs. His eyes widened at what he saw, then hurriedly ran up the stairs.

The Destroyer was in a much bloodier state. Its chest was burnt crisp and cuts were appearing from its stomach and arm muscles. However, those injuries weren't the ones that caused Adrian to panic. It was the motorcycle the Destroyer was holding, he was afraid of. 

The next second, a loud blast echoed as the motorcycle struck the wall. 

Evo arrived on the second floor and noticed the injuries of the Destroyer. Their gazes met and instead of running away in fear, he threw another energized battery on its chest.

Realizing what the projectile was, the Destroyer crossed its arms to protect itself. Evading wasn't an option since its body was too big and it was impossible to dodge.

"Boom!"

The Destroyer coughed out blood and received lethal damage. Its knees felt weak as its legs wobbled. Afterward, it suddenly fell on one knee to the ground, causing the earth to shake.

Jun beckoned. "Go, go, go! Let's go inside!"

—

—

Evo stared at the weakened Destroyer, then a realization struck him.

At the same time, Adrian arrived at the second-floor bridge and headed towards him.

Evo turned and said, "Let's go inside and regroup with the others. I have an idea how we can defeat this one."

The group gathered in the lobby of the marketplace. Everyone could see that the Destroyer was trying to recover some strength to move. Evo could have finished the enemy earlier if he had another D-Battery. Unfortunately, he didn't expect anything of this caliber.

He had four types of batteries with him. From the biggest to smallest, D, C, AA, AAA. The D-Battery had one thousand energy stored inside it, while the C had half of it. AA can only accept one hundred energy while AAA can be considered overcharging with fifty energy. All of them can be called mini-bombs with an accurate explosion radius. They were designed to deal controlled damage to a unique target.

Evo realized something from watching the Destroyer earlier. His theory was solidified after asking some questions to Jun and Edward.

"So, it pays more attention to Edward while only blocking Jun's minute-stones? We need to try this. This is the only way I can think of."

At first, Evo felt it natural that the enemy would be damaged when struck by an explosive. However, he wondered why the enemy felt so weak in front of those batteries. It's because it was compressed energy exploding to a monster leaning towards physical defense!

In the whole world, no one has any skill that requires more than 1000 energy that could deal high enough damage to disable an enemy. Even if there was a person who had that high amount of energy, it was hard to get a skill with more than 100 energy per usage. Even then, they couldn't use it consecutively without having to recover energy instantly. Otherwise, the enemy could just run away and recover its injuries and come back!

Evo started explaining his theory and Adrian worked around it to create a battleplan. Afterward, he gave something to Adrian and Sheila.

"Take this, Old John told me to hand it to you two."

—

—

"It's coming! Be ready!"

Jun shouted as the Rank 4 Destroyer crashed through the wall. Its body was covered with burnt flesh and blood, while continuously recovering damage it received earlier.

It stopped and looked around, then dashed towards Edward who was trying to raise his creative powers. He already fell deep in concentration as he chanted words than no man could utter.

"If it were anyone else, you could've achieved victory. Blame your destiny as you are fated to die underneath my feet! Drill Hammer!" Edward bellowed as he jumped at the Destroyer's chest with two hands by his side, preparing to strike.

Both of his arms became covered with a yellow aura, and his body had three wisps of yellow light circling him. An image of a spinning drill was formed in front of him as he poured most of his energy into this attack. 

The Drill Hammer was like a hammer forcefully thrown with drilling power. It's rotation forced an average-size hole to appear on the Destroyer's chest. 

The Destroyer smashed both of its arms on his sides, but a yellow barrier that appeared on top of his head blocked the attack.

"Ding, ding!"

From the three wisps of light, two vanished as the two strikes were blocked.

Afterward, the Destroyer's arm fell limply, and blood sprinkled out from its armpit. 

Adrian appeared on its side holding a katana covered with energy. He slashed the armpit a few more times, before kicking the side of the stomach and jumping back to safety.

The katana had exquisite sharpness into it. Even though it was covered with energy the weapon was still of high enough tier to cut the enemy. One slash caused shallow wounds to the tough skin of the Destroyer. 

It was Old John's creation from the bones of the Rank 3 Destroyer that Jun gave him. He worked on it non-stop and it was finished in a timely manner.

When the Destroyer turned his attention to him, it got pierced by a spear on its other armpit.

Sheila stabbed its armpit, but couldn't latch for a long time on the Destroyer's body. Her balance and control were subpar compared to Adrian. She immediately pulled back before doing a barrel-roll. 

Before the Destroyer could turn its head to the Sheila, a couple of C-Type batteries fell and exploded in front of its legs.

The energized batteries caused a mini-explosion, destroying one of the Destroyer's legs, making it kneel.

"Roar!"

The Destroyer growled and acted tough to deter any further attacks on itself. However, Jun wasn't scared and used its thighs as a pedestal and jumped high in the air.

If the arms weren't injured, it could try to grab him, but they were recovering right now. If one of the legs weren't crippled from the explosion, it was impossible to reach its head. If either one of those two failed to be executed perfectly, he wouldn't even be able to get close to it.

In the middle of his jump, a smile formed on Jun's face.

Elation. Satisfaction.

"Tough one to crack? Let's see if you're brain can remain intact after this!"

Empower multiplied his damage exponentially.

Reinforce increased his physical ability.

There were three sides to Bumuth's Warhammer. The one used this time was the hammer-side.

He shouted, "Destruction Bash!!!"

"Boom! Arggggh!!!"

In this battle, Jun learned the perfect usage of the embedded ability, Destruction Bash. The embedded skill works wonders with blunt weapons. It was a simple trick and it was laughable that it took him a long time to realize. 

Bashing was for blunt weapons while slashing for sharp weapons. Stabbing and thrusting were the same and applies for pointed weapons. All of this can be mixed up but the damage would be higher if followed correctly.

Jun bashed the Destroyer's face with the blunt side of the Warhammer. With the Destruction Bash skill, together with all the auxiliary skills, the force of the attack completely turned the brain into mush.

The Destroyer slowly fell backward as its consciousness faded away. The life on its eye disappeared together with the active healing coursing through its body.

With its tensed muscles restored to normal, Jun's continuous attack turned its face unrecognizable. By the time its back reached the floor and caused another shockwave, its face had already caved-in with blood and flesh scattered away.

Jun then put the Warhammer inside a black vortex that appeared beside him.

"We did it!" Sheila cheered happily after seeing the lifeless body of the Rank 4 Destroyer.

"Of course we did. Nothing's impossible with this lord's power," Edward chuckled, but deep inside he was so glad that they were able to do it.

"Isn't that expected since I planned for it?" Adrian grinned widely. All the battle coordinations were planned by him. The formation, the attack patterns, it was all him!

After calming down, Sheila came back to herself and continued her duties. 

"Is anyone injured? None? Okay~" she said filled with relief then checked on Adrian.

"*crunch crunch...*" After a stressful battle, Evo started eating peanuts to calm himself. For a non-combatant, the battle was extremely tiring and unpleasant. He felt in danger all the time. If it weren't for his inventions, he wouldn't be able to help in anything except for theory crafting.

Jun watched his companions. A lot of people died during this two months. He never thought he would survive with them this long, but he was happy.

He was happy that he's with them.

He knelt and placed his hand on top of the enormous Destroyer's body.

[Looting... 10...9...]