Chapter 67: Chapter 67 : First Defeat?
’Saved Me,’ Thalia thought, her heart hammering. Relief washed over her.
He looked like a god descending to save her.
The SS-Rank dragon landed with a soft thud, the ground cracking under its weight.
Jax hopped off, landing gracefully. He didn’t even look at Emma. He looked straight at Thalia.
"Senior Thalia," he said, his voice laced with disappointment. "Tssk."
Thalia blinked, her relief turning to confusion.
"I really had high expectations from you," Jax continued, walking past her. "In fact, I considered you the only person in the whole academy that I... liked."
"What?" Thalia’s face flushed. "But... we haven’t met before today."
Jax paused, glancing over his shoulder with a smirk.
"Yeah, we haven’t. In real..."
He turned away from her, finally facing the real threat. "Let’s forget that. Besides, there is one more interesting figure with us."
His eyes locked onto Emma.
"So, who are you, Emma? And what do you want from this whole challenge?"
Emma smiled, a cold, calculating expression. She gestured to the fractured, silent battlefield around them.
"This," she said simply. "This is exactly what I wanted."
"And as for who I am..." Her smile widened, becoming almost maniacal.
"I wish you get it eventually. Right when I beat your ass up."
Jax chuckled. ’Confident. I like her. But she’s just another arrogant I need to clear.’
"Thalia," Jax said, not looking back. "Stay out of this. You’ll just get in the way."
Thalia’s flush of embarrassment turned to anger, but she bit her tongue. He was right. Her beasts were gone.
Emma made the first move. She was probing.
"Zephyra," she commanded.
The S-Rank storm avian vanished.
Ion Step.
It reappeared in a flash of plasma at Jax’s flank, its ’Tempest Blades’—homing lightning discs—slicing at him.
Jax didn’t even flinch.
"Tempest. Eternal Gale."
WHOOSH!
A thin, shimmering barrier of wind erupted around Jax, ringing his position. The lightning discs hit the barrier and deflected harmlessly.
Clang! Clang!
Zephyra blinked again, striking from behind. The gale held.
"Vulkrayne. Feint."
The massive Furnace Knight roared, executing an ’Infernal Charge’ along a nearby crystal plate, testing Jax’s reaction time.
Aethernox, the SS-Rank void beast, remained inert. A terrifying, silent threat.
Jax responded playfully.
He commanded his Tempest Sovereign to push the ’Eternal Gale’ outward.
The wind barrier didn’t just block; it expanded, curling Vulkrayne’s magma trail into a predictable, harmless arc.
He then used ’Skybreaker Wrath’, not as an attack, but as a series of sharp, precise gale-slashes that repelled Zephyra’s probes.
Hiss!
"Watch the sky sing, Senior," Jax taunted over his shoulder.
Thalia watched, stunned. ’He’s... playing with her? He’s controlling an SS-Rank beast like it’s an extension of his own body. The finesse...’
Emma’s smile faded. The probes were over.
"Synchronize," she ordered.
Zephyra launched a full volley of ’Tempest Blades’, dozens of lightning discs homing in on the gale barrier.
Simultaneously, Vulkrayne timed a heavy ’Infernal Charge’, aiming for the exact spot the discs were weakening.
Aethernox’s gravitational rings relaxed. It was readying a ’Singularity Pulse’, prepared to swallow any counter-attack Jax launched.
’A pincer move. Nice.’
Jax’s grin widened. He escalated.
"Tempest! Thunderheart Resonance!"
The dragon roared, its eyes glowing. It channeled Jax’s own exhilaration.
The wind barrier began to crackle, lightning threading through the gale. His defense was turning into focused offense.
"Skybreaker Wrath! Meet him!"
A controlled hurricane column spun to life, roaring forward to collide head-on with Vulkrayne’s charge.
BOOM!
The hurricane slammed into the Furnace Knight, forcing it to stall, its charge stopped cold.
Sparks flew as magma met wind.
But Emma was ready.
"Aethernox. Pulse."
The void beast activated ’Singularity Pulse’. It didn’t target Jax. It targeted the edges of his hurricane.
Fwwwip!
The outer vortex of the storm lost cohesion, chunks of wind energy vanishing into the void, reducing the hurricane’s power.
Jax just grinned. He improvised.
"Eternal Gale! Convert! Be my conductor!"
The defensive wind barrier snapped inward, swirling around the Tempest Sovereign. The gale bars charged with energy, turning the dragon into a living lightning canal.
He channeled ’Thunderheart Resonance’ harder.
’More power!’
The storm grew meaner. Lightning forked along the gale, slicing at Zephyra every time it tried to teleport close.
"Tssk!" Emma hissed.
She sacrificed a piece.
"Vulkrayne. Core Detonation. Low-yield. Target his platform."
The Furnace Knight slammed its fist into the crystal plate, sacrificing a chunk of its own HP to trigger a localized explosion.
KRA-KOOM!
The island of crystal Jax was standing on ripped apart.
The Tempest Sovereign roared, forced to redirect its Skybreaker currents just to keep itself and Jax hovering.
A new opening.
"Zephyra. Harass."
The storm avian used ’Ion Step’, appearing in the new gaps, launching ’Tempest Blades’ into the dragon’s flank.
Most deflected, but one scored a grazing hit.
Clang!
[Tempest Sovereign - HP: 98%]
Jax laughed, enjoying the chaos. He pushed his ’Thunderheart Resonance’ even harder.
The storm grew, wind slicing at Vulkrayne, staggering the molten knight.
Thalia watched, her heart pounding. ’He’s insane. He’s actually enjoying this. He’s fighting with manic joy.’
Emma remained perfectly calm.
She had been holding back Aethernox.
She let it watch Jax feed power into his ’Thunderheart Resonance’. The void beast hummed, collecting a predictable energy signature.
’Got you,’ Emma thought.
Her plan was set.
"Zephyra. Feint pattern Delta."
The storm avian executed a spectacular series of ’Ion Steps’, blinking left, right, high, low, simulating a massive distraction.
Jax, exhilarated and high on the fight, took the bait.
"Sovereign! Chase it down! Full power!"
He channeled ’Skybreaker Wrath’ into a massive, localized storm, amplifying it with his own emotion.
For one second, he was glaringly predictable.
Emma struck.
"Aethernox. Singularity Pulse. Latch."
The void beast released its pulse, not to attack, but to capture. It latched onto the core waveform of the storm Jax had just created.
"Vulkrayne. Infernal Charge. Vector 40."
The Furnace Knight charged, its angle set to cross the captured vortex.
"Now."
As Jax pushed ’Thunderheart Resonance’ to its maximum, Emma unleashed her masterstroke.
"Aethernox. Omega Equation. Localized."
A pocket of void bloomed exactly where the storm’s core was anchored.
The storm didn’t disintegrate. It unthreaded.
The Tempest Sovereign’s control over the weather stuttered. The ’Eternal Gale’ barriers collapsed.
In that same instant...
"Vulkrayne. Core Detonation."
The molten blast expanded into the now-unprotected void pocket.
With the dragon’s gale defenses gone, the molten AoE hit its center mass full-force.
BOOM!
"Zephyra. Execute."
While storm and lava collided, Zephyra teleported into the dragon’s exposed flank and released a concentrated volley of ’Tempest Blades’.
Shhhk! Clang!
The blades pierced the joints weakened by the detonation.
The combination was catastrophic.
The Tempest Sovereign roared in pain. Its HP crashed.
[Tempest Sovereign - HP: 5%]
The backlash slammed into Jax.
[Jax Rayne - HP: 5%]
The battlefield fell silent.
Thalia stared, stunned. She admired both: Jax’s daring, chaotic joy, and Emma’s cold, surgical cruelty.
Jax’s manic smile was gone.
He hung his head for a moment, his shoulders shaking.
Then he looked up. His face was a mask of cold, terrifying rage.
He turned to Thalia.
"I saved you," he said, his voice flat. "And now, I’m taking back what I saved."
Thalia’s eyes widened. "Jax, what—"
"Tempest. Eliminate her."
The dragon, barely clinging to life, obeyed. It fired a single, weak bolt of lightning.
It was slow. Thalia could have dodged it.
But she just stood there, stunned.
The bolt hit her center mass.
[Player Thalia - Eliminated]
Her avatar dissolved.
Jax watched her vanish. "Sorry, Senior. But you know it too. There’s nothing for you here."
A faint chime sounded.
[Player Kill Bonus: HP +2%. Beast EXP Gained.]
[Jax Rayne - HP: 7%]
[Tempest Sovereign - HP: 7%]
It was almost nothing. But it wasn’t zero.