"Shit!" One of the two Acolytes felt a hand on his left shoulder and turned pale as he felt his companion move him against his will.

Just as he was about to be hit from four different sides, the level 5 Acolyte with the Nine Demon Formation swiftly brought his ally's body in front of him.

"Silas!" The person screamed as he felt his body being pierced in several places, especially his abdomen and heart.

Meanwhile, Silas ignored the cry of pain from his ally, whom he had just used as a human shield to prevent his heart and abdomen from being hit by the enemy's blow.

But even though he had temporarily escaped the worst of Vicente's attacks in his direction, Silas still had his arms and legs hit by Vice's chains.

"Aaaaagh!" The first man opened his mouth in pain, while Silas was unable to do the same, his vocal cords severed by one of Vicente's many attacks.

However, Silas struggled to activate the Nine Demons Formation, seeing that he would have no escape.

'If I'm going to die here, I'm taking you with me, you bastard!" He thought, howling in pain as he felt his body being pulled in the opposite direction of the chains that had pierced him.

As this happened, his bones and muscles in the affected areas were further damaged, with one of the chains leaving his right arm so destroyed that as he fell to the ground, Silas felt that arm separate from his body.

"Aaaaaagh!"

His companion was already severely injured and would have died without further attacks if he had been given time. But he didn't have that time. As the twisted edges of Minos' chains, which had parts similar to anchors, left his body, he was completely torn apart, no longer resembling a human but a pile of flesh, blood, and bones.

'Be careful, master!'

Torne shouted in Vicente's mind, feeling the power of the formation that had been activated just before Silas' body was severely injured amid the misfortune of the two Acolytes who died before they had a chance to use their powers.

Vicente heard Torne's warning and looked at the red sphere thrown in his direction, glowing as if it was about to explode.

But instead of exploding, a red magic circle with various inscriptions around it suddenly appeared from it.

When this magic circle appeared, the space inside it darkened. In contrast, hands and legs simultaneously appeared from it, forming a red barrier that covered the entire area of the plane where Vicente and the two bodies were.

As he moved away from the formation's middle, Vicente tried to control the metals around him. Yet, he felt a much smaller amount of metal in his area of influence. Meanwhile, as he tried to move one of his blades out of that area, he saw it hit a barrier much stronger than the defensive barrier of his enemies earlier.

'That is an offensive formation that traps its targets within a particular area, master. Unless you have the power of a Mid-level Mage to destroy it, the only way to escape is to destroy the formation's core.' Torne said as Vicente looked at the glowing red sphere above where nine creatures were emerging from the dark part of the magic circle.

Clenching his fists at the sight of the enemy's tricks, Vicente thought about using his own defensive formation.

But then Torne said to him. 'Master, I know what you're thinking. Unfortunately, formations don't work within the influence of other formations. You should have activated your defenses before the enemy formation started working to protect yourself.'

"Shit!"

He used a sword and floated towards the core of that thing, intending to do what Torne had told him.

But the moment Vicente moved, the semi-transparent creatures with horns on their heads, tails, extremely muscular humanoid bodies, and sharp animal-like teeth moved towards him.

As the first of them slashed at his neck with its sharp claws, Vicente jumped from his sword back to the ground.

'Fuck!'

He saw the creature intending to cut his throat and used a sword to strike it, sending it into the confines of the barrier while already leaving a small dent in the blade of the sword.

'From what I can sense, these mana creatures are as strong as Low-level Mages.' Vicente estimated their strength as he considered the power of the first mana demon to attack him.

Thinking quickly about what to do, he acted and made the chains and metals under his control in the surrounding area form several fine, long, and sturdy needles.

Using the electromagnetic field around them, he gave them a boost, making them fly at high speed and on curved trajectories toward the formation's core.

When they felt those many needles approaching the formation's core, five of the nine creatures moved to defend it. Meanwhile, the other four flew toward Vicente.

"Tsk!"

Vicente made a series of seals, aware he couldn't affect the creatures made of mana with his usual blows. But he had another way of fighting these corporeal creatures, which were quite different from the ghost.

Moving his mana in his spell, he formed several hands of earth that rose from the ground of this area and headed toward the demons attacking him.

Meanwhile, he didn't stand still, moving further away from the approaching creatures as he saw an opening for another attack.

As he formed a new spell, several sparks appeared around him while bolts of lightning shot from the ground in this area toward the top, where the core of the enemy formation was.

The other demons stopped the needles from flying towards the formation's core, but they couldn't react in time to the lightning bolts cutting through the air towards the small red sphere.

"Break it!" Vicente shouted as all the creatures in the area looked in the same direction, making strange noises as they dealt with their own problems.

'Watch out!'

Then, just as one of Vicente's rays was about to hit the glowing sphere, Torne shouted in Vice's mind, causing the young man to retreat immediately, raising his defenses as much as he could.

As he did so under Torne's warning, Vicente saw the nine mana demons dissipate. At the same time, a five-meter-tall creature with muscles and body parts proportional to its size appeared in front of the formation's core.

In a single stroke, the creature created by the union of the nine demons destroyed Vicente's lightning bolt, followed by a kick that sent a blade of mana slashing at the spot where Vice was standing.

Swooish!

"Oh?" Vicente muttered in a cold sweat, feeling pressured as he saw the creature looking in his direction.

'How am I going to beat that bastard, old Torne? Does it have the power of all nine demons simultaneously?' Vicente asked as he drank a potion to restore the mana he had used so far.