The colonel was out of breath as this series of attack took more than half of his energy reserve. The energy around the creature dissipated and to everyone's dismay, the creature was still alive. The Colonel was disappointed but he was not surprised. Arachnes are known for low mobility and high defense. However, he hoped that he could kill it with his ultimate combo since it was weakened due to the mist not being dense enough.
The only positive thing was that despite the fact that he failed to kill the creature, it seemed to be badly injured. The durability of its body defense was very low and it even had to use up a lot of mist energy to create magical shields so as to take less damage from the Colonel's attack. The squad members realized this and immediately pounced on the Arachne to take advantage of this situation. Many close combat warriors used their elemental attributes to propel themselves towards the creature while the mages started attacking from distance.
Hidden from the eyes of everyone, the boy in the sphere started reacting strongly. His body released mist energy and the sphere around him exploded. The Colonel turned around in shock as he did not detect any mist energy from him earlier. This sudden explosion also caught the attention of those fighting the Arachne as they sensed the mist energy of an intermediate level mist creature from their backlines. This small second of inattention was all the Arachne needed. It went berserk and like an injured beast, it started attacking like a maniac. It trampled over many close combat fighters, killing them instantly. Adrian immediately backed away so as not to get caught up in its rampage. The Colonel noticed that the mist energy from the boy seemed to be provoking the Arachne. But he did not have the time to keep considering this idea. He flashed forward twice and enhanced his fist with fire energy and prepared himself to punch the head of the Arachne so as to attract agro.
But the beast ignored him. It went straight past the Colonel and rushed towards those hiding behind him. Realizing that a punch would not suffice to attract agro, and even less to deal significant damage to such a creature, Colonel Xino used his earth attribute to halt the movements of the Arachne by casting 2m long and wide earth walls. However, the mist creature was heavily disturbed by the mist energy emitted by the young boy and rushed towards him, running against the earth walls and breaking them. The monster lost balance and paused for a while. The Colonel seized this opportunity to use the broken pieces of the earth walls to trap the legs of the creature. Many used this opportunity to charge the creature. The Colonel charged lightning in one hand and fire in the other. Albeit, he realized that his attack would not reach in time. Although it would deal massive damage to the creature as it was in a vulnerable state, he had to cancel it. It was charging a massive amount of energy and preparing to unleash it onto the incoming soldiers. He immediately flashed in front of his squad and shouted," Shields up. Now!"
He himself casted a massive earth wall in front of his squad. However, since it was long, it lacked in thickness, thereby making it less durable. The Arachne was now in a lunatic state and went all out. Its mist energy depleted extremely quickly but it didn't care. It let out an insanely huge amount of poisonous spider webs which melted the defensive walls the Colonel casted and easily went through the magical shields the soldiers casted. The Colonel realized that their defense would not be enough and he took a group of soldiers with him and flashed out of the way. Some followed his lead and did the same but many failed to do so and got destroyed by the poisonous spider webs. The Arachne didn't lose any time and continued to rush towards the boy emitting huge amounts of mist energy. The soldiers knocked the boy out, immediately ceasing his exertion of the energy.
Upon seeing this, the Arachne became frantic and started screeching even louder. It appeared to have gone completely mad. This provided enough time for the Colonel to deliver the final blow. He activated one of his bloodline limit abilities and casted Seal of the Grim Reaper. This seal is extremely powerful but it has many conditions (one of which being that the target must have lower energy than the caster) before it can be casted and there is also a chance of it not working if the enemy has enough vitality left.
A giant grim reaper like creature appeared and used its scythe to cut through the creature. The scythe went through it but did not deal physical damage. It sealed the energy of the Arachne in a single clean sweep as the creature was too weak to fight back. It overexerted itself during the last attack and did not have any strength left. The creature slowly evaporated and disappeared and its energy lingered in the air and the Colonel finished the sealing by sealing the energy in an energy scroll.
The soldiers immediately felt a huge weight being lifted from their shoulders. They felt relieved that this creature was finally killed. After a brief pause, the twenty one remaining soldiers finally started cheering and celebrating their victory. Although the fight did not last that long, it was definitely intense, dangerous and felt longer than it really was. After letting his squad relax for a brief moment, Colonel Xino ordered them to bury the bodies of the 7 dead soldiers. The procedure was grim and solemn. However, they did not have much time as the Colonel felt the need to return back to main camp as quickly as possible. He walked to the boy to pick him up but he immediately felt a familiar energy coming off from his body, an energy almost identical to the one Articus used to instill mana messages in living and inanimate bodies.
Articus has a very unique ability. Most soldiers had to convert mana into other elements such as fire or water to be able to make use of this energy. However, Articus could control mana itself. One of his unique abilities was the ability to engrave mana messages into nearly all bodies. Colonel Xino was used to deciphering those messages as Articus and him were very close friends at the Royal College of Magic.
Noticing this, he immediately carried the boy in one of the tents and shouted, "Get ready to leave. We will retreat back to the camp in one hour." Most of the mist energy surrounding them has been absorbed by the Arachne and the low level mistborns so they had nothing to be afraid of but Colonel Xino did not want any unexpected events to occur again.
In the tent, Colonel Xino proceeded to read the mana engravings left in the body of the young boy by Articus. He injected his own mana over the barrier covering the mana engravings. The protective layer immediately burned with blue flames and the message left out finally appeared. Letters floated in the air over the body of the sleeping boy. This method is actually more secure than in seems. To figure out that there are mana messages in a body, one must be used to the mana frequency of the messenger or the messages may go unnoticed. Furthermore, injecting more than the required amount of mana to decipher the message can easily burn the message itself.
Xino, I hope that you are the one seeing this message. I teleported this boy near Yemana Village. I knew you would be around there at this point in time. I rescued him from CVX under the orders of General Ryak. The kid was being used in mist experiments. You need to hide him from the military, especially from that snake Ryak. I am certain that he and other branches of the military are secretly working with those terrorists from CVX. I don't know what their purpose is. Hide the kid Xino. By the time you read this, I may be dead. Goodbye.
The message was short and concise. Mana messages could not be very long. So, the messenger had to convey the most amount of information in a small number of words.
Colonel Xino was shocked to say the least. But he had no time to waste. It will be tricky to make this boy disappear. His mist energy which he must have developed during the experiments has led the epic tier Arachne to his squad. Moreover, now that nine members have died and many have seen the mist energy explosion of the young boy, it will be impossible to hide his existence.