Aezaleon’s expression hardened.

He could feel that this battle would be unlike anything he had fought before.

But that in fact excited him even more, considering after the eight calamities he just absorbed, along with the previous calamity: White Ibex, he could feel that he was halfway done to reaching ascension rank three already!

Three to four ascension rank three calamities and he was sure that he would ascend to the next rank; the reason behind his excitement.

The thought was a spark in a tinderbox, lighting up his rising ambition.

"Remember the moment you kill this calamity: Galescourge Bearer! The leader of this colony would definitely notice your presence," Clementine reminded him in a sharp, cautionary tone.

"And obviously it would come for you—The invader killing his subjects—along with the other calamities to hunt you down! Meaning, you would only have 2-3 minutes to rest, prepare or even kill the other rank three Galescourge Bearer residing in the north or the south, before the others reaches you."

Aezaleon nodded without even glancing at her.

Coming out of the concealment, he rushed towards the Calamity Galescourge Bearer, roaming the treeless land, just two hundred meters away from him.

The calamity immediately noticed his presence as his head snapped towards Aezaleon’s direction. His purple eyes narrowed, aglow with an eerie light and full of wrath on finding some other calamity on his land. His gaze—like a violet spear, aimed directly at the intruder’s heart.

In four seconds Aezaleon reached the calamity, who had not moved from his location even after discovering him, but he did not care why that was the case, as he came to a sudden halt. His feet digging into the ground, creating a cobweb shaped crack from the strength exerted.

Such movement generating a strong flow of wind that put pressure on the calamity, while Aezaleon’s claymore slashed towards the calamity’s foreleg!

SHOOWH! CRACK! SLASH! CLANG!

However, that was when the unexpected happened, as instead of feeling pressured by the gust of wind, the calamity used it to change the position of his body with a masterful precision. His head tilted as one of his antlers blocked the sword, creating visible sparks.

With a slight jerk, the Galescourge Bearer pushed Aezaleon backward, following after; his antlers glowed in an eerie purple, which spread to his dark black purple furs. They rustled and the calamity roared. With which came the Darkwinds—silent, precise and fast. The collision was a sudden thunderclap in the silent waste.

It was a gust that shot in every direction, with an acceleration far surpassing that of Aezaleon’s!

Therefore, the instant he steadied himself from the push, the Darkwinds struck him, sending him rolling backwards a 50 meters, with many irregular cuts, from deep and shallow to even longer, from vertical, horizontal to even diagonal; his shirt was completely shredded apart. Leaving him soaked in his own blood, with much of his flesh in his hands falling down. He was a piece of paper caught in a meat grinder.

"UAGH!" he groaned out in raw pain.

Aezaleon gritted his teeth while his gaze squinted. Realizing, even though the calamity has not awakened it’s soul core yet, it was still able to match his speed because of the unique wind elemental it had grasped.

Not to mention, the concepts this calamity had compherended. He observed his body, noticing how his wounds had begun to fester already, within seconds!

"How troublesome!..." Aezaleon muttered in a grim tone. It truly looked disgusting.

It was fortunate that as a Normalblood calamity, unlike him a Pureblood calamity, this Galescourge Bearer could only utilize one inferior concept at a time. Otherwise with strong inferior concepts such as [Infection] [Paralysis] and [Energy Drain] the calamity would’ve become far more dangerous than it already was.

"Let’s go long range this time! Those noiseless and fast moving wind attacks are really dangerous..." he voiced with a determined edge.

Meanwhile, the calamity, obviously wouldn’t wait for him to recover. It shot towards him with his antlers glowing in purple again but in a different pattern, indicating the usage of another ability.

On the other hand, Aezaleon also stretched his left hand on the side, for the first time utilising the power of his inferior concept: [Lesser Frost]. He created a meter long and five centimeters thick—<Ice Needle>—in his left hand.

He threw it towards the charging calamity with his full strength, and without a second thought, moved backward. Maintaining the distance, he kept throwing the—Ice Needles—which the calamity did not dodge at all because of not feeling threatened by them.

However, killing the calamity with these ice needles was never Aezaleon’s goal from the beginning. Rather it was his other inferior concept: [Movement Impairment] that he imbued in those ice needles before throwing them at the Galescourge Bearer!

In a 20 seconds chase the deer calamity was wounded by more than 17 ice needles and despite that, the calamity had not noticed how much his speed had fallen and how stiff his movements had become because of the cold that spread in his body and the ice that froze his muscles and major internals. The frost was a creeping vine, slowly strangling his momentum from the inside out.

Meanwhile, in these 20 seconds, almost all of Aezaleon’s wounds had recovered. Which was quite easy for him to pull off, considering as a Pureblood calamity, the quality of his energy was plainly higher than a Normalblood calamity.

In other words, all he had to do was fight against the fester from the darkwinds, powered by a low quality energy with his high quality energy. He was able to do it in these 20 seconds, while letting the natural regeneration of his body as a calamity take over afterwards to patch up his wounds.

Also, simultaneously getting his lost tissues regenerated by his wonderful girl—Clementine!

Now, with the time ticking at 30 seconds since the start of the battle and with 25 ice needles piercing the Galescourge Bearer! Suddenly, Aezaleon, instead of distancing himself from the charging calamity, shot towards it, which made the calamity shocked, making his eyes go wide, but also elated.

Finally, he had the annoying rat in his hands.

ROAR! He was fucking as hell going to paralyse the shit out of this rat now, so it won’t run anymore. Afterwards he would surely eat him alive for annoying him so much. It was vengeance time!

With such thoughts, the savage calamity grinned, (figuratively) and advanced towards his pray with renewed vigor. However, that was when the unexpected happened, as the rat, by the calamity bitch, became faster than him all of a sudden!

SLASH!

He didn’t even had the time to blink let alone activate his ability with the inferior concept of paralysis, when he saw the world spinning. Subsequently he saw his body; headless—with blood gushing out in conspicuous amount. 𝓯𝓻𝓮𝙚𝙬𝓮𝙗𝒏𝙤𝒗𝙚𝙡.𝒄𝒐𝓶

SPURT!

The Galescourge Bearer’s eyes became blank as the darkness consumed him. The head hit the ground along with the headless body with a small thud.

"This was pretty easy...!" Aezaleon commented in a cool tone. "I wonder how their leader would turn out to be?!"

"Don’t waste the time, absorb this calamity and let’s go kill another before facing the final boss," Clementine said in a calm voice, landing beside him in a graceful manner.

However, this time Aezaleon shook his head in denial. "No, I’m out of energy! Constantly running at my full speed and creating so many ice needles had drained me a lot, I only have about 20 percent energy left in both my cores combined," he voiced in a weary tone.

"Ooh... Well, it is to be expected when you’ve so much unnecessary movements and with almost zero proficiency in your concepts." Clementine shook her head.

"And you had the arrogance to say it was an easy battle, just because you suffered less compared to the previous battles!" she added in a teasing yet firm voice.

Aezaleon smiled at her remark but didn’t say anything. He threw the calamity’s head near the headless body and used—<Matter Absorption>—from his sub ability—Essence Devour Ascension: Matter-Soulmatter Absorption—on them simultaneously.

"This would surely get me back to hundred percent. Also, let’s see if I can get a concept or two!" he voiced with an expectant grin.