The dragon breath sword that Xiao Lin had treated as a sure-kill technique all along failed for the first time. He understood that dragon breath was not omnipotent, despite its high levels of power. The special sword aura allowed him to wield power that was several times stronger than his own ability, but it was still nothing to someone truly at a high level.
However, the elf was definitely not someone at that level. At least, she was not before her transformation.
More accurately, even after transforming, Xiao Lin did not feel like she was strong to any extreme degree. Even so, she perfectly countered his dragon breath sword.
Xiao Lin noticed a faint green shield appear around her, and believed that was what blocked his sword aura. The energy shield quickly disappeared, not giving Xiao Lin enough time to observe it.
He was still in his Ruin state. The dragon breath sword’s failure did not stop Xiao Lin’s attacks. He followed closely with a flame sword aura, the intense flames turning into the shape of a sharp blade. The woman deftly dodged it, using her wings as well as her innate elven dexterity to make it look as if she was dancing as the blades of fire missed by the narrowest of margins.
Xiao Lin narrowed his eyes. This time his opponent had chosen to dodge instead of blocking, showing that the strange green shield could not be used at will.
Since it was not an absolute defense, Xiao Lin was not afraid of it.
The dragon breath sword used up a lot of energy, and Xiao Lin could not use it twice in a short time, but each attack he made under his Ruin state was still extremely threatening.
Xiao Lin was getting better at using his flame sword aura, and the skill was no longer the same flame sword aura or wave blade from before. Ever since he started learning elemental sword aura, he had slowly been improving on his flame sword aura. His sword aura now used the natural elements that had gone through destruction and rebirth, and those flame elements formed the true flame sword technique. Its power was several times greater than it used to be.
The elf woman was quite shocked because Xiao Lin had only mastered that skill after heading back to the academy, and so it was not in her information. However, the woman quickly let out a cold laugh, and shot out rays of green light. Each individual ray looked a lot like a Disintegration Ray, but it was incredibly slow, allowing Xiao Lin to avoid them easily.
However, those rays of light were not aimed at him. It looked like the woman was just aiming at the empty ground. When the rays landed, they quickly turned into liquid. The deep green color had traces of black and dark red. It looked quite disgusting as the liquids started to bubble and quickly seep into the ground.
After a dozen seconds, the ground started to rumble as if something was underneath. Suddenly the ground split open, and various plant-like objects rapidly grew out. Xiao Lin was shocked, but knew it was definitely nothing that would be good for him. However, as he prepared the flame sword aura, the elf woman rushed to stand in front of him.
This time the woman took on the flame sword aura, and the green energy shield once again appeared, perfectly blocking Xiao Lin’s sword aura again.
At the same time, those rapidly-growing plants quickly turned into huge trees. They were many meters tall, and the trees quickly uprooted themselves from the ground, waving around their massive arms as they started to surround Xiao Lin.
Xiao Lin suddenly remembered something he had been taught in class before. Some special elves had the ability to summon treants. It was obvious the one in front of him was one of them.
However, flames naturally did a lot of damage to trees, and Xiao Lin once again raised his Holy Sword, and streaks of flames turned the surroundings into a sea of fire. However, those treants were quite strange; their leaves were not a natural green, but instead a metallic black.
The treants did not seem to care about the sea of fire at all, and the flames did not seem to have any effect on their bodies. Xiao Lin once again used his Eye of Truth, and with his third eye, he saw that the trees were all formed by a black energy, which Xiao Lin immediately understood.
It was dark energy that combined with the unique elf ability of summoning treants. Darkness itself had a resilience against fire, perfectly covering up for the weakness of the treants.
Since flame sword aura would not be useful, Xiao Lin chose to use regular sword aura instead. Even though using other elements was not a bad choice, Xiao Lin was currently only more familiar with the flame element, and had yet to master the other elements.
The summoned dark treants were very strong. Each slam of their branches would form a crater on the ground. However, they were way too slow, especially to Xiao Lin after activating Ruin. It was practically impossible to hit him.
Xiao Lin’s regular sword aura was also impressive. He just did not use it much normally. With the purest of the sword aura on top of the Holy Sword’s own destructive ability, slashing those branches was as easy as chopping vegetables.
After a short battle, the treants started to fall.
However, before Xiao Lin could even catch his breath, even more treants started to rise from the ground. Xiao Lin understood then that the woman was just using the treants to use up Xiao Lin’s Ruin state, and even hold back anyone else from joining.
The commotion at the casino had alerted quite a few people, and Rosa’s troops quickly gathered. However, they were all held back by the dark treants. The soldiers had no way to deal with the treants, and in less than a minute, dozens of the soldiers died while the others were forced to retreat for reinforcements.
However, most of the forces in the capital were all defending the city, and those merchants from Earth were not willing to do anything themselves with the lack of a resurrection tower. With no one willing to do anything, Rosa’s soldiers were forced to ask for help from the embassy. All of that took up quite a lot of time.
Xiao Lin’s breath was beginning to get erratic. The fight with the dark treants had wasted a lot of his time. Coupled with the fact that he opened with the dragon breath aura, he knew that his Ruin state would not last much longer.
It was the first time Xiao Lin was facing an enemy like this, so he lacked the experience to handle it. The elf was already quite strong herself, but she was using the dark treants to stall for time. It was obvious she was being very careful, and wanted to guarantee capturing Xiao Lin, not giving him any chance.
