Ainen shared the spotlight.
People outside saw the blazing fire that ate monsters and transformed, spreading and killing monsters with impunity.
"W-What the hell is that?!"
"Didn't he just break through to Adept-rank?!"
"Is this the power of S-rank Elemental Manipulation? It's too much, isn't it?"
Yelvina and Lilian were shocked as well.
"That's not the power of someone who just broke through to Adept-rank," Yelvina muttered. "The way that flame burned those Adept-rank…his stats, at least his Arcane stat, are already high."
Unlike Ainen, the other Adventurers couldn't store stat points to distribute, after all. Tʜe sourcᴇ of thɪs content ɪs NoveI(F)ire.net
It was because Ainen had a system that could store the stat points. For other people, they just gained random five stats per level that were automatically distributed.
"His food. He must have increased his stats by eating after the breakthrough," Lilian said.
Lilian and others on the ground were not the only ones who were watching Spotlight.
The mysterious pairs of eyes above also watched the latest spotlight that pushed Ainen to the 7th rank in the leaderboard.
"What the…why is there such a monster here in this shitty place?"
"Does he have a divine bloodline? Why does he already have an enchanted element? And S-rank mastery?"
"Looks like S-rank at its peak. We just got a very fine specimen, ladies and gentlemen."
"Do we have to check his background? If he is from one of those places, we have strict orders to avoid them for now."
"We have no time for that. We'll get him first and then check the background."
"How long until the squads are here?"
In less than a minute, Ainen's flames had killed around five thousand monsters.
And they were still dying.
But the challenge wasn't over yet.
Moreover, the tide of monsters also started rushing towards the fort. Even the monsters who were burning and dying began rushing, dying midway.
The influence of flames was subsiding fast as the Monsters spread while rushing towards the fort.
"We should attack as well." Naresh raised his hand, conjuring a large orb of Earth energy with patterns. "Ground Porcupine."
The orb shot down amidst the group of Monsters and vanished into the Earth. In the next second, hundreds of spikes shot out of the ground in an area of over a hundred meters, killing many monsters.
"That was nice. This is my spell." Hammer chuckled and waved his hand, creating hundreds of thin, finger-sized earth spikes that spun rapidly and flowed like a raging river.
They killed Awakened-rank monsters instantly, though when attacking Adept-rank monsters, they were destroyed.
"That was quite a lethal Earth spell. I'll try it," Naresh said with a nod, focused.
"Create a river formation and arrange spikes. The natural magnetic field around them can also make them spin faster based on the way you format the spell's structure."
Although Naresh was stronger, Hammer had lived longer and wielded Earth Manipulation longer than Naresh, so his spells were quite refined.
Ainen heard them and smiled. "Well then, let's play Earth."
With a wave of his hand, Ainen created a tsunami of Sand twenty meters wide in three waves, slamming against monsters and impeding their movements.
Naresh and Hammer both used Ainen's scattered Earth energy from that tsunami, conjuring spells and killing monsters.
"They're closing in fast. If they all get in at once, we'll lose the crystal." Naresh frowned as he also switched to defense, slowing down the monsters.
"Ainen, shoot that infernal disaster again." Hammer grinned.
Ainen used his new S-rank skill that he had learned from Lord Black. Of course, he had already modified this skill to make it more powerful.
Naresh and Hammer suddenly saw several thousand fireflies. At least, they looked like orange fireflies at first glance, glowing bright, fiery orange.
But when this veil of fireflies covered a hundred monsters, terrifying screams rose.
A monster was touched by fifty fireflies across its body. All fifty fireflies were fine, refined grains of sand capable of heating up to thousands of degrees Celsius. With Ainen's Arcane stat reaching 60 plus 60% of 60, his flame's potency, its upper limit of temperature, had increased quite a lot.
Not to mention, his peak S-rank flame was already powerful.
So when these fireflies gently struck the monsters, they released burning lines to each other. All fireflies were designed to connect to each other via a stream, a vein of flame, after getting embedded into a target. This was the addition that Ainen made to the spell.
The fireflies literally penetrated and burned through a few hundred monsters, and while they burned, a thick black smoke was produced, instantly turning the area into a black zone with high temperature.
Black absorbs heat more.
This penetrating heat from black smoke could impede targets in multiple ways, slowing them down, distorting their senses, and giving hell as this black smoke, once inhaled and entered through any holes, could mess up their Mana control. This was the main effect of this S-rank skill, Doomed Smoke Veil, that Lord Black gave him from his memories.
Attributes: Sand, Fire.
Cost: 3% Mana per second.
—> Unleashes firefly-like burning sand that embeds into foes, linking into streams of flame that burn the target and generate thick black smoke around, which scorches flesh, slows movement, distorts senses, and disrupts Mana control.
"Crazy…" Volmik and Toram had their jaws dropped to the ground as they witnessed the spreading doom as Ainen created more veils, covering the area in the front.
"It looks like we will complete this challenge without any hiccups." Hammer wryly smiled.
"Well, this wasn't a challenge." Ainen sighed. "Anything that dies swiftly with my attacks is boring."
Naresh dryly chuckled. "Don't say that. Only you have such powerful skills. None of us has any S-rank skills, but every skill you use is like an S-rank skill, mainly thanks to your S-rank Fire. Moreover, you are creating them. There are differences among S-rank skills, but your skills are quite good."
'Is this the difference between someone who is simply talented and someone who is a monster?'
"Well, I hope you all can also reach S-rank in your elemental manipulation fast." Ainen smiled.
"Screw it. I am going to break through now. Ainen alone is enough for this challenge, anyway," Hammer said. "Thanks to his food, I already reached the peak of Awakened-rank, and I have refined my Magic Core to 90% already. It's time I go above."