Supreme Monarch

Chapter 183 C183. Denied

Hearing the behemoth's words that address him in an almost disinterested manner, Mammon frowned. He had vaguely sensed that something was wrong here and now he had confirmed it. He had activated his ability before this behemoth had even entered the fray yet for some reason, he hadn't been able to copy any of the skills the behemoth before he had used so far.

He could accept it if the behemoth was already aware of his innate ability and had taken precautions by using only spells instead but he could clearly tell that most of what he used were skills. That meant he already had multiple skills active before he had even stepped foot out of the castle.

Such a thing was ludicrous as even if passive skill were skills that were always active if one was to keep an active skill constantly active, they would continuously burn through their mana reserves, and even for a behemoth— demons who typically possess large amounts of mana— such a thing was insanely reckless and risky.

If he were ever to try that, he would not be able to last long in a fight against another behemoth and would end up losing his life due to mana exhaustion.

Yet, something even weirder had happened. Having moved closer to the behemoth in question with the pretext of making him an offer, there was no way he would miss the activation of a skill and he was right as his ability had finally succeeded in recording something.

However, what he had recorded was not a skill, it was a spell and unless he had the time to study it, it would be useless in this fight. He was just about to open the illusionary book to another blank page when he suddenly caught a glance at the name and tier of the spell that was being used against him. It was a tier 1 fire spell, fireball.

'Is this a joke? Did my ability break?'

It didn't matter how he looked at it, the fireball spell that had been used by the behemoth was clearly of a level beyond even his Tier 6 Blaze spell.

'What the hell is this?! Is he somehow able to interfere with my ability? Or I'm I under an illusion? Impossible! I have far too much resistance for that to happen.'

With very little time to react, Mammon pushed down his frustration and instantly used a skill while simultaneously instant casting a spell to counteract the massive fireball headed for him, skipping the chant completely.

-Max Magic - Dark Lance-

As a giant lance made of complete darkness formed above his head, he quickly stretched out his arm and it shot at the massive fireball in mere moments. Aware of the limits of his spell, Mammon quickly boosted his luck with his skill, •Luck Enhancement•

However, even with his booster luck, the massive fireball had still overwhelmed his spell, swallowing the dark lance completely as it headed for him without losing any of its momenta. "Tsk." Clicking his tongue, Mammon then opened a gate in front of him and the black void swallowed up the flames.

He had sent the attack somewhere else, and to him, it didn't matter if there were people there. Still, a gate could not really be used in such a way and the only reason it had worked was due to the effect of his skill, •Editor• It allowed him to slightly tweak or edit his skills to a certain extent. However, he was sure such a Strategy would only work once and thus, needed to put an end to this fight immediately.

Not wasting time he used another spell and complemented it with his skill, •Probability Correction• Boosting the possibility that his spell would cause damage to the behemoth even if it was met with a defensive barrier.

"Solar Vortex"

A spiraling large ball of flames appeared before him and shot towards Tyler with great speed. For some reason, he felt it would be difficult to counter this attack as though fate itself was against him. However, he could hardly feel threatened by just this much. With a nod, the Dark Garuda snorted and moved like lightning after only flapping its wings ones.

Without even using a skill, it wrapped its claws in dark energy and caught the large ball of flames like it was nothing but a ball of fur. Infusing his own energy into the ball, it turned purplish-black and grew larger, spinning with even greater intensity.

[Kwafufu... Here, boy, you dropped something, catch!]

In an exaggerated motion, he hurled the ball of spiraling dark energy back at Mammon as it laughed almost Hysterically with a malicious glint in its eyes.

Although he was slightly surprised by this outcome, Mammon knew he couldn't take this lightly at all. The two remaining generals had retreated far behind him as they could not participate in this fight.

Their abilities were completely outmatched by both parties and they just stayed far from the fight trying to hide their presence and not draw attention to themselves. Although they normally weren't opposed to teaming up against a troublesome opponent, they knew now was not the time to interfere.

However, seeing his spell sent back at him with twice the strength, Mammon knew he would be unable to defend against this himself and needed the help of his generals.

Using thought communication, he ordered the pair on what to do, and although they had been struck dumb by the battle so far. As top-tier demons themselves, they were able to force their bodies into action without a second thought.

"Greater Magic - Aurora Blast!"

Ovil cast his highest single target attack spell and a large ball of multiple colored lights shot at the ball of spiraling purple energy. However, the spell was not strong enough as it was consumed after only slowing down the attack by a bit.

Following Ovil's attack, Serene cursed; "Curse of Dispel." Her lips parted as she blew a kiss at the ball of energy headed for them and a slight gust of wind that blew at the spiraling mass of energy destabilized the spell and managed to shatter it.

Like clockwork, Ovil attacked again the moment Serene was able to dispel the attack. "Widened Magic - Brilliant Radiance!"

An insanely wide pillar of light shot down from the sky at Tyler in a range of more than 300 meters radius.

Tyler used Ultimate barrier on his companions as he ordered the Dark Garuda to take care of the two pests that were currently being a bother. The Dark Garuda laughed in anticipation as it was about to dash at them when suddenly the Mammon in front of them exploded in front of the Garuda as another appeared In the sky behind Tyler.

The Dark Garuda stumbled backward a bit due to the knockback effect of the explosion but the sudden attack was too weak to actually damage it even a little. It would seem the last light attack had not been to damage them but to fool their senses while Mammon instantly created a lifeless exploring doppelgänger as he simultaneously activated his skill; •Null Existence•

Effectively avoiding Tyler's senses as he teleported behind him and flew up while activating one of his final trump cards, a God Tier skill.

"Fwahahahaha... Pay for your sins with your life. You should've accepted my offer earlier but your foolish confidence in your pitiful strength will be your downfall."

He then brought out two bottles of potions and crushed them in his arms as he simultaneously activated a second skill.

"You should know, this skill cannot be blocked, not even by your absolute barrier. I'll be sure to eradicate you completely so that even the highest tier resurrection magic will not work on your corpse. Regret your poor choice in the infinite void of the afterlife."

•True Soul Annihilation•

He hadn't just been ranting on because he was just being cliche but this skill required some time to activate which was why he had also used a skill Prior to this to restrict Tyler's movements. His plan was perfect. With his unique skill; Martial Authority, he could set up various restrictions within a certain range that could not be broken even by a far superior opponent.

Thus by using Martial Law: Restrict Movements. He could bind his opponents in place for a least 10 seconds no matter how strong they were. Obviously, ten seconds was more than enough time for his soul annihilation skill to activate.

This was how he had been able to kill the original Behemoth of Greed, Mammon, and inherited his name even before he had become a true demigod. As such, he could not lose to another behemoth.

Although since then he had recorded countless numbers of skills from his foes and thus, he had hundreds of skills in his arsenal. Realistically, he could not use all of them in a single fight as he had limited mana and thus had to make adequate strategies on which skills to use on particular opponents so he tends to always go back to skills that had been proven to succeed in the past.

Still, the fight up till now had cost him a bit of mana and these skills cost way more mana than the norm. That was also why he had used two high-grade mana poisons before he could use the soul annihilation skill.

At his command, a dark aura gathered around his hand and as though looking down on Tyler, he shot the soul shredding aura at him with a mocking and satisfied smile on his face.

"Die!"

A barrier was constructed to meet the aura but it quickly passed through it as though it wasn't there and continued on its trajectory until it consumed its target. Relishing in his victory, he slowly descended and prepared to either face the Dark Garuda head-on or convince it to leave by offering him the souls and body of everyone here including the corpse of his own generals.

However—

"Magic Arrows"

Before Mammon's mind could even comprehend what had happened. Countless magic arrows pierced through his defenses like a hot knife through butter as he hastily jumped back to avoid a fatal blow albeit, having already received several wounds by that attack.

Turning around in a rage, he saw the young behemoth standing silently behind him as though he hadn't even moved a single step but Mammon was sure he had aimed correctly and his Martial Law should still be in effect as the ten seconds weren't up yet.

"You! What did you do?! How the hell were you able to avoid that?!"

There was no response. It was impossible to completely nullify his laws so how could he have escaped. Even if he had somehow still resisted it, the soul annihilation spell should've still damaged him a little but Mammon couldn't feel such a thing had happened.

"Fine then, No more holding back! Let's see how you'll resist this!"

With all of his remaining magical energy, he used the skill of his Martial Authority once again, aiming to settle this in a final brawl.

•Martial Law - All Skills are Prohibited in this Space•

While all skills were forcibly prohibited, he wouldn't be able to use any of his active skills. And while his resistances and physique were below the average demigod due to the nature of his abilities, he had gathered a number of passive skills to make up for his weaknesses and thus, would have the advantage in close combat.

This was his chosen course of action after realizing that the behemoth before him somehow surpassed him in magic and with the aid of the Dark Garuda. There was no way he could with a contest of spells anymore.

However, his superiority in magic meant he would have an advantage in a melee fight. Or so it was supposed to be.

[Denied]

[Notice: Martial Authorities has been overruled by the Monarch Authority. Thus, the spatial restriction placed around the Monarch will be voided.]

[Notice: Condition to evolve Spatial Manipulation had been acquired.

Kill and absorb part of the owner of Martial Authority to evolve Spatial Manipulation to Spatial Domination.]