Apocalypse with my SSS Harem Beauties-Chapter 102: Doubt

All the attacks rained down on the monster from every direction. Enchanted steel, Ether, and intent to kill collided at once.

Ethan and Samantha held their fire this time. From their position afar they stopped shooting because they didn’t want to risk hitting their own friends now that everyone had closed in.

George was the first to reach the monster’s head. His heavy hammer came down again and again, each blow aimed to crush and shatter him. The ground cracked beneath every impact as he tried to cave the monster’s skull in through sheer force.

Clara moved like a streak of cold light. Her short bluish spear flashed as frost spread along its edge. Her thrusts left a trail of biting cold and each hit slowed, froze, or gnawed at the monster’s body.

Ryan struck from the opposite side. His spear was crystalline and smooth, almost beautiful, yet every stab landed ruthlessly. Ether energy rippled through the weapon as it pierced and tore, carving deep wounds into the black flesh.

Kade stayed close. His gauntlets glowed faintly with red embers as he pummeled the monster’s torso and limbs. His every punch carried explosive heat that rattled bone and muscle.

Daniel slipped in and out of reach. His thin, bluish twin daggers carve shallow but relentless cuts across the monster’s tendons and joints. His slashes stacked pain and disruption, never allowing the monster a single breath.

Different weapons, different powers, and different effects attacking the monster. They didn’t intend to give him time to recover.

They attacked without pause and without mercy, driven by the same thought to end it now, before he stands again!

For several seconds, the monster was buried under their attacks.

Then the purple mist surged. It thickened in an instant, swelling outward before detonating.

BOOOOM!

A shockwave blasted across the battlefield.

Everyone was thrown away in different directions. Bodies slammed into rubble and broken walls. Weapons flew from hands. Dust and debris filled the air as the pressure crushed outward like an explosion.

The monster roared again. The sound was raw and sounded painful, but this time, Myles felt that something was different.

"Don’t stop!" Myles shouted, forcing himself upright as his boots scraped against the ground despite the pain in his body. "Attack!"

He sprinted forward again without waiting for anyone to answer.

"He’s taken too much damage,’ Myles thought grimly. "He shouldn’t be able to move properly anymore..."

But the moment that thought crossed his mind, the monster proved him wrong.

With a violent motion, the monster leapt to his feet.

Fast! Too fast!

His massive black body was covered in bruises, deep cuts, and torn flesh. Thick black blood streamed down his limbs and pooled beneath him. By all logic, he looked close to defeat.

Yet the purple mist around him was changing.

It no longer flickered chaotically. It began to stabilize.

Myles slowed to a stop, unease creeping into his expression.

The monster straightened. The mist drew closer to his body, spiraling inward instead of leaking outward or dispersing. His breathing steadied. His stance grew firm.

"It seems that he still doesn’t fully understand his own power," Myles realized, dread tightening his gut. "That could make this worse. We can’t predict what he is going to do."

From afar, bullets and arrows resumed. Ethan’s shots cracked through the air. Samantha’s Ether arrows followed. Their attacks striking the monster’s back and shoulders.

The monster groaned each time a projectile hit but he still didn’t move.

"Myles, let’s finish it now!" Nadine shouted.

"Wait," Myles replied sharply. "I’m not sure what he’s about to do."

Nadine clicked her tongue, frustration flashing across her face but she trusted him. She held her position.

Then it happened.

The purple mist thickened again. This time sinking into the monster’s body. It seeped into his wounds.

One by one, the cuts began to close. Torn flesh pulled together unnaturally fast. Bruises faded. Black blood evaporated into smoke as the damage reversed before their eyes.

The monster lifted his head. His eyes changed.

The human-like pupils stretched and narrowed, becoming vertical slits. A pale purple glow spread within them, cold and inhuman.

"That thing..." Victor muttered, staring in disbelief. "It’s changing again."

He turned toward Myles, desperation clear in his eyes. "Myles!"

"Shit," Myles hissed.

He raised both blades and shouted. "Alright. Come on! Attack again!"

Myles charged.

Victor and Nadine moved with him, the three of them attacking together. None of them looked back toward the others who had been scattered by the shockwave. There was no time to spare. No room for hesitation right now.

But the monster wasn’t done.

His body swelled. Muscle fibers tightened and refined, growing denser and more defined beneath black skin.

His veins bulged, glowing with purple light. From his head, a pair of horns began to emerge. They were just small horns that looked jagged and still unfinished.

Then his form flickered. His solid flesh blurred and wavered.

For brief moments, his body turned semi-ethereal, phasing between physical form and something else entirely.

His presence felt unstable, as if his body could no longer decide what it was meant to be. Flesh and shadow overlapped imperfectly, strange power leaking through the gaps as reality struggled to contain him.

What stood before them was no longer bound by the limits of a living creature nor fully shaped into something else. The monster right now was like an existence caught in the middle of a transformation.

Myles’ heart sank. But he didn’t stop. Victor and Nadine moved with him, never leaving his sides.

None of them spoke about what happened. They didn’t need to. Their focus locked onto the monster as one.

Then the air pressure changed again.

From the monster’s body, distorted Ether surged outward, dragging thick strands of purple mist with it.

The fog didn’t drift or spread naturally like how mist should by the influence of wind. It poured, spilling like liquid purplish shadow and racing across the ground in violent currents.

In the blink of an eye, everything within five meters of the monster was swallowed whole.

The pressure hit immediately. The mist warped the air, muffling sound and crushing down on their senses.

Myles’ Victor’s and Nadine’s vision blurred at the edges, and even their breathing felt heavier as if the air was pushing back against them.

Myles reacted on instinct.

He twisted his body and swung the Fangblade again, channeling Ether into the edge. Shadow Rend was used and a crescent of black energy screaming toward the monster with lethal force.

But the moment it touched the purple mist, something went wrong.

The black slash shuddered, its form unraveling as if it had slammed into an invisible wall. The energy of the skill fractured then collapsed in on itself, dispersing into harmless wisps before it could reach its target.

Myles’ eyes widened. His attack hadn’t been blocked. It had been erased.

The purple mist churned faster, pulsing in slow, ominous waves, as if reacting to his attempt.

The monster’s silhouette stood at the center of it all, barely visible yet unmistakably watching them.

A cold realization crept into Myles’ chest. Can they actually beat this monster with this unbelievable power that he had?

—