The three men weren't sure about what happened, but they related his sudden scream to a hidden injury that he had.
They had been pretty shocked when a little kid that they thought they could end in a matter of seconds fought with them for over ten minutes.
And that was with all the injuries he had accumulated.
'He's a monster,' the swordsman thought grimly as he stepped forward and raised his sword, but then he felt the air around him change, as if it had become denser. The feeling was extremely unpleasant and suffocating.
So much that it made him drop his sword and try his hardest to breathe in as his eyes bulged from their sockets.
'S-such ov-verbear-ing aura!'
He was the strongest of the three, so he didn't think the others had it any better. As he tried to look for the reason for this sudden change, his eyes were drawn to the monster's motionless and bloody figure.
He spotted terrifying fluctuations that should have never belonged to a fourteen-year-old erupt out of Luan every single second.
He fell to his knees with bloodshot eyes and asked himself.
'Am I going to die like this? From nothing but the aura of a little kid I could've ended with my own hands?!'
Meanwhile, Luan, the monster in question, was going through an entirely different ordeal.
Once he had the thought of abandoning all reason, an overwhelming aura surged from the austere blade in his hand.
An overbearing voice that seemed to come from ancient times resounded in his mind, causing his head to feel like there were thousands of augmented sledgehammers slamming on his consciousness
"Pathetic."
"Huh?" a voice asked, it bore a striking similarity to Luan's own voice, but it sounded much more… abysmal.
"Huh?" The ancient voice replied reflexively, flustered. Then it spoke again, many times louder with unbridled rage in its voice.
"I am the spirit of the great Mal'hakan! How dare you not be in subservience in my presence?!
"I once fought alongside the hero of the seven continents, Berak!
"I order you, bo–"
"Shut it," the voice replied. "You are asking me the question I should be asking.
Then, the swordsman who was about to collapse from the overbearing aura suddenly felt it disappear, enabling him to breathe.
He sighed in relief and looked around, finding the spearman unconscious and the axe wielder in the same state as him.
"Let's end this farce. The kid has revealed itself to be a–"
The words suddenly got stuck in his throat as he felt a wave of serenity wash over him. Except that along with this wave came a force of suppression of a thousand oceans.
They didn't notice, but the forest around them rustled and bent towards Luan's motionless body. As for the animals, they scampered to their senses and burrows and lay down, whimpering, shivering.
Mal'hakan's voice became stifled as he felt the aura of a being countless times more powerful than his wash over him, threatening the very foundations of his existence.
"H–how… what is… what is a deity doing in the body of a mortal?!
"Wait… I know you… the Lord of the Abyss??? I thought you were kil–"
"Begone!"
Along with the single word, the powers of the Abyss surged. The aether that held the particles of the voice's existence was eaten up, the path of nether that led to the underworld was devoured, and the soul was extinguished.
Mal'hakan was destroyed.
The Lord of the Abyss glanced at the outside world through the eyes of Luan and muttered.
"I won't be able to help you much, but I shall grant you two things…"
The pressure weighing on the humans disappeared, and when their eyes opened, they saw Luan.
He had also just woken up.
The swordsman was the first to react as he grabbed his sword and drove it towards Luan's belly.
There wasn't much distance between them, which meant that for someone of Luan's skill level, he would have no way to avoid it.
At least, that was before.
Now though, things were different.
Luan pivoted on his right foot, making the sword brush past his belly harmlessly, then he clamped the sword between his left arm and his ribs, surprising the swordsman.
Luan didn't know how, but he knew that he would lose his left arm if he didn't make his next move.
Therefore, his left foot stomped the ground, pushing strength to his right arm which held the blade. With the strength delivered, he brought the pommel of the sword down on the skin between the swordsman's thumb and index finger, making him let his sword go in pain.
Without taking a moment to breathe, Luan's right foot propelled him forward and the austere blade in his hand flashed once.
He only exhaled the breath he had been holding when he was bathed in the blood that erupted from the swordsman's neck like a fountain.
The swordsman's head rolled across the ground with an expression of shock frozen on his face.
The swordsman was dead.
Then, he locked gazes with the axe wielder who was rooted on the spot. When his gaze met Luan's, he snapped out of his daze, but it was too late.
Half the length of the austere blade had already penetrated his throat.
With a look of shock and indignation in his eyes, the axe wielder went to his knees before collapsing to the side.
He was dead.
Luan walked up to the corpse and tugged at the blade, removing it and causing blood to spray over him.
He calmly walked over to the unconscious spearman and severed his neck in one fluid motion.
After that, Luan collapsed on his back.
The stench of blood was thick and sickening, but he didn't mind. All he wanted was to rest.
And rest he did.