"...Right." Soren blinked in slow, grim agreement. "But let me... recover first."

He then leaned back against the pile of cooling corpses, his chest heaving. Even though he just wanted to rest, his mind couldn’t help but calculate the mechanical strain of what they were about to attempt.

Combining the abilities was a blind gamble. Soren could feel the untapped power of Adrenaline Burst coiled within him, and he knew that forcing it to merge with Ryan’s mana would likely tear his muscles apart. He hadn’t even tested the skill’s base side effects yet, but he guessed the combined backlash would be several times worse.

He glanced at Ryan. The other boy was deathly pale, his hands trembling as he gripped his sword. Ryan was pushing past his mana capacity. A backlash was almost certain.

’Will we even survive the aftermath?’ Soren pondered.

Defeating the King was only half the problem. If the side effects hit them while they were still in the gate, they were as good as dead. He looked at the bone-white monolith, then back at his own blood-stained hands. The situation was as hopeless as it could be.

A cold doubt crept into his mind.

’Did I... do the right thing?’

’...’

’Perhaps it would have been better to ignore everything? Maybe just abandon the boy? Maybe not accept this mission at all...’

Soren fell silent at his own pessimistic thoughts. The doubt was like a cold weight in his gut, heavier than the exhaustion.

However, as he recalled what he went through, what he had gained, and the immense value of what he was about to gain, he took a deep breath. Right. There was no need to overthink. He had made his choice long ago.

He firmly gripped his spear.

"Let’s... finish this."

He closed his eyes, forcing his mind to go blank as he focused on the rhythmic thrum of the monolith. Every second felt like a drop of water hitting a still pond. He could feel the artificial vitality from the potions slowly seeping into his weary muscles, dulling the sharpest edges of the pain. Beside him, Ryan’s breathing gradually stabilized from a ragged wheeze into a heavy, controlled cadence. They sat in that heavy silence, two broken figures waiting for the world to stop screaming.

Just like that, the three minutes passed in the blink of an eye. Thankfully, the potions worked through his system just enough for Soren to recover to a movable degree.

Right at that moment, a sudden, violent crack rang through the air.

The golden radiance atop the monolith flared one last time before abruptly shrinking. The intense, repelling pressure that had tried to pin them down for hours vanished in a single heartbeat. The air became deathly still.

Soren forced himself up, his joints popping. He looked at the "King" atop the stone. The creature was frozen, its body half-covered in a hardening crystalline shell.

"It’s time," Soren rasped.

Ryan stood up beside him, his eyes burning with a desperate light. He raised his hand, his mana flickering as he prepared to use his ability.

"Don’t hold back," Soren commanded.

"I won’t," Ryan muttered, understanding the gravity of the situation.

"Good..."

Taking a deep breath, Soren began to walk.

His boots crunched on the obsidian scales of the fallen, his gaze locked on the creature atop the pillar. 𝙛𝒓𝒆𝙚𝒘𝒆𝓫𝙣𝓸𝙫𝓮𝒍.𝒄𝒐𝓶

The "King" had already snapped its eyes open—vertical slits of burning gold that stared at them with a mixture of predatory vigilance and pure, murderous intent. It couldn’t move yet, but the air around it was already beginning to warp.

Soren didn’t stop. With each stride, his pace quickened. He ignored the screaming protest of his healing muscles, focusing entirely on the internal flow of his mana. He circulated the energy through his pathways with a violent intensity, readying his spear for the final transition.

Ten meters.

Five.

Four.

Three.

"Now!" Soren roared as he triggered Adrenaline Rush.

In an instant, the world slowed down.

His heartbeat thundered in his ears like a war drum, and his vision sharpened until he could see the individual cracks in the monster’s hardening shell.

At that exact moment, Ryan’s Amplification hit him.

A flood of raw energy fused with his own mana, surging through his limbs.

For a fleeting, terrifying moment, Soren felt invincible, as if he could split the seas and level mountains with a single swing.

He slammed his mana into the soles of his feet and launched.

Swoosh!

His body became a blur, a bullet shot toward the paralyzed King. The air hissed as he cut through it, his spear erupting in a cold, ethereal blue light.

He then twisted in mid-air, shifting his grip to align the spear with the monster’s crown. The creature’s eyes tracked him, wide with frantic terror as it struggled against the cooling mana shell.

’Glacial Edge Arts: Final Form—’

The mana around the spearhead condensed into a jagged, crystalline spike. It sucked the heat right out of the clearing, leaving a trail of falling frost in the air as he descended.

’—Glacial Descent!’

BOOM!

The spearhead slammed into the center of the King’s skull. It hit the exact spot where the obsidian plates met the golden crown. The force of the jump, multiplied by the double-stacked surge of power, drove the weapon deep into the creature’s brain.

CRACK!

The crystalline shell covering the monster shattered into a million glittering shards.

A shockwave of absolute cold erupted from the point of contact. It flash-froze the King’s eyes and turned its golden blood into ice before it could even spill. The creature didn’t even have time to roar. Its body stiffened, looking like a frozen statue under the dying light of the monolith.

Then, the true weight of the move landed.

The frost traveled down the creature’s spine, turning its entire nervous system into brittle glass. Soren felt the spear sink further, punching through the back of the skull and into the stone of the monolith itself.

He didn’t let go. Even as the backlash of Adrenaline Rush began to bite into his nerves, he twisted the shaft, detonating the remaining mana at the tip.

"DIE!"