With an air of domination, a Krita beast struck down where Hadrian had been a moment ago, sending pieces of bark and the rock floor Hadrian had created on it flying.

Five metres from it, Hadrian frowned at the beast.

It stood two heads shorter than him, red hair and four arms, the corrupted monkey that had killed horse Hadrian.

You're just a beast.

Having seen the city wall, Hadrian took the time to see if he could find it.

Back then, it had been a mountain of a presence, and he thought he would feel some kind of triumph facing it after his growth.

Looking down at it, however, he was only disappointed.

It had unleashed its dominating aura and stood still, its mad eyes locked on Hadrian.

Hadrian imagined this was an area of effect ability of the force path like the stinging mist of the elemental path.

A regular looking monkey walked up from behind Alia and Hadrian on all fours.

Seeing Hadrian not falter from its aura, the Krita let out a deep roar that sent a shudder through Hadrian's bones, and charged at him in the next moment.

Hadrian grabbed the regular looking monkey, having already swapped to force path essence, and tossed it at the corrupted monkey.

With a swing of its arm, the corrupted monkey split the incoming regular monkey in half, its flesh and blood splattering everywhere, covering its face red.

The rock coating the branch bark rose, forming a wall.

The corrupted monkey crushed through it.

Mist came out of Alia's nostrils, filling the space in hot stinging mist.

He would rather avoid area of effect attacks like this since they affected the vessels not channeling that particular path's essence, but right then he needed to, as Facing the force path beast, he was at a disadvantage when it came to speed and reaction.

A rock spear shot at the corrupted monkey in the hazy mist, but with a swing of one of its arms, the spear shattered in contact.

Hadrian didn't bother calling at its essence. He had no plan to turn it into his vessel.

Since he was nearly back in the city, having a beast like this would make discrete movement hard.

Rock spears rained down on the beast. It dodged some, wafted away others, but most struck.

However, the force they struck with seemed to be slowed down.

Fire shot at the beast from a specific direction.

With a powerful leap towards the direction of the flame, the beast struck Hadrian's guarding elbow.

Fast.

Hadrian cursed.

Of course, his rock molding layer had absorbed most of the force.

He'd bought enough time to swap back to elemental essence channeling.

The beast landed more manic blows on him, sending cracks and pieces of his rock exoskeleton falling off.

Hadrian wanted to attempt using what he'd learnt from Truston's fight with Haldon.

Truston had managed to bypass the limitation of the invisible barrier of essence channeling beings to trap Haldon in his rock molding by coming into contact with him.

Hadrian gritted his teeth, the blows sending electric pain through his bones.

The corrupted monkey's head jerked back with a sneeze spasm.

The monkey Hadrian had thrown at it had been channeling flesh path essence, imbuing its skin and bodily fluids with the infectious disease, and the corrupted monkey's eyes, nose and mouth were covered in its blood.

Of course, it wasn't enough to kill a beast, but it's irritation and the stinging mist would slow the force path beast down.

With a grating wet sound coming from its throat, the corrupted monkey grabbed Hadrian, intending to throw him back towards Alia, but Hadrian's rock exoskeleton wrapped around its arms.

It had an extra pair though, and using them, it crashed the molding.

My essence shouldn't be depleting this fast.

Hadrian thought.

The dominating aura isn't that simple?

At rank two, it wasn't noticeable like he'd experienced with Bagdona in his office, or at the ceremony's dais.

Without realizing it, he'd been using more essence than usual, so that he wasn't fighting like he was in mud, as the aura of the beast was creating an area of suppression.

Alia stopped exhaling the mist and stopped the heat wave.

The beast paused too, as it felt these effects lift off of it.

As the air cleared up, they stood seven metres apart on the branch, Alia and Hadrian on one side.

Its eyes and throat were swollen, a thick string of saliva dripping from the left of its mouth.

Temporaryly blinded from its swollen eyelids, Hadrian called at its essence, not to turn it into a vessel, but to simply agitate it further.

It might have been a creature, but it still had its instincts.

From behind the beast, a lizard-like creature with long limbs climbed up the wide branch.

Though it was a land creature, Hadrian had given it sharp rock claws that dug into the bark of the tree, allowing it to climb.

Baring its fangs, the corrupted monkey lowered its head, letting out a low gurgling roar interrupted by violent spasms.

Hadrian swapped for space path essence, carrying some of the rock layer off him, and summoning it on the lizard-like creature.

The lizard-like creature charged at the corrupted monkey.

To distract it further, Hadrian formed rock spears off the remaining rock exoskeleton, shooting them at the beast.

Even though it couldn't see, it dodged the rock spears. As a beast of the force path, it could sense incoming projectiles.

When Hadrian made contact with its essence, there was a stall in its movements for a second, and that was enough for the lizard-like creature to wrap itself around the corrupted monkey with its limbs and tails.

Hadrian had wanted to do this with the Hadrian vessel as a personal win, but seeing he'd underestimated the beast, he chose not to risk it and used the lizard-like creature.

The lizard-like creature was two sizes bigger than the monkey, so it could manage wrapping itself around the beast.

Flesh path essence merged with his other paths' essences, Hadrian channeled it and used the bone softening and skin stretching to wrap around the corrupted monkey.

The beast struggled, crushing some of the rock exoskeleton, but it was hard breaking something that stretched.

The lizard-like creature's snout came in front of the beast's swollen face, and stinging mist shot out.

Tightly wrapped, Hadrian turned his control over the lizard-like creature mechanical, as the corrupted monkey crushed itself against the bark and stem.

The lizard-like creature raised one of its limbs, stretched and coated with sharp rock, and stabbed at the beast's eyes, which, as he'd last experienced with hawk Hadrian, were the least or nearly non augmented parts of the beast.

With a loud roar, the corrupted monkey pushed itself and creature Hadrian off of the wide branch, sending them falling down.

Tsk.

Hadrian and Alia followed so they wouldn't fall out of his range.

They crushed into another lower branch, falling off of that too.

After piercing the beast's eyes, something small burrowed out the rock coating and into the creature's eyes, then another.

It was small burrowing Hadrians.

Out of disgust, Hadrian kept his control over them mechanical, reducing what he felt.

Since the burrowing creatures didn't have eyes, he didn't see as they ate through the beast's eyes and into its brain.

The lizard-like creature, with its cracked rock coating, unwrapped itself from the beast with its objective complete.

The corrupted monkey creature crashed into the ground, leaving a small crater.

A few seconds later, Hadrian and his vessels landed on the ground, looking at the still body of the beast, its brains completely destroyed.

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