Albina, Savina, Bori, Alyra and Boleros watched on as this battle of natural disasters unfolded, only to stop when they noticed something odd happening at the periphery of their vision.
A dozen or so Terrorcotta Soldiers began to enter the room from various points, either through obvious entry ways or literally pulling themselves out of the walls and breaching it like fishes out of the water.
"Oh that can't be good," Albina muttered to herself as she saw the soldiers appear one by one.
The others had similar sentiments at the sight of the appearing majimonsters. They had already gone through quite a difficult fight and had no desire to go through another one.
However, just as they were about to grit their teeth and get ready to go for another round, the clay soldier majimonsters suddenly whipped out their weapons and began to destroy themselves!
"What the hell are these crazy monsters doing?!"
"Wait...take a look at their aether! It ain't disappearing."
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As Voxea began to press the advantage against the Terrorcotta Lord, a sudden disturbance in the air prickled at my ears.
Flicking my gaze towards the source, I saw what appeared to be more Terrorcotta Soldiers gather at the edge of the battlefield and then destroy themselves. I was confused at their self-destructive behavior, until I saw that aether that made up the Terrorcotta Soldier didn't disappear like normal but instead began to flow towards the Terrorcotta Lord!
As more and more soldiers destroyed themselves, the originally pure lightning spear the giant was holding began to become more and more solid looking.
I didn't know why it was happening, but I could guess.
[Uh Voxea?]
[Yes?]
[It's not normal for other majimonsters to use them as aether for another monster's technique, right?]
[Actually, I've seen it done before in the old days. Why?]
[Because that Piercer creep is doing that right now!]
Right on cue, the giant lightning spear began to suddenly push back harder as a now solid spearhead made of stone manifested out of nowhere and replaced the original spearhead made of lightning.
Several of the ghost soldiers that had just manifested from me boosting Voxea suddenly disappeared as the amount of force behind the giant's attack was too much for them to bear.
Any ground we managed to gain from this clash of techniques was quickly lost and instead, this guy was starting to put the pressure on us.
[Well crap,] Voxea complained, [Looks like this fight went from a two on one to a two on twenty.]
The weird thing about her complaining is that it felt a bit too casual. I figured something like this would cause her to panic...like I am now.
[Voxea, you can still win this, right?]
[Maybe, but that's under the assumption our aether can outlast his, and right now his is getting denser by the minute,] Voxea stated while fortifying her technique, [And before you ask, the staff on your hip will only be marginal increase at best. We'd need you to be a stronger maji or some questionably powerful artifacts at this point full of aether.]
I began to grind my teeth at the realization that we might be up the creek without a paddle. Were we seriously going to die fighting some relic of a majimonster in the depths of a freaky castle dungeon thing made of wild aether?!
...
...
...
Wait a minute...
[Voxea...I have a really stupid plan...]
[Stupid how?]
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The others could only watch on as the lighting clay spear began to encroach on Voxea and Silvia.
They wanted to help their friend and fight this thing, but the more they watched, the more they felt the Fog of War kept getting denser and denser. It was almost impossible for them to even muster the thought of summoning a majimonster.
Under their gazes however, something unexpected occurred.
In the middle of the clash, Silvia had suddenly stopped channeling aether and took off her belt. She twirled the belt around once and somehow changed it into a pinewood staff with a weird cage on the top that she then held in front of herself with one hand and began to channel aether though it. A beam of light came out of the cage and began to flow into Voxea.
"Where did she get that staff?"
With the other hand, Silvias' finger began glow with power as she began draw into the air a spell circle.
"When could she do that?"
Once the spell circle was completed, Silvia grabbed the spell circle and slammed it into her chest. Suddenly, the aether around her became even more turbulent and the beam of light she was releasing from her staff became even stronger. Unexpectedly, this had caused Voxea's technique to become even stronger.
"What did she just do ?!"
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BY THE AETHER THIS FREAKING HURTS!
I MEAN SURE, I EXPECTED TO BE FLOODED WITH AETHER, BUT I DIDN'T EXPECT THIS MUCH AT ONCE!
I THINK I HAVE ENOUGH GRIP STRENGTH TO BREAK MY STAFF!
[Silvia, what in the hells did you just do?!,] Voxea yelled at me.
[Can't...talk...need to...focus!]