Affinity:Chaos
chapter-132

Another minute went by with Grey not stopping his assault. He naturally has a reason for this. Although he wanted to kill Quinn, he knew it wouldn't be easy.

Had Quinn not found out he was following behind him, then maybe he would have done a sneak attack that would end his life or at the very least, injure him, instead of toying with him. But alas, Quinn was too vigilant, and quickly figured out he was being followed.

After being found out, Grey decided it was best to wear him down while also toying with him. This wouldn't only break him physically, but also mentally. Once he's worn down, then the real battle would commence.

But there was one thing he had to make sure of, and that was, as long as he showed himself, then he had to kill Quinn at all cost since he had used two other elements. Quinn would be able to figure out he had five elements that would put his life at risk if the information of him wielding more than three elements were to be disseminated.

The first reason for this was because, in the entire history of the Azure continent, the highest number of elements a Multi Elementalist had ever wielded was three, although, there might be a chance of people having more but not showing it.

Then the second, and most important reason was that, if the people from his empire were to find out he could wield five elements, then he would be subject to multiple questioning and possible experiments since when he took the test, he had only two elements.

____

After being assaulted for almost three minutes, Quinn had finally calmed himself and started thinking, soon, a realization dawned on him.

'This person is trying to wear me down. Well, there's also a chance the person is deranged, so there's no way I'm sure this is his plan. But, if I'm the one doing something like this, that would be my only reason.' Thought Quinn.

Placing himself in the shoes of his unknown opponent, he assumed the reason the person was doing this is to wear him down. Although he wasn't a hundred percent sure, he felt he shouldn't be far from it.

Having come to an assumption, he stopped trying to escape since it had been futile all this while and focused on defending mostly. This allowed him to conserve more energy.

'Hmph! There's no way you can do this for long. Your essence will be used up soon and then, I'll see where you can escape to.' Quinn snorted while blocking an attack.

Given the amount of essence an Origin Plane Elementalist can keep in the body, attacking for over thirty minutes straight without taking breaks would naturally dry it up. Only when an Elementalist gets to the Sage Plane will they have an unlimited supply of elemental essence.

When defending, an Elementalist tends to use lesser essence, but again, this all depends on the strength of the attack the Elementalist is defending against.

____

It didn't take long for Grey to realize Quinn had changed tactics. Instead of trying to escape, it looks like he's trying to fight a war of attrition.

'*Sigh* Although he acted dumb previously, he truly is a great fighter. But unfortunately for him, I can go on for hours without running out of essence.' Grey sighed at Quinn's quick thinking but also felt pity for him since his plan wouldn't work out.

When attacking with the symbol, it doesn't require the Inscriber's elemental essence, rather, it takes its essence from the environment. Given how abundant the essence here is, there's no way it would run out.

The only downside of inscribing was that if the number of inscriptions the Inscriber is using simultaneously is too much, it wears the person down, just like what happened to Grey previously. But for the current Grey, he could keep up a single inscription for just over one hour before it starts straining him mentally.

'Since he wants to play, I'm pretty free, so I don't mind.' Grey chuckled playfully and increased the speed of his attacks.

He just stayed on his tree, in the cover of the night, and was enjoying the show Quinn was putting on.

____

Another fifteen minutes went by with Grey sometimes increasing the tempo of the attacks, and sometimes decreasing it.

'It shouldn't be long now, once this person runs out. I'll immediately kill the person!' Quinn thought spitefully.

This was the only word he could use to comfort himself. Even though he hadn't been injured, defending nonstop for almost twenty minutes without resting is annoying. He felt like an animal being toyed with.

A terrifying aura was being congealed in his body. He was gathering so much energy that once he sees this person, he'll kill whoever it was instantly.

Fifteen minutes later.

'How can he still keep going?' Quinn's mind was turning into a mess.

It had already passed the estimated time of thirty minutes, but the person still hadn't stopped the attack, and the speed of the attacks was still the same.

'What's all this? It doesn't make sense!' Quinn felt confused by everything.

He was already starting to get exhausted, even though he hadn't been attacking. The energy he had been preparing previously had already started to slowly reduce, and the stress of having to defend against attacks that would come from unpredictable locations was starting to eat him up.

"Why are you doing this? Come out and we can talk things out!" Quinn roared looking like someone who was on the verge of going insane.

Anyone facing the same situation would feel that way. The most annoying this was that he hadn't even caught a glimpse of his opponent.

____

'*Sigh* It's a shame a nice young man like him is about to go crazy.' Grey shook his head in pity like he wasn't the cause of it.

If Quinn were to know what he was thinking, he'll surely curse him and his entire family.

'But, I've had my fun, and, watching someone do one thing repeatedly is quite boring.' Grey slowly stood up.

'It's time to end this!' Grey prepared himself for the last fight.

____

"Ahh! You don't want to come out?! Fine! I'll force you out!" Quinn shriek madly.

"Darkness! Consume!" Quinn spread his arms wide and a terrifying scene occurred.

At the back of Quinn, a phantom of some sort appeared spreading its hand, like it was copying Quinn.

Darkness essence soon started spreading in all directions, and the moment it came in contact with any living thing, it slowly started consuming it. When it came in contact with a tree, the tree would slowly start decaying, like it was going through the passage of time. After decaying to a certain extent, it would fall and shatter into bits.

Even the ground he was standing on wasn't spared from this attack, and it soon parched up. The earth slowly started having cracks like it would give way shortly.

Within ten seconds, all the trees within a three hundred meters radius had all decayed, with the earth also suffering from the same thing.

The impact of the attack was dreadful, no one would believe this was the result of an attack. Even Grey who witnessed it was having a hard time believing it.

Looking at it properly, it felt like it was the natural work of time!