Chapter 391: At Critical Moments, It Has To Be Paimon
"It's right in front of us! We absolutely cannot let it tunnel away this time!" Stelle's voice cut through the chaotic whistling of the wind. She dug her heels into the fractured ground, her boots kicking up plumes of dust as she forced her legs to pump faster. The heavy firearm in her grip clicked sharply as she slammed a fresh magazine into the receiver—a specialized payload packed with high-penetration rounds designed specifically to punch through thick armor.
Unfortunately, the Cattle-Ghoul Bringer was evolving. As its monstrous power swelled, so too did its acute sensitivity to aether energy and its innate talent for tearing through the fabric of space. The beast's grotesque, twitching ears swiveled, picking up the lethal intent trailing right behind it. Worse, its gluttonous instincts had locked onto another tantalizing prize just up ahead: the rich, pulsating aether signature of the fourth fuel tank.
A sickening cocktail of ravenous greed and desperate urgency twisted the monster's deformed features. Its heavy, muscular hind legs coiled and snapped, propelling its massive bulk forward with a sudden, terrifying burst of speed. It barreled straight toward a shimmering, unstable fissure in the air—a spatial rift that pulsed with chaotic light, clearly a gateway to its next meal.
"Dammit! It's trying to run again!" Lumine cried out. Anemo energy swirled around her boots, creating a slipstream of emerald wind to boost her agility. She darted forward like a swallow, but the sheer physical distance between them was simply too vast. No ordinary elemental strike could cross that gap before the creature slipped away.
"Watch this!" March yelled, tossing caution entirely to the wind.
She knew standard ice arrows wouldn't even scratch the beast's hide before it vanished into the void. Gritting her teeth, a fierce, unyielding determination ignited within her bright azure eyes. She drew deeply upon her core, channeling the absolute zero chill of her Six-Phase Ice.
"Just—stop!"
Using her momentum, March vaulted high into the air. Mid-flight, she drew her bowstring back to her cheek. The sheer density of the frigid energy she gathered caused the ambient moisture to instantly freeze, wrapping her silhouette in a glittering halo of diamond-dust ice crystals.
The bow curved into a perfect, taut crescent. The arrow rested on the rest, glowing like a captured star.
Thwip—!
The bowstring snapped forward. An arrow of pure, concentrated energy erupted from the weapon, leaving a blinding ice-blue contrail in its wake. It tore across the battlefield at a terrifying velocity, aimed dead center at the Cattle-Ghoul Bringer's back. The projectile was so intensely cold that it instantly flash-froze the ambient aether dust in the air, leaving a lingering, sparkling path of frost suspended in the atmosphere.
The grotesque, unblinking eye embedded just behind the Bringer's right shoulder suddenly dilated. It sensed the lethal, freezing threat bearing down on it—a power more than capable of crippling its current form.
It didn't even bother to glance back. The beast unleashed a guttural, muffled roar, and vile purple energy surged from its pores.
Riiiip! Riiiip! Riiiip!
Without a fraction of a second's warning, seven or eight spatial distortions violently tore open across the battlefield, directly intercepting the path of March's arrow. From within the dark, rippling voids, massive, grotesque hands thrust outward. Each limb was heavily armored in jagged keratin plates, and embedded within the center of every palm was a single, bloodshot eye.
These monstrous appendages didn't strike out offensively. Instead, they formed a gruesome, fleshy barricade. They acted as fanatically loyal meat shields, throwing themselves directly into the arrow's flight path while simultaneously creating a massive, jagged wall that completely blocked Stelle and Lumine's pursuit.
CRACK! SHATTER! HSSSS!
The payload of Six-Phase Ice detonated upon impact. The sheer kinetic and elemental force was devastating. The first two keratin-plated hands were instantly flash-frozen to the marrow, transforming into grotesque, crystalline sculptures before violently exploding into a shower of razor-sharp ice shrapnel as the arrow punched clean through them.
The third and fourth hands suffered a similar fate, the absolute zero temperatures eroding their flesh and locking their joints beneath thick, heavy layers of rime. But the Bringer had summoned simply too many of them, each one pumped full of dense, highly resistant aether energy.
By the time the arrow pierced and froze the fifth hand, the brilliant light of the Six-Phase Ice began to sputter. It buried itself halfway into the forearm of the sixth monstrous limb before its energy finally gave out, dimming into nothingness and dissolving into the wind.
The remaining two or three hands were badly frostbitten, but they had perfectly executed their master's command: delay the hunters.
Worse yet, the battlefield was now a disaster zone. The shattered remnants of frozen flesh, jagged ice pillars, and violently swirling aether turbulence had merged into a hazardous, impassable labyrinth. The freezing mist and chaotic energy violently choked the corridor, forcing Stelle, Lumine, and Dan Heng to a grinding halt.
"March! What did you just do?!" Stelle slammed her heels into the dirt, skidding to a violent halt just in time to dodge a massive, falling stalactite of ice. She stared in dismay at the towering barricade of frost and flesh now blocking their path. Through the translucent ice, she could see the Bringer preparing to step into the spatial rift. She knew the archer had only meant to help, but the friendly fire had completely backfired.
March landed clumsily on the ground, a deep, embarrassed flush spreading across her cheeks. Realizing the catastrophic tactical error she'd just made, she waved her hands frantically. "Sorry! I'm so sorry! I just wanted to pin it down! I didn't think it had that many gross hands, or that they'd be so tough... My bad, guys!"
She stared down at her own palms, currently numb and drained of energy, feeling a miserable mix of frustration and guilt.
That brief, chaotic delay was all the monster needed. The Cattle-Ghoul Bringer's massive front claw hooked onto the edge of the spatial rift. Its grotesque, malformed face twisted into what could only be described as a sickeningly human sneer of mockery. The majority of its hulking torso began to blur, dissolving into the twisted, kaleidoscopic light of the portal.
It seemed their desperate chase was about to end in bitter failure once again.
Hovering anxiously beside Lumine, Paimon watched the disaster unfold. The little guide knew that if this monstrosity managed to escape and gorge itself on the fourth fuel tank's aether, it would become practically invincible. A fierce, burning refusal to lose—a desperate urge to protect his friends—ignited within his tiny chest.
"Paimon Star!" Paimon squeezed his eyes shut, condensing every ounce of his mental fortitude into a single, explosive command. He threw his tiny arms wide and screamed at the top of his lungs, "ZA WARUDO!!!"
BZZZZT—!
The universe slammed to a violent, absolute halt. It was as if an invisible hand had slammed the pause button on reality itself.
The swirling dust hung suspended in mid-air. The falling ice crystals froze in their descent. The dissipating streams of aether locked into place. Stelle's frantic shout, March's guilty grimace, Dan Heng's coiled muscles as he prepared to hurl his spear, the Anemo currents swirling around Lumine's blade—everything stopped.
Even the Cattle-Ghoul Bringer, half-submerged in the rippling void of the spatial rift, was trapped, its sickeningly arrogant sneer permanently plastered across its frozen face.
The entire world was instantly washed in a deathly, eerie grayish-yellow monochrome. Absolute silence reigned.
In this world of halted time, only Paimon remained unbound. Towering directly behind the tiny floating guide was his Stand—the hyper-muscular, impossibly chiseled manifestation known as Paimon Star. The towering spirit's piercing eyes locked onto the target.
"Now's our chance! Get him!" Paimon commanded, pointing a tiny finger at the beast.
"ORA ORA ORA ORA ORA ORA!!!"
Paimon Star vanished, transforming into a blinding white afterimage that casually bypassed the frozen laws of physics. It materialized instantly beside the immobilized Cattle-Ghoul Bringer. The Stand drew back its massive, glowing arms, and a torrential downpour of iron-heavy fists rained upon the monster's purple-black hide.
The Stand wasn't aiming for a lethal blow. Instead, every single devastating punch was calculated, packed with a specialized kinetic force designed specifically to shatter the creature's connection to the spatial rift and violently scramble its internal aether balance. The sheer concussive force was meant to literally beat the monster out of the closing portal.
"ORA!!!"
A final, devastating uppercut connected squarely with the Bringer's jaw, a blow so heavy it threatened to snap the beast's neck.
Then, the invisible clock began to tick once more.
The eerie grayish-yellow filter shattered like glass. Color, sound, and motion violently crashed back into reality.
But to the unadjusted perceptions of Stelle, Lumine, Dan Heng, March, and even the Cattle-Ghoul Bringer itself, the sequence of events was utterly beyond understanding.
One second, they heard Paimon scream a bizarre, foreign phrase, and saw the muscular phantom behind him blur for a fraction of a millisecond.
The very next second, the Cattle-Ghoul Bringer—which had been halfway inside the portal and mere inches from total escape—was violently yanked out of the rift as if swatted by the invisible hand of an angry god. The massive beast was launched backward through the air, flailing helplessly like a discarded, broken sack of meat.
CRASH!
The monster's colossal weight slammed into the earth, plowing a massive, jagged trench through the bedrock. It tumbled violently, finally skidding to a halt more than fifty meters away from the now-dissipating spatial rift.
Its thick armor was suddenly riddled with fresh, crater-like dents and deep, splintering cracks, as if it had been run over by a speeding astral express train. Vile, purple-black blood oozed freely from dozens of spontaneous, brutal wounds.
The grotesque eyes scattered across its battered body twitched and dilated wildly. The beast lay there, paralyzed by a potent mixture of absolute confusion, deep shock, and boiling rage.
What... just happened?
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