Ethereal Ascendance: A Journey of Transformation

"How can I let these crappy human weapons stop me!"

After being suppressed by two demon-slaying Gatling guns for a while, Camille lost her patience and started to go wild.

Even though the enchanted bullets hurt when they hit her, they couldn't do much damage. She endured the pain and bleeding, rushing forward until she was only a meter or two away.

Just as she was about to succeed in destroying the Gatling guns, Adrian proved he wasn't to be underestimated. At this critical moment, he suddenly raised the muzzle angle slightly, and the situation suddenly reversed.

"Aaaaargh!"

What followed was a true face-to-face barrage. Even though Camille had reached the seventh level, she simply couldn't withstand such heavy weapons firing at point-blank range.

Caught off guard, she could only cover her bloody, battered head and retreat over ten meters, hurriedly backing into the President's office.

"Don't let her escape! Chase her!"

Seeing this, I quickly jumped out and shouted. I hadn't expected human weapons to be so powerful. Adrian adding Battle Qi to the Gatling guns had undoubtedly given us a glimmer of hope for victory.

The M-country office was a complete mess! Half the roof and wall had been blown away, exposing the mansion garden outside. Amazingly, the big screen display on the broken wall hadn't been damaged. Even the wires behind it were mostly intact, still stubbornly broadcasting the rescue team's battle.

"You won't be cocky for long!"

Seeing Adrian and me quickly chasing after her, with two shiny Gatling guns aimed at her again, Camille took a deep breath and yelled at us angrily, covering her face. She jumped onto the desk and looked down at us, glancing at the screen on the wall.

The monitor happened to be showing Cyra being targeted by the vampire ancestor, punched out of the sky and struggling to get up. With this major loss to the rescue team's fighting power, the situation looked very bad!

"So, want to reconsider my offer? If all your people get wiped out, you'll have even fewer bargaining chips later!"

Rasambla clearly had the upper hand, almost certain to win. Camille smiled with satisfaction, trying one last time to persuade me.

It seemed she'd changed her mind about running away. But no one expected what happened next -

In the live video feed, Raydwin saw Cyra get hurt and immediately broke away to check on her. But Rasambla spotted him with his back turned - an obvious weak point! So he feinted at Cyrae who'd been tangling with him, then dove down from the sky to try and take out another target.

"Raydwin, watch out!"

Cyrae was frantic, but even with the Appollos sword, she still wasn't quite a match for Rasambla.

Although Rasambla had calculated all this, the moment his claws were about to reach Raydwin, he never expected Raydwin to suddenly pull out a flash grenade, turn around, and detonate it right in his face...

If it had been a regular grenade, the vampire ancestor might have only gotten some flesh wounds. But a flash grenade was very different!

Those of us in the President's office only saw blinding light fill the whole screen. When everything dusted down, we saw the shocking scene of Cyrae's weapon piercing through Rasambla's heart, snatching victory from the jaws of defeat.

This was it - Rasambla was completely done for. Even though he fell to the ground not quite dead yet, Cyrae was very careful and quickly rushed forward to stab him in the head!

"Impossible..."

Seeing her subordinate revert to bat form, Camille forgot to cover her injured face, hardly believing her eyes.

Although the vampire ancestor's final attack had badly hurt Raydwin too, it wasn't fatal - just a serious injury. This unexpected turn of events was a huge win for us!

But with Rasambla's death, we suddenly heard piercing alarms go off throughout the military base on the monitor.

We didn't know why yet, but our spirits were lifted.

"What are you waiting for? Keep shooting!"

Strike while the iron is hot! Adrian and Franklin immediately opened fire again. The dense fire from two Gatling guns forced Camille to scramble around, unable to find a chance to counterattack. She could only leave the President's office and fly into the sky outside.

This was the moment I'd been waiting for!

Just as she steadied herself in the air, I finally locked onto Camille's exact position and shot a small ball of water element energy I'd prepared into her body.

According to what Feliciana Number 14 taught me, this water element ball was a medium to change the element type of her body. Once the elements making up her body changed, she naturally couldn't maintain her original form and would fall apart.

But in reality, Camille just frowned slightly, seeming to feel a bit uncomfortable, and then... nothing else happened!

Such a tiny effect, but the backlash on me was huge. My head felt like it was splitting open, very similar to the side effects I got after entering memory fragments at the Soul Academy in Crescent City.

"Your target area is still too big! The amount of elements to convert requires more energy and calculations than you can handle right now. You must reduce the target area! Focus the element conversion on her vital points, step by step!"

Feliciana Number 14's guiding voice suddenly rang in my ears again. Although her image didn't appear this time, it showed she was closely watching my situation.

"Reduce the area even more?"

Hearing this, I could only mutter to myself. Making it even smaller would require much more precise control of water elements, which is harder to master. But where's the time for all this on the battlefield?!

Luckily, although Camille glanced at me several times, she couldn't figure out what I was doing standing there. The demon-slaying Gatling guns were clearly a bigger threat, so she had to focus on dealing with Adrian.

As for Franklin, for an ordinary person, even a gang boss, it was already amazing that he could carry a Gatling gun and charge into battle here with Adrian.

Of course, this was thanks to Adrian's protection and light magic defensive spells, which kept him from getting hurt!

But now his luck seemed to have run out. Soon after the battle moved to the mansion garden, his Gatling gun ran out of bullets first. All he could do was drop the weapon and run for his life!

Unfortunately, he didn't get far before Camille knocked him down with some pebbles she had ready.

Without his firepower support, Adrian quickly started to struggle alone. Camille had been dodging around in the sky for so long, waiting for just this chance!

She dove down from the sky again, braving the hail of bullets. But this time Adrian couldn't use his old trick to fight back. He could only raise his weapon and barely hold his ground! The outcome was obvious - the last Gatling gun couldn't survive. Camille hated this weapon so much, she grabbed it and stomped it to pieces.

"Feliciana! Are you ready yet?"

Now we were back to our original disadvantage. With Adrian's remaining power, like me, he obviously couldn't hold out for long. But even though I didn't have time to explain, he keenly sensed that I must be preparing some kind of ultimate move!

But Camille wasn't going to show mercy anymore. She pummeled him with punches and kicks, her strength unbelievable! After a few rounds, Adrian was clearly about to collapse. He couldn't help shouting: "Whatever big move you've got, use it now! Right now!"

"What big move?"

Hearing this, Camille was startled. She quickly turned to look at me, finally seeming to realize she'd been deliberately drawn away and stalled.

Fighting the splitting headache, I'd spent several minutes condensing the water elements in my palm into an unprecedentedly fine needle shape. This target area should be small enough now, right?

I was going to aim for her heart, but then I thought, who knows how many hearts a succubus has? So I changed to target her head instead.

"You've got to be kidding!"

Although she still didn't know exactly what was happening on my end, Camille's high-level demon instincts clearly sensed a whiff of unusual danger.

She didn't hesitate to abandon Adrian, who she'd almost cornered, and flew towards me! At the same time, she fired off that black light pillar she'd copied from me earlier, hoping for a double attack.