Standing there with the silver aura pulsing around his body, Rhya and Lira stood rooted to the ground as they watched with wide eyes at Grim's sudden transformation.
For the 500+ year old elves, this would be a scene they would never forget.
Raising his head slowly, Grim looked at the two elves without any emotion in his eyes. To the current him, they were no longer worth his time.
'What the hell happened to this guy!? Since he doesn't have the marks of reincarnation I can tell that he isn't our comrade. But then where is this power coming from? And why does it look like I'm looking at one of my brethren!? None of this makes sense!'
"R-Rhya." Lira called out with a noticable stammer in his voice. "You feel it to right? This guy... His power is a lot stronger than it was before."
"Yeah." He nodded looking quite troubled noticing something else.
'It isn't just his power and appearance that's changed, this guy's whole vibe is completely different. It's like I'm not even looking at a human anymore.'
While the two of them were busy trying to figure out what had happened to Grim, the man in question was focusing on understanding the changes in his body.
Closing his eyes slightly, he felt a weird sensation coursing through his veins. Almost as if something had caused the blood in his body to start acting up.
But more than that, he felt complete for the first time in his life. That feeling of only fighting at 50% had completely vanished. Like it wasn't even there to begin with. And weirdly enough, he felt completely comfortable with this power. Almost as if he had it all along.
'So this is what he meant when he said reincarnation through blood.'
Using the elven power within the captured elf's soul, King used it to stimulate and bring out the elf part of Grim's blood and awaken his true potential.
Whilst Grim was growing accustomed to the changes in his body. Rhya had already figured out just what he really was.
"I didn't think it was possible but, that white hair, those ears and those yellow eyes... You- You're a half elf aren't you?"
"WHAT!!" Lira looked at him in disbelief.
"But that's impossible! No one else could have survived the human's cowardly sneak attack on us! We were wiped out!!"
"I know I know! But look at him Lira! Even before he transformed his eyes were yellow! The signiture colour of our people!! And his mana reserves... No normal human could possibly have that much. So the only conclusion I can come up with is that he's part elf, a half breed." He said the last part through grit teeth.
"A half breed... *Clenches fists* An elf mated with a human? A member of our glorious race joined bodies with one of those things that exterminated us like we were bugs... To do such a thing and produce this- this thing! I won't allow it! I'll wipe you and every single dirty human out of existance!!! YOU HEAR ME HALF BREED! DON'T THINK JUST BECAUSE YOU HAVE OUR TRAITS THAT YOU'RE ONE OF US! SOMEONE WITH DIRTY BLOOD LIKE YOURS DOESN'T HAVE THE RIGHT TO CALL YOURSELF A MEMBER OF OUR RACE!!"
"Lira..."
He was right, even if Grim did posses their blood, his human part made it so that he would never be one of them. And even though he was curious as to where Grim's lineage came from due to all the elves being wiped out, Rhya chalked it up to one of their clansman mating with a human long before Licht was made their leader and that Grim was the product of a long lineage of half elves breeding with humans.
"Half breed?" Grim opened his glowing yellow eyes and sounded his words out slowly.
"Out of everything that you've said so far, the only thing you got correct was the fact that we're indeed not the same. You see-
*Flashes between the both of them*
"Compared to you guys *places palms onto their chests* I really am just built different."
!!!
[Breath of Flames: Ninth Form - Rengoku]
*BOOM!!*
"GYAHHH!!"
As his flames blew a hole through each of their respected chests, time seemed to slow down as Grim watched the two bodies by his side fall to his feet.
*THUD*
Looking down at his hands that had just blasted their chests apart, a glow of silver raidance swirled around it.
'So this is what it feels like to be able to use 100% of my power.'
This increase in magical abilities... Its amazing.
*Clenches fist*
'With this power... I'm just as strong as Mereoleona. No! I've exceeded her!'
*Cough* *Cough*
"Hmm?"
Looking down at the two elves, Grim saw Rhya cough out a large mouthful of blood.
Well what did he expect to happen? In their normal states Grim was able to easily handle Rhya using [Hyper Focus]. And despite Rhya transforming while he was still in his normal form, he was still able to survive the combined effort of both him and Lira. So now that he had also transformed wouldn't it make sense that since he could barely handle his normal form, why would a transformation that increased his magical abilities change anything?
With such a large increase in magical power output, Grim had no choice but to use the normal [Breath of Flames] instead of [Breath of Blue Flames] in fear of it killing the two of them. He even went so far as to scale back the power he put into the attack. Not to mention that without the use of his swords the spell would be considerably weaker. But even with all that in mind, to think that a causal [Rengoku] that he had intentionally weakened would be strong enough to put these two at death's doors.
'This form boosts my magical abilities to too high of an extent that all my spells have become astronomically more dangerous... HOW SATISFYING!!'
"Why *cough* *cough* why are we still alive?" Rhya wheezed out trying his best to struggle through the pain.
'An injury like this is gonna take a while to heal, not to mention I'm gonna need to heal Lira as well. Dammit! To think we'd have to face off against a monster like this. The power of an elf with the nature of a human... I'd rather go up against that anti magic kid instead.'
Crouching down and materializing a single beast sword into his hand, Grim casually said "I need answers."
"Tell me the next part of Patry's plan?"
"Heh." Rhya chuckled despite feeling like his organs were on fire. "I won't tell you anything."
'As if I'd let a wild card like this get the opportunity to mess with Patry and the others.'
"Is that so." Grim smiled innocently as he raised the sword high into the air before uthlessly stabbeing it down into Rhya's thighs.
"ARGHHHH!!!" He screamed and laughed at the same time. "Do what you want to me! I won't tell you anything!"
"Oh I know."
"What!?"
"I didn't expect you to tell me anything from the start, stabbing you was just for fun on my part."
Staring at him maliciously, Rhya grit his teeth.
Ignoring him, Grim pulled the blade out of his thigh and pointed to the collapsed Lira.
"Hey Rhya, you've watched your comrades die before right?
"What!?"
'No... He couldn't be thinking of-
"How would it feel to see it happen all over again?"
!!!
"You heard me right? Since you won't tell me anything, it looks like I'll have to go around rounding up the members of your clan and bring them back here for you to witness their final moments... Now that I think about it, I'm actually kind of jealous. I'll never be able to kill the same person twice, but you'll be able to watch them die a second time. Fuck, I can't even imagine how that would feel. Watching the people you fought so hard to bring back die in front of you again. Damn that actually sounds like fun. Lets start with the one in Rill's body."
"W-What are you saying...
"Hmm? Maybe I should torture him first, kill him and then go find another elf and rinse and repeat. What do you say Rhya?" He looked at him playfully. "How much elves do you think will have to die in front of you before you crack? My mind is saying 5 but my heart is saying 3."
"Y-YOU CAN'T DO THAT!!" Rhya protested.
"Oh? And why is that?!" Grim raised an eyebrow.
"If you hurt him you'll be hurting your comrade as well!"
"Huh?"
"Your comrades aren't gone! They're just being suppressed by the souls of my brethren. They're essentially still in there! If you kill him you'll be killing your magic knight friends!"
[A/n: Pfft! He said friend!! Lol, Rhya really doesn't know anything]
"So if I torture the guy inhabiting Rill's body, I'll be hurting Rill to?"
"Yes." Rhya nodded.
'I won't answer your questions and you can't use Lira to threaten me or else your friend dies as well. I don't care if you're stronger than us, you won't get your way!'
Thinking that everything would work out for them, Rhya didn't expect that Grim's next sentence would throw cold water all over his celebration.
"I didn't think that the first captain I killed would turn out like this, oh well, a captain's a captain."
'WHAT!!'
*Raises sword*
"WAIT WAIT WAIT!!" Rhya panicked seeing Grim about to poke Lira with his sword. "He's your comrade! If Lira gets hurt your friend gets hurt to!"
"So?"
"So?... WHAT DO YOU MEAN SO!! DON'T YOU CARE IF YOUR COMRADE DIES!"
"Compared to the look you'll have on you're face when you see me slit this guy's throat. I'd say its a good trade."
'T-This guy... He isn't lying!' Using his innate lie detector ability, Rhya was terrified to find out that Grim meant every word of what he said.
But just before he could say anything, the left side of the room suddenly exploded open as three elves with angel-like wings on their backs came flying in.
"Hmm, where are we? I thought I sensed Rhya and Lira's man-
"RHYA!!!" One of the evles screamed seeing Rhya and Lira lying on the floor with holes in their chests.
"Oh?" Grim raised his head to look at the newly arrived elves.
*Looks back at Rhya and grins*
"More playmates."
!!!
'T-This guy! I have to stop him before he kills everyone!'
Knowing that there was only one person in the entire base that could stand up to Grim's current power, Rhya grit his teeth and whille Grim was distracted by the three new elves, he used his imitation magic to open up a portal beneath Grim's feet.
"Huh?" Realizing what Rhya was planning, Grim was about to use his beast magic to shred the spatial magic to pieces. But then he suddenly stopped and looked at Rhya with a terrifying grin as he slowly descended into the portal.
Looking at Lira, the three flying elves and then back at Rhya, Grim left behind a single yet soul shaking sentence behind.
"Let the hunt begin."