"Hahaha... Nekk, you look like hell!"
A flash of lightning tore through the air. Suddenly, a towering beast loomed before both "Tiger" and Nekk. Standing nearly five meters tall, cloaked in dark blue scales, and shaped like a monstrous upright lizard, it radiated an aura so savage it made your skin crawl. Its yellow-and-black pupils locked onto Nekk as its booming laughter echoed around them.
"Can it, Vito. Don't piss me off."
Nekk spat out a wad of blood and glanced at the other coldly, clearly irritated.
"We're in this together, remember? I need your intel, and you need our muscle," Vito replied with a toothy grin, casually waving a claw.
Despite being hounded by an army of relentless stone constructs, his ambition hadn't cooled in the slightest. If he could get his hands on the treasure, and more importantly, the Living Glove, he might finally rise to the rank of true pirate legend.
"But first, explain what the hell these things are! Why are they so damn heavy, and so damn tough?"
"You saw them at the altar, didn't you? Those are the guardian beasts that were once enshrined there. They're forged from volcanic copper extracted from an active volcano, mixed with several rare metals, crafted centuries ago by the royal family of the Gamas Kingdom. I used to think they were just statues... but clearly, they've been hiding their trump card."
Nekk gripped his golden scimitar tightly, his face pale as he gave a reluctant explanation.
"Volcanic copper? That's premium sword-forging stuff... rare as hell," Vito muttered, stunned as he eyed the three animate beasts. "And they have names?"
"The tiger's called Taigo. The snake you fought is Senek. The wolf's Worf. The lion under 'Lion' is Rhein, and the eagle circling above is Ikou. All of them are forged from the same metal. With their durability... even if I go all out, I can barely scratch the surface."
As he spoke, Nekk's face twisted slightly, a flicker of frustration showing.
"Planning your escape, are we?" Tiger sneered, crossing his arms. "Nekk, you know how tough these things are. You two don't stand a chance. Might as well sit down and die with dignity."
"Eat shit! I'll show you how I dismantle your oversized toys!"
Vito roared, his body surging with lightning as he transformed into a blinding bolt of light, charging straight toward Tiger.
As Vito launched his strike, Nekk had no choice but to join the fray. In a flash, chaos erupted. Shockwaves burst out in all directions, violent gusts ripping through the ancient ground. Powerful slashes tore through the stone like paper.
With a bone-shaking warcry, a black flash exploded through the army of stone sentinels. Every few steps, a massive shockwave went off, blowing apart the formation like scattering leaves.
"High-Frequency Shock Blade!"
Aeridar's right arm was encased in Armament Haki, black as obsidian. His hand vibrated at a frequency too fast for the eye to follow. Like a missile, his body launched straight at a metallic knight.
His arm drove clean through the knight's chest, armor, frame and everything, like a knife through tofu.
With a second hand, he gripped the breach and, with a bone-snapping wrench, tore the metal guardian in half.
He flung the bisected remains aside and scanned the battlefield. All around him were shattered fragments of stone and glinting scraps of metal. That brief rampage had already wiped out more than two hundred stone sentries and half a dozen metal ones.
A metallic lion, cast from shining volcanic copper, charged at him, its rider Lion bellowing as he leveled a golden spear-axe straight at Aeridar's neck. The weapon screamed through the air, thick with killing intent, its edge howling like a banshee.
Aeridar flicked a toe, sending a knight's fallen warhammer into the air. He caught it one-handed, and met the incoming blow head-on.
The impact sounded like thunder striking a steel cliff. Shockwaves exploded outward in concentric rings, blasting the ground into a crater several meters wide. Countless cracks spiderwebbed from the epicenter.
CLANG. CLANG. CLANG. CLANG...
Aeridar didn't let up. Gripping the warhammer tight, he swung it again and again. The solid steel head tore through the air, each swing whistling like a freight train, aiming to demolish everything in its path.
Lion sat astride his lion mount like a seasoned knight, a master of both riding and weaponry. His golden spear-axe darted and carved through the air, sometimes stabbing, sometimes hacking, in sweeping, powerful arcs.
The lion beneath him coordinated seamlessly, striking out with fangs and claws, aiming for Aeridar's weak spots.
Hammer and spear-axe clashed in a shower of sparks, the air between them rippling like disturbed water, every strike threatening to tear the sky open.
With a sudden roar, Lion swung his golden spear-axe, the entire weapon turning pitch-black in an instant. He brought it down in a brutal overhead arc, an arc of black light slashing through the air with terrifying speed.
In that same moment, like a sickle through tall grass, the warhammer was split in two. The hammerhead clattered to the ground, shattered clean.
Aeridar arched a brow and took a step back, just in time for that black slash to carve through the air right before his chest, its edge icy with lethal intent.
The axe blade bit into the ground, carving a gash more than ten meters long into the earth.
"Well now... didn't expect that."
Aeridar glanced down at the thin line of red blooming on his abdomen. Blood trickled out in slow beads. He smeared it with his fingers, then casually licked them clean. His eyes narrowed as he stared Lion down with a wicked grin.
"But now... are you ready to see what I can really do?"
Before the last word left his lips, he vanished.
In the next instant, Lion was sent flying clean off his mount, the massive mechanical lion Rhein, as if struck by a cannonball.
Mid-air, Lion spat out a mouthful of blood before crashing into a thick tree nearly a hundred meters away. The force snapped the trunk in half and kicked up a massive cloud of dust.
Seeing its master hurled like a ragdoll, Rhein let out a thunderous roar and lunged to the right, jaws wide to bite.
"Scrap metal junk! Get lost!"
With a bellow, Aeridar raised his right leg and swept it sideways.
His whipkick smashed into Rhein's metallic skull with a dull, crushing thud. The two-ton beast was sent flying dozens of meters across the battlefield, gouging a crater into the earth where it landed.
Aeridar didn't miss a beat. With another blink-step, he appeared right beside Lion and seized him by the left wrist.
"This glove? Mine now," Aeridar growled, grinning savagely as he reached to tear the glove from Lion's arm.
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