When A Mage Revolts

Benjamin felt his heart pounding as the spear flew above him.

He was clear that, to survive, he had to take advantage of the intangible form of the System. But, the old man’s current state was eerie; his shapeless and formless attacks made him feel as if he was dealing with the void. Thus, he was worried that he could dodge this next attack.

But…...if he failed to, he would be dead, so what else was there to say?

Seeing the spear that was centimeters apart, Benjamin felt as if his heart had stopped, but also… as if his soul was freed - a sense of relaxation.

"Activate it." He said silently.

After saying this, everything in front of him changed.

He did not experience the usual intangible state. This time, he felt as if someone had pressed a button and slowed down everything around him.

He felt his body get lighter, and the energy that was binding him disappear; he slowly descended from mid-air. He could clearly see the flesh and blood spear go through his chest, but not leaving any wound, as if he was looking at an illusion.

An illusion...

Suddenly, a strange idea emerged in his head.

This intangible form turned him into an illusion, so no one could harm him. But, from another point of view, maybe this had actually changed everything else into an intangible illusion.

So, which was it?

In this immensely slowed down state, Benjamin lifted his head and looked forward.

This time, he saw a completely different scene.

In front, not far away, the old man’s body parts looked just like fake images. In those fake pieces of imagery, Benjamin could see another completely intact old man.

A floating old man, with crystal in hand, glowing green from head to toe. Benjamin was stunned.

Who was that? Why were there two old men?

Not knowing why, he felt that the "old man" that was cut into pieces was actually fake, as if it was just a reflection from another world. But the "old man" he was seeing now was the real one, and he if reached out his hand in his current state, he could feel the opponent.

Wait, what?

The intangible him was intangible, there was no way he could interact with something else.

Unless…...his opponent was intangible as well!

A lightbulb lit up in his head. At that moment, Benjamin realized how the man’s "Undying Form" came to be!

But, before he could finish thinking, his slowed-down and intangible state ended.

"Huh?" muttered the old man.

The flesh and blood spear somehow appeared behind Benjamin, yet he appeared unscathed as he fell to the ground.

But Benjamin was well prepared. In the blink of an eye, a Pillar of Stem was conjured, which lifted him up and away from the old man.

Everything happened so quickly that the opponent could not react.

After a few seconds, Mikel opened his eyes and looked through the window, seeing the Benjamin was uninjured, his jaw fell to the floor.

Lance was no different. He watched as the flesh and blood spear went through his chest, but did not see any trace of blood. He now looked at Benjamin as if he saw a ghost.

"You… you… what happened?" Not knowing if it was because of the injury, or because of shock, Lance could not speak properly.

Benjamin heard this, smiled, and did not say anything, but instead smacked him with a healing water ball.

After that, he returned his gaze towards the old man.

As for Benjamin’s escape from death caught the old man off guard. But, Benjamin knew this was just an illusion and thus, had no way of determining his opponent’s genuine reaction.

Based on Benjamin’s deduction, the binding skill was short-ranged; if not the old man would not haved delayed any further and used it again.

If he could keep his distance between himself and the old man, he would not be bound.

"What are you?" Finally, the shattered old man slowly composed himself, and spoke, with a tone full of shock," How…...are you able to enter the Inner World?"

Benjamin was surprised. The Inner World? What in the ‘worlds’ was that?

"Hey, that intangible form you can utilize, is it related to the Inner World?" he asked the System.

"I have no idea." The System’s reply was prompt.

"...Oh well."

Benjamin could not expect the System to explain much. But, based on his experience, and what the old man said, he could theorize:

His intangible form was not actually intangible, but actually allowed him to enter this "Inner World" - it was probably a world that was parallel to the world they were in now. Whilst in this state, his actual body did not exist in the real world, so the ‘real’ world attacks could not harm him.

But still, he did not understand what this Inner World was.

"What? You... How do you know about the Inner World?" What else could he do, of course he had to speak and play along to try to try extract something out of the old man.

Whatever, as long as it bought time for him to breathe.

"Hmph! So, what if you can enter the Inner World, even if the elements told you everything, you have to die here today!" The old man did not speak much. In a rage, he conjured tons of energy balls.

Not this shit again...

Using energy balls to disrupt him, one misstep would place him under crowd control. With Benjamin under crowd control, the old man could easily destroy him. Benjamin already saw through his plans.

Sadly, he still could not understand this ‘Inner World’ at all. But, with his limited information, he had a rough idea.

The secret to the old man’s "Undying form".

The small energy balls came flying, and Benjamin dodged them as he pondered. His guess was, the old man he saw when he was intangible was the real old man.

The so called" Summoning God’s Energy", was actually just using the energy in the green crystal to hide his real self in the Inner World. Then, he would replace his body with some sort of substitute. Even if it was attacked and destroyed, the old man in the Inner World would be in perfect health.

Because of that, if he wanted to harm the old man, he would have to attack him in the Inner World.

But how?

"Hey, didn’t you say before, that you once absorbed water elemental energy for so long that you grew, and the time for the intangible form also lengthened?" He asked in his heart, "Can you still use the intangible form now? How long can you last?"

The System was silent for a while, but replied: "I can’t hold out much longer! At most… at most two seconds."

Two seconds...

While dodging the small energy balls, Benjamin lifted his head, and silently look at the old man’s position from his memory.

"Are you done playing around?" The old man’s voice reverberated, "Even if you can enter the Inner World, would there be any point? God rules that realm, you can’t control anything there."

Lance and Mikel obviously did not understand what he meant, but, seeing the tide of battle slowly go back to the way it was, they could not help but feel nervous for Benjamin.

Especially Lance. All he knew was martial arts, he could not help at all, he could only stand aside and give emotional support.

But, as Lance was clenching his fists, wanting to slash the old man so badly, Benjamin suddenly turned around and spoke.

"Sir Head Knight, lend me your sword."

Lance was stunned for a while but immediately reacted. Even though he did not know why Benjamin said this, he still threw his sword up towards Benjamin.

Benjamin’s eyes shone with adamancy. While controlling the steam, he spun Lance’s sword up.

"You wish!" At the same time, the old man realized what Benjamin wanted to do, and screamed in rage.

Maybe it was the sudden threat to the old man, but he could not care less about his energy balls anymore. His formless energy gushed out and rushed towards the sword, as wanting to steal the sword from the steam.

But, Benjamin had the upper hand. The steam was closer and managed to wrap around the sword. The formless energy lunged at it before tugging at the sword from the steam.

At the moment, they were evenly matched.

"You think a sword is enough to harm me?" Maybe because his weakness was exposed, the old man’s tine became more aggressive," A small mage, just barely having caught a glimpse of the world’s wonders, don’t get caught in your own hubris."

"Oh really?" Benjamin replied, "If I cannot hurt you, why would you be scared to this point?"

While saying that, he flew towards the sword, reached out, and snatched the sword with his own hands.

"You seek death!" The old man shrieked, and the formless energy came rushing out, "I warn you, if you continue to..."

Bang!

The old man’s words were stopped abruptly. Everyone was stunned.

Silence.

The deserted outer city went quiet as the wind whistled across everyone’s ears.

"Did, did I mishear? What was that?" Mikel peeked with his head through the window, his voice trembling.

Maybe it was because too much happened in one night, but he could not digest it fast enough.

"Sir, I think…...it was a gun." A troop beside him spoke hesitantly.

That is right, it was the sound of a gun.

Benjamin and the old man were having a tug-of-war over the sword, the old man was still shrieking, when suddenly a gun was fired, like the slam of a gavel, judgment was dealt.

The gunfire ended everything.

"Phew…...I’m sorry, I thought the gun was empty."

After some silence, Benjamin blew at the smoke coming out of the barrel, raised his brow, and said innocently.

The "old man" who was still in pieces, was completely motionless. As if petrified, he could not make a sound.

The night wind blew over, and the pieces of flesh and blood, together with the green circles and words, were carried off in the wind, slowly drifting into the distance.

Another round of dead silence.

"He’s… dead?" Lance came back to his senses and exclaimed.

Benjamin kept away his gun and nodded.

In his heart, he was actually a lot more excited - he’s finally fucking dead!

When he realized the secret of his opponent's "Undying Form", he slowly formed a plan. Lance’s sword was just bait he set for the old man.

He was just pretending to want to snatch the sword. In reality, he intended to use his handgun. He did not need the sword at all, he just needed an opportunity where his opponent let his guard down. This came as his opponent screamed at him in a rage.

Thus, at the right moment, he activated the intangible form, raised his gun, and fired…...everything went according to the script.

In the two seconds of the intangibility, Benjamin killed the old man in his "Undying form". Then, he came back to reality, rubbed his shoulders, blew at the barrel, and slowly admired the "old man" dissolving into thin air.

He had won.

The sword that had been so passionately fought for dropped onto the floor with a loud clang.