Chapter 369: Chapter 369: The Imperial Arena [5], The Invincible Imperial Queen

"Hah, and now its you against us," Violet grinned, her rapier glowing with power as she prepared to attack, "You stand no chance—"

Nature’s Strings!

Before Violet could even finish her sentence, or even react for that matter, strings made out of leaves erupted from the ground and bound her in place, completely immobilizing her.

The exact same happened to Leon, though he was able to cut them apart after seeing Violet be trapped, his sword slicing through the magical vines with a single swing.

"YOU—" Violet shouted as she tried to move her body, but to no avail, the strings holding her tight and preventing any movement.

"I think you misunderstood something, my dear~" Iris smiled sweetly, "You may be strong, but I am infinitely stronger than you all combined, I simply wanted to see how you would do against my army’s commander."

BOOM!

Just like that, Iris released her aura, and many people in the stands of the arena passed out from the sheer amount of pressure, their bodies unable to handle the overwhelming power that radiated from her.

Iris was unbelievably strong, so much so even Leon felt he wouldn’t be able to fight her even with all his abilities combined, the gap between them simply too vast.

If she wanted, she could have ended the fight the very second it started without any trouble at all, but she had chosen to play with them instead.

And if Leon had to assume based on the aura she exuded... she probably had around 13 million combat power, perhaps even more.

That was just a rough analysis from his experience and the amount of aura she exuded, but it was enough to know he was completely outmatched.

"Well," Iris moved her staff, pinning Violet against the arena’s wall with her magical vines, "Its just you and me now."

Leon knew that even with [Time Stop], he stood no chance against someone of her caliber, in fact even [Berserk] wouldn’t be enough if he couldn’t defeat her within 3 seconds.

As for [Oblivion Meteor], for some strange reason, Leon had the feeling if he used such an obvious forbidden spell, Iris would simply use one of her own to counter it.

He had the feeling that she also had one of these forbidden spells hidden away, and he didn’t really wanna face that kind of power head on.

Iris spun her staff in her hands lazily, then pointed it forward toward him, a playful smile on her face.

She could cast her spells in an instant without any preparation, but she still made some theatrics like this for some strange reason, perhaps to entertain herself.

"Alright, you win," Leon shrugged, raising his hands in surrender, "I don’t really care about winning that much anyway."

Violet sighed in relief as she saw him give up, she hadn’t expected the queen to be so strong either, and was glad he wasn’t going to get himself killed again.

"It seems like the empress and Celestial’s teams have given up, that means that—"

"No," Iris cut the announcer off, a menacing smile spreading across her lizard face, "This human killed my guard, I believe the fight has already gone far enough to simply "give up", don’t you think?"

"Huh..." the catgirl announcer mumbled nervously, "T-That’s right, lets see at least what these two can do before we declare a winner!"

’Damn,’ Leon thought, realizing there was no way out of this situation.

Leon knew he stood no chance against her, so he debated if he should just kill himself to end this quickly and avoid the pain.

Doing so wouldn’t satisfy the queen though, he could see it in her eyes that she wanted to have some fun with him before she ended things.

"Attack me~" she giggled, "I wanna see what you can do before I end this!"

"...Hm," Leon said, his mind racing for a solution.

Fwoosh!

Leon dashed forward and swung his sword with all his might, but the moment he got one-meter close to her, something happened.

BAM!

There was an insanely powerful blast of aura around Iris, propulsing Leon back like a ragdoll, his attack completely ineffective against her barrier.

He tried repeatedly to do that again from different angles, and even used some spells, but nothing he did managed to hit Iris at all.

She was completely untouchable, her barrier too strong for anything he could throw at her.

"Is that all?" the lizard queen smiled, "Then I guess it’s time to end this..."

TIME STOP!

Leon stopped time at that moment and closed the distance once more with all his speed, pushing his body to its limit.

This time, since time was stopped, Iris’ constant passive barrier didn’t save her, and so Leon swung his sword with everything he had.

As time returned, his sword was about to connect with her body, but in the microsecond between the moment Leon’s sword was about to collide and when it should have hit, Iris turned her head and gazed at him.

"Teleportation?" she smiled, swinging her staff to meet with Leon’s sword, then pushing him back with a wave of her aura, "Or perhaps time stop? You did that against Zarek, didn’t you."

She had been the only one to notice how Leon had managed to kill her army’s commander, her perception truly remarkable.

Truly, the [Imperial Queen] was one of the strongest beings across all higher domains that Leon had ever seen, her power almost overwhelming and impossible to overcome.

She was unbeatable at his current level, and so Leon simply sat down, resigning himself to be killed, both because he knew he couldn’t do much, but also because [Time Stop] actually kind of tired him out and drained his energy.

"Giving up already?" Iris smiled, "Well then, don’t mind if I take... REVENGE!"

She lifted her staff high above her head, a massive amount of mana beginning to form into an orb that glowed more and more with each passing second, the power building to a terrifying crescendo.

Even Violet was shocked by the sight, her eyes wide with fear, but she was still stuck and couldn’t do anything to help.

Fwoosh!

But right as she was about to fire her devastating beam at Leon, something unexpected happened that made his heart stop.

"Kaaaa~"

Leon heard a sound, and his eyes widened as he saw Alphox come out of his chest, the baby dragon materializing and standing before him protectively.

"ALPHOX," Leon actually panicked, his voice filled with concern, "GET BACK IN THE [PET SPACE] RIGHT NOW!"

"Kaaaaaa!!" the small dragon yelled back, refusing to listen.

The small dragon didn’t seem to wanna listen though, as it simply stood there, eager to do something after having slept these last few hours, its tiny form trembling with determination to protect its master.

"Goodbye, human, though I know you’ll revive eventually," Iris said, her voice cold.

BOOM!

Iris fired her beam, aimed at both Leon but also Alphox, the power of the attack threatening to engulf them both.

"Kraaaa..." Alphox whimpered, but didn’t move.

"Goddamn it," Leon groaned as he immediately got up, because he wouldn’t allow this to happen to his pet.