"Why did you interrupt my play, uncle? Perhaps, you want to join us?!"
The boy dusted off his cloak and riveted his eyes at the sewed-up stance of Takashi. He started walking towards him with each step increasing the intensity of coercion.
"You are an unrefined, uncultured, and discourteous bastard, uncle!"
He said with the same unblemished and gracious smile. He opened up his elbow horizontally to the ground, with the front oblique of the palm facing towards the ground.
"Barbaric uncle needs to be punished!"
He clenched his fists and consorted his palm up as if pulling something out with pure extortion.
'It will not be that easy, I guess.' Takashi thought while reprieving in the same stance, opened up arms with the palms placed vertically to the ground, toward the sky.
Suddenly, the sky brimmed with red blood all over, promulgating from the dead bodies.
"Aaaaaaarrrrggghhhhh!!"
"Eh, what happened?!"
"This is…."
"Something is happening with his body!"
Unanticipated, the ones who were just slightly injured or far from the risk of vulnerability fell one after another. The blood was being extracted from the small and invisible cuts from their bodies, all agglomerating together in the air like a giant sphere. They did not leave even the sea kings, as most of the percentage was being contrived by their monstrous bodies.
A few moments later, Takashi realized the situation was getting out of his hands. Finally, he adjourned his posture firmly and joined both the ends of the palm together with a strong dynamic force.
"Pyro Sanctum!!"
Takashi shouted as he joined the ends of his palms. A substantial magnitude of yellow flare gushed from between his palms, covering the entire region, where the crowd was, under a semi-spherical barrier.
Connections from the outside were fissured and the blood absorption was gridlocked.
"This is not right! I haven't given you the permission to play with me!"
The boy folded his fingers inside and clenched his fists tightly and pointed it towards the giant sphere of blood.
At that moment, the enormous sphere discharged a manifold of fumes around it. As the smoke dissipated, a diamond shaped red crystal, with the same height as before but in a condensed form, revealed itself.
"If you can take this head-on, I will play with you, okay?!"
The large crystal was pushed against the barrier as the boy pivoted downwards with his clenched fists.
"Damn it!! This kid is out of his mind. Is there even any possibility that I could survive such an attack?!"
Takashi said, as he dispensed more energy to provide a better durability to the barrier.
"Are we gonna die?!"
"No, that's not possible! We have this barrier to protect us!"
"But…"
"That thing seems much more intimidating to trust on our lucks."
"True, but just close your eyes and clamp your ears in case."
'I didn't expect it at all. A few moments ago, there were thousands of people roaming and now they have inclined to mere hundreds. My already dead mana is getting depleted at an unbelievable speed. I wonder how long will I last?!'
Takashi was anxious. It was not because of the incoming attack or the boy in front of him. He was feeling burdened by the counts of deaths and the number of life he was gambling with right now. The pressure was extreme and was pestering Takashi.
At last, the crystal struck the surface of the barrier, producing a preposterous amount of spark and smoke all around.
The ground trembled and shuddered with an immense intensity, completely shaking off everything around the barrier.
The impact and the percussion that was being produced because of the collision blew away all the shops and trees away, annihilating them. Deep fractures and fissures appeared withing the walls of the houses nearby, a living den for the survivors.
Everyone lost their mind, with many losing their consciousness and the others using the various objects to protect themselves.
"Keugh…Aaaaaugh!!!"
The moment Takashi opened his mouth to scream, what spilled forth was no shriek, but a clump of blood.
The implausible pressure over the barrier was crushing Takashi's guts. He vomited up large quantities of his lifeblood as he coughed. His knees were crushed, but he was still struggling to maintain the shield. He had already depleted all his mana and was preserving the barrier with his life force.
No matter how experienced, he was not strong enough to unlock the full potential of his own life-force since it's something hazardous. A body always acts on reflexes and currently Takashi's body was acting against it, which was also weakening the barrier.
Within his dim field of view, he saw the instigator, the boy, looking at him with intriguing eyes and a meddlesome smile.
'Ah, shit! I am losing consciousness. Everything's over if I fall here right now. I know that… I know that, but… I can't take anymore.'
Takashi finally lost his will to fight and unbuckled his control a little but quickly replenished and pushed the barrier against the Crystal.
'I can't take it anymore… but… but' He thought in his mind and poised up on his broken knees.
"But, I don't want to die!!!!" He yammered and stood up on his feet while negating the effect of the crystal.
The cascade of the mana elevated, and the outflow of the flare incremented through his palms. He wasn't sure of what or from where this energy was accessing from but he realized its side effects soon after.
Mollified armor and burnt clothes were enough of a heat but it didn't stop there. Takashi was completely naked, currently engulfed by the reddish-yellow flame which was blistering his skin, lynching his fresh flesh out. His eyes were burning out because of the flare oozing out through the gaps of his body.
Willpower is not genetic. It requires the will to resist, and a power of a resolved mind. Unknowingly, his willpower to not die had opened the door to Takashi's life force, the pure essence.
Takashi had lost his consciousness and left everything up to his burning body. The connection between the brain and the body was severed, and it started acting haphazardly.
The impact of the crystal had calmed down since a large chump of it was already evaporating.
The people inside the barrier looked at Takashi. Many started weeping, but there were those who were getting scared after looking at his appearance.
"Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaarrrrrghhhhhhhhhhh!!!" Takashi screamed and increased the flow of flare to an unbelievable amount, which quickly evaporated the rest of the crystal, completely negating the impact.
Fissures appeared on the barrier, which soon turned into heavy fractures and it broke into pieces.
The burning body of Takashi dissipated its flare, and the red burnt flesh emerged under the fumes.
The boy, who was looking at all this with utter curiosity, finally looked at Takashi with deadpan gaze and unhinged his black cloak from his back.
He started walking towards him while pointing his palm towards the burnt Takashi.
"Play time is over now, uncle!!"
He tilted his head, contracted his eyeballs, with an aura stronger than ever, he clenched his fists with a malicious smile on his face.