As the four of them raised their heads, facing each other, the four skill cards turned into beams of energy and collided at the center. Instead of acting against each other, they merged into forming an energy sphere, which was then fired at the members of Team Twilight.
While the energy sphere of peak-rank-6 appeared to have been aimed at Claire who was standing at the front, it was actually an energy bomb that will explode as soon as it touched something.
Team Rebirth's strategy is to make the opponents disperse in different directions.
Little did they expect the weakest one would crush their plans.
"Let me take care of it," said Calder with a shield. He grabbed the shield's handle with his two arms and stood before Claire. He then launched his most powerful soul skill, which he only uses in tough situations.
<strong>"Soul skill: Invincible Barrier"</strong>
"Arghhhhh…." He slammed the tip of the curvilinear-triangular-shaped shield into the floor, enlarging it to dozens of times big, thereby protecting everyone.
The energy bomb hit the shield and exploded, pushing him back. But, he refused to budge and dug his foot into the floor, and stood there.
Looking at the scene from the top of Leviathan, Estella turned serious, "He's not gonna make it." She couldn't help but glance at Claire, "what are you doing?"
Claire was standing behind him but is refusing to lend a hand and so were the rest of them.
In a couple of seconds, the shield started cracking while Calder's veins popped up everywhere as his body turned. Eventually, millions of joules of energy released by the explosion dispersed and Calder managed to hold on.
With his hands bruised heavily, Calder no longer felt sensation in them. Still, he had a big smile on his face. He turned his head, "Captain, I did it."
"Yes, you did it," replied Claire with a nod as she finally placed her hand on his back. Her soul energy entered his body and made him return to his peak condition as before the match except for half of his soul power that was consumed earlier. The shield was also repaired.
While Team Rebirth was indeed surprised by his move, they didn't waste the time. From the moment their combined attack was dissipated, Tiara already instructed them to attack.
As Calder's shield shrunk back to its original size, Claire and others found the opponents charging toward them. However, none of them panicked and just rooted to their spot in silence.
Upon covering half of the distance, Tiara raised her dual swords above her head to launch an attack from far away as the previous one failed.
Looking at it, Claire nodded and raised her holy sword. People thought that she would attack but to everyone's surprise, the attack came from somewhere else. Claire was only sending a signal to Estella.
Now, with the opponents less than a hundred meters away, Estella made her first move, going big by unleashing the soul skill.
<strong>"Levi, use Soul skill: Stairway to Hell."</strong>
*Hisssss*
Leviathan let out a powerful hiss as its eyes shot invisible beams of energy and struck the opponent team's captain. Before she gets to show her true strength to her opponents, the eighteen-year-old fell to the floor and lost consciousness, getting trapped in a powerful illusion.
Everyone from Team Rebirth was stunned for a second, not expecting such an outcome.
Claire shouted, "Let's go."
Team Twilight finally moved from their positions.
This was actually the first time Estella had ever shown this soul skill in the competition. So, the opponents were flustered for a moment before the flaming Eagle in the sky let out a powerful screech. "Substitute, hurry…" Iphi shouted at top of her lungs while she was in the middle of a battle against the Sky Eagle Garuda.
Carmella Hearth, Team Rebirth's representative instructor acted quickly and urged one of the substitutes to replace the unconscious Tiara.
But, will Team Twilight let go of this wonderful opportunity? Obviously, they don't.
By the time the new substitute entered the barrier, Team Twilight had put their plan into action.
Garuda, which was aggressively attacking a flaming eagle that's tenth its size, retracted its talons and spread its wings. Louis kicked the floor as much as he can and took a great leap, landing on its back and pointing his bow at Iphi. He took a glance at Estella from the corner of his eyes and mumbled, "She has let someone else mount on her Arcana. I wonder what happened during the past few weeks."
"Here, catch it, Calder," said Mia as she threw one of the handguns to him. Calder, who recovered his soul energy, joined her as he caught the handgun. Both of them rushed forward together with enthusiasm. Their target is the strongest opponent, Evelina Crow as well as her Giant Bear.
As for Estella who just finished an opponent, she had taken out a rank-6 bow from her storage card that has a 100-meter attack range and then passed an order to the Sea Serpent, "Levi, stretch forward." With the beast long enough to cover every inch of the battlefield, she doesn't need a longer-range bow, and neither does she feel the necessity to stock up energy for a higher realm attack.
*Hisss*
The beast let out a powerful hiss and stretched its upper body toward Savannah, the one who challenged Louis for an archery battle.
As for Claire, she charged forward to cut down the poisonous girl Lilie, the one with a man-eating plant Arcana.
Now, all of a sudden, Team Twilight is fully mobilized against a team with a big hole in their offense and defense.
As the vice-captain, Savannah wanted to take charge but Estella and Leviathan were so fast that she couldn't pass any instruction and busied herself to dodge the attacks of Estella's cyan energy arrow and Leviathan's bite.
Savannah's lightning squirrel charged forward at a beast that is hundreds of times bigger than it. Because of its tiny size, Estella and Leviathan missed it. The tiny beast thought that it can take this opportunity to teach the snake a lesson.
Charged in the lightning, the peak-rank-5 beast attempted to pierce Leviathan in its neck and planned to kill it from inside. It even managed to destroy that dragon scale and entered its neck.
Once it has successfully entered the Leviathan's body, the lightning squirrel started moving down from the neck and aimed to destroy its core. Once its core gets destroyed, naturally, Leviathan will die. This tactic was employed by its master a lot of times against large wild animals. So, it followed to do the same.
Little did it expect that something terrifying is waiting for its arrival. Due to the darkness, at first, it couldn't see its exact appearance, but as Leviathan attempted to bite Savannah, the sunlight entered its body and the squirrel spotted a clone of Estella whose body is stuck to the wall of Leviathan's neck but there was no life in her eyes.
*Squeak*
The lightning squirrel panicked as a terrifying amount of energy was released by this clone of Estella in the form of a concentrated beam, killing it completely in the process.
Once it was dead, the Estella clone retracted her hand and stayed there like a statue.
On the outside, the sudden drop of her soul power took Estella by surprise, "Hmm, something triggered it? Ah, I see… that squirrel." A smile appeared on her face as she nodded in satisfaction, "I guess I did a good thing in creating the defense. However, I'm still lacking in mastery. I could kill an ally if I'm not careful with it."
In reality, this isn't exactly a clone of hers but a secret technique she developed over the course of time after she was defeated by Azzy in the battle, months ago.
Not wanting to face the same type of defeat, she placed a couple of defensive mechanisms inside, which uses her soul power automatically to remove any type of threat, whether it is in the form of energy or a material object that came near to its core.
Estella was happy that everything worked out and she continued her battle with the weakened opponent who was in a dilemma whether to use a precious resurrection card to revive her squirrel in this pointless match or not. After all, she already realized that they have no chance from the start.
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