Chapter 82 - Mastermo Is Not Happy With Taki's Stamina

Even if Zhihao hadn't stepped in and saved the demon king, he was sure that the demon king would have been able to save himself. This was the man with the demonic deep voice he was talking about, if this man wasn't able to stand up to this Akuma, Zhihao wouldn't even stand a chance.

The hand that had burned off was now once again regrown, but this time it was in a condition much worse. It used to have muscles, veins, bones and although it still had all of it intact, the muscles looked much weaker and the bones looked frail while the veins looked completely lifeless.

Zhihao suddenly understood something and just as he did, he couldn't help but smile. This Akuma that looked like a hard to defeat big shot wasn't as invincible as Zhihao had thought him to be.

At this moment, Zhihao had caught a hold of this demon god's weakness. Although this Akuma had regenerative abilities, he had his own limits. The Akuma could regrow an arm out of nothing, but couldn't do it perfectly.

If Zhihao were to continue attacking the same arm, again and again, he was sure that a time will come when this arm will not be able to grow back. Maybe not even the bones will be able to regenerate when that happened..

This wasn't a fight about who was stronger, it was much simpler yet complicated. It was a fight about who attacks more and who defends more. Plainly speaking, it was about who would be able to stretch this fight out and still be able to thrive. It was a game about patience and perseverance.

Luckily for Zhihao, he lacked in none of the two and so, this fight already had a winner.

"I'll take the right," Zhihao spoke before he got ready to attack.

The demon king wasn't stupid and even without the words being spoken, he knew what his son had wanted to say. Taki wanted to fight together with him and the demon king had never got the chance to even dream about something like this happening. He had always thought that this son of his would never accept him and so this rare chance to fight together, surely brought a smile to the old demon king's face.

He was sure that after this fight was over, the two father and son would be able to mend their relationship and go back to the way they were. He was ready to spoil this son of his and the only question remained if his son wanted to be spoiled?

The demon king also decided to make his move, "I'll attack from the front."

Zhihao only spared a side glance at the man and there was a small satisfied smile on his face.

The one who attacks from the front is the bait and Zhihao had never seen someone be so enthusiastic about being a mere bait. This didn't mean he disliked it though. For him, this was the optimal situation.

If this demon king wasn't going to volunteer to become the bait, Zhihao already had a plan B up his sleeves.

Now that he thought about it the plan was kinda stupid, so he was glad he didn't have to take such extreme measures.

Pushing the demon king at Akuma was really a half-baked plan that would do more damage than good.

The demon king stepped closer to Akuma with calm strides as if he was not affected by this demon god, however, one look at his facial expressions, and everyone would be able to notice that this demon king was in fact looking a bit worried just like he should have.

Li Ling and Alvi were standing on the side, far away from the main fight so that they don't get caught up in it. Zhihao wasn't too worried about the safety of those two and he was too busy with fighting the demon god in front of him so it was only natural that he didn't notice Li Ling slipping away from there.

"Where are you going?" Alvi asked Li Ling and since it wasn't a common voice transmission, it could not be heard by Zhihao.

Li Ling looked at the bot who was following after him, "I can't just stand there and do nothing can I?"

Alvi squinted at the player, having the feeling that there was something about this player that she found oddly familiar. He wasn't giving out everything he knew and he seemed to know a lot more than he should. It was suspicious for Alvi whose main job here was to oversee the players and pay attention to their every move so that there was no unfair play. Alvi didn't have evidence, but she felt like this player was cheating and at the same time, he wasn't. It didn't make sense and maybe she would never be able to find out the answer behind this.

She had no proof to call him a cheater and so she was utterly helpless and could only follow this player right now.

Back at the festival, Zhihao and the demon king were working together to beat this Akuma together. The ghosts who were running around in panic stopped as they saw the father and son getting involved in this gruesome fight. They seemed to have been mesmerized by the way the fight was going since they all stopped in their tracks and with their mouths wide open in awe, they stood there taking in the sight that could only be considered beautiful in their eyes.

It was as if this had changed into one of those battle arenas where the ghosts would place bets and take part as the audience.

Akuma was busy with regrowing its limbs that Zhihao was constantly cutting off, all the while also fending against the fire attack the demon king was constantly hitting him with.

Zhihao was satisfied with the bait. The demon king was doing a very good job of keeping the Akuma busy as Zhihao kept on chopping down its arm again and again. The regeneration ability of the arm was visibly worsening, however, this was just an arm and it had already taken him so long to have it come to this state where bones were the only thing that could be regenerated.

Although it sounded good and looked like Zhihao was winning, this fight was a lot more unpredictable than it seemed and only Zhihao was aware of this.

He was losing his health bar.

This Taki seemed to be really powerful with a lot of different powers up his sleeves, one more powerful than the other, however, his stamina was way lower than Zhihao's.

Keeping the ball of lightning going for five minutes reduced his health stats by 20%

In the end, Zhihao thought it was a waste of energy to keep the lightning so he decided to change his strategy.

He skimmed through the list of powers Taki had and read through the stats of each power.

Useless.

Every single one of them was useless since they required a person to have a high level of energy. Although they were energy-consuming, they were equally powerful and Zhihao couldn't deny this fact, but what was the use of it being powerful if Akuma could just keep on regenerating?

Zhihao could destroy every bone in this Akuma's body, but he still won't win and in turn, he'd just be wasting away his energy on something that would make him lose in the long run.

In the long run... That was the most important thing to think about at this moment.

Zhihao decided to try using another power.

Ice.

In the next minute, Shuang was covered in ice and it was letting off a frost smoke. Zhihao couldn't deny the beauty of this sword that was overwhelming.

This might have been his best decision yet. Shuang was a sword with a cold constitution and if it was paired with a power of ice, it would be a perfect way to increase the stats of this sword.

There were certain powers that were compatible with this sword and certain others that would only make the sword become useless. Lightning, ice, and water were some of the elements that would strengthen the sword while fire would do the opposite. This was the reason why Zhihao had not used Taki's most powerful spell: fire.

If he were a noob, he would have most certainly gone with that fire and he would've doomed himself, but he wasn't and so everything was well and good.

The ice sword once again cut down the arm, which only contained the bone, and this time, the arm, or to be more specific, the bone didn't grow back.

Zhihao did a victory dance in his mind with a straight and calm expression. His face was never the one to betray his feelings and emotions. Because of this, he felt like he'd become a great actor one day, but who wants to become an actor when you could be the world's best pro-gamer? His career choices had been clear since the beginning and he was sure that they would never be changed so easily.

The Akuma glanced at the missing hand and realized that it was now unable to regrow it, and just as he realized this, he immediately snapped up at Zhihao and glared at the man.

"You're supposed to be looking at me!" The demon king snapped as he attacked Akuma from the front.

This time the Akuma was bored of playing around with the demon king and the ball of fire that was aimed at him was devoured.

Zhihao's eyes went wide as he saw this and he wasn't the only person who was shocked. The demon king also seemed to be taken back by the sudden revelations.

"T-That... That can't happen..." He muttered in disbelief.

In all his years of reigning over this world as the demon king who oversaw many yearly ghost festivals, he had never seen such a sight.

Akuma can devour fire? It was truly a new finding.

Zhihao let his brain do the magic and after a minute or two, he understood what had happened.

There was a reason why the human vessel and a demon vessel was different.

When Zhihao glanced at the demon king, he was sure that he wasn't the only person who had understood what had happened.

The two father and son shared eye contact and nodded, both understanding the situation.

It was the perk of having a demon vessel.

If the Akuma were to have a human vessel, this really would have been impossible since swallowing a ball of fire would destroy the insides of the human vessel.

This wasn't the only perk of getting a demon vessel. Having the ability to regenerate was also a perk of having a demon vessel.

Zhihao still remembered what Alvi had told him and now he finally understood why a demon vessel was much more dangerous and more destructive than a human vessel.

But what now?

The fire was useless against this Akuma and Zhihao couldn't just keep on cutting off his limbs again and again.

The only thing bright about the situation was that the Akuma was now physically handicapped with only a single arm and it just so happened that the arm that was cut off was Akuma's dominant arm.

The rest was all negatives of the situation that Zhihao rather not want to look at, but although he didn't want to didn't mean he could just ignore it. He still needed to analyze everything and see what he had to deal with. He had to calculate his odds at winning and losing in this fight.

The worst thing at this moment seemed to be the fact that Zhihao had angered Akuma who was now glaring at him with a bloodthirsty expression.