69 A true Aesir doesn't retrea

The elven queen looked troubled. Evidently, she hadn't expected the situation to turn out like this. Four major powers had formed an alliance to take down a newly formed power but now half of their upper echelons were already wiped out.

The situation on the ground was only slightly better for them. The Aesir army had fully regained their bearings and managed to beat back both sides that pincer attacked them.

Since both Odin and the elven queen were still hesitating, I could afford to meddle a little.

At my command, the combat golems rose from the earth and joined the fight. With their suicidal advance, the Aesir were once again forced into a flustered defense.

Odin finally made a move. He had a new spear that thankfully wasn't as strong as Gungnir. He stabbed towards me but couldn't do much damage due to my ever-increasing density. Only those crazy weapons such as Gungnir or Gramr could really cut me at this point. Elemental attacks were probably the only effective way of fighting me. Too bad that both the Jotuns and the fire giants were already defeated.

Odin retreated a few steps, realizing the futility of his attempts, he turned towards the elves.

"Are the elves just going to stand back and watch this monster grow? You participated in this attack, don't think he will spare you."

With silent determination in her eyes, the elven queen stopped hesitating. Her two subordinates nodded in silent understanding and each drew a dagger and stabbed it into their hearts. As the life slowly faded from their eyes, the queen waved her hand and grasped the near intangible energy.

Skillfully manipulating that energy a shimmering but translucent connection was formed between us. Suddenly, I felt a pull, my own vitality flowed out of me and to the queen.

Völsung and Loki wanted to interfere but were blocked by Tyr and Odin. Interestingly, the matchup was Völsung against Tyr and Loki against Odin.

Tyr was only at the grand duke level but had seemingly reached this level as both a magus and a fighter. While he couldn't meet Völsung's attacks head-on, his decades of combat experience allowed him to dodge and counterattack. This wasn't a strategy to win but merely to stall for time and thus very feasible.

However, similar to Völsung, Odin found that while he was clearly stronger than his opponent, he couldn't defeat Loki in a short amount of time. Every now and then, Odin would randomly stab at empty air. I could only speculate that this was due to both Odin and Loki using their unique powers. Odin read Loki's next move and attacked preemptively only to meet air because Loki had used his powers of change to change his next move.

Safe to say, the situation wouldn't see any major changes over the next hour or more, giving me ample time to focus on my own predicament.

'Well now, this is somewhat troublesome.'

"Serves you right for being so arrogant. Now that I've established this life link between us, even you as a king magus can't sever it."

'And why would I need to sever this link? You probably aren't aware of this but a link goes both ways.'

"What does that matter?"

'Watch and learn!'

The slow flow of vitality that left me was immediately reversed. Like gathering magic from the air, I pulled as hard as I could and began a tug of war with the elven queen.

As the moments slipped by, it became more apparent that the elven queen wasn't my match. Her supple, pinkish skin first grew pale and then got more and more wrinkles. Her luscious blonde hair quickly turned into an aged white. The queen aged at a visible pace until she turned into an old crooked hag.

Now, it was her who attempted to break the link established between us. Which, as she herself mentioned before, was a futile effort. Instead of breaking the link, her losing focus made it even easier for me to drain her. Once the last bit of vitality had left her body, she was but an empty lifeless husk. A gust of wind blew past and the husk turned into dust as it scattered into the sky.

Down below, as the elves witnessed their queen die, their morale hit rock bottom. Their formation broke completely and they turned to flee like a bunch of headless chicken.

This in return, caused the other three factions to lose all hope. Akin to a forest fire despair spread through their rows, eroding their determination and making them too abandon their positions.

'Your troops are fleeing, Odin. It's over!'

"A true Aesir doesn't retreat! This war isn't over until every last of us has fallen!"

Despite his words, Odin was visibly shaken as he caught a glance of his army retreating. Enough so that the always passive Loki managed to free himself long enough to throw a dagger at Tyr's back. This unexpected attack messed up Tyr's rhythm and forced him to receive one of Völsung's slashes. Völsung's broadsword shattered Tyr's blade and proceeded to dig into Tyr's shoulder, nearly splitting him in half. Gathering the remains of his strength, Tyr threw a punch at Völsung, hitting him square in the chest. However, Völsung didn't even budge. After getting an innate understanding of dragon strength, his physique had reached a scary level and he could simply disregard Tyr's last struggle. He twisted his broadsword and let Tyr's corpse drop to the ground.

Now even Odin turned to flee but things wouldn't be that easy for him.

'What are you doing, Odin? Is this what you call a tactical retreat? Here, accept this parting gift from me!'

Odin had only just turned around when a sharp object pierced his heart. Gungnir was successfully returned and this battle was now truly over.

But Loki seemed to think otherwise.

"Quick! We must pursue the fleeing armies and decimate them!"