[The Flame of Conversion temporarily changes into the Flame of Burning Desire.]
"What!? How!?" An orange-haired man rose from his chair and slammed the small tea table he was sitting at with his hands.
"Hehe, she's incredible, isn't she, old man?" A small white fox that was seated across the table facing the handsome man spoke in an excited tone.
"This isn't about her being incredible or something! It should be impossible for her to use an alternate form of mine!" The man exclaimed, clearly still flustered.
However, the small white fox showed nothing. She didn't seem to be bothered at all. Instead, she just wore a faint smile as she looked at the blue flames covering Aurora's body.
Taking a deep breath, the man sat back down behind the table, finally calming down from his previous shock. In the end, he just shook his head helplessly.
"Shinara, you have no idea what monster you have created." He muttered under his breath before falling silent once again.
-----
Back to Aurora, the white fox didn't react at all to the flames that suddenly erupted from her body. There was no emotion on her face, just pure calmness.
As the last of her wounds on her body had healed, she took a deep breath and took her stance once more.
"Right, no more playing around." Aurelius muttered to himself and prepared as well. The next moment, the wolf disappeared from where he stood before.
He appeared back right in front of Aurora, striking downwards with his claw. However, before his attack could even connect and before he could even react, he felt a sudden surge of pain in his abdomen.
*BOOOOOM!*
The pain lasted only a second before the world around him spun as he got sent flying straight into the wall on the other side of the hall. The crash momentarily made his vision go black before coming back.
"Heh, I guess I should really take this seriously now." The wolf laughed out loud, and making use of the wall, he used all his strength and shot out towards Aurora once again.
Even in the face of such a display of power, the small fox remained unfazed. As the wolf came slashing down at her with his claw powered by freezing mana, she easily dodged to the side. Then, she simply brought her claw upwards, sending out a wave of searing blue flames.
The arc of flames moved so quickly that Aurelius barely managed to avoid it, a fiery slash narrowly moving past him. The flames then traveled further, only stopping after colliding with one of the pillars in the room. Faced with the power of those blue flames, the pillar immediately gave in and got blown into pieces.
Aurelius's eyes contracted to the size of needles when he saw what that simple-looking arc of flames could do. If he hadn't dodged in time, he definitely wouldn't have come out uscathed after getting hit by such an attack.
'And to think I would have such a feeling from a being of the first rank. Truly, you have outdone yourself with this one, my lady.' He thought silently, gathering up the mana inside him.
Jumping back, the wolf let his mana run wild before controlling it. The next moment, his mana shot out, creating waves upon waves of ice and frost. The mana formed into sharp ice spikes, heading towards Aurora.
Faced with such an attack, the small fox merely swiped horizontally with her claw, letting out another arc of flames. The flames traveled through the air and then through the ice spikes as if they weren't even there, cutting them apart.
Meanwhile, Aurora herself followed closely behind the flaming slash, closing the createe distance between her and Aurelius in a second. She jumped into the air and quicjly dove down, her left paw outstretched forward.
Of course, seeing his attack fail, Aurelius already expected a counterattack, so he was already out of Aurora's reach. However, he truly didn't expect what came next.
As Aurora's paw connected with the floor of the hall, deep blue ice suddenly erupted from beneath her. The eyes shot upwards towards the ceiling, forming a robust pillar. The most striking part about the pillar was that the ice it was made of seemed to be constantly burning as blue flames coiled around its length.
Aurora, who was on top of the pillar, looked down briefly before she slashed down with her right paw. As soon as her claws dug into the ice, the whole pillar crumbled and exploded into large, flaming chunks of ice that fell down across the hall like meteors.
"Incredible." Aurelius muttered in awe before he quickly shook his head. He couldn't afford to be admiring the sight in front of his eyes, not now.
Some of the ice meteors were already closing in on him, so he needed to react fast if he didn't want to get hit. Even if one meteor wouldn't be able to kill him, it would still at the very least wound him pretty badly.
So, without any hesitation, the wolf jumped towards one of the approaching ice chunks and thrust upwards with both his claws at once. The icy meteor burst into small fragments upon impact with those powerful claws that wielded oposing elements.
*BOOM!*
Aurelius's eyes went wide as he realized his body was suddenly falling towards the ground at breaking speed. Before he could even react, he was already about three meters deep in the ground.
His whole body shook from the sudden impact, some of his bones threatening to break into pieces. Right now, he was feeling a great deal of pain, but he forcefully ignored it all.
Instead, he just jumped back out of the crater created by his body and coughed up a mouthful of blood. Briefly looking around, he saw the chaos that the previously grand hall was thrown into.
Chunks of ice were scattered everywhere around the ground. Flames covered everything inside the hall, and multiple of the pillars that connected the ceiling to the floor were now nowhere to be found.
He didn't ravel in the sight for too long. Without wasting any more time, the wolf's front paws glowed with power, and he once again charged towards the small white fox that was observing him with a neutral face.
The two soon got entangled in a dance of claws. The whole hall—no, the whole palace shook as their clash sent tremors throughout the whole place.
Both of Aurelius's claws were empowered by his mana, his left by ice while his right with fire. Each swing and slash of his claws sent flames and frost flying around the whole room.
On the other hand, both of Aurora's claws were burning with the same bright blue flame that covered her body just a moment ago. All those flames gathered around her claws, and only bits of them remained scattered around her body.
Those blue flames were truly something else. Even the slightest swing of her paw caused the energy condensed inside it to erupt, forming burning ice spikes in its path. The stronger and faster the swing, the more the amount of spikes that appeared increased.
The onslaught of ice that restricted his movements combined with flames that could spread in the blink of an eye truly did a number on Aurelius. Wounds began to slowly appear on his body.
However, the wolf paid none of this any mind. He just continued to attack and dodge to the best of his ability. Still, he couldn't completely avoid all attacks. The absurd thing was that both the ice and the fire were actually able to hurt him despite his high resistance to both elements.
Meanwhile, his attacks simply couldn't reach the body of the small fox. Aurora just elusively avoided all his strikes. Of course, he didn't limit himself to only using physical attacks. If anything, he was probably throwing even more spells and magical attacks than slashes.
Aurelius threw another heavy slash Aurora's way, the surroundings erupting into bright orange flames. By the time his attack landed, Aurora had already moved to a different spot.
Arriving under the large body of the wolf, she aimed her paw upwards, landing an uppercut right under his chin. Then she did a backward flip, the blue flames gathering around her hind leg and cleanly on the wolf's upward-facing head.
The world around Aurelius spun around from the sheer force contained behind both of those strikes, yet even without using his eyes, he jumped away and, by using his tail, sent a wave of flames Aurora's way.
They remained unfazed and simply let the blue flames spread around her, blocking all the incoming fire. Before the two attacks could even cancel each other out, with a sonic boom, Aurora shot forward, appearing in front of Aurelius once again.
By now, the wolf already knew just how the small white fox attacked, so just as she appeared, there was already a large ice spike waiting for her. Of course, he didn't have high hopes of this attack actually hitting. Its purpose was to hopefully slow Aurora down, even if just by a bit.
The wolf's hopes were crushed basically instantly as Aurora just simply crashed through the ice without even slowing down her momentum one bit. Just as the fox appeared before him, his claws were already both on their way to hit her.
The next thing Aurelius saw and felt were his claws hitting a wall of ice so strudy that he could barely even dig into it. As his claws struck the ice and almost broke through it, the wall quickly repaired itself, trapping his front paws inside it.
Right after, Aurelius felt his body flying through the air once again, crashing into one of the few pillars that were still standing. The pillar fell apart the next moment, and with it, the wolf's large body came crashing on the ground as well.
"Heh, you really like throwing me around." Aurelius forced out a smile and got back onto his feet, catching a quick glimpse of what was left of the hall.
If he were to describe the sight before his eyes with just one word, he would say just one thing: destruction. He had never seen the hall that served as his home in such a desolate state.
The special thing about the final floor of the dungeon was its self-repair function. Even in the middle of a battle, this hall could repair itself just by using the mana produced by the dungeon.
"I guess it's really about time I use everything I have. Otherwise, I'll doubt I'll be able to even scratch you, not to mention defeat you." With a small chuckle, the wolf's eyes began to glow, and the faint glow around his body also became brighter.
The patterns all over his fur became even more lively as the fur's colors began to shift and move around. The most striking part about this transformation was the complete change in his body that now became slightly transparent.
It was at this moment that Aurora finally received the message that has yet to appear.
[The final boss of the dungeon appears before you. The Spirit Wolf of Polarity, Aurelius Borealis, appears!]
This is where the real battle against the final guardian of this tomb begins. All that happened up until now was only a prelude to the true battle.
As if they could read each other's minds, both Aurora and Aurelius shot out towards the middle of the hall's remains, meeting midway. It happened just then.
*BOOOOOOM!!!*
An explosion so strong and loud that it made all the previous explosions look like a joke occurred from the clash of the two beings. The shockwave produced by the explosion was so strong that it destroyed anything that got in its way.
Ice, flames, parts of the hall, even the walls got blown into bits. Nothing remained, only the empty cosmic space that the two found themselves in.
Before the shockwave could even spread further, some kind of invisible wall stopped it in its tracks.
Meanwhile, right after the clash, both Aurora and Aurelius got sent flying in the opposite directions, stabilizing themselves once their feet landed on the nonexistent floor.
"Unbelievable. Even in my true spiritual form, I can merely match your power. Truly incredibly." Aurelius said, and even if the voice he let out wasn't too loud, it easily spread throughout the empty space.
Yet, even after it reached Aurora's ears, she showed nothing. The only thing that could be seen in her face was the same calmness and indifference as before.
The true battle had only just begun.