It came like a crushing wave.

  No one could see it, but it was there.

  The advance faltered. On Caelindor’s side, every soldier stopped in their tracks as one. The cultivators with lower-level Phases showed the most obvious signs; they staggered back a step, faces etched with wide-eyed confusion and disbelief.

  Something had changed. But how, no one knew.

  Nathan looked inward, his spirit world stirring, but the sensation was indistinct. Was this the effect of nora? Had his body already adapted to it, assimilating with the Entropy Aspect?

  Beside him, Elen and Frank frowned, equally baffled by the sudden shift on the battlefield.

  The Maelivar forces gave their enemy no time to ponder what Arthur Merinor had unleashed. They surged forward to attack. The two armies were now nearly equal in number, and the fear that had previously plagued the city guards had vanished. In its place was an unstoppable momentum, as if they were certain of the outcome and had no doubt in the power of the gaunt man who looked to be on the verge of death.

  Arthur Merinor’s lips curled into a smirk. He lowered his hand, tipping his chin up in a gesture of absolute invitation.

  Crack!

  A spiderweb of cracks erupted across the mana barrier protecting Lachlan’s soldiers. The fissures sealed themselves instantly, only to reappear seconds later. The effect spread like a contagion through the entire army.

  The spears and energy blasts from Maelivar’s side tore through the faltering mana barriers with little effort. Caelindor’s defensive line vanished in a heartbeat.

  The disciples from the various sects faced the same predicament. Even though they used higher-quality protective items—forged by powerful and skilled cultivators—the light that marked their essential safeguards began to dim, growing as bleak as their expressions.

  The problem wasn't the items themselves. But no one understood what was happening.

  Lachlan had received a considerable amount of intelligence, none of which had mentioned this. Arthur Merinor had deployed a technique different from his usual Entropy Aspect.

  The army immediately fell into disarray.

  A soldier charged forward, sword raised, aiming to sever an enemy’s head. The brilliant red flame engulfing his blade winked out mid-swing, leaving only a mundane weapon with no added force. The blade scraped uselessly against the black armor of a Maelivar soldier, throwing off a few pathetic sparks. With a single thrust from his enemy, the Caelindor soldier collapsed without even a cry of pain, a spear piercing his heart.

  In another corner of the battlefield, a squad of soldiers executing an array formation lost their rhythm. They could no longer maintain their tempo; the man in front was struck, but the one behind couldn't advance to support him. The soldiers on the flanks failed to channel their mana in time to help. One man fell, blood gushing from his neck. The array destabilized and collapsed. A few moments later, the four-man team that had been fighting so effectively was reaped, one by one.

  The Tier 1 cultivators frantically reassembled embankments and shields, replacing mana stones and ammunition. But their efforts were in vain; no one could use their creations. The Tier 2 soldiers protecting them fell continuously, leaving the support troops frozen in place, staring at the surrounding carnage, paralyzed in a battle that was becoming increasingly hopeless.

  “Go help them!” Nathan commanded, pushing his two junior brothers forward.

  He stretched his body, once again assessing his own condition as his wounds continued to heal. Thanks to the food he’d managed to eat, he figured he could still act, using the Aspect Amplifier to narrow the power gap with his enemies.

  He glanced back and saw the two Verdant Spire Sect disciples still frozen, staring ahead, not yet moving.

  A vein throbbed on his temple, his eyes blazing. He roared, using his Physical Cultivation to shape the sound, transforming it into the furious, untamed cry of a wild beast.

  Startled back to reality, Elen and Frank blinked, their hair standing on end. They bowed their heads quickly and rushed toward their comrades.

  Nathan launched himself straight toward Lachlan and Zeryn, who were hovering in the air.

  The Major scanned the battlefield, his gaze taking in the turning tide. He half-closed his eyes, his expression calculating. Zeryn, however, had already drawn his sword, his stance radiating a high alert that even the Dao Intent user who had fought to the death hadn't provoked.

  “Well?” Arthur asked, hands behind his back, his expression arrogant. “What will you two do? Oh! My mistake, there are three of you!”

  When Arthur’s gaze met his, Nathan couldn’t stop an unnamed sense of dread from rising.

  Triggered [Tingling Sense]. One credit given.

  Triggered [Tingling Sense] x 99…

  The three prodigies exchanged a look. In that single moment, a silent understanding passed between them. All three advanced at once.

  Lachlan, with the superior speed of Lightning, flickered in and out of existence around Arthur Merinor. He rained a frenzied storm of blows upon the protective dome maintained by Emrys, the crackle of electricity setting a grim rhythm.

  This story originates from a different website. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

  Zeryn gently raised the tip of his sword. An invisible clang of metal echoed through the space. He glided forward, each movement as graceful as a dancer’s, the arcs of his blade reflecting the dawn. The slashes carved into the air, heading straight for the dome protecting Arthur.

  Nathan lowered himself, channeling the full force of his body into his legs. The muscles in his calves threatened to tear through his trousers. He pushed his mana to its peak, essence burning within the engine of his body. Berserker was fine-tuned to his limbs.

  Triggered [Amplifying Strike] x 2…

  Triggered [Flowing Strikes]…

  With a deafening boom, he appeared directly before the dome, his punch, encased in a Tier 3 gauntlet, crashing down. A shockwave formed, sending earth and stone flying. The force of the blow ripped his sleeve to shreds, leaving only the invisible armor intact. The barrier between them rippled with a wave visible to the naked eye.

  Inside, Emrys’s eyes widened, a knot forming in her throat. Arthur, beside her, merely tilted his head and raised an eyebrow, his lips curving into a smile.

  Ruby appeared in front of him. Before he could land a second blow, her own counter-attack sent him flying backward; he somersaulted several times to stabilize himself.

  Lachlan and Zeryn were still pressing their attack. However, Arthur's attention was now solely on Nathan.

  “Fascinating!” Arthur placed a hand on his chin. “You possess some strange mechanism when you attack. It defies convention. It transcends convention. What is it?”

  Nathan swallowed hard, partly understanding what his opponent was referring to.

  Passive Skills.

  Though he couldn't fully analyze what was happening, he had a partial understanding. He had a few hypotheses about the phenomenon the soldiers were experiencing, but he would only be certain after coordinating with Zeryn and Lachlan.

  Arthur was accelerating the entropy of their mana-based attacks, decaying the techniques and skills themselves. A cultivator’s attack was the product of intense focus, of the smallest details in guiding mana. A simple thrust technique might require a hundred minor maneuvers. This state of existence was considered a low-entropy state. There was only one way to combine a hundred maneuvers to produce a useful technique, but there were endless ways to create chaos, leading to uselessness. This was happening to the techniques considered most dangerous from Zeryn and Lachlan. Normally, cultivators would have to fear and yield before these two combat prodigies. Yet now, a single Emrys Merinor was enough to hold them off. It wasn’t because they had grown weaker, but because their deployed techniques had been partially neutralized, forcing them into a high-entropy state and erasing their intended initial damage.

  The more he observed, the more Nathan believed in his assessment. The lightning bolts, upon touching the defensive dome, scattered in all directions instead of concentrating on a single point. This further clarified the dilemma for cultivators: For techniques to become stronger, to carry greater destructive power, their complexity had to increase. Controlling hundreds, even thousands, of variables in the heat of battle was no easy feat.

  And it all made sense.

  What was difficult for others was normal for Nathan because of his Passive Skills. Or more accurately, thanks to [Martial Arts Mastery]. All the variables were tightly controlled by him, to the point that even if one detail went wrong, the whole would still function normally. Thus, his punch toward Emrys still maintained its stability, crashing down like a mountain and causing his opponent to suffer.

  On another front, his other Passive Skills operated as if in a different dimension, making them immune to Arthur’s influence. [Amplifying Strike] and [Flowing Strikes] were thus able to deploy without interruption.

  The gazes locked on him made his entire body feel an invisible weight. It felt as if not only Lachlan, Zeryn, or Arthur were observing, but also the higher powers above.

  He bit down hard, the pain in his jaw bringing him back to focus. If he was the only one who could be effective, he needed to act as quickly as possible. Despite his body’s recent injuries, he forced himself to advance.

  CRASH!

  His punch was like a cluster of bombs detonating in one spot. A destructive shockwave spread out, whipping up his clothes and knocking over even the soldiers who were too close.

  Ruby’s face was inches from his, her red eyes burning with an intensity that surpassed the flames of hatred and anger, threatening to incinerate him. Her weapon had changed to a pair of gauntlets with razor-sharp blades. Nathan knew without needing to check that his own gauntlets were being damaged, cracks forming on their surface.

  Disregarding all etiquette or any shred of mercy, he tilted his head back and slammed his forehead forward. His opponent’s mana barrier held firm. A contemptuous smile stretched across Ruby’s lips. But a second later, her mouth opened as if to scream.

  Triggered [Rebound]. One credit given.

  A force no less powerful than his initial headbutt shot out from an invisible muzzle toward Ruby. The mana barrier shattered. However, her defense didn’t stop there. The armor on her body activated automatically as she was thrown back, her two feet carving a long trench in the ground.

  Zeryn materialized beside her, his arm thrusting forward. The tip of his sword tore through her armor like a thin sheet of paper. Just as it was about to pierce her, she vanished, no longer on the battlefield.

  Arthur looked up at the air defense base above the city, letting out a contemptuous snort.

  Zeryn retreated to stand beside Nathan. “She was teleported out by someone’s hand. But there’s a chance she may come back. So you’d better prepare.”

  Then, the most dangerous person here lowered his head and said, “Don’t worry. I won’t let her. Such a disgrace she brought upon me.”

  “So, we should thank you?” Zeryn asked, flicking his sword playfully.

  “No, no.” Arthur waved his hand. “I’m the one who should say it. You all are giving me a show of my life. Even better than Adrian’s.”

  Nathan stood straight, trying to keep his breathing even and his spirit wavelength from becoming too chaotic. On the surface, he was calm, but inside, he was a mess. To fight against higher-level beings like Emrys and Ruby, he hadn't held back. Every punch was all he could muster. This meant he was gambling with his own foundation. Added to that, the Berserker state was always harmful because it pushed him beyond his limits. Using [Anger Management] excessively had also left his mind in a state of confusion.

  Of course, he did it for reasons beyond the current threat. He knew the higher beings were monitoring this battle that would decide the balance of the war. The better he performed, the greater the protection he would receive. If someone from Tier 4 or higher intervened, he would get the necessary help to keep his insignificant life.

  Zeryn seemed to sense his facade and stayed close, not immediately returning to support Lachlan.

  A blue lightning bolt flashed in the dawn, a wild, heart-wrenching dance of destruction. Lachlan attacked relentlessly, appearing and disappearing, pushing the devastation to its maximum. In the end, all that was left were sizzling sounds that settled heavily on the heart.

  Nathan could almost see a thin, frail figure, wreathed in fire, superimposed over Lachlan. Adrian, with his heavenly flames that could burn space itself, unleashed a storm of orange and red. And the result was known to all. The destruction that had once been considered insurmountable had been surpassed.

  The pain in his chest grew stronger; the wound from Ruby, though not deep, still left its mark. He had to use all his strength to fight off the encroaching fatigue.

  Around him, the screams of pain added to the weight in his heart. The soldiers fell continuously under the enemy's spears, their blood staining the square. Amidst the dust were splatters of black. The battlefield blazed, yet he felt trapped in a cage of ice.