Divine Beast Ascension

Nabeer’s flaming claws ripped across one of Tilgron’s biceps. It had been impossible for Nabeer to dodge at such a close range, and the same had been true for Tilgron. Flipping in the air, it was impossible to get away or fully evade until Tilgron could reset his footing.

When the Tundra Tiger finally touched the ground and dashed to the side, Saltor appeared in a streak of lightning.

Tilgron swiped the air with his paws, flinging ten razor-thin blades of glacial blue ice flying toward Saltor. It wasn’t enough to deal serious damage to someone as strong as Saltor but it was enough to force the speeding combatant to react.

Saltor easily evaded or sliced through the icy knives. But he discovered that something was off. All ten blades split in half before Saltor was able to block or break them.

Coming from many more directions less than a krin away, the icy blades carved their way through the lightning and light essence gathered around Saltor.

However, that wasn’t too big a deal compared to Saltor’s auto-healing, light essence armor. So long as he didn’t receive a major injury, he could recover in exchange for some of his essence. The greater the injury, the more essence and time it took to heal. Half a dozen cuts covered Saltor’s body while he evaded well enough to avoid a major would and all six cuts were healed in the span of seconds.

That allowed Saltor to somewhat keep his attack going and strike against Tilgron’s bestial, ice essence armor. Saltor’s sword pierced through without too much trouble. But Saltor’s slowed charge and Tilgron’s icy essence armor helped dissipate a good portion of the lightning essence coating the sword while also weakening the blow.

Tilgron swiped the icy ground under Tilgron’s feet. His claws hooked an indent in the ice, yanking out an ice lance and launching it straight into Saltor from close range.

.....

Unlike the attack of the ice knives, Saltor didn’t dare to gamble facing the lance while so close to Tilgron. He pulled back and sidestepped to avoid all chances of that lance running him through.

That left the competitors back in a triangular formation. Only Nabeer and Saltor were on nearly opposite sides of Tilgron to flank him and keep his awareness divided. Whenever Saltor paced around Tigron, Nabeer did the same. And when Nabeer changed directions, so did Saltor.

It was obvious that both of his opponents had mid-range or even long-range attacks. Such knowledge only made Tilgron warier about his situation. He wasn’t like Netra. Though he had one of the best defenses icy essence nature could allow, Tilgron would never be able to do what Netra does and rely solely on one strategy to win a battle. And even if he did, Tilgron’s current abilities wouldn’t allow that to happen.

So Tilgron had to make a decision, and he had to make it quick.

Roaring, Tilgron bolted toward Nabeer with all his might. The lion retreated quickly but was somewhat slower compared to Tilgron’s claws gripping the ice he created underfoot. But the difference in speed was still minimal. Tilgron wouldn’t be able to catch Nabeer right away.

Compared to that, Saltor had a much easier time catching the tiger with aid of his lightning essence.

When Tilgron leaped toward Nabeer, Saltor rushed Tilgron with a cautious charge. He had fully committed to attacking the tiger yet was also keeping an eye out for some kind of counterattack.

Tilgron continued to chance down Nabeer anyway. Saltor was the fastest of the three combatants but his attack had been the weakest as well, though that’s only when compared to the relative, powerhouse beasts currently in the arena.

Glacial blue ice pillars began to pop up everywhere Tilgron went, blocking his rear from more attacks.

Saltor mercilessly attacked the defending ice structures. And he was immediately put off by the incredible durability of those glacial blue pillars. They were just tall enough to guard Tilgron and spaced perfectly to make it extremely difficult to maneuver at high speeds without wind essence. When one of Saltor’s lightning bolts crashed into the pillar, it had melted somewhat but was still standing. It took an additional sword strike to hack and break it apart, costing Saltor time and essence.

While Saltor was doing what he must to keep chasing and flanking the tiger, Tilgron was hurling ice knives and lances at Nabeer without end.

Sadly for Nabeer, his best defense against such attacks would’ve been his fiery breath. But using that would’ve left him turned around and easier to catch. So the lion was forced to do something else.

Fire essence started pouring out of his feet and into the frosty ground. Some cracks formed in the ice. This led to Nabeer continuing to run while he weakened and overpower the icy ground. Or, at least, that was Nabeer’s immediate plan.

However, though cracks would form under Nabeer’s sprinting paws, they would never shatter the ground or completely remove the ice.

Between the icy floor and the ice pillars, as well as Tilgron’s attacks, Saltor and Nabeer were left dazed by the durability of Tilgron’s ice. It wasn’t enough to completely defend against piercing attacks or even well-controlled slashing attacks. But that was before they noticed Tilgron’s icy essence armor adopt the same glacial blue color as his pillars and patches of the ice underfoot.

An icy blue lance was thrown with the swipe of Tilgron’s claw, forcing Nabeer to dodge completely instead of sidestepping and relying on fiery essence armor to shrink the many exploding knives and their glancing blows.

Fweeeeet!

A shrill whistle suddenly rang through the air. And Nabeer could tell that it was coming straight for him based on the sound alone.

So Nabeer glanced back at the tiger. He immediately spat out a fireball and leaped sideways. It slowed Nabeer down but it kept Nabeer from being skewered also.

Fweeeeet!

The whistle sounded again and Nabeer evaded again. His retaliatory fireball was enough to weaken and slightly slow the long ice spear. But the fireball was spat out to cause the spear to somewhat veer off course.

A cloud of steam erupted from the clashing attacks but it wasn’t violent enough to be called an actual explosion. It lacked the shockwave and knockback of a steam explosion.

FWEEEEET!!

Then, the next ice spear was launched. It whistled twice as loud and carried an echo-like effect. It was also larger than Tilgron’s usual ice spear. It was able to withstand the lion’s defensive fireball and stay on course.

So the lion spat two fireballs and sidestepped away from the spear’s trajectory.

But that left Nabeer far too close to Tilgron to feel safe. Tilgron was finally catching up to the lion and would soon be on top of him.

Nabeer could either decide to fight in close combat or do something that would allow him to create more distance between the big cats.

It wasn’t just Nabeer pushing himself, though.

Saltor was forcefully breaking past the ice pillars with great effort and a lot of essence spent. In return, Tilgron was also expending a lot of essence just to keep himself covered from the rear. And since Tilgron’s attention and essence were divided into a two-front fight, Saltor didn’t feel bad about expending so much essence. Because the more essence Saltor used, the more essence Tilgron was forced to apply to his many ice pillars

For Nabeer, he chose to get closer to Tilgron. If he could force Tilgron to stay put then they would be able to trap and flank the tiger yet again.

The lion unleashed a massive stream of fire from his blazing maw. It poured out like a fountain of flames and formed a cone of fire to engulf Tilgron completely.

CRRRSH!!

Before Nabeer could properly react, something emerged from the huge spread of fire. It was an icy long spear with a drill-like spearhead and spiraled fletchings. By far, it was the largest spear Tilgron had thrown so far and it also streaked through the air without any whistling whatsoever.

It was already too late. Nabeer was was defenseless against such an attack and had no way to avoid it either due to it already being too close.

The spear cleanly drilled through Nabeer’s uninjured shoulder. However, unlike Nabeer’s first spear wound, the drilling spear tore through the bone and flesh of the lion without the mercy of a clean injury. The spear’s rotation was drastically slowed but it didn’t stop. It kept drilling into Nabeer’s armpit and along the side of the lion’s torso. Though it didn’t harm any vital internals, the blood and gore of the strike were well beyond the threshold of what Nabeer could handle while still fighting.

“I give!” Nabeer roared and dropped to the floor.

He quickly closed his eyes and stopped paying attention to the other two combatants. At the same time, Vloz suddenly appeared beside the big cat and carried Nabeer away from the rest of the fight.