He pointed at the guy and a swarm of Stone Bolts covered the sky, and before long, they completely annihilated the running bandit.

Boom!

The Bottled Thunder also detonated at that time and a few seconds later only a scorched circle of soil remained where the man once stood.

His potions still had some time left so he wasn't worried about using too much Mana. Besides, he had two Earth bracelets with 10 MP each. Still, he used his shitty Earth Crystals first, since he had the option to. He was saving his bracelets and his internal Mana for emergencies.

Just as he was about to take a breather, another bandit came out of the forest, all out of breath.

"Tsk, another one… Stone Shower!" Gerald didn't lose any time and directly cast another spell toward the bandit.

"Wah-" the bandit screamed and quickly ran back under the cover of the dense branches. It did not appear he was interested in a fight.

"Bah! I missed…" Gerald frowned and waved his hand saying, "Whatever! I don't have time for this! I need to check on my new teammates…" After that, he ran back towards the cliffside, where an intense battle was currently happening.

Derrick and his brother Doven were currently fighting against red-armored bandits, it was a two versus three fight. Owyn was also there and he was keeping two of the remaining bandits away from the warriors with his Earth magic.

Gerald quickly noticed that one of the red-armored bandits was missing. When he came closer, he saw what had happened.

A bandit was currently lying down in a pool of his own blood and he had a two-meter long stone spike pinning him to the ground. It appeared he was sneak-attacked by Owyn.

It was no surprise to Gerald since he saw Owyn was quite good at controlling his stone projectile.

"Damn, I hate mages! They are such a pain in the ass!" One of the bandits complained loudly while dodging Owyn's Stone Javelin.

The other bandit hacked down with his sword and slightly deflected the Stone Javelin away from his body, saying, "Don't worry… When our five brothers come back we will cut them down as easy as killing chickens! We just need to preserve until they kill that other mage!"

"Hehe, you are right, they are probably already done by now!"

"Oh yeah? I don't think they will be coming back any time soon!" A laugh that came from behind them made them shiver. They suddenly had a really bad feeling about the situation.

A bandit spared a glance and looked back, just to be stunned by the sight. There he was, a mage that ran away and there was no sight of their brothers.

"What happened?! I refuse to believe you defeated them all!" he roared with red eyes.

Gerald chuckled as he gave him a taunting look, "Hmm? Should I show you their corpses for you to believe me?" He didn't actually kill all of them, just two. One of them ran away and the other two probably lost his trail. He was not too concerned about them.

"How dare you!" the bandit screamed as he dodged the Stone Javelin once more. Now the dynamic of the fight changed quite a bit.

It was now four against five, but even though the bandits held a numbers advantage, they were already in a stalemate before Gerald showed up.

The enraged bandit now clenched his teeth as he was contemplating what to do next. His empty hand slowly lowered into his pouch as he spoke through gritted teeth, "We will have to use it after all… It's such a waste, but we have no choice!"

"Scales! Defensive Formation!" the bandit roared and the three fighting Derrick and Doven quickly moved back.

All five of the red-armored bandits gathered in a half-circle, with backs facing each other. They each took out something from their respective leather pouches.

"Really? More Bottled Thunder?! For God's sake! Have some mercy!" Gerald screamed in hopelessness.

From what he calculated, these guys had to have at least fifty gold worth of Bottled Thunder. Just seeing them waste so much money was torture for him. His heart was tearing apart.

"Hahaha! Too late for prayers boy! It doesn't matter if you defeated our brothers or not, because soon you won't be among the living anymore to enjoy that accomplishment!" one of the bandits roared in laughter. He completely misunderstood Gerald's words.

"Now… Go to hell!" The bandit screamed as he threw his bottles at Gerald. All five of them had wicked smiles on their faces as they looked with interest to see how the mage is going to die.

"By the power I control, shifting dirt, warping-" Owyn started to chant quickly, but it was clear he was too slow to be of any help as the bottles were already dangerously close to Gerald. He was worried that they would lose a friend, even if they only met recently.

Doven and Derrick, on the other hand, crouched down and covered themselves with their shields, gritted their teeth, and prepared for the explosion.

The only one calm was Gerald himself. He predicted this course of action before he even came back to the cliff. Since two of the bandits he fought tried to attack with Bottled Thunder, he figured the rest would do the same if they felt threatened.

Indeed, that's what happened. Gerald had already gathered sufficient Mana for his next spell. He took a deep breath and punched toward the falling bottles, "Wind Blast!"

Woosh!

With a strong gust of wind, the bottles suddenly changed directions and flew back to where they came from. The red-armored bandits were shocked by the development and one of them quickly recovered, screaming, "Scatter!"

They all jumped to the side, except for one of them who tripped and fell on his back. He could only look in horror as the Bottled Thunder fell to the ground before him. The blinding flash of light that followed was the last thing he ever saw.

Boom!

Sharp glass fragments and broken stone pieces flew out with the shockwave. It acted like shrapnel from a hand grenade.

The bandits were the ones that took the brunt of the impact. Their backs and legs were bleeding, as the simple leather armor was unable to resist the explosion. The shockwave also pushed them to the ground, so they had faces full of dirt.

The two warriors from Silver Phantom were left unscathed since they were hiding behind the shields, although their arms did feel a bit sore from the shockwave.

Owyn was luckily far enough to avoid the shrapnel and he was completely fine, even though his armor was the weakest among everyone present.

The same was with Gerald, although he was the main target of the attack, in the end, he was left without a scratch.

"Ugh…" a red-armored bandit groaned and tried to get back up. His body was aching all over and his ears were bleeding as his eardrums popped because of the explosion. Among his teammates, he was in the best shape, although that was not saying much.

Derrick reacted quickly and before the bandit even knew what happened, he was on the ground again. Derrick's knee was on his chest and a sword on his neck. The meaning was quite obvious; If he tried anything funny, he would be immediately executed.

Doven quickly went towards the remaining three thugs and bound them together with a strong rope. He did not have any problems doing so, as they were all unconscious.

"Who are you, people? Why did you attack us?!" Derrick questioned the bandit under his knee.

The bandit did not seem too concerned with answering. Although his eardrum was pierced, he could still somewhat hear Derrick yelling. He turned his head around to see better and his eyes landed on the remaining three of his companions.

They were in bad shape and blood was flowing everywhere. The bandit gritted his teeth in anger, but he could nothing to vent his rage. Eventually, he spoke, "Fuck you…"

He then spat in Derrick's face.

Bam!

A heavy fist landed on his face and a searing pain came from his nose. Soon the warm blood started flowing, making the bandit choke on it. He got punched in the face, but still, he did not answer the questions. Instead, determination came to his eyes as his hand slowly moved down, to one of his leather pouches.

There he grabbed two bottles and very carefully opened them both and combined the contents. He was doing it very slowly and with only one hand while Derrick was kneeling on his chest.

Nobody noticed his slight movements.

Suddenly, there was a glint in his eyes as he made a decision. His hand quickly jerked upward and he threw a bottle up, high in the air.

"Watch out!"