Bruce heart felt like it was being squeezed. His thoughts scattered for a moment. His body knew before his mind did: this lion wasn't just stronger. It was above him. A ruler. A being whose existence rewrote the hierarchy of the world around it.

[The Golden Mane Lion sees you are affected by fear!]

[Its pride increases!]

[Its strength increases.]

[Its pride increases.]

[Its strength increases.]

[It has reached the level of Absolute Arrogance.]

[Its Aura of Arrogance is acting on you.]

[Its Aura of Pride is acting on you.]

[Your stats are being reduced.]

The lion stood there, radiating golden flame and domination like a walking throne. Every second Bruce remained afraid, the beast grew stronger, fed by the very emotion it forced onto him.

Bruce forced a smile anyway. "...Heal."

[You've healed from all negative effects.]

The fear shattered. The awe broke. His thoughts clicked back into place. His mana surged back up to full, no longer shrinking in submission.

Bruce lifted his head, staring into the lion's glowing golden eyes, something that took effort, even now. The pressure was still there, the presence still suffocating, but this time, he was standing in it willingly.

At that moment, he understood. The beast hadn't just evolved. It had transcended. Its existence was now greater than even Ozai's had been at full firelord mode.

Bruce was surprised the Guild prepared something like this, but he wasn't shaken. He just analyzed it the same way he'd analyze a new chemical reaction he'd never seen before.

The lion growled, and something in the air shifted...

[The Lion's pride is shaken.]

Boom!!

Bruce vanished, breaking the sound barrier in a single burst. The lion reacted instantly, raising a burning paw and blocking the strike head-on. The collision detonated like a cannon blast, carving a crater into the ground beneath them.

The shockwave ripped the surrounding earth apart. Several baobab trees exploded into splinters from the force alone.

The lion's eyes locked onto Bruce, feeling irritated that Bruce stared and locked gaze with it and then its tail snapped forward.

The impact wasn't just strong. It was catastrophic.

[You've been hit with 10,000 ton of force!]

Bruce felt like he'd been hit by a high-speed train at maximum force. His ribs caved. His arm twisted at an unnatural angle. His entire body was launched through the air like a rag doll, flying so fast the air split behind him.

Blood burst from his mouth.

He couldn't even brace for impact, trees shattered as he crashed through them, one after another, reduced to splinters as if they were made of thin paper. He kept flying for nearly a full kilometer before finally skidding, rolling, and crashing to a halt across torn earth and broken roots.

'Damn…' Bruce coughed, spitting blood as more dripped from his nose and chin. His bones were broken. His organs bruised. His body felt like a sack of crushed glass.

'Heal…'

His flesh began to knit itself back together. Bones cracked, shifted, and aligned. He forced his pores open to increase mana intake, speeding regeneration as fast as his nerfed class in vr allowed.

He gritted his teeth, vision flickering, body numb in places it shouldn't be. The pain wasn't normal pain, it crawled into his skull, a stabbing, needle-like sensation as if his brain itself was being torn and restitched at once.

He wanted the healing to go faster. Anything faster. But even with his ability, he was still a mangled mess.

He looked up.

The Golden-Maned Lion was already walking toward him, step by step, with the calm, regal aura of a sovereign approaching an insect it had already judged unworthy.

Its arrogance was absolute. Its pride was suffocating. And Bruce struggled to get up.

The beast watched him, and what showed in its gaze was not anger, just disdain. The sight of Bruce on his knees, broken and trying to stand, wasn't seen as tenacity. It was seen as insult, the fact this mere insect dare slaughter it's pride annoyed it further.

The lion released a deep, guttural sound, something between a growl and a scoff, the sound a ruler makes when the defeated still dare to move.

Then it raised its paw and casually swatted Bruce across the chest.

PAH!

The blow wasn't a strike. It was a verdict. The lion's entire paw sank into Bruce's torso, claws and all, punching a deep crater into his chest as if his bones were wet clay. There was no resistance. No block. Just overwhelming force, at least ten thousand tons behind a casual motion.

Bruce's body was pierced clean through.

But instead of screaming, instead of collapsing, Bruce did the unexpected.

He grabbed the lion's paw, still buried inside his chest, held it in place, and spoke through gritted teeth:

"Heal: Restorative Detonation."

In an instant, the healing energy flooded into the lion's limb. Its flesh began to overgrow, cells multiplying far faster than nature intended. The beast's eyes narrowed, realizing something was wrong only a heartbeat before it happened.

The golden paw swelled, too fast, too unnatural, then burst into fragments of flesh, fur, and bone.

A bloody explosion.

But the lion didn't flinch.

A new paw regenerated instantly, muscle and bone weaving back together in seconds. Its body healed itself as casually as breathing, like losing a limb meant nothing.

Bruce exhaled slowly. "…So it has a healing factor. That rules out Restorative Detonation."

He wasn't panicked. Just adjusting variables.

He still had other skills, Mana Lock included, but his mana was low, and the difference in existence level between him and the beast was too wide. Overriding the lion's blood channels and mana pathways while his own pool was drained was nearly impossible. Even with full VR mana reserves, forcing a lock on an S-Ranked monster like this would be a battle on its own.

The Golden Mane Lion wasn't S-Rank for decoration.

Bruce sighed, wiping blood from his lips. 'Let me just try it anyway. I could be wrong.'

But healing came first. If he couldn't move, he couldn't test anything. He focused inward, directing Heal to flood through the mana pores instead of flesh. His regeneration rate multiplied, mana first, body second.

More mana. More healing. More adaptation.

His flesh began to reknit faster, bones straightening, muscle stitching back together with supernatural efficiency.

[You've healed and adapted to 10,000 tons of force.]

The next instant, the lion lashed out again, another paw slash, fully loaded with claws. This time, Bruce didn't dodge.

He raised his arm and blocked it barehanded.

"Heal: Mana Lock."

His cold voice resounded in the place.

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