Chapter 495 (1/2)

Hoping that this was the end of the incident and they could brush it off, Hank turned to Ezekiel, but he stopped short. The man's entire eyes had turned a crimson color, and there was a strange, sulfurous smell in the air.

”Mine... mine... mine... MINE!” What started as mutters transformed into a bellow, and Ezekiel waved his hands wildly. ”Acid Maelstrom!”

Globs of green liquid appeared around Ezekiel and in the air above him. First a dozen, then a hundred, but soon a thousand, without the genesis of the strange globs slowing in the least.

”I'll take it ALL!” Ezekiel shouted, his eyes red, foam forming at the edges of his mouth. Those thousand globs of acid began to spin together in a strange formation, then the whole thing shot forward, followed by the hundreds of follow up globs. Again, Hank was frozen, shocked by the sudden change in Ezekiel. Sure, the man was always an asshole, but this was just... insane. These were PEOPLE. If they could ally with this Zone 32-

After throwing the attack, however, Ezekiel shivered and then collapsed. But the dice had already been thrown. Around Hank, the rest of his party seemed similarly shocked, even Affina looking slightly aghast, her blind eyes searching in the sky for what was occurring. Only Katie seemed to know where this was coming from, a bitter expression on her face. Apparently, Ezekiel was kept in the Holding Area for good reason.

Contrary to expectations, Dinesh and Tykes didn't seem upset. Their eyes glowed with interest, and they shared a glance. After a second, even as the huge attack covered over half of the distance between them, Tykes rolled his eyes and snorted. His giant iron ball disappeared and he folded his arms.

Meanwhile, Dinesh smiled.

”Domain: Labyrinth of Mirrors.”

Instantly, dozens of transparent squares, 1 meter by 1 meter, flew up from Dinesh. The air around him crackled, and he folded his palms in his hands. After another second, the air began to bend and twist, and Affina spoke.

”This... this man's Mana is so strong and thick that it destroys the air. I can see him... see his silhouette as clear as day.”

The two forces met. The hissing and bubbling acid globs smashed into the transparent squares. From what Hank could observe, these squares were a variation on the Mana Shield. But they were so, so much more than that. Hank wasn't sure whether the acid was stronger or weaker than the plasma, but he hoped it was weaker.

It took about 3 globs to destroy a square, and often that just let the square with a large hole in the center. Instantly, when their blocking capabilities were compromised, the squares would pivot backward, flying towards Dinesh. Another square was already there to take the first's place, and the wounded one would slowly heal next to Dinesh.

A thousand collisions happened in the first second, and hundreds in the following 10 seconds. Very quickly, Dinesh's strange domain was devoured, the acid ripping its way through, but there was always more barriers there, folding outward, collapsing inwards, guiding the poison so it was useless, so two globs would ricochet off of each other, depleting their effectiveness. And after the first wave pierced through, Dinesh's Skill expanded outward, boxing in the poison, separating each branch of the Maelstrom, making it so that they couldn't concentrate the attack in any one direction, piercing through with force. The Poison Maelstrom was helpless, as Ezekiel collapsed, leaving it without direction.

By the 12th second, the attack was defeated, and Dinesh's strange Skill folded back into himself, disappearing into nothing.

Hank coughed. ”Mighty obliged for that. I dun know how I would have explained to my boss that we killed the first diplomatic delegation we ran into.”

Tykes snorted, and Dinesh smiled politely.

”The pleasure was all mine,” Dinesh said. ”It is very rare that I get the chance to test my Domain as thoroughly as that... perhaps you would be willing to accompany us back to our current base. There we can confer... and of course, compensate you for stealing your kill.”

Tykes rolled his eyes.

An hour later, Hank and his group arrived at the base of the Zone 32 delegation, which turned out to be... extremely peaceful. Almost disturbingly so.

Ezekiel hadn't yet awakened, so Hank and Katie had created a stretcher to carry him. When they arrived, they carefully set Ezekiel down. Hank had a lot of questions, but couldn't think which to ask first.