26 – Getting Serious

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[Legendary Artifact]

[Artifact Effects]

– Mana Cost: -75%

– Spell Area of Effect: +30%

– Spell Strength: +30%

– Mana Regeneration: +15%

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Pale God’s Intervention.

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Unbreakable.

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Ashley’s lips curled into a smile as an electric pulse surged down her forearms. Holding the legendary staff was nothing like staring at a flat screen.

A strange physical dissonance settled deep in her bones. Celestine’s body, a form that increasingly felt like her own, tensed in anticipation as mana bled into the artifact.

The Balrok roared in fury beyond the wall, clawing at the elevator gate. Metal groaned and wood splintered as it ripped the structure down. Through the widening gap, obsidian muscles coiled and bulged under the strain. Two points of blazing fire locked onto her.

“Let’s play. I want to see this beauty in action up close.”

When the gate finally gave way, the demonic beast thrust an arm through the opening. Its shoulders were far too broad to fit through, leaving it jammed on the other side while its claws swept through the air only a few feet from her face. Mortar crumbled from the wall, and fresh cracks spread through the stone under the strain of its massive Strength.

The beast heaved forward again, reaching.

Ashley parted her lips and whispered the invocation. A sharp ozone scent bit the back of her throat as a single bolt erupted from the open tip of the staff.

“[Thunder Bolt].”

Ashley’s vision went white.

No, not her vision.

The world itself vanished beneath a torrent of incandescent light as the bolt blazed from the staff, engulfing the Balrok’s outstretched arm before swallowing the rest of its massive frame.

For a fraction of a second, beast, gate, wall, and sky dissolved behind a solid curtain of lightning.

Thunder struck an instant later. The detonation rolled through the city with enough force to shatter the nearest windows, and a concussive blast of hot air swept past, carrying the sharp tang of vaporized masonry as structures shattered somewhere beyond the glare.

The searing glow receded, leaving only a ragged opening ringed by dripping, molten rock where the reinforced gate had once stood.

From the breach all the way across the smoke-filled cavern floor, a massive furrow ripped through the terrain. The scar widened steadily into a deep trench, the lightning having plowed through solid earth and bedrock in its path forward.

The Balrok stood at the end of that scorched scar, thrown hundreds of feet back from its original position. Its clawed feet had gouged twin trenches marking where the force of the impact had dragged its massive weight across the battlefield.

The beast stayed upright through sheer, stubborn malice. Its shoulders braced against the residual shockwave with its trembling arm still extended.

Two of its four obsidian fingers were missing, sheared away cleanly. Heavy black smoke boiled from its ruptured flesh.

Ashley blinked, clearing the lingering static from her eyes.

The creature had been smoking before the strike, but now, crimson light pulsed violently through the deep cracks in its hide as though an active forge had been stoked beneath its skin.

The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.

One of the chains anchoring it to the wall had snapped at the collar around his neck. The other trailed across the ground behind it, stretched taut and dragging a chunk of shattered stone.

Ashley walked without hurrying, her steps echoing rhythmically across the battlefield. The monster watched her approach with a different look in its eyes now.

“Don’t tell me you’re already done for,” she taunted. “We’re just getting started. I’d say we’re warming up, but you’re already crispy.”

The monster let out a guttural snarl that rumbled deep within its chest and lumbered forward.

Each step carried enough weight to make the ground tremble, but it was still unsteady.