It was a wild, fierce smell, something that hit his hindbrain and straightened the hairs on the nape of his neck. For a moment, Lukas could’ve sworn he was back in the Crypt of Fiendish Worms. The toxic musk of the creature, the smell of what felt eerily like urine, a bit of rotten meat, and lots of sulfur.

Prey Found You.

When he heard rocks rolling over, Lukas turned around and saw something climb out of the terrain behind him. It was almost human— if humans were eight feet tall and had muscles the size of tree trunks. It had neon-yellow nerves criss-crossing over lava-kissed skin, with hands and legs ending in nails sharp enough to serve as daggers. Its hair was long, ferocious mane, and the horns of a stag grew from its skull. A heavy mantle of furs over a long cloak gave its lean torso some kind of protection, and it carried a long spear of some blackened metal in its hands.

ANALYZE (LEVEL 3)

SPECIES

IFRIT

Total Soul Capacity

0

Used Soul Capacity

-3845

Total Mana Output

4370

Negative soul capacity? What’s that supposed to—

Before he could finish the thought, there was a shrieking sound, and a chunk of lava, easily the size of a trash can, came hurling through the air towards him.

Lukas wasn’t stupid enough to stop it. It was just too much energy, too much momentum. It would be like using a medieval shield to block a descending war maul. It was possible, but if you did, you would soon wish you hadn’t. Besides, even if he managed to hit it right, the resulting explosion would have burnt his team to shreds.

No. A few pounds of pressure in the right place, at the right time, would be much more effective.

Molding a sphere of dense lifeforce in his right palm, Lukas banished an overcharged Burst at a side, smacking the projectile firmly in the flank, shifting its trajectory by several degrees. The lava-boulder went past them, smashing itself against the ground as it tumbled into the rest of the grassland.

Not a good thing. Not at all.

He met Tanya’s eyes and found her staring at him with annoyance. “Remember how I told you kami looked less than favorably at intruders?” She pointed at the grassland around them that was now cloaked in crimson flames. “That’s why.”

“Then ask him not to throw stuff at me!”

As if in response, the creature growled again, its voice like a shifting of tectonic plates.

“Do all kami have negative soul capacity?” he questioned.

“You caught that right off the bat, huh? Yes, they do. Kami are either symbionts or parasites, depending on their power levels. I’ll let you guess which one applies to this.”

Kami were creatures that needed the soul capacity of another Host to accelerate its own growth. In return, they boosted the Host by allowing them use of their mana-generation capabilities. Or, maybe, spiritists needed to wrench control over the kami and compel it to obey their commands. Either was a possibility. A single glance at the creature told Lukas that this ifrit was not a creature that one could control or subdue. Not with the average soul capacity levels he’d observed of bremetans so far.

And yet…

He tilted his head. Something about this didn't make sense.

Every single creature needed soul capacity to gain skills. Removing the soul cap later on didn’t make you forget those skills. It only lost you the ability to level up. But if he understood right, that nifty little issue could be easily solved by attaching oneself to another Host.

One capable of providing the desired soul cap.

Someone like him.

“I see,” he murmured, eyeing the creature. “Tanya, take care of the fires. See to it that Mori gets her job done.”

His eyes dilated. Alert. Focused. No more reservations. No more holding back for the sake of holding back. The battle was his to win now and he would guide it to whatever conclusion he deemed fit.

“I’ll deal with this vermin.”

It was as if the word triggered something within him. Lifeforce surged, at a far greater amount than he was normally used to. Ordinarily, he’d have deployed them as kinetic bursts out of his open palms. But now, they circled around his wrists, coiling, slithering, begging to be unleashed.

The ifrit brought the tip of its spear up. There was a low howling sound, and a flicker of reddish light gathered around the creature’s hands. The light flashed up the shaft of the spear, which glared scarlet. Then it dashed towards him.

Lukas didn’t move.

The ifrit came closer.

He clenched his fists. Not out of panic, but preparation.

The nasty fire-breathing monster lunged at him, its spear in tow, with flames erupting out of its tip.

Then he acted, pushing out the lifeforce until it was touching the motion around the spear, and pulling. The spear was yanked out of the ifrit’s hand and flung away into the ground, while a pulse of raw kinetic force slammed upon the creature’s leg, right at the ankle. Unable to balance its momentum, the creature tumbled its way down, but not before belching a wall of flames at Lukas, who threw a wedge of force to deflect it.

“Seriously!” he heard Tanya complain.

The ifrit whirled towards him, rolling off the ground and dashed against his direction. Lukas used his lifeforce to grab the creature by the throat and pulled it over in a large somersault, using its own momentum against itself. The ifrit crashed down upon the ground and sank beneath it, throwing up a gale of dust and debris.

“How… are you doing that?” Mori asked in surprise.

“Watch carefully,” he replied, eyeing the hole in the ground where the ifrit had disappeared. “This is how one tames a nasty ifrit.”

Prey Found You.

Nope, Lukas mused gleefully. I found you.

He whirled around, extending his right leg in a graceful arc like a certain goddess, and drew in power. Lifeforce spun around him in concentric circles, multiplying the momentum by magnitudes with every spin. And then he moved his leg in a sweeping arc right ahead.

Just in time for the ifrit to erupt out of the ground with a roar.

The result was a sight to behold.

Tanya gawked with surreal fascination as Lukas Aguilar whirled lifeforce around him in the same manner as she drew wind. Only instead of blades of wind, he was drawing motion itself. Momentum. As the energies spun at increasingly higher speeds, the gravity around him wobbled, as if his very presence seemed to bend light just a little. And then, he moved his leg in a sweeping arc, acting upon precognition of his opponent’s presence.

The ifrit couldn’t have reappeared at a worse time if it tried.

Tanya winced. Had the ifrit been hit by a speeding locomotive, it might have been better off. Raw power hit the creature in a concentrated burst of precisely aimed energy as focused as that of a martial artist. The creature’s body flew back like a rag doll, only to hit against the ground and turn amorphous.

Meanwhile Mori was—

“So much treasure!” the svartalfar collector was murmuring, as more and more chunks of urathril were being pulled out by her power. “So much treasure!”

The rumbling of thunder clouds up ahead captured Tanya’s attention. They really needed to get out of this place as soon as possible. Ifrits were notorious for widespread destruction, and the more damage they caused, the more they’d attract unholy attraction.

A faint sound to her left then attracted her gaze. Tanya could see movement beneath the ground— Earthen Kami in action. Calling in more frost, she cast a wide-area freezing spell to extinguish the flames.

The ifrit, however, was still out of sight.

No way it’s been defeated, Tanya scoffed. Ifrits were notoriously powerful, and would definitely not be taken down so easily.

Her questions were answered as several areas of the terrain suddenly went aflame.

A creature of fire and spirit. Apparently the Spirit element allowed these creatures to materialize in a physical shell and act like a physical creature. But do enough damage, and the creature would return to the ethereal.

He’d understood that much.

What he hadn’t understood, was that the ifrit did not need to stay physical to dish out power.

The world around him gasped and went scarlet, red light flooding him like a haze. The air screamed with unnatural power as the ifrit’s rage unleashed destruction upon the area, a kind of destruction he had seen only once before — when Inanna had incinerated the khorkhoi with liquid lightning. And even then, it had been carefully constrained, existing only to fulfill a single purpose.

The ifrit, however, had no such constraints.

Lukas’s stomach did a nasty flip, but he concentrated his lifeforce and drew it close to him like a protective cocoon. The air and ground shook as a fog of insurmountable heat came crashing down upon him—

Only to be caught in the middle by a frozen layer of aqua-light that took the brunt of the impact head-on.

Lukas caught Tanya’s eye and nodded in acknowledgement. She grinned.

The flaming head of the ifrit reformed in the heavens, now several magnitudes larger. A pair of detached hands appeared right next to it, with giant fireballs hovering above each palm.

Meanwhile, the thunder clouds continued to rumble.

“This battle might just take a little longer than I thought,” he huffed.

“Having second thoughts?”

“You wish.”

And with that, Lukas smirked and leapt up into the sky.