Journey Of A Legend

Outside the house, Russ and Wayne were sitting before a table, while happily playing some kind of card game.

"Ha! I won! I have an Ancient Row!", said loudly Russ with an excited expression and threw his cards from his hand onto the table.

Wayne looked at the five cards with different symbols and colors on them and said calmly, "An Ancient Row? You must have cheated."

"Haha! I didn't. Maybe I'm not so good at this game, but you can't be denied I have great luck! Haha!"

Watching Russ's excited smile, Wayne shook his head helplessly and put down his cards too.

"Yes I can't deny that fact, but unfortunately you are still nowhere close to my level."

"Wha-, huh?"

Russ wanted to ask Wayne why did he say that, but the moment he looked at Wayne's cards he stood up instantly and asked with disbelief, "C-Celestial Pillars??!" How?"

Grabbing the pack of cards from the side, Wayne took away Russ's cards and together with his, he started to shuffle them slowly.

"Just like I said it, to beat me, first you need to reach my level. This game is not fully about luck. It's about intelligence too. And well... You don't really have that."

As Russ listened to this, his expression turned a bit angry, and wanted to say something, but before he could suddenly the whole place started to shake like crazy.

*TREMBLE!!*

The quake was so great that the table before the two men crashed over, while the windows of the house behind them started to form small cracks.

"Wh... What is happening?", asked Wayne with shock.

Russ was also confused by the sudden tremor, but instead of answering he grabbed Wayne by his shoulder and teleported away.

In an instant, both of them appeared at the edge of an insanely vast pit and looked down, but the moment they did, their expression froze instantly.

Below their feet, deep down, at the bottom of the crater, a massive creature was standing tall with its hundreds of meters height, while it was rapidly punching something on the ground.

But Russ and Wayne didn't freeze up because of the creature and its fast attacks even though it was massively huge, but because under each of its attacks, Greg was lying.

He was using earth layers to protect himself, but because the attacks were so fast and powerful those thin earth walls couldn't halt the creature's attacks, and each time he was smashed into the ground.

It was a total shock that he could struggle even after those hits. Only one smash of that creature could make even the whole surroundings tremble like crazy, but somehow Greg's body could resist.

*BAM!*

*TREMBLE!!*

*BAM!*

*TREMBLE!!*

But even like this, it was very obvious that inside Greg's body a few bones have been broken, especially his left arm. It was in a shape that was very unpleasant to the human eye, however, even with that, the determination in his eyes didn't fade even for a single second.

"We need to help him now!", said Wayne and was about to jump down to help Greg, when suddenly Russ grabbed his hand.

"What are you doing? He will die if we don't help! That creature is totally out of his league. It's on the summit of the Calamity rank!", said Wayne somewhat angrily and wanted to shake off Russ's hand, but suddenly he saw Russ smiling.

"Why are you smiling?"

Instead of answering Russ pointed at Greg and said, "Just watch."

Not understanding why Russ said this, Wayne turned his head back toward the pit, but the next second his eyes widened.

"Is... Is he?"

"Yes. He is about to break through.", said Russ with a slight smile and continued to watch what Greg will do with great anticipation.

While the two men were spectating the happenings below, until then Greg was struggling below the creature's attacks with everything he had.

*BAM!*

"Argh!!"

*BAM!*

"Fu-"

*BAM!*

"Luckily my body is stronger than others on the same level, so I can bear this beating a bit more.", thought Greg with clenched teeth.

*BAM!*

*BAM!*

*BAM!*

With each strike, Greg knew that the bones in his body could turn powder if he doesn't do something, so he wanted to activate his Ghost Bone Soul Creature to protect himself against the attacks, but before he could, suddenly he noticed something.

*BAM!*

*BAM!*

*BAM!*

With each hit when the creature's fist hit his body, he felt as the solidified cycle inside him made a small vibration through his body right into the ground, making him able to sense the surroundings around him dimly.

"What is this?", thought Greg with surprise, and instead of activating his Soul Creature, he concentrated on the cycle inside his body.

*BAM!*

Again, after the creature hit his body, Greg could sense as the vibration from the cycle channeled through his body right into the ground below him, making him able to see his surroundings clearly for a second, even though he couldn't see because of the blood in his eyes.

"It's just like when I tried to stop the creature's attack. I felt this sensation before too, but unfortunately, my hand got broken..."

Thinking about this, Greg got another hit from the creature, making his whole body to sink even deeper into the ground, and just like the last time, the vibration appeared again.

However, this time when it did, Greg could feel a small connection between the earth and himself forming, making him feel that he could precisely control the earth if he wanted to.

But unfortunately, he couldn't try out if he was right or not, because another hit came from the creature and exploded on his body in an instant.

"This should be the key to my breakthrough?", thought Greg with surprise, and seeing as the creature's fist was about to smash into his body again he created another earth barrier to protect him, but just as before, it was futile.

*Crack!*

*BAM!*

"Blergh!!"

Vomiting out a huge amount of blood, Greg clenched his teeth and said, "I don't have much time left, I need to act now!"

With that in mind, he struggled to stand up, but just as he climbed up onto his knees and hand, the creature made his body explode back into the ground in an instant.

*BAM!*

But not giving in to the pain, Greg clenched his teeth and started to climb up again, making the monster to be slightly shocked.

*ROOAAR!*

With an angry roar, the creature raised its hand high up into the air and under a second on its knuckles huge spikes started to form one by one.

Wayne seeing this looked shocked, and wanted to help Greg, but suddenly Russ's voice sounded in his ear.

"Stop. This is it."

And just as these words left Russ's mouth, the creature roared loudly and threw a powerful smash toward Greg's figure.

Wayne watched this with a nervous expression, but the next second his face froze up instantly.

Just as the creature's fist was about to hit Greg's figure, suddenly Greg turned his torso to the right and raised his remaining hand, meeting the attack head-on.

*BAM!!!*

*BOOM!*

"!?"

Wayne thought Greg's act was total stupidity and it would only end up in his arm turning into a waste just like his other hand, but nothing like that happened.

Instead, he watched as the massive fist collided with Greg's small and fragile looking hand, creating a huge shockwave and wide cracks below Greg's feet on the ground.

Watching as Greg was able to halt the creature's fist made Wayne utterly speechless, while it made Russ to smile like crazy.

While holding firmly the creature's hand, Greg slowly opened his blood-covered eyes and looked at the creature with a death stare, making the monster feel immense fear instantly.

Not knowing how could this possibly happen, the creature wanted to pull away from its arm, but it realized with a shock that it couldn't.

"!?"

Seeing its struggle, Greg snorted and said in a cold tone, "Die."

*Crack!*

*Crack!*

*Crack!*

In an instant, huge cracks started to form around the place where Greg was holding the creature and like a virus, it started to spread up on the arm at a rapid pace.

And as this happened, Greg's body started to pulsate and shine with a brown color, showing that the Fourth Flow inside his body started to form.

*ROOOAAAR!*

Feeling the approaching death, the creature struggled to escape from Greg's grip, but no matter how hard it tried, for some strange reason, it couldn't.

*Crack!*

Small cracks one after another started to form on the creature, and in seconds the whole body of the creature was covered with small, but deep cracks, making Greg's expression to turn even darker.

"Die."

*CRACK!*

With a strong pull with his hand, Greg pulled his arm away, and just like a chain reaction, the whole figure of the creature started to fall apart and turn into nothing more but debris.

What remained from the creature on the ground was a fist sized crystal with a surface very similar to that of an ordinary stone. If it was not because of its somewhat shiny look, Greg wouldn't have thought at all that it was an energy crystal.

Seeing that it was finally over, Greg sighed up with relief and wanted to relax when suddenly Alice's voice sounded in his head.

"You are in the middle of a breakthrough."

"!"

Realizing that his body was shining and pulsating, Greg said, "Damn!"

Without any hesitation, he picked up the crystal from the ground and started to consume it slowly.