Ocelia used her icy sword to cut a shallow wound on her hand, causing drops of blood to leak onto the floor. The blood moved according to her chant and attached to others to form a circular shape pentagram, absorbing the Elements within the air, building the colossal silhouette of the Leaning Tower of Frost.
Although Ocelia did not move in to fight in the close range like before, she had used the process of creating the Leaning Tower of Frost to restain the Witch of the Scarlet Snow indirectly. Not only did she changed her fighting style, but Forus also did the same, swapping their positions as well as roles.
In the past, Ocelia would take the role of close confrontation because her explosive ability was higher than Forus', allowing the couple to finish the battle faster while not giving times for the enemies to prepare and use their hidden life-saving secrets. With Forus' unique art of alchemy inherited from the blue-robed sorcerer, he could use his unpredictable tactic to generate chaos and subverted the tempo of the battlefield.
However, in this fight, both the couple and the Witch of the Scarlet Snow knew their respective strength after probing, and it turned out that their power was not equal. In the peak condition, Forus would die after taking one hit from the icy spike, and Ocelia would soon follow, having no chance of fighting back against the power of the peak-stage second-ranked sorcerer.
However, after getting injured by her enemies, the Witch had experienced a drop in sorcery mastery caused by her extensive and severe injuries. With the nasty will-infused Elements invading her body, she would have a hard time channelling her power and making excessive movements to avoid the strikes. From every factor combined, her strength had dropped from the peak-stage second-ranked to the pseudo-second-ranked.
Although a pseudo-second-ranked sorcerer could suppress the peak-stage first-ranked, they were still far from the genuine second-ranked sorcerers. Even though Forus and Ocelia could not contest with the Witch, they could indefinitely delay and drag out the battle, which would be extremely favourable to them.
As time passed, the accumulated injuries within the Witch's body would begin to display its terrifying qualitative changes, erupting into a powerful wave of destruction that damaged both her body and soul if she did not manage to treat it in time, causing her to experience another drop in sorcery mastery. So, if Forus and Ocelia could keep the Witch busy with them for some times, she might fall out of her grace and became a lowly first-ranked sorcerer or even a sorcerer apprentice.
To slow down the invasion of the will-infused Elements within her body, the Witch needed to release and use the surrounding Ice Element to melt into her wounds, sealing the movement of her blood as well as the movement of the invading Elements. However, with Ocelia condensing her Leaning Tower of Frost, she would have to absorb a large amount of Ice Element to create more floors, contrasting against the Witch and indirectly slowing the enemy down while improving herself.
Using her hand, the Witch of the Scarlet Snow swiped her sharp fingers up, grazing the figure of Forus as he attempted to jump back to evade the blow. Although she could not make any excessive move, the Witch was very ruthless. She disregarded her pain to make an unexpected blow to injure Forus. For the strike, she intentionally took Forus' flaming fist onto her chest, coughing out blood as she deflected his black blade on his other hand and injured him.
Landing nearby, Forus immediately threw out more potions to create some distraction while he was setting his sorcery array as well as mending his wounds and getting rid of the Ice Element on his injuries. Although he only got scraped by the icy nails, the scars became frozen upon contact and spreading the invading Ice Element into his body, stagnating his blood flow as well as the circulation of sorcery energy.
If he did not treat the wounds and stopped the Ice Element quickly, it could cause a severe chain reaction that might kill him or cripple his sorcery mastery. This strike perfectly captured the true essence of the second-ranked sorcerers.
Although the power of the Witch was only pseudo-second-ranked and was still decreasing, it was the truth that she was once a peak-staged second-ranked sorcerer as well as the protector of her Icy Scorpion Sect, whose history ran deep and vast, having many secrets techniques and sorcery cultivation methods.
If she and any ordinary peak-stage sorcerers fought, she would no doubt defeat her opponents almost every time. Although facing and defeating second-ranked sorcerers were easy for her, capturing or killing was another matter in itself. Anyone who could reach the realm of second-ranked sorcerers by themselves was no fools, and they would always pack themselves full of cards and life-saving secrets.
Because of this reasons, although the Witch got set up in an elaborate trap of her enemies whose power rivalled her, she still managed to survive the encounter and got transported into the last floor of the Tower of Succession.
Not letting Forus had any time to complete his offensive array, the Witch waved her hand again and summoned even more icy spikes. However, this time, she also split them apart into two groups and sent them to both Ocelia and Forus. Although the spikes could not severely harm Forus, they could restain Forus from helping Ocelia as the Witch only wanted the formation to collapse.
Seeing the incoming icy spikes, Ocelia commanded in her mind and let out a few Ice Spirits to tank them for her as she divided her attention from solely condensing the floors of the Leaning Tower of Frost into replenishing the Ice Spirits in the Tower.
Before a smile crept onto her face, the Witch suddenly gripped her chest as she coughed out more blood. This time, the blood had changed its colour from fresh-red into dark-crimson, showing signs of internal damages caused by invading Elements. Immediately after her rounds of coughing, her sorcery mastery dropped once again into the realm of peak-staged first-ranked sorcerers.
However, taking advantage of the precious time her spell gained her, the Witch stopped everything else to focus her sorcery energy into the giant gripping hole on her stomach. With Ocelia dividing her attention as well as Forus defending against the rains of spikes, the Witch of the Scarlet Snow used this chance to drive away some of the invading Elements.
After a while, her expression turned a little brighter as her sorcery mastery increased a little, alarming Forus as well as Ocelia. Both of them knew that when they fought against a pseudo-second-ranked sorcerer, it was very challenging for them to gain the upper hand. However, against a peak-stage first-ranked sorcerer, they would have an easier time fighting her.
With that goal in their mind, how could the couple watch silently as the Witch slowly regained her sorcery mastery?
Forus gritted his teeth as he let go of defending the formation, allowing the icy spikes to destroy it as he rushed forwards to the stationary Witch of the Scarlet Snow, igniting his fists as well as summoning his black blade.
With his excellent defensive ability, he could ignore most of the icy spikes as long as they did not hit his vital spots. However, with his hands covered them, he would only need to endure some superficial wounds to appear in front of the Witch.
Stabbing his blade onto the ground, Forus used the momentum to leap forwards, avoid landing in front of the Witch to bypass her prepared traps as he punched towards her head, aiming at her forehead with his blazing rotten fist.
As Forus expected, the ground beneath him turned into freezing ice coated in countless tiny spikes as soon as the blade stabbed into the ground. However, although Forus manage to predict the trap, the Witch had already considered this scenario and smiled as she saw his action.
As soon as Forus closed in, four giant spikes curved out of the ground from four directions surrounding the Witch, aiming towards Forus who was above her. If Forus did not do anything, they would firmly stab into his abdomen and stopped his momentum, causing him to remain motionless above the Witch for her to slowly kill him.
Realising his predicament, Forus changed the trajectory of his fist into gripping onto one of the spikes, letting it pierced through his hand as he grasped tightly before exerting force to break the tip of the sharp ice. By using the remaining momentum, Forus managed to narrowly avoid the three death traps with the cost of having one of his hand drilled.
While in the air, Forus channelled his Death Aura and created many of the black weapons, floating beside him as he pointed towards the weakened figure of the Witch. Responding to his command, they all vibrated as the rotten scent emitted out from them before firing themselves at the Witch.
The power of Death Aura was overwhelming, puncturing through the magical walls of ice without any problem. However, although the Death Aura was powerful, Forus was not. The black weapons whose power scaled with their owner could not instantly kill the Witch of the Scarlet Snow, and they could only injure her more.
Although the Witch was powerful and wise, she could not predict that the legendary Death Aura would appear in front of her, or that the user of said Death Aura would be a lowly first-ranked sorcerer. Seeing the black weapons, she thought that they were some kinds of mystical spells that fused Fire Element with Dark Element.
As a result, her defence got easily trampled, and she could not react in time to dodge, causing some of the weapons to stab onto her vital spots. With one of her shoulder broken, the Witch could not use it before she could heal it. However, before she could get rid of the invading Elements, she would not waste any time to do anything else.
After a moment, the Witch of the Scarlet Snow recovered her calm and decided to silently endure the assault while continuing to force the invading Elements out. However, after suffering the second round of the onslaughter, the Witch realised something horrible, and her face turned pale in an instant.
She smelled a disgusting smell on her wounds, causing her to shift her attention towards her shoulder. The pale and smooth skin that she once possessed had already turned into a dark, greyish and rough surface that slowly expanded, devouring the lifeforce in the surrounding.
Seeing the hidden threat of the black weapons, the Witch began searching her memory and quickly found the mysterious force that had this same property. Although the Death Aura was the stuff of the legend, it perfect;y fitted the condition, causing her to frown.
"Never in my life would I expect to encounter one of the Taboo Existences." The Witch of the Scarlet Snow muttered as she sighed softly. The revelation that she had caused her previous plan to crumble, leaving her with no choice but to forsake it and build a new one.
The property of Death Aura was terrifying, invading the Witch's body and directly devouring her lifeforce. Its destructive capability was even more potent than the invading Elements that could only wreak havoc and not anything else. With the faster speed of decay and the harder way to eliminate, Forus had given the Witch much more pressure than her nemesis.
After all, the stuff of the legend was mighty and mysterious, having unlimited power and all-encompassing ability, and with such a formidable history behind it, everyone below the realm of the myth would feel an invisible pressure weighted onto them when they accidentally encountered such a thing.
Even if her enemies only had one spell that could manipulate Death Aura, she was sure that she would die a terrible death, and there would be nothing that she could do to escape it. The Death Aura was just that powerful.
