Sam felt like going up, but Arkiv beat him to it.

"Great sage, you said any form of attack would work with this technique as long as it is physical, how about archery then?"

Arkiv asked humbly. His tone is full of respect.

"Of course, archery is also useful. Let me show you." The Monkey King seemed to have enjoyed someone calling his Great Sage. After all, from what Sam knew this is his self-proclaimed title. Maybe no one calls with that. After all with his strong temper, it is already great that no one is calling him rogue and such, the Sage is really not a fitting title to him.

The statue took the bow and arrow and started channeling his energy once again. At this moment, they noticed that as the energy formed waves in the arrow and the bow, the link with the energy in the body was cut off.

Unlike the time, he used the staff, the energy wave in the body and the staff are all a single cycle, but now, they are both having individual cycles.

After he trapped the energy within the arrow and formed the energy wave, he let the arrow go.

The arrow landed right at the feet of Arkiiv and he was blasted off from the platform, straight towards a nearby tree.

Sam looked at him and tempted to go up. He knew that he wouldn't be able to stand a chance. This situation is the epitome of the scenario when the strengths are equal the skill reigns supreme.

He's quite confident that even his body and elements might not be of equal level to that of the monkey king's constitution.

But he is sure that he is not far off. But the monkey king's skills are something is far off from.

Sam always used basic skills, he didn't like flashy moves, he always used the simplest moves to the maximum advantage.

In fact, this move is also a simple move. It doesn't have any fancy hand signs and flashy large moves. This all depends on the energy flow.

He held the staff tightly and said.

He slightly bowed in respect to the monkey king. This is his respect for a person who is willing to teach such a precious technique to them without any prejudice.

Sam knew that there is something going on between gods and the twelve candidates that came are not going to have an amicable relationship. At least, they are going to have some rivalry. These gods chose these candidates as players in their stead and they can just teach to their own candidates.

No one would blame him. In fact, Indra did just the same. He personally didn't even talk to anyone except Arman himself.

But the monkey king is different. Maybe this magnanimity is what makes him worthy of Sage's title. When Sam thought of this, he chuckled to himself on how he is contradicting his own thoughts.

He said to the Monkey King.

"Great Sage, I would like you to create a barrier around us. I don't want to reveal my skills to anyone due to some personal reasons."

The monkey king thought for a moment and nodded. There was a barrier around them and Sam took off his cloth that is covering his face.

He held the staff in his hands and his whole body buffed up a bit, the spiritual energy was completely roaring around his body.

But this time, it is not normal spiritual energy, it has fire elemental energy mixed in the temperature within the barrier increased.

"Your technique is good, but the spiritual energy is too violent and making the muscle fibers to have some space between themselves, they are not quite close and a lot of strength is being lost, you might want to rectify that."

The Monkey said, Sam nodded.

He made his attack and the monkey actually let him. When the staff clashed with other's staff, the fire elemental energy exploded and golden flames blasted at the contact point.

The Monkey king raised his eyebrows as he was a bit amused, that he is because he noticed that the attack is not finished, the tailwind of the strike is still acting and it made the flame sharper and more ferocious at the same time.

Sam wanted to test his own prowess at this moment. He wanted to see how he will reign in front of a supreme existence like the monkey king himself. The one who is arrogant enough to claim himself to be Heaven's equal, how magnificent would he be?

He wanted to see how he could compare to him.

After Sam's first hit, he quickly made the second one, he didn't dare delay much. But the monkey king is no pushover and he didn't stand there just to take a beating.

He made a move and the energy waves made Sam extremely cautious, his hair stood at the end and he immediately kicked the ground hard, there is a crack in the platform and with that force, he jumped to the side.

When the staff move of the statue was finished, a huge force went and hit the barrier. Sam felt his heart shudder. He didn't expect that he would feel this scared when he is this close.

The attacks started coming at him continuously, Sam didn't dare be careless and moved like crazy.

He started kicking the Platform so that he could use the force to dodge. He didn't want to block the attack.

After a few hits, the aura around him suddenly changed and all of the purple mist seeped out of the staff's edge.

He slammed the staff into the Monkey king. He is using poison. He doesn't know if it works on the statue but the answer came.

The Monkey King took a step back and shook his head.

"Hydra's Poison. Not bad. The Gambler's candidate is as resourceful as him." He praised Sam. One could see that the dazzling light of the monkey king dimmed a bit.

As the body is translucent Sam could see the poison mist which seeped inside do its job. The monkey king didn't play dirty. He made sure that things like poison will have the same effect on the statue as they would have on fleshly beings.

But Sam was surprised to see the next development. The whole poison which was seeping into the muscles suddenly started moving along with the energy waves.

When the monkey attacked one more time, the poison came out along with the spiritual energy.

This is the amount of control that the Monkey King has over his body and spiritual energy. He can contain the most potent poison in his body without letting it affect him much and expel it as he wished.

This is the epitome of control.

Sam became incredibly vigilant, he dodged the attack by hair's breadth and landed another hit on the monkey king, but this time, it didn't land cause external damage, because what Sam used is water elemental energy and his main aim is to disrupt the energy flow.

Since the effects on the statue are the same as fleshly beings, Sam used the water element to send tremors through the blood in the body.

The Monkey King stumbled for the first time.

Sam didn't want to miss this opportunity.

Suddenly two types of auras raged around his body. One of them is silver in color and the other one is black in color. Sam's silver lightning is raging all over his body. Out of all his elements, the lightning element has the most destructive raw power.

He disappeared from the place with the shadow flash and appeared right behind the monkey king, who is stabilizing his blood circulation.

Sam's staff was brimming with energy and as he landed his hit squarely on the back, he also felt a extremely powerful blow landing on him.

Then only he noticed that the monkey king already made his move and the elbow was emitting the same energy waves.

Sam took such an attack squarely.

Both of them flew to opposite sides and Sam hit the barriers quite strongly.

The monkey king also fell down. But he stood up immediately.

Sam couldn't do anything, he sat up with difficulty and once again started covering his face. The robes on his body were tattered.

The barrier disappeared and Sam walked down. The spectators are stunned by his state.

They didn't expect that the battle is so fierce. They did hear some sounds, but they all thought that most of it are caused by the monkey king himself.

Then they saw the monkey king's statue and the dazzling light covering it is a lot dimmer and it is gradually increasing as if recovering.

This is what shocked him even more.

They weren't even able to dodge the attacks.

But Sam seemed to have done more than just dodge.

Sam walked down and leaned against the tree.

Then only they saw the gaping wound on his right abdomen. That is where the elbow landed.

They could see that his flesh almost burst apart and they could faintly see the ribcage.

They couldn't imagine the hit that he took.

They want to see his face all of a sudden.

Sam didn't care about them and took his concealing formation disc once again.