The Mechataur retracted his robotic arm from the white wall of the combat space and turned to look threateningly at Seunghyuk, leaving a huge crater on the wall just with its fist.
The magnitude of the attack was a huge shock to Seunghyuk, which replaced all the confidence in Seunghyuk's heart with fear. The Mechataur was not tired out from the big attack it unleashed at all, and continued to hunt Seunghyuk down without even needing to take a breather.
Seunghyuk watched as the Mechataur nears him motionlessly, while the King sat in the main room looking at Seunghyuk's misery through the cameras smiling to himself thinking: He should be dead by now, he would not be able to complete this task anyway.
Seunghyuk continued dashing around the huge combat space with his Nighthowler form, avoiding the Mechataur's horrifying attacks like a small ant trying to outrun a man's finger. Seunghyuk knew the task was going to be difficult, but not of such an impossible difficulty, and now he finally understood fully why the King had to use a Conqueror Magic Enhancement Weapon in order to destroy the Mechataur. Though it all started to make sense to Seunghyuk, that connection he had made was of no use at all to him, the Mechataur still continued to throw punches with the strength of grenades and barely missing Seunghyuk.
"This god damn machine!" Seunghyuk muttered under his breath as he slide right under the Mechataur's legs with insane speed, flipping backwards as he stretched out both his arms and his claws were wedged into the Mechataur's back, "Damn it, why won't you budge!"
Seunghyuk immediately used his skill Short-Fused Explosion to explosively increase his stat points by five.
"Conqueror's Name: Choi Seunghyuk (Male) (Leader of Legendclad)
Conqueror's Level: 4
Strength: 22 (raised by 5)
Agility: 22 (raised by 5)
Defense: 22 (raised by 5)
MP: 22 (raised by 5)
Skills: Short-Fused Explosion (1 out of 5 stars)
Eye of Detection (2 out of 5 stars)
Heart of Cold Steel (2 out of 5 stars)
Ancient Language Comprehension (1 out of 5 stars)
Snake Of Ophiuchus (2 out of 5 stars)
Dancing With Fire (3 out of 5 stars)
Nighthowling (0 out of 5 stars)
Charm (0 out of 5 stars)"
"Urghhhh!" Seunghyuk worked every single muscle in his arms and with his upgraded strength, he forced his arm strength together with his body weight down on his claws, successfully pushing his claws downwards as it cuts a small piece of the Mechataur's back out, but it seemed to do nothing.
"MRRRRRNNNN!" The Mechataur roared like a bull that had a broken radio stuck in its throat, sounding out a mechanical and aggressive "moo" that rang in Seunghyuk's ears painfully.
The mechanical bull looked like it was done with having fun and rushed aggressively forward like Seunghyuk was wrapped in complete red. The ground started to vibrate with every heavy footstep of the Mechataur, then the bull leapt forward, doing his first attack by throwing out a threatening fist which shot towards Seunghyuk like a rocket at maximum speed.
Seunghyuk had absolutely no time to react.
The Mechataur's fist forcefully met with Seunghyuk's chest and sent all the nerves in Seunghyuk's body screaming in pain like Seunghyuk's entire body was dipped into River Styx for a quick, painful wash. The cracking of internal bones were audible right after, then Seunghyuk let out a throaty shout as blood started to build up in his mouth as it flew out when Seunghyuk was sent dashing backwards and knocking into the white wall of the combat space, painting the patch of white red.
Seunghyuk had dealt more than one attack on the mechanical, nightmarish creature, but just one punch from it had dealt damage tenfold to that of what Seunghyuk had dealt. Seunghyuk felt helplessness again, and this time, like many other times, he tried to combat helplessness with anger and determination, but not even a single bit of energy was rushing into his limbs.
"Damn it...If only you were alive, I could scan your combat...Wait..." Seunghyuk choked on his own words as more blood shot out of his mouth like a blood fountain and he immediately felt his throat aching like something was punching the inside of his throat intensely, "This pain is...is...is nothing..."
Seunghyuk tried to send energy to the top of his body and forced his head to tilt upwards, stating at the hulking Mechataur which just stood there, preparing for another dangerous set of attacks. Willing his lifeless eyes to rekindle with light again, Seunghyuk bit his lips hard to keep himself conscious, then moved his lips apart to try to speak.
"System: Us...Use Eye...Of...Of...Detec...tection..." Seunghyuk forced those words out as information jumped right in front of Seunghyuk, but he was in no state to read and analyse the information given, instead, Seunghyuk looked around the Mechataur's whole body structure and forced his brain to stay awake and think of any weaknesses that came to his mind.
All of a sudden, the Mechataur rushed forward once more, not giving Seunghyuk any chance to stand up and defend the attack. It was never human in the first place, so mercy was not in the Mechataur's dictionary from the very start. Seunghyuk's brain ran at superhuman speed since his brain was now the deciding factor of Seunghyuk's life and death. Seunghyuk had adrenaline rushing all over his body like a long snake slithering around his veins. At that moment, Seunghyuk's eyes saw circles of red pop up on the approaching Mechataur's body, and with the speed that the brain was processing information then, Seunghyuk immediately went in without much thought, using the hysterical strength that he was given in the heat of the moment.
All of that happened in less than a second, it was like Seunghyuk manipulated time but the truth was just that when Seunghyuk was pushed to the edge of a cliff, he would be forced to think of all possible ways to survive, so even if Seunghyuk was not a Conqueror but just an ordinary human, he was pushed past the limits of a human.
"ARGHHHHHH!" Seunghyuk's eyes filtered out everything else except for that red circle that evidently indicated the Mechataur's weak area, so Seunghyuk shouted out and exerted all the remaining strength in his body to drive his claw through that weak area.
The claws touched on, the claws sinked in, the class went through.
Seunghyuk immediately pulled out his claws after that lethal attack to the Mechataur, stopping the mechanical bull's attacks and sent it doubling back instead. The energy levels was still high and way above ordinary levels in Seunghyuk's body at that current moment, moreover, seeing that the Mechataur was only slightly worn out but still had fight in it, Seunghyuk dashed forward again like his body's fatigue had vanished into thin air temporarily.
Seunghyuk conjured fire in his palms even with the state of a Nighthowler, and he let the fire build up as he dashed forward towards the angered Mechataur, then blasting it forward like two flashing lightning of flames that struck the Mechataur completely. The Mechataur that had the upper hand earlierwas immediately put to a stop, being unable to retaliate under Seunghyuk's nonstop attacks.
"SERPENS CAPUT STRENGTHEN!" Seunghyuk hollered out at the top of his lungs after he summoned out the Snake of Ophiuchus, turning its head to solid, hard gold, and using his fingers, Seunghyuk directed the snake forward like a bullet soaring through the air, piercing through the Mechataur's same weak point once more, hitting the nail on the head.
"AHHHHH!" Seunghyuk summoned a tornado in between his palms, letting it spin at an extremely high speed that the spinning action of the flame was not visible any longer, then coordinating with the Snake of Ophiuchus's attack, Seunghyuk threw out the brutal tornado of flames, burning up the whole combat space while the Snake of Ophiuchus continued to damage the Mechataur from every single angle.
The extreme heat had slightly melted the external covering of the Mechataur, but it was unable to melt fully due to the high-grade materials used in building the Mechataur, but it was more than enough. Seunghyuk put his claws together and leapt forward, twisting his body midair as he drove forward like a drill, piercing a hole through the Mechataur's body.
The fire then spread over and covered the Mechataur, because of the reason that the fire could not extinguish not escape, the huge oxygen in the enclosed air fueled the fire like kerosene was thrown into it. The Mechataur by then, was completely destroyed and toasted head to toe until it was basically only recognisable due to its three-metre height.
Seunghyuk had won the battle and completed the task, but he had also burned himself in the result, letting out his own fire and letting it burn himself. Everything sounded so ironic, so stupid even, that one would let something of their own hurt himself, but Seunghyuk had absolutely no other choice.
When Seunghyuk had started to lose consciousness due to the lack of oxygen and the intense heat accompanied with the fire burning up his Nighthowler fur, his body slowly shapeshifted back into the form of a human while his eyes weakly shut. The final thought echoing in his brain was: I did it.
"Turn on the Gas Absorbing Machine and dispose of the Mechataur while bringing the contestant to the infirmary! Tend to the contestant's wounds!" Duke Travessle ordered his men immediately after the result was clear, and he quickly went on to announce to the royal members that have watched until their jaws have lost its muscles, "Well, royal members of the kingdom of Arkawarenia, as you can see clearly, the first task was completed. Even though he had fallen, the task given was to defeat the Mechataur, and the contestant had done so...Without any Conqueror Magic Enhancement weapons or artefacts."
The royal members all nodded their heads in deep thoughts as they started to write something on their thick booklets which seemed to contain records of all previous contestants from ten whole years ago till now. Everyone was contented that the result turned out positively, even Duke Travessle, but amongst all that gladness, there had to be a strong feeling of animosity and dissatisfaction that stuck out like a sore thumb.
"Choi Seunghyuk...You're not going to get the throne! I do not care how competent you are, but the throne is mine, and forever it will continue to remain that way."
With just one throne and a title of the King, it had threw the whole Kingdom into a big, irreparable mess.