Chapter 351 Brance’s First Turning Point Quest (4)

–Several Seconds Earlier–

Without hesitation, the instant Brance noticed Michael’s shoulder muscles tense up, his left hand went to his sheath, and he used it like a lever alongside kicking off the ground to dive out of the way from the tri-pronged wing attack, narrowly avoiding it.

Unfortunately, he used too much force and lost control of his roll after throwing his body half a dozen meters backward.

‘Fuck, FUCK!’ Brance screamed in his head as he tried his best to keep his knees tucked close to his body, allowing him to continue rolling, but as he completed each rotation, his eyes flicked to Michael, who had caught up and was flying within arm’s reach above him.

‘Predict his next sequence.’

Having fought for several minutes back and forth and observing the sinister and prideful smile on the Archangel’s lips, Brance knew he was in for some deep shit; as Michael extended his arm to grab him and do something vicious, Brance’s mind spun.

‘Only one shot at this, time to play possum!’

“HAHA! IT SEEMS I WASN’T THE ONLY ONE AFFECTED BY THIS STRANGE EFFECT! YOU AREN’T USED TO YOUR INCREASED STRENGTH. PITTY, THIS ENDS HERE, MORTAL!”

“Tier-2.5 Paladin Skill: [Hallowed Ground],” blinded by arrogance, Michael didn’t hear as Brance calmly muttered a skill name, nor did he see the slight flash of Light encasing Brance’s body after the activation of his skill.

BOOOM

The Archangel slammed the helpless Brance directly into the second floor’s ceiling a quarter of a second later.

‘1 Mississippi,*A Very American Way of Counting Seconds*’ beginning the countdown, Brance relaxed his body to the point where he was completely limp and dead weight, acting as if the first impact had either stunned him or knocked him out.

“HAHAHA, THIS IS WHAT HAPPENS WHEN YOU, A FILTHY HYBRID MORTAL, TRY TO STAND AGAINST A GENERAL WITH THOUSANDS OF YEARS OF COMBAT EXPERIENCE!”

BOOOM BOOOM BOOOM BOOOM BOOM BOOM

‘2 Mississippi, 3 Mississippi, 4 Mississippi.’ Even with his eyes closed, [Mana Sight] was still active, allowing Brance to see each time the walls or ceiling came close. Yet, strangely enough, due to his [Hallowed Ground], he only felt a slight pressure, not unlike getting hit with a pillow each time his body connected with a hard surface.

Growing tired of slamming Brance’s motionless body into walls and the ceiling, Michael shot toward the ground spiking the limp body downward, forming a crater, and finishing off by jumping back into the air and unleashing a flurry of Mana attacks into the ground where the collapsed Brance lay silently.

SHOOOM BOOM CRASH

A cacophony of explosions and strange sounds echoed through the room as dozens of powerful attacks were sequentially fired at Brance, each having a different impact sound upon connecting with his body or the nearby ground.

‘5 Mississippi, 6 Mississippi, 7 Mississippi, this is it, his grand finale, come on, you bastard, keep it up, burn yourself out.’ Laying on his back and hidden by a heavy cloud of atomized stone due to the destruction of the floor, Brance watched Michael’s Mana Signature dimming rapidly as the blue bar indicating his MP on the HUD drained swiftly.

Knowing the time for a counter-attack was approaching, Brance willed all his Mana to move, surging through his body like a mighty white water river.

‘Tobs, “Perfect Time,” please.’ Brance smirked calmly under cover of the dust cloud as he sensed the final attack heading his way after Michael burned the last bit of acceptable Resource Stats, soon realizing the Archangel had reached his limit. With Brance’s invincibility only having about 2 seconds left, he began his counter-attack with an aptly named song.

-Now Playing “Perfect Time” by Takafumi Wada and Hiroyuki Sawano.-

“1 Mississippi, [NEPHILIM MODE], [NEPHILIM CREST], TIER-2 PALADIN SKILL: [COUNTER]!”

-Tier-2 Paladin Skill: [Counter]-

-Category: Active Skill.-

-As the party’s hope and defense, you must always stay standing. The Light has blessed you; you fight for justice and the righteous.-

-By charging ample amounts of Mana into your weapon and matching the exact speed and timing of an incoming attack, you counter it and return it to the being who issued the attack.-

-Distribute the excess force and kinetic energy from the attack to either side of your body and deal an additional 25% damage on top of the initial damage you would have received from the target opponent.-

-Cost: 750 Stamina, 750 Mana Points.-

-Cooldown: 15 Minutes.-

WOOOSHHH

Several things occurred at once, the first of which was a blinding flash of Light as Brance’s body changed from his [Nephilim Mode] and [Nephilim Crest].

Brance’s eyes shifted from Violet to Gold. His hair turned to a pristine and pure white, while delicate golden markings in different slash-like shapes adorned his entire face, emphasizing his high cheekbones and sharp jawline before moving down his neck and ending at his pointed collar bones.

At the same time, Brance’s skin had tanned slightly and radiated in a pale white light.

Next, a pair of radiant golden glowing feathered Mana Wings erupted from his shoulder blades, and with a flick of them, all the dust cleared just as a horrifyingly hot flaming Mana slash reached his body.

When the powerful Mana slash reached Brance, his Katana creaked as it barely withstood the power of the attack before; like exhaust from a car, the residual momentum was redirected to the left and right of Brance’s shoulders.

With focused golden eyes, Brance’s muscles tensed and bulged as he slashed out, shattering his Katana in the process but returning the attack right to Michael, who was utterly stunned that Brance was fine.

Before he could even speak, the flaming slash slammed into his torso, rocketing him through the air and slamming the Archangel into the ceiling where he stayed, imprinted in the stone, creating a person-shaped crater.

-You have Countered an Attack and dealt 85,000 points of Magic Damage and an additional 21,250 points of Countered Damage to your opponent.-

-Total damage dealt to your opponent: 106,250.-

Glancing at the HUD floating where Michael was hidden in the stone, Brance noticed the Archangel’s HP had tanked massively. In dealing 106,250 points of damage, he had dropped Michael’s HP down to 57%, which is a big deal considering how all he did was counter a single attack against a Peak Tier-3/Early Tier-4 opponent.

Crack…crack…shatter

Unable to withstand the force of the attack, the Tier-3 Katana in Brance’s hand shattered and scattered metal fragments all around his feet. Still, Brance didn’t have time to pay attention to it as he quickly resheathed the broken Sword on his left hip and forced a large amount of Mana into his arms.

Knowing he couldn’t let this opportunity go and not wanting the counter-offensive to end here, Brance raised both his hands and burned a significant amount of MP on manifesting his next attack.

“[Swords of Judgement],” Brance calmly stated as 30 Light Mana portals opened up above his head. Expediting the summoning of the Massive shining Mana Constructed Greatswords, Brance dropped into an orthodox boxing stance while making a pulling gesture, forcing all 30 swords out of their portals and bringing them down closer to him.

With clenched fists, twenty of the massive 15-meter by 3-meter Mana Greatswords condensed in size, shrinking into a single golden white radiant four-meter greatsword, leaving the remaining ten in the original size and pointed at the spot Brance knew Michael was stuck.

Flapping his wings and taking to the air, Brance reached out, caught the hefty Light Mana constructed Sword with his right hand, flourished it, and slashed out in the direction of the Archangel.

On command, the remaining 10 [Swords of Judgement] went into motion, shooting forward as artillery shells fired from a howitzer cannon.

BOOOM BOOOM BOOOM

“RAHHHHHH!!! FUCKING MORTAL! HOW DARE YOU?” When the first Sword slammed into the Archangel, he screamed with agony and rage before using his wings as a spring and launching his body out of the crater to meet his opponent head-on.

What he DIDN’T expect was to find nine more equally as impressive Mana Constructs waiting outside the crater, and in a show of pure strength and skill, Michael blocked, deflected, and countered each of the building-sized swords. Even though the Archangel survived the attack, he lost another 8% of his HP, bringing him under half health.

However, just as he was about to gloat, Brance flashed in front of him, wielding the condensed Greatsword, and lashed out with a powerful horizontal strike of his own.

BOOOOMMMM

Wide-eyed, Michael could barely bring up his Flaming Greatsword in time to block the attack, and, as a result, his Sword was flung upward, and the Archangel was sent spinning through the air due to the force behind the strike.

He had severely underestimated Brance, and after steadying himself in the air, he noticed that Brance had activated his Bloodline skills, gaining a similar appearance to his own.

The only difference being, as a pure-blood born and raised LightBringer Seraphim, Michael was permanently in this state, unlike Brance, whose [Nephilim Mode] was a transformation skill that gave him an additional 125% boost to all of his stats.

That’s also excluding the [Nephilim Crest], which vastly increased Brance’s control over Light Mana Particles, which was how he could condense the majority of his [Swords Of Judgement] into a singular, powerful Mana Construct.

Surprisingly, the best part about using his Bloodline skills at the moment was that the boosts from the second floor STACKED with his [Nephilim Mode].

Brance gained an additional 125% boost on top of the already existing 35%; instead of having his stats modified by their Base numerics, it was added to his CURRENT stats.

: Strength-  935 (2839):  (TEMP +327) (BOOST +1577)

: Dexterity- 777 (2360):  (TEMP +272) (BOOST +1311)

: Agility- 777 (2360):  (TEMP +272) (BOOST +1311)

: Intelligence- 935 (2839):  (TEMP +327) (BOOST +1577)

: Vitality-  935 (2839):  (TEMP +327) (BOOST +1577)

: Mind-  777 (1049):  (TEMP +272) (TEMP +1311)

His stats had risen so high that he was well above his Tier-2 cap and into the territory of Tier-3, making him stronger in every way than the injured and Debuffed Archangel.

*Michael currently has, STR:2600, DEX:1298, AGI:2122, INT:1661, VIT:2600, and MIND:1855.*

Staring at Brance, 20 meters away, Michael’s sword arm trembled as numbness set in as a sign that he had just been overpowered.

“How…how is this possible?” Terror in his eyes and slurring the words in confusion, Michael’s pupils constricted to pinpricks as Brance smiled confidently and rushed forward.

—

Back in the training room, Gabby’s skin glistened with moisture as she had been continuously healing Brance.

In the middle of fierce combat, the young man was unaware that every time Michael’s Sword cut him, he injured his soul and body. As gnarly wounds kept appearing all over his body, Gabby immediately tended to them by applying some herbal salve.

However, everything changed in a moment of rest, as Brance’s body suddenly transformed, revealing his Bloodline skills to the entire party after a bright flash of Light, forcing Cynrik to jump forward and catch Gabby by the waist and drag her to safety.

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