"Heh..." Balam produced a moan of amazement.
Balam's [Fateful Emissary of the Future] is a killer move that pursues the opposite direction of the Archbishop's [Glorious Depiction of Heroes and Myths]. Instead of summoning historical figures whose strength has empirically been proven, Balam summoned figures from the future, with the primary 'spell resource' being karma itself.
Time-path cultivation revolved around time and karma. Anything related to the past is significantly cheaper than the unknown and everchanging future in terms of karmic weight. From Balam and the Archbishop's summoning competition alone, it was clear that the Archbishop had a considerable advantage. Balam barely managed to summon two Magi of Holy Terra, whereas the Archbishop had brought four Braves, with more on the way. However, summoning future figures has its own merits.
For example, they might bring insight from the future. After all, there's always a chance that their methods have yet to be invented. That, or their actions or reactions might indicate a possible future situation. Just their mere presence brought benefits.
Nevertheless, Balam was quite pleased when he saw Limitless Heaven's [Heaven Constellation Chessboard].
Between Heinrich's hovercraft and the floating fortress Avalon, a gigantic heavenly construct had manifested. It has the shape of a rectangle, further segmented into eight-by-eight 'cubes' alternating between darker and lighter hues: a literal chessboard. On Avalon's side, there were nine figures, five being the Ancient Desolate beasts trapped in the frontal cubes. The remaining Braves were segmented behind them, and each was also contained within their own cubical world.
On Heinrich's side, there were eight groups of 10-man squads of rank 4 Space Marines, donned in uniformed Power Armors with each squad having different variations of colors and design. A simple 'pawn' piece floats above their 'cubes', signifying that they are but mere Pawns. Behind the rank-and-file pawns, the 'Rook' piece is held by a red-haired muscular man, 'Knight' being a large hound-like beasty figure with pulsating mass of twisted fangs and fleshy bone that leave trails of disease and puss, the pair of 'Bishop' being a petite elf and a short dwarf, the 'Queen' is a pink-haired fairy with butterfly wings on her back, and the 'King' being an undead lich with a bone crown.
"The stage is set, the pieces are ready..." Limitless Heaven glanced at Balam. "This is how I, the Magus-Logistica of Human Imperium, fight my war. Your Highness, please provide support if applicable!" He snapped his finger, and a miniature imitation of the [Heaven Constellation Chessboard] appeared in front of him. He plucked the Pawn-pieces and put them onto the box where the Ancient Desolate Beasts were. At that moment the Space Marine squads were teleported, and sent to fight the Ancient Desolate Beasts.
Each 'cube' isn't an empty space, it is a small world, with its sets of dimensional laws and environmental limitations. Naturally, they were set so that Limitless Heaven's side would gain territorial advantage.
A wyvern capable of flight? The world it is transported to is an underground passageway, barely enough for its wingspan. A turtle Ancient Desolate Beast? Then the world it is transported to is a hot scorching desert lacking of water. It was designed in a way that the world itself would be against them.
While the Space Marin squads were fighting the Ancient Desolate Beasts, next in line were dealing with the trapped Braves, but he couldn't randomly assign his chess pieces against them. Despite being blind to the power dynamics of the Braves, he understood that this wouldn't be an easy fight. The Magus-Logistica dares not to underestimate the strength of their enemies, so he made a probing blow.
The first step is to observe their power so that he can design and refine the appropriate countermeasure.
The world that Undying Juggernaut was sent to is a dark desert, with perpetual blizzards and strange ice whose cold could harm the soul. It is an anti-life zone that even the best survivalist would find it difficult to survive due to the presence of undead creatures.
As he exhaled warm air and inhaled the toxic, irradiated icy particles contaminated by the power of undeath, the Juggernaut realized that whoever had teleported him inside this world had high space-path comprehension. It needs to be said that all Braves are highly resistant to teleportation, it's not easy to subject them to high-dimensional interference. Of course, the next time Limitless Heaven wanted to translocate him, it would be more difficult since he had already begun developing countermeasures. He won't let Limitless Heaven do as he pleases and he needs to get out of this prison as soon as possible and rejoin with the others.
Therefore, what he did was obviously just that.
The Undying Juggernaut put his greatswords, which were his instrument for defense instead of attack, onto his wide back. Then, clashing his fist with great strength, he began an activation sequence for his next move, "Rank 5 strength-path killer move, [Cloud Shattering Fist]!"
He started shadowboxing, punching the air randomly like a madman. Each time, his punches generated fistforce that traveled into the distance, piercing the blizzard and producing an explosion of raw force, carving the landscape as he desired.
The Undying Juggernaut isn't a muscle brain. In fact, he is one of the smartest men in the Braves. The [Cloud Shattering Fist]s are his probing method to gain intel regarding his situation and how the 'world' would react under certain stimulation.
Then, it was as he had expected. The *natives* began to pop left and right. Skeletal hands unborrowed from the icy soil, followed by all sorts of skeletal creatures with wings, tails, and even two heads. With a glance, he counted them. Tens, hundreds, tens of thousands... their numbers could easily overwhelm an army. However, most of these skeletal undead are weak, with the majority being rank 2 or below. The rank 3 Legendary Undead can be counted in single digits.
In an instant, he knew what this world was and the gravity of his situation. "This is a Battlefield Killer Move... designed to force me to reveal my cards." He glanced at the surroundings with investigative killer moves, trying to find out the edge of this world.
Needless to say, a single all-out [Cloud Shattering Fist] from the Undying Juggernaut could literally destroy cities, flatten mountains, gouge earth, and affect the world at a scale that it isn't wrong to say the Undying Juggernaut had a paintbrush and the landscape is the terrain that he could easily alter as he wishes. Terraforming is something that all rank 5 Epics can easily accomplish. The undead natives were dying in droves due to the sheer vibration, but they were considered collateral damage.
In twenty seconds, he had discharged thirty consecutive [Cloud Shattering Fist]s, and the landscape had been changed considerably. The distant mountainous ice is no longer present, only a collapsed mountain range littered the area, with some fragmented undead body parts protruding from the landscape.
'The Battlefield Killer Move used a core to maintain its integrity... but it's always moving erratically...'
Undying Juggernaut's onslaught was but a mere probing. He used the same method over and over again to ensure his true strength could not be deducted so easily, but that didn't matter since the target of his probing was seemingly able to 'read' his next move, thus barely managed to escape his senses. He knew that keeping this world's integrity is constantly on the move, but he couldn't grasp what the 'core' shape is and how it moves. He continued to shower this world with more [Cloud Shattering Fist] until a flicker of light suddenly manifested not too far from his position.
"[Rook-Piece: Dragonblood Berserker]!" Limitless Heaven's gentle voice reverberated onto Undying Juggernaut's cubical world. *Thud!* The icy dust got kicked up as the newcomer landed. The feedback from his drop indicates that he should weigh at least a hundred thousand kilograms. Undying Juggernaut used his investigative method to inspect the newcomer closely.
From top to bottom, the newcomer is almost two meters tall, his upper body naked, as if his well-toned muscle is all the armor that he ever needs. Long, dark maroon hair cascaded from the crown of his head. The man does not emanate radiation of a rank 5 Epics common of Morgen World, but that is what made Undying Juggernaut's senses go overdrive. As someone who cultivated wisdom-path on the side, his greatest fear was the unknown.
The maroon-haired topless man roared as a small, translucent rook-piece floated on top of his head. He immediately lunged at the Undying Juggernaut without fear.
In a natural response to an enemy approaching him, Undying Juggernaut produces multiple [Cloud Shattering Fist]s. Three invisible fistforce projectiles are launched toward the Dragonblood Berserker, hitting him in the face, chest, and stomach.
As expected, the Dragonblood Berserker was unable to handle Undying Juggernaut's brutal attack that could terraform the landscape, he was thrown back a few hundred meters, leaving a long trail in the icy soil. The icy soil that softens his landing accumulates into a small hill.
"Limitless Heaven wasn't kidding when he said the warrior is more powerful with his bare hand... But this much... is still manageable..." Dragonblood Berserker stood up and inspected the wounds inflicted upon him. Where Undying Juggernaut's fistforce landed, the flesh was crushed, blood vessels ruptured, with the bones had visible cracks on them. The leftover energy still rampages around the wound, hindering passive self-healing. It was much worse than having one's flesh being cut by a blade.
Wiping the blood from his lips, he cracked his neck and smiled as he silently activated a healing method. The wounds rapidly healed at a rate visible to the naked eye and the leftover fistforce was quickly flushed out of his system. Then, he grinned, "Rank 5 transformation-attribute Reinforcement Arts [Armor Form: Bloodline of Gravios]!"
The disturbing sound of bone being broken and flesh being torn resounded from Dragonblood Berserker's body as his body transformed. His legs developed new joints, his hands turned longer, dark maroon scales began replacing his skin, and a pair of twisted horns decorated his forehead. In only a second, he had transformed into an Armor Wyverian before lunging towards Undying Juggernaut once more.
Repeating the same response, Undying Juggernaut launched multiple fistforce, but this time, Dragonblood Berserker's scales were able to shrug them off as if they were but a mere breeze. A single instance of damage allowed Dragonblood Berserker to learn and adopt the necessary countermeasure from Undying Juggernaut's attack. His charge was unstoppable.
*Boom!* The shockwave produced by Dragonblood Berserker's fist hitting Undying Juggernaut's armor left a cone-shaped crater on the ground behind him, yet it did not even push the Juggernaut. There wasn't even a hint of damage in the armor, he was like a rod standing straight even under the onslaught of a category 7 hurricane. However, that does not mean Undying Juggernaut received no damage whatsoever. He's simply a master in receiving damage and healing from it, giving off the vibes of being invulnerable.
Dragonblood Berserker's offense was relentless. The pace was so fast and the intensity incessantly increased, which left Undying Juggernaut to passively defend from his attack, not allowing a single counterattack whatsoever.
As seconds turned into minutes, chips in the armor began to accumulate. "Are you just a sandbag? You should just think for your own survival instead of others." Dragonblood Berserker taunted as he kept on increasing the pace. At this point, his body had already begun burning due to the sheer air friction from constantly moving beyond Mach 241, with the average surface temperature of Undying Juggernaut's armor having gone beyond the surface of a star due to the sheer kinetic force it endured.
Nevertheless, Undying Juggernaut never made any counterattack, for he knew what kind of opponent his enemy was. 'This shapeshifter had already optimized his body for high-speed movement...' He analyzed as he continued activating self-healing methods while using his two greatswords to set up a dynamic defense.
At this point, Dragonblood Berserker has mutated a pile bunker bone weapon in one of its arms in an attempt to break Undying Juggernaut's perfect static and dynamic defense. His continuous single-point attack focus has been able to slowly chip his armor, it wouldn't be long before Undying Juggernaut's fortress-like armor would break if he kept on passively defending.
'I only have one chance of defeating him... otherwise, he would transform and adapt into a stronger form...' With that in mind, the Undying Juggernaut bid his time.
"You want to go that way huh." Realizing Undying Juggernaut's plan of not allowing him to collect information, Dragonblood Berserker smiled. "Let's see who wins, my adaptive spear, or your unbreakable shield..." The pile bunker-like bone weapon on his arm began to twist like a drill.
...
Within another 'cube', there's a spearman terraforming the landscape with his attack. It was quite a similar early scene to Undying Juggernaut's cubical world. The difference is that Seven Spear's world isn't an icy desert, but an ancient forest with gigantic trees reaching for the skies. The root system of a single tree was comparable to a mountain range, so even with the destructive power of [Seven Dragon Destruction] comparable to that of neutron bombs, it still took some time for him to fall a single tree.
The natives of this world varied, from gigantic insects to large beasts the size of apartment buildings, all of them generate sufficient threat to the spearman. The weakest of them is rank 4 Desolate Beasts, so in terms of scale and environmental hazard, Seven Spear's cubical world is far more dangerous than Undying Juggernaut's.
Wiping his sweat after felling a 3rd tree whose diameter is comparable to a mountain, his attention was taken away by a flicker of light.
"[Queen Piece: Celestial Arcanist]!" Limitless Heaven's voice manifests a beautiful woman with long pink hair and butterfly wings on her back, a small, translucent queen piece hovering on top of her head. The fairy has seven colorful gems floating behind her, they radiate alien energy that Seven Spear, as a native of Morgen World, had never experienced before.
"Rank 5 light-attribute Arts [Orbital Strike]!" The fairy whispered as one of seven colorful gems behind her shone in white light.
Sensing the dangerous fluctuation, Seven Spear jumped back, like an instinct when someone accidentally touched a searing hot pan with their finger. At that very moment, a seven-colored spherical shield manifest, protecting him from all sorts of vectors of attack.
Swoosh! A pillar of light suddenly deletes everything where Seven Spear was, turning biologicals into dust and soil into sands.
"*Tsk!*" The fairy clicked her tongue, as the white gem dimmed significantly. Since light-based attacks move at the speed of light, even rank 5 Epics shouldn't be able to react accordingly, but it seems like Seven Spear was able to achieve something that most find near impossible.
"Rank 5 fire-attribute Arts, [High Bolide]!" Before the light pillar disappeared, Celestial Arcanist drew runic fonts on the air with her fingers, as the gem corresponding to the color of red shone brightly. In that very instance, the skies of this cubical world turn orange, with large meteors falling in the skies, accurately heading towards Seven Spear who have yet to get a grip on his situation.
The gigantic forest quickly ignited into a sea of fire as the meteors fell. Each projectile was as big as a building, but due to the accuracy, the meteor barrage did not allow Seven Spear to react properly.
"Rank 5 earth-attribute arts, [Continental Seism]" The brown gem behind Celestial Arcanist shone for a brief second, before an apocalyptic earthquake shook the burning sea of flames, shattering the landscape while also spewing earthen projectiles into the air.
Not only from the skies, but the very earth that he stepped on has become a vector of attack. Between the meteors and the earth projectiles, both contain strange destructive energy that was completely alien to Seven Spear. The energy shield that protect Seven Spear were quickly dimming despite his best efforts to parry the meteors and the larger earth projectiles.
'This fairy can continuously cast strategic-class spells as if they were nothing...' He already noticed that Celestial Arcanist must've been using the colorful gems behind her to cast strategic-class spells almost instantly as they dimmed after each successful activation. Using a single strategic-class spell against one person is similar to bringing out a shotgun to kill a fly. However, this 'fly' was so hard to kill that even a shotgun was not enough, so she brought out a repeating shotgun.
He realized that she should be able to instant-cast four more strategic-class spells, so if he could just defend and endure, he should be able to dispatch the fairy if she no longer had her strategic-class spells.
However, he had to scratch his plan of enduring the onslaught when his senses picked up Celestial Arcanist's actions.
She had begun using normal-casting to activate normal spells, such as [Fireball] or [Lightning Strike] to disrupt his tempo while conserving her strategic-class spells.
Surely, this was a great idea since conserving trump cards would lead to advantages in the later stages of the fight, but this way, she wouldn't be able to defeat him.
*'Ah, I see... your goal is not to kill, but to delay.'* Thinking that his conclusion was correct, he decided to up his game. "Rank 5 lightning-path killer move, [Avatar of Storms]!"
Bluish lightning enveloped Seven Spears, turning into lightning armor that augments his physical performance, mainly in speed. With newfound strength, he could handle the strategic-class spells and return some [Seven Dragon Destruction] to Celestial Arcanist, stopping her from freely casting spells.
...
Watching all the battles currently occurring inside his [Heaven Constellation Chessboard], Limitless Heaven grinned. "Divide and Conquer, a tactic that often works too well," he commented.
Balam can only agree. When the Braves worked together as a party, their performance rating wasn't calculated by the additions of each member's power level. Instead, they could achieve the result of 1 + 1 equals 4. The synergy of the Braves is what allows them to defend against the overwhelming powers of the Otherworldly Invaders. Although segregating a battlefield into multiple segments does not make it any easier to kill the any of Braves, it'll reduce the synergy.
"Who are you going to kill first?" Balam inquired.
Currently, Undying Juggernaut is fighting against the Rook and Seven Spear is occupied by the Queen, which leaves Darkblade Shadow forced to fight the Knight, and Beast Sniper heavily countered by the King.
The Knight-piece is Unclean Beast, the wriggling mass of flesh and bones covered in puss and disease. Fighting the Unclean Beast inside a salt-flat cube world was very disadvantageous to Darkblade Shadow since the beast has soft flesh armor while the terrain does not allow him to use his best skills. Furthermore, the Unclean Beast has no magic whatsoever, so Darkblade Shadow cannot showcase his best skill.
On the other hand, Beast Sniper's opponent, the King-piece is 'Russ' the Lich King. Their fight occurred in a ruined city cubical world where undead and ghosts are a common sight. The elven huntress tried to summon her trusty beast legions, but Russ also had his own undead legion that fully utilized the ruined urban landscape. Unlike the other cubical world, this one is a true blue war zone.
Naturally, despite looking grim, the tides of victory are leaning on the Brave's side. After all, there's a reason why the Braves are revered as such, merely fighting at an environmental disadvantage could not deter a true expert's power.
However, it was all within Limitless Heaven's calculations. The Magus-Logistica has no personal combat strength, but he can always rely on others to fight his battle. So, to answer Balam's question, he glanced at his companion, Distorted Shadow.
"Rank 5 information-path killer move, [Class Selector: Fortress Defender]!" Distorted Shadow's body, which was enshrouded by misty black pixels, had its shroud swirled. Flashes of black light slowly reforged his figure, turning him into a man donned in superheavy power armor with various degrees of black hues. On his left, a high-tech tower shield while on his right, a cannonlance even longer than his 3-meter tall figure.
He took his weapons and pointed towards the cubical world where Unclean Beast was fighting against Darkblade Shadow.
Limitless Heaven smiled, as his plans came to fruition. Unlike the other Braves, Darkblade Shadow heavily relies on techniques instead of brute strength, so despite being an assassin, he is the one who exposes a lot of his methods just to barely survive against Unclean Beast. To an information-path cultivator like Distorted Shadow, information is his greatest weapon, so it's natural that he would choose the fool who reveals the most first.
"I'll designate you as a temporary Knight-piece. Go!" Limitless Heaven snapped his finger and Distorted Shadow's hulking figure disappeared with a flash of black pixels, leaving only a skull-shaped camera-drone in place to gather more intel regarding the rest of the Braves.
Almost at the same time as Distorted Shadow's departure, Avalon produces a dangerous fluctuation as the Archbishop's summoning circle has already finished calling another Brave.
Unlike the previous four, this time a gigantic 18-meter-tall MEKA appeared. The combat mech has a sleek, speed-focus design with four katanas hanging on its waist, and purple-and-white as the primary color. "Violetstorm Empress." The pilot reported her name.
The Archbishop, wary of having Violetstorm Empress fall into their opponent's trap, tried to warn her. Before her words ended, however, the MEKA had already performed a backflip and transformed into a fighter jet before flying into the distance, seemingly not desiring to enter combat with Ageless Despot and Limitless Heaven.
"Damn..." Balam cursed as he had already 'felt' a glimpse of the future. In his senses, Limitless Heaven could not trap Violetstorm Empress inside his [Heaven Constellation Chessboard] due to her MEKA having high-dimensional teleportation devices. She would just warp back onto the River of Time if she got caught. "Just leave her to me." He muttered as he began the activation sequence of a time-path killer move.
