My Elder Tree Revenant didn't wait for an invitation. He immediately hammered the Kobold King with a wooden branch, and then slammed his roots down on the desperately ducking wolf beast. He wasn't able to completely avoid the blows and found himself laid low by the wood type attacks. My Elder Tree Revenant, which I decided to christen Da Shu (which funnily enough was homophonic with Uncle, even though the characters used were literally Big Tree), continued launching attack after attack, pummeling the Kobold King to the ground.
He didn't bother using ghost type attacks like Shadow Claw or Phantom Force because he knew they wouldn't be very effective against a Dark type spirit beast like the Kobold King. Indeed, he spun around and kicked Da Shu back. The Elder Tree Revenant reacted with another flailing slam, but the Kobold King countered with a night slash that was super effective, dealing incredible damage to the usually sturdy Da Shu.
As Da Shu staggered, the Kobold King pounced to deliver what might prove to be the decisive blow, but Myria swiftly intercepted him. Her water whip sword lanced out and lashed from multiple directions simultaneously, slashing and cutting shallowly into his dark fur. The Kobold King snarled despite the superficial injuries, spinning about and weaving through the snaking water whips and evading as best as he could. He swiped away a few of them, breaking them apart into a mist of water droplets, before he stomped on the ground where Myria was. She rolled away and then parried the follow up kick with her sword before being hurled back.
Before the Kobold King could pursue the now vulnerable Atlantean princess, I intervened with my own swords, slashing him across the back. he roared in fury and spun around to kick me, but I ducked under his sweeping leg while leaving a few cuts across his outstretched limb. He swung his leg down to crush me, but I dove to the side, narrowly escaping death. The Kobold King whirled about to track my position, only to be forced to duck his head under a sweeping blow from Da Shu's huge branch.
He planted his foot back on the ground, the nails digging deeply into the bark, regained his balance by spreading his legs out and bending his knees slightly to lower his center of gravity, and then rammed an elbow into the center of Da Shu's trunk, where the solar plexus would normally be for a humanoid organism. The Elder Tree Revenant folded and stumbled back, almost unable to withstand that blow.
The Kobold King followed up with another turn and kick, but Myria's water whip curled around his leg, binding it. She yanked it back and he staggered, almost toppling over, but instead he gracefully cartwheeled and placed both palms firmly on the ground before spinning around and pulling the stunned Myria off her feet.
Fortunately, she was able to disperse the fluid coils of her water whip and retract her sword, allowing her to flip in midair and land on a nearby tree before the Kobold King could rip her head off with his other clawed foot. I could see crimson blurs as the glowing nails tore through the air at incredible speed.
He hopped back to his feet and lunged at the retreating Myria, but Da Shu and I attacked from opposite flanks. The Kobold King landed on the ground, halting his momentum with impressive skill, and then whirled around to parry both my swords and Da Shu's hammer blow. Fortunately, Da Shu wasn't done, and his roots unfurled to kick the Kobold King in the gut and dropped him to his knees. He growled and emanated a dark pulse that knocked both me and Da Shu back. Even though I successfully blocked the blow with both of my swords, Da Shu suffered much worse damage because he was a ghost type spirit beast and that made him weak to dark type attacks.
This wasn't good. I gulped and stabbed Azure Dragon to the ground, drawing Obsidian Drake to fire Azure Frost at the Kobold King before he could pounce on the fallen Da Shu and finish him off. As expected, he spun around and swatted the arrow away, only to have his entire limb frozen solid. Even so, he simply shattered the ice that encased his arm with a single flex.
"It's useless," he snarled. "You cannot defeat me!"
"We'll see about that," I replied. "Da Shu, Ingrain!"
My Elder Tree Revenant wasn't defeated yet. Far from it. Instead, he stood back up and rooted himself firmly into the bark of the World Tree, absorbing the rich nutrients and drawing upon the dense mana that saturated Yggdrasil. The Kobold King whirled around to glower at Da Shu when he saw that he was rapidly recovering from the wounds he sustained earlier from the fight.
"No way! Impossible!"
It wasn't long before Da Shu fully healed, but the Kobold King wasn't stupid enough to stand and watch. He launched himself at my Elder Tree Revenant, emitting a dark pulse and getting ready to execute night slash, but he found himself yanked back by a water whip that curled around his ankle. While he turned to cut the water whip into droplets, I struck him with a barrage of arrows right in the face. He snarled and swatted the volley away, catching a second Azure Frost arrow that turned into a freezing nova.
As usual, he spent a few seconds shattering the ice, but it was more than enough for Da Shu to recover and get back into the fight. The Kobold King reflexively whirled around to parry the next hammer blow, the wood splinters digging into his fur, before he was sent flying. Even so, he flipped himself in midair and crunched his feet against the trunk of a nearby tree before launching himself back into the fight.
Myria and I combined our water and ice techniques into a freezing fountain that trapped the Kobold King in an exquisite sculpture of frost. Black mana crackled around him and detonated destructively, flinging broken frost all over, but he was too slow to avoid another attack from Da Shu, which slammed him against the ground. He grunted and rolled away, kicking off and putting as much distance between himself and Da Shu as possible. The Elder Tree Revenant attempted to pursue, but he paused and took a step back, realizing the deep gash that the Kobold King had somehow left on his trunk during his withdrawal.
"It's useless," the King Kobold insisted with a sneer as he straightened himself. "It doesn't matter how quickly your Elder Tree Revenant heals itself. A ghost type spirit beast like it will always be weak to my attacks, especially since I have a high affinity with the dark element!"
He bared his drooling fangs gleefully, looking triumphant despite his tattered cloak and torn leather vestments that used to be his royal garb.
"And given that the Elder Tree Revenant is your ace in the hole, being the only Earth ranked combatant among you, once I destroy it, you two Mystic ranked warriors will be doomed. And don't count on your Earth ranked Abyssal Hydra to come over in time. The Raven Guard might only be Mystic ranked, but they are more than enough to keep that blundering beast tied up for a long time."
He was right. Hei Ba had killed a few more Raven Guard, their armored corpses laying crushed and mangled at his feet, but the rest continued to hack and slash at him with their chainsaw like swords and lightning claws, darting through his weaving heads and making use of their superiority agility to overcome the vast disparity in strength.
For all of Hei Ba's superior power, it counted for nothing if he couldn't get a clean hit in. And the elite Raven Guard knew that.
In contrast, the Kobold King was uncannily swift, matching both Myria and my speed. I would have summoned my Titan Golem to help us, but he was too slow and cumbersome. The Kobold King would run circles around him. Even though Da Shu was vulnerable to his dark type attacks, he had the speed and power to land the critical hits needed to see us through victory. Myria and I just needed to protect him long enough for him to continue pummeling the Kobold King until enough damage accumulated to overwhelm his healing factor.
But the Kobold King was cunning and he saw through our strategy. He sprinted toward Da Shu, unleashing a series of crimson slashes that blurred through the air and left disturbing trails of demonic light. Myria and I couldn't make it in time, and Da Shu staggered from the barrage.
"Damn it!" I raised my bow, even though I knew my arrows wouldn't have any effect. But I couldn't do nothing!
Fortunately, help arrived from an unexpected quarter. Before the Kobold King could reach Da Shu, spirit swords rained down on him and impaling him. He howled in pain and rage as he was pinned to the ground, writhing in agony as he attempted to free himself. He managed to, but a dazzling flash of light descended upon him, looking almost like shooting stars that bombarded and detonated against his body. lunar rays continued to pummel the shrieking Kobold King, leaving horrendous injuries across his torso and limbs.
He jerked and crumpled to the ground, and despite still being in the presence of moonlight, his healing factor was clearly no longer working as effectively and rapidly as before. He groaned and lifted his head in disbelief.
"What…?"
"If you're a dark type spirit beast, then it follows that you're weak to fairies' attacks!" Silvia proclaimed proudly, stepping forward with her hands on her hips. "You're no match for us!"
"I will not allow you to hurt Jun Wen, Myria or any of our spirit beast friends," Sylvie declared next to her younger sister. Both of them had their glittering wings spread out behind them as they wielded the full power of their newly set up spirit arrays to shower destruction upon the now vulnerable Kobold King.
"Uh, I don't think there's such a thing as a fairy type attack," I muttered, but Silvia laughed and waved dismissively.
"Don't mind the little details!"
"We're just using advanced spirit arrays to draw the power from the ley lines and dragon veins spread throughout Yggdrasil, which is why our spells now have immense firepower," Sylvie explained, as serious and earnest as ever.
"You two…!" The Kobold King's eyes widened when he caught sight of their wings. "You are fairies!" His blood red gaze darted toward me. "I never imagined that you would also be able to summon one of the Ultimate Species!"
"What's with this ultimate species nonsense?" I facepalmed. "This isn't Beast Tamer, for heaven's sake!"
"This is impossible!" The Kobold King snarled in disbelief. "Even if you are fairies, who are rumored to be the most proficient in magic among the ultimate species, you're both only at Mystic ranked at best! You can't be capable of dealing this much damage to me, even if a dark type spirit beast like me is weak to fairies!"
"Again, stop the ultimate species nonsense, and the fairy element doesn't exist. This is reality, not a pocket monster game, and also not a light novel series with an anime adaptation."
Everyone ignored me. Instead, Sylvie was polite enough to answer the Kobold King's doubts.
"It's because you gave us too much time to prepare. The advantage of deploying spirit arrays is that they don't really depend on the cultivation realm of both parties involved. We can make up for the difference between our strength and that of the target by tapping into the natural energies of the world around us. Of course, the disadvantage is that we actually need the time and resources to set everything up. But because you were occupied with fighting, we had more than enough time to prepare whatever spirit arrays that are necessary."
"You underestimated big bro and big sis Myria, as well as big bro's spirit beast friends." Silvia grinned gleefully. "You thought they couldn't win, but they bought us the time required to secure victory."
With that, both sisters weaved more arcane runes in the air with their hands, bombarding the howling Kobold King with a fresh wave of meteoric lights and spirit swords. Blood dribbled from his gnashing jaws as he flailed about, forcing his body off the ground and ripping off the spirit swords that pierced through him with a single violent jerk.
"Like hell I'll lose to you fairies!"
He hurled himself forward, only for Long Wang to grab his head and slam him into the ground. Seconds later, Da Shu and I joined him, with my Elder Tree Revenant hammering him on one side and me stabbing the Kobold King on the opposite flank. He howled and writhed once more, only to have his chin crushed onto the ground by another blow from Long Wang.
My dragon butler had certainly bidden his time, waiting for this precise moment to launch a decisive strike. As his current strength was still capped at peak Mystic rank because of my own weakness, he had been assigned to protect Sylvie and Silvia from the shadows. Now that the Kobold King threatened the fairy sisters, he found himself ambushed right at the moment his guard was down.
"You…!" He spat, blood frothing through his lupine lips, as he stared up at Long Wang in astonishment. His eyes turned round like saucers. "That aura…you're a dragon?! So that kid has made a contract with more than one type of Ultimate Species?!"
Long Wang's lip curled. "My lord is right. You've been watching too much Beast Tamer."
"Why is a proud dragon like you serving under a mere human?"
"Honestly?" Long Wang shrugged. "Because I lost to him in combat, and so he earned my servitude. Also, as I got to know him over the last couple of years or so, I've grown quite fond of him. I look forward to seeing what heights he would ascend to."
He then smirked and punched his claws through the Kobold King's skull, the lethal blades lancing straight into his brain.
"I'm sorry, but you're simply a stepping stone for my lord."