"Aaaargh!"

Jario's body was surrounded by the cloud of lightning shards before they started crashing onto him like fireflies to flame. As a result of this, Jario's body was subjected to a dense amount of electrical discharge that overpowered him.

Jario was unable to move his body. The small explosions that had occurred over his body due to his mana defense layer colliding with the lightning shards caused some burn marks on his skin.

Eren was already charging toward Jario. He swung his blade in front of him and sent a flying slash toward his opponent while gripping the hilt of his weapon with both his hands.

Jario saw Eren coming at him at full speed. He realized that the flying slash he had sent ahead would hurt him if he didn't take action. The look on his face suggested that he was in a panic.

The flying slash of lightning struck Jario's stunned body. As a result, his body was sent further back from its original position. The slash had changed its orientation mid-air and crashed onto his body diagonally. As a result, there was a gaping wound on the demonic ranker's body that ran from his left shoulder to his right waist side.

"Aaaaaaargh!"

Driven by pain, Jarico yelled loudly while gripping his weapons hard. He saw that Eren had stopped maintaining his safe distance from him. Now that he was severely injured, the lightning-element ranker charged at him without any fear.

When Eren got close to Jario from behind him, Jario's anxious and stressed expression changed into a devious smile. It was apparent that Jario had baited Eren into coming close to him.

"Hahaha!"

Jario's body started regenerating lost flesh at a crazy speed, which didn't look like the work of a normal healing spell. The demonic rankers had the means to pull off stunts like that.

Clang!

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Eren clashed with Jario using his weapon. Now that he was within range, running away from Jario would only make him attack even more fiercely. So he decided to clash with Jario knowing full well it was a setup at this point.

"Hahaha! Little fish, hope you survive this."

Jario laughed as he clashed with Eren's Tachi using his left ax. He charged his right ax and performed the same move with even more ferocity and speed than before. He spun on his toe while raising his ax to Eren's lower ribcage.

Eren smiled wickedly when he saw Jario performing the same move. As it turned out, even he was prepared to face the demonic ranker. He sent his mana to the ring he was wearing and activated his defense properties. The same ring he had received from Rog.

A semi-transparent protective layer surrounded Eren's body like a tight bodysuit. The dome-shaped energy barrier could be used this way too if the user wished for it.

Clang! Boom!

Jario's charged ax made contact with Eren's upper abdomen from his left side. Since Eren had braced for the impact, he wasn't pushed far away by the impact like the last time.

Jario felt something was wrong as soon as his ax clashed with Eren's body. He didn't feel the feedback of cleaving the flesh of his opponent anywhere. Moreover, even the impact he had made seemed to be wiped out.

Jario didn't give up. He knew his attack had pushed Eren some distance away from him. So he charged his axes some more and sent a series of flying slashes of his own while he was spinning. As a result, the flying slashes that were sent in pairs had a kind of non-linear path with which they were closing on Eren.

Eren stood in his place and spread his hand. He also let the energy barrier take the shape of a dome to counter Jario's attacks. Meanwhile, he cast some more Blitz Shards behind him outside the energy barrier to prepare for an attack of his own.

Jaio stopped spinning when he realized that he had launched several attacks on Eren. He quickly adjusted his position and gripped his hands while fixing his gaze on his opponent who was standing only about 7 meters away from him.

The demonic ranker was shocked by what he saw.

All his attacks were negated by Eren's energy barrier. It had a few cracks here and there. Nevertheless, the shield was still able to withstand a lot more of his attacks. The guy that was inside the energy dome did fine as well. In fact, he was preparing for his next attack.

"This... Adelman's ring? Or is it counterfeit? Where the fuck did you get it?"

Jario asked Eren with stupefied expressions. He now understood how he along with other team members had countered the effects of miasma.

Eren had taken Reece, Mia, Ekay, and Rhea under the protection of the energy barrier cast by his ring. They were all near him and within the range of the energy barrier. It kept them safe from the miasma's effects, enabling them to launch a counterattack when the time was right.

From the way Jario spoke, Eren concluded that the ring he had "borrowed" from Rog was special. But he didn't have time or interest to ask the enemy that was trying to kill him. He decided to finish the guy first before focusing on other things.

It was not Jario but Eren who had persuaded the former to use the same move. He had observed last time that the demonic ranker would show a defect in his stance after using the attack. So now was the time to make full use of it.

Blitz Steps!

Eren cast his spell and disappeared from his place. In the next moment, Jario found out that his body had suddenly become unstable and he was about to collapse on his face.

Eren had chopped Jario's right leg off from its knee, dealing a fatal blow to the demonic ranker who was his opponent. The right leg from the knee down stood on its own while Jario's body fell to the ground. A fountain of blood erupted from the severed head that was still standing on the ground firmly like it had been planted as a decorative item for Halloween.

"A..."

Jario's scream was abruptly cut when his head was separated from his body. The ax-wielding warrior who was supposed to be the de facto leader of the demonic rankers was killed by someone who was five stages below him in the Meta rank.