Lucius had recently broken through to the Seventh Stage of Evolution—and the difference was terrifying. His presence alone now carried weight, like the air bent around him.
Usually, evolutions didn't grant such explosive leaps in raw strength. A cultivator might rise a rank, but the power gain wasn't always immediate. Sometimes the advancement simply expanded their qi capacity, refined control, or unlocked the potential to learn higher-tier skills. Real leaps—those world-shaking upgrades—came every two stages.
For example, a Stage 3 Paragon Warrior could sometimes overpower a careless Stage 4, but against a Stage 5, that same fighter would be flattened without some external aid or rare artifact backing them.
Tamsin was Stage 5, and while he knew he could stand toe-to-toe with anyone up to early Stage 6, facing a Stage 7 head-on? That was suicide. Unless he wanted to see what his organs looked like outside his body, he'd have to fight smart.
'It really sucks having a power you can't fully use,' Tamsin thought, a frustrated growl echoing inside his mind.
He clenched his twin swords tighter, his knuckles whitening. 'Guess it's best I use everything I have right now. No holding back.'
He took a steady breath, grounding himself. "Alright," he muttered under his breath, eyes narrowing on Lucius. "This is gonna hurt, but it's the only way through."
A low hum began to rise. The twin blades quivered in his grasp as if alive, feeding off his qi. Their length expanded, metal groaning under the surge of power.
The once-smooth edges warped into jagged fangs of silver, their surface now shimmering with faint streaks of violet energy.
The air rippled around him.
The swords had awakened.
The twin blades in Tamsin's hands looked ordinary enough at first — plain, weather-worn steel, the kind of medieval relics you'd expect to hang forgotten on a castle wall.
Then, in a heartbeat, they changed.
The metal shimmered, humming with energy, as if reality itself was being rewritten.
The swords stretched, lengthened, and thickened — not grotesquely, but majestically — until each one towered over Tamsin himself.
Yet somehow, he held them effortlessly, as though they weighed nothing more than a pair of feathers.
Around him, the chaos of the battlefield blurred into streaks of motion — flickers of fighters clashing in flashes of steel and light. But Tamsin was focused.
He lowered the tip of one blade into the nearby flames.
The sword drank in the fire like it was alive. A second later, it erupted, the blade wreathed in roaring flame that burned brighter and hotter than its very source.
Without hesitation, he plunged the other sword deep into the snow at his feet.
Frost crawled up from the tip like living veins, racing along the metal, freezing everything it touched — until even Tamsin's fingers were wrapped in crystalline ice.
Lucius stood across from him, motionless, watching the transformation unfold. Not a flicker of fear crossed his face.
"You really just stood there and watched me get ready?" Tamsin asked, his voice carrying a faint edge of disbelief. "You don't feel threatened at all?"
Lucius smirked, shifting his stance as he began to circle slowly. "Threatened? No. Intrigued, maybe. It'd be boring to kill you before seeing what tricks you've got."
Tamsin's eyes narrowed. "Don't underestimate me just because I'm two levels below you. That's a mistake you'll regret."
He thrust the flaming sword forward — and a torrent of fire roared out, racing toward Lucius like a beast unleashed.
Lucius simply clapped his hands together.
A shockwave of wind burst from his palms, howling like a hurricane and slamming into the fire. The air cracked with a thunderous bang as flame and wind collided.
The ball of fire burst apart, blown away by Lucius's gust like paper in a storm. But before the smoke even cleared, Tamsin swung his frost blade.
A thin white slash shot through the air — clean, fast, deadly.
Bang!
It hit Lucius right in the chest. For a second, it looked like nothing happened. Then the cold spread — ice and frost crawling across his body, locking him up like a statue.
Tamsin didn't stop to watch. He dashed forward, his fire blade burning brighter the closer he got. When he swung, it felt like the whole air tore apart — but the sword hit something solid.
There was no metal, no shield — just raw qi, wrapping Lucius like invisible armor. The flames crackled against it and died out slow, and Tamsin's eyes widened.
"So he's walking around with armor made out of qi, huh…" he muttered under his breath.
A sharp crack! followed. The ice around Lucius shattered into pieces, the shards falling away as he stepped free like the cold meant nothing to him. Then he threw a punch.
Tamsin barely got his frost sword up in time. The hit sent him sliding backward, his boots cutting lines into the dirt.
The power from that single punch rattled through him — his chest twisted, his stomach clenched, and a warm taste of blood filled his mouth.
He spat inside his mask and hissed through his teeth.
'Did I just get hurt from a blocked hit?' he thought, a flash of panic in his mind.
"Shit…" he muttered under his breath. "I can't let that touch me again."
But Lucius wasn't slowing down. He was already coming — fast. Too fast. His steps barely touched the ground.
Qi flared around his arm, light swirling down to his fist until it glowed like a burning star.
And in that brief moment, even Tamsin could tell — this next one wasn't something he could just block.
Seeing Lucius charge up, Tamsin stabbed his fire sword into the ground. The blade slid in like the earth itself was butter.
In the next instant, a wall of fire roared up from the ground — thick, wild, alive.
Lucius didn't even flinch. He threw his fist straight at it.
BOOM!
The punch connected, and the wall exploded. A blast of heat swept across the arena as Lucius's qi burst outward like a violent wave, scattering the flames in all directions.
On the other side of that inferno, Tamsin had already stabbed his ice sword into the ground. From it, an enormous wall of frost rose — shimmering, cold, and almost translucent.
Lucius's wave of qi tore through the fire, but when it hit the ice, everything changed. The impact rebounded, reflecting his own power right back at him.
The blast caught Lucius off guard, throwing him backward across the field.
Tamsin didn't waste a second. He yanked both swords from the ground, their edges glowing. Then, with a metallic snap, he joined them together.
The two blades locked into one — massive, deadly, and burning with both frost and flame. The strange hybrid blade hissed, one half steaming, the other freezing solid.
'Alright… this should do it,' Tamsin thought.
He gripped the sword by the hilt, aimed, and hurled it like a spear.
The air twisted violently — heat and cold swirling together — rushing toward Lucius in a blazing arc.
Lucius's eyes narrowed. He brought his palms together in one swift motion.
Bang!
A shockwave ripped through the air.
The big sword stopped right before it could hit Lucius.
The tip hovered just an inch from his stomach, shaking slightly as Lucius held it between both hands.
He looked down, seeing how close it was to cutting through him, then raised his eyes to Tamsin.
Lucius smirked.
'Oh yeah… I bet that smile won't last,' Tamsin thought, clicking his finger.
The sword began to shake in Lucius's grip, humming louder and louder until—
BOOM!
The explosion swallowed the place whole. Fire and smoke rushed everywhere, tearing the ground apart.
Tamsin shielded his face from the heat. His heart was pounding.
'That should've done something… right?' he thought.
But then, a golden light spread out from inside the blast, pushing back the fire like a wave. The smoke cleared fast, and there stood Lucius—untouched.
Not even a burn. Not even his clothes were torn.
The sword in his hand looked dull now, no fire, no frost, nothing.
'Of course he'd survive it…' Tamsin breathed out.
He stretched out his hand, and the sword flew right back to him.
As soon as it touched his palm, it split into the two original blades again.
The moment he did that, the fire on the blade reignited—roaring back to life—and frost began crawling along the second sword again, coating it in thick ice that glittered under the broken lights.
'Alright, Gwen, Merrick… you two done over there or what? I could really use a hand right now. This guy's tougher than he looks,' Tamsin called out through the system, his voice edged with frustration.
By now, he had already used attacks that should've torn Lucius apart—or at least left a scratch—but the man still stood there, perfectly fine. Not even winded.
'Sorry, Tamsin. Things aren't as easy as they seem on this end,' Gwen's voice came through the channel, strained and short of breath. 'It might take a little more time.'
'Same here,' Merrick chimed in, his tone just as tense. 'Sorry, but you'll have to hold him off a little longer.'
Tamsin let out a long breath and steadied himself. He could feel his heartbeat pounding inside the mask. His grip tightened around the twin blades.
'Alright then… looks like I'll have to get a little creative,' he muttered to himself, eyes locked on Lucius.
---
Meanwhile, Gwen and Merrick weren't exaggerating about their situation.
Gwen's whip had been caught—no, snatched—right out of the air by Dravik Orlov, one of the clan leaders. His grip didn't budge an inch.
She activated the burn enchantment on her weapon. The whip hissed to life, glowing yellow as flames sizzled up its length. The smell of burning flesh filled the air… yet Dravik didn't even flinch.
That was when Gwen noticed it—his hand. The one gripping her whip wasn't human. It looked like something mutated, the skin thick and cracked like an elephant's foot, but with disturbingly human fingers wrapped tight around the weapon.
Her stomach twisted. 'What the hell are you?' she thought, pulling hard, trying to free her weapon.
Before she could react further, the ground shook with heavy footsteps. From behind Dravik, about ten soldiers rushed in—fast, coordinated, deadly.
But these weren't normal men. Their auras told the truth before their faces did.
They were all Paragons.
Some of them started controlling the fire around them, pulling it closer as they prepared to attack Gwen.
Gwen was completely circled.
"Give it up... you've been surrounded," Dravik said.
On the other side, Merrick was having his own share of trouble.
Kira Vostan landed in front of him. Her muscles bulged almost comically against her short frame — Merrick would've laughed if the situation wasn't so bad.
Then several other figures began leaping down from the cliffs. About ten of them landed beside Kira. They were dressed like soldiers, but it was clear — these weren't normal soldiers.
They stomped their feet on the ground, each one raising a boulder of rock in front of them.
"Surrender, or die!" Kira barked in her harsh, stone-like voice.
"You must be fucking joking," Merrick shot back, raising his weapon.
His gun had changed — no longer a sniper or mini qi rifle. It had become a full-on gatling gun. One of his arms was buried deep in the mechanism, making it look like the weapon had fused to him. No trigger. No magazine. Just power.
"Let's see how you intend to kill me," Merrick growled, pointing his arm forward.