A Sorcerer's Journey 465 The Maze of the Sea Serpent XVII

The deep wounds inflicted by Grandalph's relentless attacks were nowhere to be seen on the giant monster's body. It seemed the killing machine had fully recovered and was back for blood.
A massive ten-meter ball of muscle and bone powered its pair of fleshy wings. As the apex predator on Mount Serpentine, its pressuring aura permeated the air surrounding the sorcerer's cave. Multiple mouths, all contorted in disturbing shapes across its body spat out vile creatures which looked similar to a skinned wolf. These gruesome beings circulated its creator before descending in unison towards the sorcerer's cave.
Wave after wave of the power of Serpentine piled towards the monster from every direction.
Although this giant monster could not feel any impending powers nearby, having learnt of Grandalph's existence from its previous battle, it sent a large horde of parasites down to scout the grounds, evident of its cautiousness with every step.
The "sorcerers" who were living in this cave today, were no longer the helpless fledglings who could only cower behind their mother after receiving intense drilling by Grimm as well as witnessing the deaths of their fellow brethren.
These almost mature creatures had started taking the form of their mother, Grandalph. The surface of their bodies were dripping with highly-flammable mucus. They were prepared to die fighting these monster parasites. Their resolve was rock-hard and giving up their only place of solace over to the monsters was out of the question.
Although they were outnumbered by the enemy parasites, due to the limited area in the cave entrance, the thirty-or-so fledglings were able to hold their ground without great difficulty. Their eyes were brimming with anticipation as they glanced upwards at Grimm, who was in the sky, from time to time. The look in their eyes were the same as before, full of respect for this "elder" who was doing what their mother did previously.
Grimm shot through the area covered by the power of Serpentine, flying through the sky high above the cave.
Raising his head, Grimm's eyes locked onto the two thick red beams of light which seemed to be some sort of creature's giant limbs. They grew out from Mount Serpentine itself from some unknown corner. Those limbs ripped open a slit in the Phagocytic Shell as it did many times before.
Within the crack, the gentle, pure white light of the Awakening Ray cast onto Mount Serpentine's surface, the buffer zone that existed between the boundaries of the real world and the Spectral World. One after another, the Phagocytic Shells opened up after a brief rustling and the sea serpent's pearls could be seen chasing after each other playfully in the warm glow of the Awakening Ray.
As the Awakening Ray presented itself, Grimm finally heaved a sigh of relief.
Finally, he could feel the Balanced Law of the endless world!
Choosing the densest spot where the sea serpent's pearls were gathered, Grimm tightened his grip on the Sabbatic Goat Staff. Summoning his magic power, a small fire started burning at the tip of the goat skull's horns. Gradually, this ball of flame formed into multiple fire bees, each the size of an open palm.

A droning buzz sounded through the air as the fire bees' wings fluttered. Without so much as a warning, the bees turned into a streak of phantoms which pierced through the area encompassed by the power of Serpentine, towards the direction of the giant monster who was slowly making its way towards the sorcerer's cave.
Zoom, zoom, zoom, zoom, zoom...
While these fire bees were barely visible to the naked eye, the giant monster was able to detect it from its incredible sense of perception. To it, each of them were shining brightly like flaming phoenixes that were hurtling towards it at high speed. Caught off guard, it tried to dodge Grimm's attack but failed due to the sheer size of its body.
Boom, boom, boom, boom, boom…
The fire bees detonated as they made contact with the monster's body.
Each resulting fireball had a diameter of at least a dozen meters. As the series of explosions erupted across the monster's body, large swathes of surface area were caught in the scorching flames.
The giant monster opened its huge maw and bellowed out in pain and rage. As it did so, rolls of the power of Serpentine swept over its body, merging itself with the flames.
Whoosh!
A violent gust of wind followed by the power of Serpentine shot towards Grimm. And yet, he remained unscathed, shielded by many of the sea serpent's pearls which surrounded his body.
Summoning his magic powers again, ice bees started forming at the tip of Grimm's Sabbatic Goat Staff.
"That attack should have been at least three-hundred thousand points of power of Serpentine. If it's able to deal a million, or even two million points of damage, then it would be on par with the Stigmata Sorcerers or any other World Lords, I presume."
There were virtually no scars whatsoever on the giant monster's body.
After those fire bees broke through the power of Serpentine's protective barrier, the remaining momentum of Grimm's attack was barely able to put up a fight against the giant monster's own defense mechanism.
The giant monster stubbornly kept itself within the confines of the power of Serpentine's protective barrier, refusing to take the risk of stepping beyond its territory.
Although Grimm was not sure how this giant monster's sense of perception worked, he was sure that if such a powerful concentration of power of Serpentine made its way beyond Mount Serpentine's protective barrier, it would likely attract the attention of the lord of the sea serpent's pearls which would then…
Of course, for this giant monster to leave the Spectral World, it must launch its attack when the Eye of Destruction was at its weakest point, which was during the final phase of its descent. This was what Shyann did back then.
Though, it seemed that this giant monster had its eye on obtaining total control, proven by its intense dissatisfaction with merely three-hundred thousand points of power of Serpentine.
What it did not know however, was that the larger the concentration of the power of Serpentine, the slimmer its hopes of ever leaving the Spectral World.
A creature like itself, who was able to yield such powers was no longer able to leave the Spectral World by itself as it had long been assimilated into this world of lies.
A stretched out mouth roared in Grimm's direction, projecting the monster's hatred and rage towards him. Grimm answered the beast's call with a swarm of ice bees, which rained down on his enemy like a hailstorm.
Whoosh, whoosh, whoosh, whoosh, whoosh, whoosh…
Boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom…
Frost splattered across the monster's body from the ice bees' attack. Again, the giant monster absorbed these frost splatters with the power of Serpentine, rendering Grimm's attack useless as it did to his fire bee attack from before.
Grimm now felt the same sense of helplessness and despair Grandalph must have felt when battling with this monster.
Grimm finally understood why Grandalph used such desperate tactics, such as draining his own life force to withstand the attacks from this monster and to protect his own fledglings. The level of ferocity this Mount Serpentine bastard possessed was something even a World Lord would be wary of!
As the amalgamation of frost and power of Serpentine gradually subsided, a horde of parasites was suddenly launched towards Grimm's position.
These parasites were gnarly things, and there were at least a hundred of them charging towards Grimm, beyond the protective cover of the power of Serpentine. A cold smile appeared underneath the Mask of Truth.
Supported by the nearly-endless sea serpent's pearls that swarmed the sky, these parasites were nothing in comparison.
Sure enough, beam after beam of the sea serpent's pearls struck down on the parasites and their painful wails echoed through the sky. Instead of melting away, as Grimm once saw, they disintegrated into dust which blew off into the wind.
"He he he he, Fire Blast Spell!"
A dark-red light beam slammed into the giant monster's back, causing it to roar and writhe in agony. A ten meter-tall fiery mushroom cloud sprouted from its back as it was sent plummeting towards Mount Serpentine's surface.
A moment later, the flames burnt out.
Observing from a high-altitude, Grimm sighed in disappointment at the sight of the monster still standing strong, still unscathed from his attack.
Despite the intensity of Grimm's attack, it was just the same as Grandalph's. While it was possible to inflict heavy damage on this monster, it was insufficient to be fatal.
Glancing at the lord of the sea serpent's pearls floating higher up in the sky, Grimm gritted his teeth and said to himself.
"It seems, there is only one way out of this. But before that, I'll have to wring every ounce of energy out of this monster."
With this in mind, Grimm began extracting magic power from the mid-tier Demon-Hunting outfit beneath his sorcerer's robe. A second later, yet another dark-red beam of light rained down on the monster…
An intense battle ensued.
But in reality, it was Grimm who continuously rained down attacks on this giant monster while it had no way to retaliate.
While the monster was resilient, its signal was gradually weakening under Grimm's constant barrage of flame spells. The monster's degree of weakness had arrived to the degree where Grandalph once reached.
In just the short span of the lord of the sea serpent's pearls descent, Grimm had inflicted the same level of damage to the monster as Grandalph did using a whole Eye of Destruction's day of arrival.
Yet!
As the two thick red beams of light began to fade away, the Eye of Destruction too slowly closed shut. The protective barrier of Mount Serpentine started expanding in every direction with an alarming speed, covering every nook and cranny of the buffer zone.
In Grimm's vision.
The crimson chains across his chest had vanished. The endless streams of sea serpent's pearls started returning to the Phagocytic Shells followed by a terrifying shadow growing increasingly larger as it pounced towards Grimm.
As the maze of the sea serpent gradually retracted, the protective barrier of the power of Serpentine grew ever larger. This meant that Grimm was now within enemy territory, and the buffer zone between reality and illusion had returned to the power of Serpentine's dominion.
"Level 2 Wild Instinct, Activate!"
Grimm's body swelled into a three meter-tall titan. Bone spurs the length of twenty-or-more centimeters grew out of his body, which were circulated by the Darkness Pool, and a bloodthirsty aura permeated throughout his whole body.
In this semi-Spectral World, it took such a short amount of time, the intermediate period between the switching of the lord of the sea serpent's pearls and Mount Serpentine's rule, for Grimm to come eye to eye with the giant monster.
Grimm's plan relied entirely on this short span of time.
Now that this chance was lost, Grimm's hope of collecting the Awakening Ray was as good as dead. The only thing he could do was to leave the semi-Spectral World with the ten-thousand Blood of the Tainted Eye he had harvested.

Chapter end