The earth elemental was like an exaggerated version of Welf.
Big, scary, with a devastating momentum behind each of its strikes.
But it had no greatsword to extend its reach, the handsome face and red hair missing, too.
Fighting it reminded Konrad of all the sparring sessions he had with the blacksmith. Trying to block either of their attacks was a suicidal thought—if those stone fists came down, he ran.
At least, sidestepping them was easy; it was moving much slower than the redhead did.
He could dance around it all he wanted, except—a swarm of rock shards flew his way if he did.
It was Nimrod's way of telling him that he was still on the field.
The Void Scepter fueled his nonstop little attacks; nothing serious, but irritating enough.
Konrad hurled a fireball his way—only a small one because it'd miss anyway—and melted the shards in the process. He threw the next one at the monster, charring the earth, but that was it.
It wouldn't slow down, wouldn't fall back, coming at him with its slow, methodical attacks.
Landing a hit was trivial, but his blade had done no more than a scratch on the surface, too.
"Whew," Konrad exclaimed, wiping at his still trickling nosebleed. "If you had a toy like this, why'd you send those poor tribesmen to die?"
He tried to circle the hulking pile of dirt, but his twin was careful to keep it between them.
What a coward.
"You don't know anything about how spirit magic works," Nimrod scoffed, and he was right about that. Not that Konrad cared—any more than figuring out how to defeat him.
"Well, I know that you're running dry, and this thing is too slow to touch me," he noted.
They were at a stalemate, which was already much more than he had expected a day earlier.
His twin might've miscalculated—he seemed narcissistic anyway.
But he still couldn't catch him off guard with his fireballs.
And what would his illusions do on that beast?
It didn't seem to have eyes—or any organs for that matter.
Whether Nimrod or the spirits controlled it, blinding it seemed impossible.
"So what'll happen now?" Konrad asked, raising his sword. "Isn't it your time to surrender?"
"Hah, you'll tire out before you can lay a hand on me," his twin sneered. "And if you stop, you'll die. I can make it less painful if you give up now—but I'm curious how long you will last?"
That was cute. He'd spend entire afternoons sparring with Welf, and he was much scarier.
He wasn't even out of breath yet, and they've been fighting for at least half an hour by now.
"Longer than you," he taunted, trying to lob a fireball up and over the elemental.
To his surprise, it jumped to absorb the hit, then shook the entire village when it landed.
Okay, Welf couldn't do something that, but—did that mean Nimrod was no longer in control of his wind magic? He must have been running dry after those ridiculous attacks early on.
And if he planned on recovering, he was out of luck.
Konrad let his syphon soak up all the mana, leaving a vacuum behind in the entire village.
That'd take hours to fill up again. And even if his twin knew how to hijack other dimensions, he would have needed a pentagram or at least half an hour.
With Konrad keeping him on his toes, it wasn't happening.
The small-scale attacks were annoying, sure, but he could deal with them.
His only headache was the elemental.
He stole a glance at their audience, blocking out their noises for the most part until now.
If there were any injuries, Lily must've healed them. But they also kept a respectable distance from the main square. And the girl seemed to have lost all interest already.
She was sitting on a fence, her legs dangling, and looking bored out of her mind.
Wow. Way to crush his ego, when Konrad thought he was doing great.
And why did he even hope to get answers from her anyway?
Noticing his gaze, she raised her fist in the least enthusiastic 'you've got this' cheer. He could almost hear her voice in his mind, sounding anything but impressed.
'Come on, it's like some mana holding a bunch of rocks together. What takes so long?'
Either his imagination was running wild today, or the girl also knew how to use telepathy.
Given that she could read his mind—hold on.
Mana held it together? Well, sure, earth and stone didn't move on their own, but—
If there was mana, he could manipulate it. He had already done it with Nimrod's other attacks, so why was he trying to cut into the earth and stones?
He should've aimed at what bound them together.
Lost in thought, he almost ate a big, earthen foot, but leaped to the side in the last moment.
Nimrod's attack followed too fast.
It was another swarm of tiny, sharp rocks, and being late with a fireball, some of them grazed his shoulder. The pain was bearable—and a good anchor to keep him grounded in the present.
He savored it as he weighed his options.
"See? I've got you again," his twin opened his arms as if they were in a theater. He turned to their audience, the tribesmen looking unimpressed. "A few more hits like that, and—"
Konrad didn't let him finish. Why choose one option when he had plenty of mana?
He imbued at least three of them into his adamantite sword and charged at the elemental.
The first one was scatter—an obvious choice, but it didn't yield the result he had hoped for.
His slash at the monster's leg did nothing more than the ones he had tried before.
His second rune was syphon. That was more of his wishful thinking, trying to absorb the energy that moved the beast. But he would never know if he hadn't tried.
The beast shrugged his stab off, trying to swat him like an insect, but it was too slow.
That left him with focus—backed by a hundred mana, making his blade glow again.
He launched a backhanded blow as he sidestepped its stone fist—and the result surprised him.
While it didn't crumble to dust right away, it was close.
His charged sword—for all intents and purposes—never made contact with the monster. It felt like he had sliced through the air without any resistance.
But it was quite the spectacle, taking out a huge chunk of the beast's leg.
As if his mana repelled whatever essence held the elemental together.
Was it that simple?
Catching Nimrod's dumbfounded expression from the corner of his eye, it had to be.
Either way, he did the only responsible thing and kept hacking at the monster like a maniac.
Soon, dirt was raining from the sky, the beast shrinking with every strike. The hundred mana he had put into the blade was pure overkill; each attack only cost him around ten at most.
Was he an accidental genius, finding the spirits' weakness?
Or, was he already too overpowered for this world?
'You'll pat yourself on the back later,' the voice in his mind warned him. Right, if it were Lily, he still couldn't hold a candle to her powers. 'Focus, you still have an evil twin to take down.'