Chapter 257 Vs Terence, Again! III

However, when the wall dissipated, Terence was met with a swirling spiral mass of golden-coloured magic power that slammed into his rock armoured body.

He was sent flying backwards in a short parabolic arc, before crashing to the ground shortly after.

'How did he know where Kayla was?'

Evan narrowed his eyes in displeasure as he had noticed Terence lock onto Kayla's position twice, despite the fact that he should not have been able to sense the spirit.

However, after remembering Greed's idiosyncrasy and Terence's blood-red eyes, the young hero's own eyes widened as he came to a conjecture.

'Could it be that he actually could not sense her, but was just sensing the location of the entity he was drawing strength from?'

Marvelling in surprise upon the realisation that Greed's power could be used in this way, Evan shot towards where the fallen Terence was.

He arrived to see the bloodied man tearing off the leather rags that were once his wrist guards and tossing them on the floor.

His eyes returned to their original black colour, signalling the deactivation of Greed's power as he took a shaky step forward.

"Dude. Just sur-!"

**KAABOOOMMMM!!!!

Evan's words were interrupted by the sudden explosion in the distance. The young hero activated his elemental shield while Terence created a small wall of rocks to block the shockwaves that swept across the area.

Looking up, Evan could see a blood red gigantic arm-shaped construct, composed solely of energy, holding a large great sword that it swung downwards.

Mid-swing, it was intercepted by another gigantic energy-constructed arm, one that was holding an enlarged replica of a sword that looked all too familiar.

"Oh, it's just their Incarnation skills. Nothing serio-!"

Evan's dismissive words were cut short as what he had just seen fully dawned on him.

"They're using their incarnation skills! Are they trying to kill each other or something?!

Ah, incoming shockwave!"

He reactivated his elemental shield and braced for impact as the great sword-wielding arm slammed the flat side of its blade downwards.

'If they were still in the city, I bet like five districts would have been turned to rubble already.

But even so...it's actually their incarnations skills!'

His eyes were gleaming like a kid who just got the latest toy of their favourite superhero, deactivating his elemental shield and turning to Terence before speaking excitedly.

"Dude! Did you see that?!

Like, for real! Did you see that?!

That was like, the physical manifestation of the emotional energies of Pride and Greed!

It's definitely top of the list for things that i-?!"

Terence's response to his excited speech was a punch to the face which the hero dodged by blinking away, before reappearing behind Terence and activating fracture.

With Kayla's Electroflame, the man's bare back was once again the recipient of a symphony of lightning and flames.

He screamed out in pain as he dropped to his knees, with Evan looking down at him with a frown on his face. The young hero then grabbed the man's face with his palm and spoke.

"It's futile. The result was already predetermined from the start.

You couldn't have possibly beaten me.

Even your contracted demon could tell from the start, he did say I was better than you, after all."

Terence pushed Evan's hand away and attempted to punch him but the young hero simply just teleported beside him and kicked him off his feet.

"Guh!"

The man grunted in pain as he fell on his back, with Evan's foot coming in immediately after and crashing into his side, launching him into the air for a few metres.

Evan approached Terence, conjured shadowy arms which grabbed onto the man with his magic, and squatted above Terence's body, slapping his face.

"Hey, lower life form.

Hope you aren't dead yet?"

He slapped the two sides of his face once more, with Terence trying to raise his left arm to punch Evan off his body, only to realise that he had been bound by his own shadow.

Just before he could try to force his way out of the restraints with brute strength, Evan punched his left shoulder with an aura-enhanced fist, dislocating and cracking the bones there in the process.

"--!GGAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!"

"Oh, my goddess, that looks like it hurts."

The young hero spoke in a tone of mock surprise. A sadistic grin adorned his face as he poked Terence's dislocated shoulder, with his grin only growing wider as he saw Terence squirming in pain.

"Come on, you still have some magic power left in you. Do something with it.

Though it wouldn't really matter in the end, but hey, who says you can't try?"

[Master's weird.]

[Mhmm.]

Evan's two contracted spirits spoke among themselves as they saw the young hero poking Terence's damaged arm with his finger coated in destruction aura.

Terence's screams echoed throughout the forest, scaring any creatures who may have been in the area by happenstance.

[Master...!]

Kayla's voice rang out, causing Evan to turn away from Terence and stare at her with a questioning look, however, the young lightning spirit could see that the way he looked at her was different.

He did not gaze at her in the same way that he normally did, as if she were his mischievous younger sibling or his contracted spirit. The way he was looking at her made it seem as though he was looking at something beneath him.

Evan's eyes suddenly widened in confusion, as though triggered by Kayla's expression of shock

"What the...?"

He stood up and took a step back, recalling his actions within the past few minutes as a frown appeared on his face.

Upon opening his status board, he saw three new status effects right next to his 'Injured' condition.

'What the hell, Pride?!'

The young hero screamed at his contracted demon telepathically, however, the reply he received was most certainly not the one he wanted.

[Hold on for a moment, Evan.

I'm dealing, with this foolish brother of mine.]

"How does that relate to the three new things I'm seeing on my status board?!"

Pride did not reply to him again, causing the young hero to click his tongue in annoyance. He turned around and was about to move in Pride's direction when he heard a groan coming from behind him.

Turning back to see Terence struggling to his feet, Evan sighed in exasperation as he spoke.

"Dude, just give up.

Normally, you'd be dead by now but I won't kill you.

The people of Osto need someone to vent all their rage on. We did wreck the city in the battle so I'm gonna toss most of the blame on your head. Besides, you're already quite hated in Os-."

"SHUT UP!!

How could this! How could this! How could this be?!"

Terence screamed and forced himself to his feet, glaring at Evan. His body was in the worst state it had been since he was born, as it could not bear all the damage that had been accumulating ever since the battle in the city.

Evan was confused at how he could still stand and appraised him, only to see that his health stat had become 'B-', with his durability stat being on the cusp of joining it too.

The man then suddenly released a burst of red aura that knocked the young hero backwards.

With all of his strength, he rose up his right foot into the air, causing Evan's eyes to widen as recognition flashed through his eyes.

'Ah. I know that gesture.'

The young hero instantly jumped backwards, creating a distance of close to a hundred metres between them.

Nevertheless, Terence did not care, what he was going to do was still going to affect Evan even at that range, after all.

His last dredges of magic power flowed into his feet, with blood dripping out of his nose as he stomped his foot on the floor and screamed out.

"COLLAPSE!!!!!!!!!!!"

**BOOOOMM!

There was an initial explosion that shook the ground beneath his feet, and then an abrupt discharge of low-frequency acoustic energy into the Earth's crust caused seismic waves which propagated through the ground at high velocities.

Because the surface layer had collapsed, the ground had sunk, creating a massive sinkhole into which any surviving trees in the region fell.

It felt like an earthquake had already been going on and then a landslide had suddenly felt best to occur in the middle of it.

That was the only way to describe what was currently happening.

Seeing the incoming land-based disaster, Evan spoke despite knowing Terence could not hear him over the noise.

"I don't need to do this, but I'd do it just to spite you."

He then jumped up in the air and locked eyes with Terence, with his mystic eyes glowing as he slowly mouthed the name of his newly acquired skill, the same one Terence had just used.

"Collapse."

He grinned evilly when he saw Terence's eyes widen in shock as gravity pulled him back to the ground, with him activating the skill the moment his feet touched the ground.

**BOOOMM!!