744 Time to get serious

Everyone could see how the process transpired. The dead bear hardened like a statue and crumbled as if it was a bristle statue.

As the statue quickly turned to dust. The dust gathering on the ground started moving as if there was a strong gust occurring all of a sudden.

The dust latched on to the two familiars. Their wounds recovered, and their bodies expanded more than before. While this was occurring, more cracks on their body from overly expanding appeared. A faint yellow glow appeared, and faint steam escaped from each crack.

Vincent and Darwin checked the stats of the bears at the same time. They felt the resonance and understood they were doing the same thing.

.

[Name] Grizzly Bear

[Race] Bear

[Age] 2

[Condition] Healthy, Enraged, Mutated Amalgamation Of Dust (75% base stat boost)

.....

[Core] Tamed Earth Core

[Traits] Mutated Return To Dust, Mutated Amalgamation Of Dust, Mutated Regeneration

[Stats] Strength 161 || Agility 109 || Perception 96 || Mana 6286

[Core Skills] Harden, Earth Shard, Earth Spike, Earth Manipulation

.

Vincent, Kazumi, and Darwin frowned at the stat increase. The two far larger bear familiars had almost reached double the power. Additionally, they looked more enraged than before.

“Ladies and gentlemen. I am at a loss for words. We have all witnessed how the familiars have disappeared. They apparently have turned to dust and empowered the surviving familiars.”

Darwin glared at the representative of the five noble families and questioned, “Did the five familiars have the same trait because of special training? Egidio Faulkner, what do you think would happen to the trainer or organization that could train a familiar to become incredibly powerful?”

The commentator became ever more curious about what was happening at the center of the field. The dark cloud Awa made was attracting half his attention, but the sudden growth the bears’ experienced made all of his attention fall on them.

“The ladies and gentlemen of the audience, and me included, are all confused as to what is happening right now.” The commentator turned his gaze onto the representative and continued, “Can you elaborate?”

“Hah.” The representative groaned, yet he did not answer.

Ester, Lupa, and Mimi heard what the commentator said. They glanced at the center of the field and witnessed two huge bears covered with hardened earth as if they were gradually becoming a living statues.

The three of them didn’t need to see the status window to believe the two bears were mutating and that they were not too different from the mutated beasts they had recently met or heard about in the forest.

In the dark cloud was a man with a frown on his face. Vincent had to use the emergency plan right now before he felt it was too late.

“Cover me.” He said to Awa before jumping out of the dark could.

The two bears locked their glares at Vincent. They rose from the ground to stand on their hind legs, and from their shoulders emerged multiple earth spikes covered in blood.

Vincent was not safe in mid-air but didn’t remain in danger.

Three shadow lines shot from the dark cloud. Two were attached to the bear’s shoulders, and the third was attached to the ground.

Awa kicked her leg like a trigger and shot her body toward the two bears. She firmly held the two shadow lines attached to the bears with her hands firmly.

Try as she might, Awa could not move the two standing bears.

The bears were far stronger than Awa’s strength, and momentum could pull. They were like unmovable boulders to her.

Awa could now understand the bear’s appearance, and size was not the only thing that had changed. They became far heavier than she expected them to become. As if their weight increased not only because of their larger size, but because of the thick layer of hard earth covering their bodies.

Awa opened her hand to release the shadow lines. A moment later, she sensed danger as her feet felt the ground tremble.

Awa jumped as quickly as she could. As her feet left the ground, multiple earth spikes emerged.

Awa escaped in the air. She turned her head and noticed two bear’s with their mouths open aimed at her.

Any ordinary person would be defenseless at this moment, but not Awa. She raised her leg, shot a shadow line at one of the bears, and kicked backward like a trigger, allowing her to pull her body.

Awa circled around the two bears. While they could not harm her, she could not harm them. Awa was trying her best to buy Vincent time since the situation was not in their favor at the moment.

Vincent arrived in front of Zero. “Here are all the Limb Seeds I can create today.” He told Zero while producing and dropping seed after the other.

A vine moving like a snake approached the seeds. It curled around the seeds and started dragging them inside the pile Zero hid under.

[Zero knows what giving it the seeds means. It will eat and absorb them to provide as much support as possible.]

“We need one of the bears to become immobilized. ” Vincent said before turning around and watching Awa use shadow line after the other to distract and evade any projectile or attack.

[This is demoralizing. We need to beat one of them and make the other stronger.]

historical

Vincent leaned his body and tightened his leg muscles. “All we can do is fight. Only when we stop resisting will we lose. ” He said before sprinting toward the bears.

Mimi glanced at the current situation at the center of the field. She did not like how it was. The blade of her rapier became red. The bloody red blade was covered with a sheening layer of energy.

Mimi parried Meaty’s attack and sidestepped to the gladiator named Slaveone.

Mimi swiftly parried his attack and slashed upwards. However, even though her attack was blocked by his metal shield, a sly smirk appeared instead of a frown appeared on her face.

The blocked attack caused friction, creating Sparks, yet that wasn’t all. Another unexpected entity captured Slaveone’s attention. Droplets of blood appeared as if a shot glass worth of blood was splashed on the shield.

In the blink of an eye, the Mimi in front of him became blurry and vanished a moment later. She took the opportunity of distraction to change locations.

“Behind you! ” Meaty told him. But it was too late.

Mimi stabbed Slaveone’s shoulder. She raised her leg and kicked his back with great force.

The rapier was pulled out with the slightest move of her arm. Blood dripped before growing and covering the rapier’s blade with blood.

Mimi gazed at Slaveone’s exposed back after he was shoved onto Meaty.

Mimi’s keen eyes could see and perceive Meaty’s expression that they weren’t used to being this friendly and close. She believed they were ordered to participate in the judgment by combat after seeing each other as opponents or stepping stones.

The awkwardness they expressed when it involved helping each other caused further delay in Meaty’s reaction to catch and help Slaveone. Regardless, Mimi was not going to let this opportunity pass by.

Mimi controlled and elongated her bloody red blade. She stabbed the Slaveone’s other shoulder, and as the blade kept extending, the shoulder of Meaty was stabbed.

“Two birds with one stone.” She murmured with a smirk on her face. She wondered what her father was thinking at the moment while watching her do this maneuver.

While Mimi stopped using the two gladiators as training before tiring and easily beating them, Lupa was going all out to beat her two opponents.

Lupa’s personality kept changing. The inclusion of her random movements and attacks that did not follow a pattern was causing the two gladiators difficulty.

“Die!” She shouted while swinging her claws at Speedy. But the sharp claws slashed the metal shield, and sparks appeared.

Lupa’s ears tilted at the perception of danger, and her eyes noticed a shadow shading her body. Her eyes shone goldenly, and her body suddenly tilted to the side.

*Clang* The swinging sword slashed the metal shield. Lupa contorted her body and lost her balance. But that did not mean she was vulnerable to getting attacked. No. It was the other way around.

Lupa took this opportunity to swing her claws as she was falling. Her claws scratched Punchingbag’s legs, and at that very moment, as she rolled on the ground and stood on all fours, Lupa recalled the first time she met Vincent.

Lupa recalled Vincent telling her to bite the Great Gray Wolf’s knees. If the two gladiators were not allowing her to injure them from their waist upwards, she had to injure them from the waist downwards like a predator playing with their prey.

Speedy and Punchingbag were now confronted with another version of Lupa. The current her was like a wolf looking to eat her prey. She looked coldly at them while bloodlust kept becoming more potent by the second.

“Is she a beastman or a beast?” Punchingbag questioned before they started another round with different results.

Lupa sprang foward on all fours. She leaped forward and extended her arms before her body started rotating. The spinning wolf girl was slashed at, but the blades were only able to injure her limbs.

Lupa landed behind the two gladiators. Without offering a slider of a second, she extended her claw and curled her fingers before swinging her arms at their legs.

Lupa’s eyes returned to normal. She retreated by jumping back and glaring at the two gladiators turning around. Lupa was like a wild wolf that could suddenly turn into an incredible predator at the flip of a switch.