Chapter 162: Surprise
"So, how are we supposed to approach this?" whispered Cinla, her eyes locked onto the pumpkin-shaped mass of flesh that was spitting out miniature version of itself at the moment.
Sovereign Of Flesh was an impressive title to bear but after hearing about what she looked like and what she was exactly, their expectations had drastically lowered.
They shouldn't have thought so lowly of this minister however, the meat slime was huge and could probably move around much faster than its rotund shape would suggest.
Axiolypito had spoken quite a bit about her, so the group of four knew just how hard it would be for them to put her down.
Lolianth was an experienced spear user, with few battle arts in her back pockets, her best weapon was certainly the fact that she was a komodo dragon beastwoman, although more human than beast, she had still managed to tap into the venom this animal could produce.
Coupled with the great sense of smell, she had an edge over combatants of her level without the added benefits of lineage.
Cinla was a mage, a light mage at that, a rare element that could be both deceptive and lethal, her signature spell was the wisps that appeared all around her.
Axio had had the displeasure of being struck by it, although her magic couldn't quite reach the true speed of light, it had been fast enough to take him off guard back then.
Cinla's proficiency had increased since then, under the guidance of an expert like Blouvier, her mana control and efficiency was now on another level entirely.
Feuman was, technically, also a mage since the heretical fire he produced was made through the magical affinity variant, unlike Vlasfimia who tapped directly into the true source of it.
Being able to resist it and not be consumed was still a feat that should be praised, most went up in flames the second they tried to use the heretical flame.
Although, 'weak' by comparison with the true height of it, the pyromancer was still wielding what was essentially something capable of instantly burning away at anyone's mind and enslave them to its own impious will.
Even if he couldn't reach such heights, nothing and no one in their mind would want to even try to touch this thing.
His hair and beard were nearly completely burnt off from training his pyromancy without stop.
Lastly, Mart was also there, although not a part of the adventurer group, he would also be assisting them against the minister.
He too, was a mage, making the group's composition quite bad.
The young man was Blouvier's assistant and apprentice however, he didn't look like it, but he was without a doubt, the strongest person here.
It was simply that his power didn't translate into explosions and raw strength.
Mart had been chosen by Blouvier not because they shared an affinity for life or for his potential she judged could surpass her own, but because of his peculiar affinities.
Mandate and Stagnation were their names.
Far from the four basic elements, it was closer to time and space for they were concepts.
As one could infer, training such odd elements wasn't simple, as such, he only had one application for each of them mastered.
The four of them were overlooking Sovereign Of Flesh from a high point, from a hole in a wall created by Axiolypito and hidden from sight by one of his illusions.
They were invisible here.
Allowing for Mart to set up a complex magical formation, interwined arrays, magic circles, sigils, hexes, talismans, cyphers...
His entire knowledge had been put to the test to create this incredible formation.
It was just a bit larger than he was when sitting at its center, it had only one purpose.
It basically recreated a zone, at least part of one, he couldn't imbue any spells into this artificial zone, it only recreated the effect of turning the mana within into his own for him to absorb while also pulling in mana from the outside.
Mart couldn't use a real zone and even if he could, he wouldn't have been able to maintain it for long anyways.
This technique was reserved for the higher echelons of mages, only outstanding individuals could make full use of it.
The whole point was to allow him to maintain his two spells indefinitely, or at least long enough until Sovereign Of Flesh was defeated or that they were given the green light to just leave.
He began by casting his spell of stagnation on each of his three teammates.
Ensuring their survival.
He then focused on the minister and waited for the adventurers to jump down into the enormous room to cast his second spell.
Forcing his mandate upon the monster.
Immediately, he felt the strain of casting such a spell on a monster so much stronger than he was but he held on.
As long as he held on, they would never lose.
'...But... Isn't she much stronger than described? Axiolypito said she couldn't even speak, yet, to put up such a resistance without even realising a spell was cast on her, her mind has to be on another level...'
Something was off.
Had Axio lied to them?
Astonishingly, he had not even tried to deceive them.
He had gathered intel on every minister and truly believe his own words to be accurate.
As it turned out, unlike what he had been led to believe, Sovereign Of Flesh wasn't simply a meat shield generator with extra power.
The monster stopped producing slimes the instant the three adventurers touched the ground, landing without problem despite dropping all the way from the top.
This was a room big enough to comfortable accomodate for both the Obsidian Queen and The Condemned.
Moving its body with a hop, the entire room shook with dreadful violence.
"I was expecting visitors, but I didn't think I would be so underestimated" a dominating and regal feminine voice came from the lump of flesh.
Everyone froze and prepared for what was going to happen next.
'She was expecting us? How?' Lolianth didn't miss the content of this sentence.
The mass of flesh slimes began moving toward the group.
Weekly Power Status
-- Power
Ranking 
-- Power
stone