The metal prison began to close around Elio.
Five creatures coordinating their powers to trap him. A single error, a moment of doubt, and he would be finished.
The Roseline-shark answered his desperate call. The impulse took him eighteen meters away from the creatures, the metal barely closing as he escaped the deadly trap.
Elio Mana: 6
But the beasts were already moving again, the metal flowing between them like liquid.
The battle wasn't over.
Elio found himself pressed into another imperative decision.
He could feel the four mana points almost ready, but the options before him were all equally deadly.
Staying still meant being trapped again.
Retreating would leave him even further out of range...
The four-point explosion would barely cover a few meters, and he was already more than twenty meters away after the impulse. Despite this, the creatures were still in range to capture him.
Quick Charge: 4
Despite obtaining the small charge ready, Elio felt he needed to secure a charge of 5.
Still, using 5 points would require more charging time, leaving him vulnerable, even then, the explosion wouldn't reach the creatures from this distance.
The metal trap was closing and time was running out.
'I have an extra point,' he calculated while watching the metal flow like living liquid around him.
The neon could move him further away, saving him from the metal prison again, but then he'd have no way to reach them with the explosion.
Even if it was a 5-point one.
And repositioning afterward... the creatures wouldn't give him that opportunity.
The riskiest option shone in his mind: use that last extra impulse to enter directly into the formation instead of fleeing.
But if he failed to charge the attack in time...
The Artromus's words resonated in his mind: "indecisive". The rage that memory ignited was enough to crystallize his decision in an instant.
The neon catapulted him directly toward the formation's center.
Elio Mana: 5
The metal tried to trap him, bright blades dancing centimeters from his flesh, but Elio slid between them like water between rocks.
The four mana points pulsed inside him, ready to unleash hell.
Quick Charge: 5
'NOW!' The fifth point finally emerged, but the metal was faster.
The prison closed like a trap, turning Elio into a silver statue frozen in the attack's final moment. His arms, perfectly positioned in what should have been the instant of victory, were now part of the metallic sculpture of his own death.
Inside his prison, the spikes continued their relentless work, each one finding its way through his flesh.
One instant.
He had been one instant away from achieving it.
♢♢♢♢
(Second is over)
NO! The scream resonated in Elio's mind like thunder.
The Artromus was still out there, and this wouldn't be his tomb.
Desperation transformed into burning determination as his hands, trapped but perfectly positioned, began to glow inside the metallic prison.
'I don't need to move!' The realization exploded in his fading consciousness. 'I'M ALREADY IN POSITION!'
Between his immobile hands, pointing upward and facing each other with fingers placed in the exact position, a sphere of energy began to form. The glow intensified second by second, power accumulating in that small space between his palms.
He couldn't control the impact's direction, not in this position.
The explosion would reach him too, but that didn't matter. Pain had never been his enemy; it was just another tool.
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The detonation was blinding.
The contained energy burst from above, reaching all creatures despite their reinforced armor. The five mana points, released in a perfectly positioned explosion, were barely enough to disintegrate them.
The sensation was instant, level 10 conquered.
Mana began flowing again in his body, but there was something more. A new control, an instinctive understanding of the power that had imprisoned him now ran through his veins.
With his newly increased strength and hands finally freed by corrosion, Elio concentrated his energy. The parts of his body that the explosion had burned began to heal, but first he needed to free himself.
With a roar that contained all his accumulated fury, he made the metallic prison burst from within.
The spikes that had been drinking his blood detached when the structure collapsed. The system immediately began its healing work, sealing wounds, regenerating tissue, restoring his body to its optimal state.
Elio stood among the twisted metal remains, his body emanating level 10 power.
The true challenge was just beginning; the Artromus waited outside.
But now... now he was ready.