SSS-Ranked Summoner: Only I Summon All Heroes And Heroines Of Legend-Chapter 24: Heracles vs Ghrangoroth

"Finally," Heracles said, his voice rumbling low in his chest. "A worthy opponent."

The air shifted.

And then...

BAFF!

Heracles pounced forward. His feet cracked the earth beneath him like fractured glass, and he closed the distance to Ghrangoroth in less than a second. The platform groaned under the explosive force of his movement.

He appeared front-first, then behind.

Ba-tam!

His fist came up, ramming into the side of Ghrangoroth’s temple. The impact created a visible shockwave that rippled through the air, and the herald’s massive form lifted off the platform, hurling through space before crashing into the next floating landmass with enough force to crater the stone.

Heracles followed immediately, leaping the distance in a single bound. He walked slowly toward Ghrangoroth, who struggled to regain his footing after taking the full brunt of the punch.

But something made Heracles halt.

Crack. Crack. SFFFFFFFTTTTTT.

The herald’s stone-like skin fractured, and sand poured from the point where Heracles’ fist had connected, not blood, but an endless stream of ashen grains, pouring out, and then swirling around Ghrangoroth’s form like a living thing.

"Thou seekest to keep me from thy master," Ghrangoroth said, rising to his feet. His voice echoed with ancient power. "Impressive, but that shall be thy doom. For ye cannot face me and protect them all at the same TIME!"

DUNNNNN.

A seal formed beneath Heracles’ feet, glowing with eldritch light. The earth beneath him turned to quicksand that pulled at him like a quagmire, trying to drag him down into phantom depths that shouldn’t exist on a floating platform.

PAFF PAFF PAFF!

Several chains constructed from compressed sand shot up from the same platform, wrapping around Heracles’ arms with crushing force.

"Strength of Olympus" Heracles muttered.

Then he tugged against their grip.

CRACK.

The chains cracked, and shattered into sand dusts. And Heracles leapt out of the quicksand unscathed.

"Do not disappoint me, Emissary."

He moved again, faster this time. Ghrangoroth barely had time to raise a defensive wall of sand before Heracles’ fist punched through it like paper. The herald twisted reflexively, letting the strike pass by his head by millimeters, and counterattacked with an uppercut strike that carried the weight of a sandstorm. Heracles blocked the blow with his forearm.

KPA- BOOM!

The impact created a sonic boom that echoed across the void between platforms carrying dust and wind. Altair, Ryka and Svenja all bracing themselves.

Ghrangoroth dislodged from their wrestle, leaping back to create sufficient distance between them.

"Thou failsafe not thy name" He said. "Oh God of Strength".

Ghrangoroth’s aura changed. "But strength alone, Can not save thee from me."

Ghrangoroth raised both hands and clusters of sand swirdled around each, forming an hour glass on his left hand, and a hardened spear on his right.

"Sha-ee-nhh" he muttered.

(sands of time)

The hourglass shattered, and a hieroglyph seal glowed on Heracles forearm, at the point where he blocked the herald’s punch.

"What mischief is this" his thought racing back to that exact moment.

"Come then," the herald said. "Shew me the strength that slew the Hydra, and carried the weight of the heavens."

They moved simultaneously.

"S-kheru-en-Unut"

"Silencing of the Hour."

Heracles’ strike stalled in midair, his knuckles inches from the heralds’ skull. The world around him seemed be on a pause, arresting his momentum so violently that only the trailing gust of his momentum moved, whipping against Ghrangoroth’s heavy cloak.

"How futile," Ghrangoroth said. He continued with his attack, driving his hardened spear into the frozen warrior...

TU-TANG! 𝘧𝓇ℯℯ𝑤ℯ𝘣𝓃ℴ𝓋𝑒𝑙.𝑐𝘰𝑚

The spear struck with a loud clang like steel on steel. The spears’ tip skidded against the hero’s chest, unable to puncture the Nemean hide, a defensive techinque that coated Heracles’ skin. Unfazed, Ghrangoroth leaned his full weight into the shaft, pushing the frozen warrior and driving him down until his back crashed against the stone.

"RAAAARGGHH!" Ghrangoroth roared, his veins darkening as he channeled raw mana into the spear’s tip.

Tchkk.

A hairline fracture appeared in the divine defense, letting out a single trickle of blood.

On the distant platform, Altair watched in stunned silence, his breath hitched at the sight of his strongest summon, knocked back and bleeding, but Svenja was not dumbstruck.

"Schwarzes Loch"

Her black orb streaked through the air. It collided with Ghrangoroth’s weapon, shattering the spear’s hilt like brittle glass.

"Hmmm?" Ghrangoroth straightened in surprise, his gaze following the projectile as it curved back around, whistling straight for his skull.

He snatched the spinning sphere from the air with effortless grace. He held it up, and inspected the artifact with a look of detached curiosity. But then, the air began to hiss.

FFFFFFFFFFFFFFF

The orb ignited, fixing Ghrangoroth’s grip in as it spun with such violent velocity that it became a meat-grinder. Ghrangoroth’s fingers couldn’t withstand the friction, his bones splintered into fragments, shredded and sucked into the orb’s swirling core.

"!!!!!!!"

Ghrangoroth’s glowing eyes widened, His instincts kicking in. With a blur of movement, he raised his left hand in a sharp upward arc, severing his own right hand at the wrist before the orb could claim more of him. He watched as the orb totally obliterated his right fist, and rage filled him .

"Insolence!" he spat, his voice like rumbling like a raging storm. "That a puny mortal, a mere speck of dust beneath the heavens, should presume to mar the flesh of a Herald of the Watchers is a heresy beyond pardon. Thou hast invited a ruin thou art too small to comprehend."

He declared in fury, his gaze fixed upon Svenja with the menacing wrath of a slighted god.

PAFF.

The herald’s form vanished in a blur, moving at a velocity no mortal eye could follow, and in the span of a heartbeat, his form reappeared behind the trio. He flattened his left hand, filing the fingers into a tapered point that mimicked the lethal tip of a spear.

With a perfect aim, he lunged to impale Svenja through the back.

TAP.

The strike never landed. Heracles’ hand clamped around Ghrangoroth’s wrist like a vice of iron, halting the momentum instantly.

"You dare take your eyes off Heracles in a battle?" the hero growled, his voice vibrating with a dangerous resonance. It was only then that Altair, Ryka, and Svenja realized the two titans had moved. The air between them shimmered with displaced heat, a silent testament to the impossible speed at which they had both arrived at the trio’s side.

Altair and the others stood paralysed, their heartbeats hammered as they realized death had been a hair’s breadth away. Before they could even regain composure, Heracles acted, crushing Ghrangoroth’s left wrist which he held, and releasing a bullet punch with the force of a falling star.

BA-KOOM!!!

A shockwave of sound erupting as the fist connected, the Herald was launched through the air, skidding across the gap and crashing onto a distant platform several meters away. Heracles didn’t wait. He began a heavy, rhythmic march toward his foe. Ghrangoroth staggered to his feet, eyes flashing with malice as he triggered the stasis spell once more.

The Heiroglyph seal glowed once more, and Heracles jerked to a halt, but only for a second. His skin began to hiss and steam, turning a deep, violent crimson as his muscles surged and expanded. A colossal aura detonated outward, a wall of heat and wind so fierce that the students had to dig their heels in to avoid being blown away.

With a guttural roar, Heracles flexed, the spells’ hold shattering like glass beneath his sheer physical pressure. He rolled his shoulders, as his eyes opened with a glow, fixed on the Herald.

GoDHood: The Twelve Penance Reward