Anastarian felt that this detestable human was still lying through his teeth at this moment, actually calculating their own losses on the heads of the High Elves, and pushing it all onto a dead old man.
"Unforgivable!"
The Elven King was furious. Even if the one before him was a mirror image, he had decided to properly punish this detestable fellow!
Seeing Anastarian attack without a word, Aiden's heart was also filled with anger. He had clearly warned Kael'thas, and Kael'thas had clearly informed Anastarian, yet this stubborn old fellow not only didn't listen, but was also so unreasonable.
He summoned his weapons from the void, the Staff of Time and the Silver Judgment. After finding his path as a hero, he felt stronger than ever before, and now was the time to test it!
The Elven holy sword, Felo'melorn, was a magical weapon, and Anastarian was not only a powerful mage, but also had extensive close combat experience. He directly teleported to Aiden's side, and Felo'melorn slashed down, bringing with it a red flash of fire.
Even if the attack was launched so suddenly, in Aiden's eyes, it was still easily captured.
In his eyes, the surrounding space seemed to have turned into jelly. After Anastarian teleported to his side, he left behind obvious ripples there, and the trajectory of Felo'melorn's swing was clear and slow. Although his speed of raising his weapon was also slow, the reaction time was too long, allowing him to leisurely use Silver Judgment to parry the attack, while simultaneously waving the Staff of Time, summoning a thorny vine to entangle Anastarian's feet.
"Too slow."
He thought so, and these words also blurted out.
Yes, too slow.
Under normal time flow, Anastarian's attack could be completed in less than half a second. Excluding the 0.1 seconds or more of nerve reaction, the time left for the body to respond was only a pitiful less than 0.4 seconds.
But when this time was extended tenfold, his attack would take five seconds to reach him, while the reaction time was still 0.1 seconds.
The slowed time flow turned everything into slow motion. Any normal person could block such an attack. Aiden even had time to imagine at this moment: If it were in modern times, he could even use movements to dodge bullets, right?
His leisureliness became a complete mockery in the eyes of the Elven King: Anastarian believed that not many people could easily dodge his sudden attack, but the other party seemed to know in advance that he would appear from his current position, and almost preemptively parried the attack, and even summoned the thorny vine at his landing point.
"Too slow?" Anastarian heard the other party's mockery. In thousands of years, how long had it been since he had heard such ridicule?
Flames erupted from under his feet, burning the creeping vines and freeing himself. At the same time, he raised his hand and released a Fireball. At such a close distance, he wanted to see how this arrogant human would dodge a ranged attack!
When Aiden saw the first spark appearing in Anastarian's palm, he summoned a magical shield in front of him: It was different from the weakened version of Holy Protection from before, but an oval shield made of light and plant transformations. The Fireball sprayed on it, only scorching the leaves and outer skin of the plants, and could not harm Aiden behind the shield at all.
"How is it, my new spell?" Aiden sneered.
Anastarian snorted coldly, and his figure teleported again, landing behind Aiden. But what he found unbelievable was that his sword was only halfway swung, and Aiden hadn't even turned around before he turned the summoned shield to his back. His attacks would always land on the shield, and could not possibly harm the target behind the shield.
Anastarian only felt an indescribable suffocation in his heart. He had fought many stronger enemies, but had never felt so aggrieved. The other party seemed to be reading his mind, and his every move could be predicted in advance, and responded to flawlessly.
Aiden wouldn't just defend all the time either. He waved his staff, and two light arrows flew away. However, Anastarian had entered stealth before that and disappeared again.
"Not teleportation?" Aiden realized that the Elven King had not appeared within his field of vision, and guessed that the other party had already gone invisible.
Just like he had broken the illusions of those archmages in the Kirin Tor Council's secret chamber, he summoned Arcane Sight. A blue ripple rippled and spread out. When its ripple swept past a pillar on the northwest side of the hall, the Elven King was exposed.
He was chanting a spell!
Aiden didn't plan to forcibly resist this powerful spell that the mage had prepared for so long. He used the same method to return the favor, and also used distorted light to conceal himself.
The powerful spell that Anastarian had carefully prepared suddenly had no target. This was his palace, he couldn't just randomly blast a place, right? Even if he was unwilling, he still dissipated the spell when the chanting time was about to end.
And just then, Aiden burst out, wielding Silver Judgment and slashing over at a speed faster than lightning.
'The speed is too fast!' Anastarian didn't want to admit it in his heart, but this definitely shouldn't be the speed a mage should have. Even an assassin might not be able to explode with such speed!
He didn't know that the surrounding time flow had been greatly accelerated. Not only was Aiden's charge speed fast, but his own speed would also become faster. But even knowing it wouldn't change much. Because one was prepared, and the other was caught off guard. He had never adapted to combat under accelerated time, and it was impossible to deal with an enemy who could manipulate time in this state.
So the only response he could make was to raise Felo'melorn to block!
Clang!
The two holy swords clashed, bursting out a string of sparks.
It seemed like they were evenly matched. But Aiden didn't inject Holy Light into Silver Judgment, otherwise the splashing Holy Flame would definitely give this High Elven King an unforgettable burn! He didn't plan to directly stand on the opposite side of the High Elves, just hoping to slightly sober up this arrogant king so that he could seriously listen to his words.
In order to achieve this goal, he maintained the accelerated time and launched a storm of attacks, making Anastarian exhausted to cope with. The hall was full of two rapidly flashing figures, making it almost impossible to capture who was who.
The more Aiden fought, the more comfortable he felt, and he simply gave up casting spells and treated himself as a warrior. But the more Anastarian fought, the more aggrieved he felt. He didn't remember the last time he was so embarrassed, or perhaps it was more than two thousand years ago during the most critical moment of the war between the High Elves and the Trolls, when Silvermoon City was almost captured?
He could feel that the human in front of him was not attacking with all his strength. In his opinion, this was not humility, but humiliation—this human was humiliating him with such almost playful attacks!
Anastarian's anger grew more and more intense, as if his heart was about to explode.
Unbearable, unbearable!
The High Elven King roared in fury, no longer blocking the sword piercing his shoulder, but desperately waving Felo'melorn, attacking the other party's chest with all his might!
Aiden had not expected that this king had lost his mind. When he saw that the other party was actually willing to trade his life for his, he immediately panicked and retreated, and immediately changed the accelerated time to deceleration, and while withdrawing his attack, he summoned a shield in front of him. Felo'melorn cut through the clothes on his chest, and his heart could even feel the scorching heat, but at the critical moment, the shield still blocked it.
He breathed a sigh of relief, but immediately became furious— "You are incorrigible!"
Aiden no longer held back. He didn't want to curse, but this arrogant king not only wouldn't listen to advice, but also treated his kindness as a donkey's liver and lungs. It was simply shameless!
He condensed Holy Flame and ignited Silver Judgment, and blue flames burned on the holy sword. At the same time, he summoned a large piece of thorny vine to completely bind Anastarian.
Under the extreme accelerated time flow, Aiden's speed was so fast that human eyes could not capture it.
"Boom!"
Anastarian only felt an enormous force bombard him, completely knocking him away, and after landing, he rolled out several meters.
"Clang, clang", this was the crisp sound of metal pieces falling to the ground. That was the High Elves' heirloom holy sword—Felo'melorn.
It was broken into two pieces and scattered on the ground.
Anastarian struggled to prop up his upper body and leaned against the steps. His eyes looked at the broken Felo'melorn, but his eyes completely lost focus.
—The holy sword representing the Sunstrider Dynasty's inheritance was broken in his hands.
Aiden withdrew his Staff of Time and Silver Judgment, walked over to pick up the two broken swords, and when he looked at the High Elven King, he saw only hatred and anger in the other party's eyes.
This made Aiden completely disheartened.
With such an obstinate king, how could the High Elves not embark on a biased path?
He waved his hand and threw the broken sword in front of Anastarian, and said in a deep voice: "Is this the result you want to see?"
Anastarian's gaze seemed to burn like flames.
Aiden questioned with anger: "I told Kael'thas that Dar'khan was a traitor. In the Shattered Ridge battle, I personally saw Dar'khan become a necromancer. But until this moment, you are still stubborn! You think I am a liar! But, please tell me, what would I covet from you?"
He pointed to this palace: "The Sunstrider Palace? Or the magic you are so proud of? Unfortunately, I only smell the bias and arrogance permeating here! You think you are superior, think you have helped humans a lot, but can get very little from humans. You think the reward is less than the effort. You think humans are dragging you down. If mutual need and equal trade isn't the definition of an ally in your mind, very good, the Alliance really can't keep such an ally."
"You disappoint me very much." Aiden turned around and walked towards the closed door, "This kingdom has chosen its own destiny, I have done my best."