Elemental Cats

Toz's body was brimming with power after refining all his attributes and sitting still for so long, and he practically burst out of the camp as he rushed to join up with the other cats, all except Lucy. Toz had asked Lucy if he wanted to take a break and come along since he was worried about leaving Lucy all alone in the camp. But Lucy didn't even hesitate before refusing and saying that he was onto something.

Lucy had already proven that he knew when to fall back and when to advance, so Toz felt almost at ease leaving the camp. He shouldn't shake off all of his worries, but there wasn't much he could do since Lucy wanted to stay back. He would have felt more secure if Lucy were to maintain some form of communication through their bond. But Lucy was worried that someone would sense that and track it back to either himself or Toz, so he isolated himself.

Since that was Lucy's choice, Toz couldn't interfere. He just told himself that it would be alright, and he focused on the lightning surging through his body as he sped out of the camp and through the battlefield on his way toward Nil, Mindle, Scrael, and Asilean.

Although he had taken a break from learning the spell that he got from Hassandra, Toz hadn't completely put it aside. It was a lightning attribute spell, and it would naturally be easier to learn the spell if he was more comfortable with the lightning element. That was why Toz had decided to focus on using lightning magic until he grasped at least some of the grimoire's contents.

Toz didn't want to focus on lightning magic only because of the spell. Just as he did with his metal magic, Toz used lightning mostly as support during combat. He only used it to increase his movement speed, something he might as well do with space magic. Toz could feel how much he underutilized his magic each time he fought. But there wasn't much he could do about it. It was simply one of the struggles of having too many elements.

Toz had too much to do and too many things to learn and master. Considering how little time he had spent treading the path of magic, it was astonishing how far he had already gotten. But he was still far from becoming a real powerhouse. And it would only take more and more time as he continued onward.

The more he scraped the surface of one of his elements, the more he realized how thick the surface was and how deep the mystery of magic really ran.

He didn't regret any of his choices that led to him possessing six elements. If he got the chance, he would do it all over again. But he had to accept the fact that he wouldn't be able to specialize as much with each element or understand it as deeply as other mages could. At least not as quickly.

With the cats' help, Toz was confident he could catch up to and surpass any mage that had the same elements as him. It was only a matter of time and effort. And as soon as they saved Taienra, Toz and the cats would have all the time they could ever need to travel through the universe, explore, and grow stronger. At least as long as nothing else happened.

Toz wondered if maybe he had jinxed himself with that thought, and he quickly dispelled it from his mind as he focused on blasting apart the Earthworm in front of him with a lightning bolt powerful enough to dye the sky purple.

But by the time thunder rang out, Toz was already long gone. He only left a trail of purple-tinted afterimages behind him as he flashed through the battlefield, slicing and blasting enemies apart whenever he came across them.

Most of the enemies he came across were of similar strength to the Earthworms or the Demonic Bull, weaker demonic beasts who mostly served as cannon fodder and to exhaust the human forces. But he also stumbled upon groups of beasts like the herd of buffalos that were a little more challenging to face when alone. But when Toz didn't hold back to focus on his sword skills, he blasted through them like a rock thrown into a pile of rice.

And while he was at it, Toz also used his fire to burn any corpse he left behind into nothing but ashes. Just in case someone from the Tribe of Death came by and wanted to increase their reserve of zombies.

Although the fight he and the cats had with the two robed figures flopped and ended the way it did, he still confirmed that they couldn't reanimate ashes, at least not in the same amount of time they did with mostly intact corpses.

When Vatel fought against the necromancer, Toz saw how many zombies they summoned. He had a feeling that the only reason they came out victorious was that the necromancer couldn't summon and reanimate the zombies as quickly as Vatel and Mindle got rid of them.

If a necromancer was allowed to gather all the corpses that piled up on the battlefield and add them to their collection, the human realm could probably give up on winning the proxy war. Overwhelming might could surpass the numbers that reanimating all the corpses gave the Tribe of Death. But from what Toz had seen, the humans possessed neither the strength nor the numbers to come out victorious.

They would have to rely on their ingenuity and the endless possibilities their inclinations provided them if they wanted to win. Toz was slowly looking forward to what the general had planned, but he didn't waste too much time thinking about it.

He was quickly approaching the cats, and he could tell that they were locked in a fierce battle against a worthy opponent.

His body surged with power, his mana pool roared, ready to unleash magic, and his blood boiled. Toz dashed forward with a grin as he got ready to join the cats in their fight.