The Eternal Rock's internal space began expanding proportionally with their battle, seemingly without limit. Originally worried that intense fighting would destroy the space, she now relaxed seeing this feature.
Thea's fighting spirit also rose. "Is this a Behemoth? That transformation spell is impressive! Knowing you can't beat me in close combat, you transformed into this to crush me. This old man isn't as confused as I thought."
Old Shazam's technique was completely different from magical transformation spells. Thea didn't know if this was a Behemoth—she could only name it based on game terminology.
"Is this your Australian deity's true form?" Thea probed verbally while her spellcasting never stopped.
The giant beast had lost the ability to speak. It roared at her and charged like a mountain, footsteps thundering.
"ROAR—!" Thea's legendary transformation spell had also completed. She'd chosen the sky's overlord: a dragon.
Through swirling smoke, a thick dragon tail viciously whipped the beast's flank. The multi-ton creature was sent tumbling, stumbling several steps before regaining its footing.
Thea had transformed into the dragon most suited for magic: a blue dragon.
Azure scales covered her entire body, inscribed with profound, unknowable runes. Her wisdom-filled eyes gazed at old Shazam.
"Primitive deity, surrender the gods' divine power!" Blue dragons were known for their slender builds. Thea's dragon form naturally lacked cumbersome muscles. She agilely flew into the air and breathed dragon fire at the beast.
The beast-form old Shazam acted purely on instinct. As the self-proclaimed King of the Land, Behemoth had the confidence to challenge dragons. Its two arms, longer than its legs, violently struck the ground while its legs pushed hard. The beast leaped into the air, not only dodging the breath attack but also lunging toward the dragon.
Controlled by bestial instinct, old Shazam had that problem, but Thea didn't. Fight a dirty beast head-on? Impossible.
With a graceful twist, she flew several more feet upward. Seeing the beast at the apex of its jump with no way to defend itself, she breathed dragon fire directly down.
Whether Shazam the Lightning God was real or fake was debatable, but lightning spells probably wouldn't work well on him. Thea extracted massive amounts of magic and transformed them into bone-chilling ice, tilting her neck to breathe a massive blast at his defenseless back.
"ROAR!" The beast's entire back was covered in frost. The magical ice was constantly eroding his body. Airborne with no way to maintain balance, he crashed to the ground with a tremendous impact.
"Brainless fool, hmph!" Thea pressed her advantage, casting a large-scale mud technique that covered the battlefield. The beast struggled repeatedly but, due to its excessive weight, kept sinking deeper into the mire.
Thea unleashed countless wind blades. A golden shield appeared on the beast's surface, trying to resist.
Unfortunately, the shield only lasted three minutes before breaking. The beast protected its vital points with its arms, trying to escape the swamp one awkward step at a time.
The muddy battlefield was too disgusting to enter. Thea used another spell instead: Grand Summoning—Summon Subordinate! A sky-blue portal opened, and Faora, who'd been on standby in black armor, finally entered this space.
Transforming back to human form, Thea pointed at the beast. Her adjutant exploded forward with a sonic boom and punched the creature.
Grabbing the beast's fur, she delivered two more punches to its giant hippopotamus head.
The beast struggled fiercely, but its inability to fly became a fatal flaw, restricting all movement. Having sunbathed on Earth for so many years, the adjutant wasn't quite Superman's equal but came close. She was completely fearless of pure physical attacks.
Seemingly enraged by this flying pest, the beast roared continuously, its two massive claws flailing wildly. It wanted to grab Faora and drag her into its combat rhythm.
However, as one of Krypton's younger generation's elite, Faora's combat skills were forged through Kryptonian trials—simple but effective. Her natural talent might not match Kara's, but years of effort had bridged that gap.
The beast's combat instincts were far inferior. After merging with old Shazam, he hadn't fought in far too long.
The divine power consumed by this transformation all came from the Australian indigenous deity's own reserves. Even if the external appearance was identical, your own divine power versus someone else's divine power were fundamentally different.
Normally, he relied on his own divine power to control and channel the gods' power. When consumption wasn't too high, he could manage. But if his own reserves depleted too much, the balance would shatter.
Revert or continue fighting? This hesitation created a huge opening.
Faora directly lifted the giant beast while Thea leaped up, her sword aimed at its head.
Shazam hastily reverted to human form. His hippopotamus head rapidly shrank back to human—dodging that strike—but one massive claw didn't escape, severed clean by the brilliantly glowing holy sword.
The brown-black arm fell to the ground. Thea signaled Faora to continue the assault while she cast two sealing spells and placed the arm in her energy-absorbing necklace. The necklace automatically processed it, filtering the pure divine power layer by layer and converting it into her own.
"Total amount is too small, and some seems to have dissipated. But it's still faster than natural recovery." Thea gave Faora a look. The adjutant immediately understood—capture the target alive.
Faora took a deep breath, her internal energy rapidly converting. A bone-chilling freezing breath shot forth.
Thea's hands moved continuously. Ice Storm, Ice Cone, Frost Ray, Ice Nova—she kept throwing them out.
Having lost one arm, old Shazam struggled against their combined assault, only able to endure with his lightning barrier.
"Old man, stop resisting. For world order, dedicate your divine power—it was never yours to begin with." Thea coaxed him with classic villain dialogue. To increase persuasion, she also summoned Killer Frost Caitlin. With three of them refrigerating the room, the temperature plummeted.
Even the Eternal Rock, formed from Heaven and Hell fragments, couldn't withstand their magical and meta-ability cooling. The eternal lamps she'd seen earlier had completely extinguished, and walls, floor, and even old Shazam's former stone chair were all cracking from the cold.
Already in severe blood loss, old Shazam's face turned deathly pale. He seemed to be resisting more on pure instinct.
His frozen brain took forever to understand the situation. Finally, old Shazam shouted: "No, I still need to choose an heir, find the supremely good or evil person. This is my mission..."
"Fool!" Thea cursed. The old guy was too stubborn. Stubborn was one thing, but he had neither vision nor knowledge, completely wasting all that divine power.
Continuing this stalemate wasted her own divine power! Having long considered him her prize, Thea prepared her trump card.