Serenity was so focused on specific people in the middle of the crowd, all wearing black coats, that when the earthquake hit the ground, all of them started getting out of their seats.
Serenity ran towards the seventh entrance where some of them were standing.
'Is the earthquake some kind of signal among them?' She thought while running towards them.
"An earthquake...?...but how?!!" Daniel said looking at bella who had a tensed expression on her face
'This is a flying island, how come there is an earthquake??...shit, they're on the move...' Bella thought
Those who were standing were shaking in their place, hardly moving. Bella and Daniel nodded at each other, and without any words, they ran after Serenity; for a crown prince and a guard, they were quick to adapt to the chaos.
Baial said, full of confusion after Bella pushed her hand, "Wait ...where are you going!?!?"
From the shaking ground, she was about to fall, but Sylvia caught her in time, pulling her towards the seats to hold onto them, looking around them in a daze.
Sylvia's eyes were fixed on the others' backs as they were drifting away. 'Why am I feeling they are getting further and further away from me...?!'
She holds onto her chest, feeling uneasy. "I don't like this feeling..."
The earthquake stopped and sylvia couldn't shake her bed feeling so she grabbed baial and ran into the gate heading outside,
"Wait?...where are we going now?...hey?!?!?"
After Serenity came closer to the people in black, she jumped into the air, kicking the first person in her way to the ground, and punched the other directly in the stomach; the others retreated right away.
One of the people in black asked, "Who the hell are you?"
Glaring at them with cold eyes, she wanted to advance further, but her ears spotted a strange sound.
-ke-chak-
'What was that ?and that strange smell....'
Seeing them all masked, she realized something was definitely wrong and stopped moving any further.
"Fuck!!?"
Instead of rushing forward, she turned around, grabbed Bella and Daniel by their hoodies, and went into the seventh gate.
She stomped her feet into the ground, surrounding them with ice from all directions,leaving the other masked two outside looking at each other still shocked by her actions,
"What was that?"
"That woman was crazy dude..."
at the same time from under the seats among the croud ; red smoke started coming out and people panicked
They tried to get out but they got stuck in their seats unable to move, lana who was flying over the arena fell on her head ,
-bang-
"Ugh...what is happening?..."
She tried to use her magic but couldn't not even her dimensional ring was able to activate , even the two players beside her couldn't gather their mana no matter what they did
"I can't use my mana , what's going on here? " jarvis said then turned at his opponent and the hostess , but both shoke their head.
"I can't use mine...what about you?"
"Neither can i "
Lana then turned to the audience and all she could see was a red clouds covering the whole stadium,
"Something is not right...something is definitely wrong in here..."
Not long after the amount of smoke decreases a little making their vision clearer,
"WTF"
Lans said terrified at the scene in front of her, the stadium was surrounded by a groub of masked men, five of them jumped onto the stage and took the fallen mike,
"Ahem,ahem.....Sorry to inform you but the stadium have been aquired by us and all of you have become our hostages so you better behave "
Releasing his eighth circle mana pressure , the stadium went silent instantly.
At the seventh gate inside the huge wall of ice ,both bella and daniel looking around them in confusion, daniel started fixing his clothes and looking at the ice surrounding them,
"What in the world is going on?"
Bella got up and walked towards Serenity, and with a serious expression drawn all over her face, she asked Serenity,
"Are they from the cranium people?"
Serenity glanced at her then nodded with closed eyes, making Bella stunned. "You really do have a way to identify them, huh...."
Daniel couldn't bear the cold inside and started sneezing.
"Acho"
"Bless you."
"Sniff, sniff...sorry, it's just so cold in here."
"Now that you mentioned it, it's a little cold in here."
Serenity said ,"You're incide an ice ball duh"
Both of them fell awkwardly silent ,"ouch"
Bella who was Looking around her while rubbing her shoulders, asked, "Why are we inside this ice shell, exactly?"
Serenity said, "Bear with it for a while."
"Why?!!" Daniel asked.
"I heard the voice of some strange mechanisms being activated in the stadium and smelled a strange death smell; it was so uncomfortable," she said.
Bella looked at Daniel for confirmation, but he shook his head in denial.
"Did you hear anything?"
"No, nothing in particular."
She turned back at Serenity. "Are you sure you're not mistaken?!"
"I am sure," she turned at them with dead-serious eyes. "I already told you I felt their presence in the stadium before, and the mechanism voice came from the exact same place they were in...I dare not think it's a coincidence."
"A death smell, you say..." ,Daniel thought about it for a while but suddenly asked ,
"Have you watched the news of last month?"
Serenity shook her head in denial. 'At that time I wasn't even myself, and back then she certainly didn't like watching the news,iam glad she was readingbooks at least or i wouldn't know where to stand my feet..'
Serenity crossed arms, asking, "What are you on about?!"
"news change everyday; which one are you talking about?!" Bella asked.
"Last month there was that particular news about the CARCER prison being robbed of its constraint; did you see it?"
The realization suddenly hit Bella. "Shit! Are you telling me those bastards were the ones who did it?"
Daniel explained how he came up with such an idea: "I don't know ...I was just thinking about the masks they were wearing and the way serenity described the strange smell as death, and that piece of news popped in my head. Maybe that constraint is free on the stadium outside at this moment"
Serenity suddenly asked, "What is a constraint exactly??!!"
Both of them froze in place with jaws wide open.
"Eh....!?!?"
"There is actually something you don't know...!!??"
Serenity felt pissed and threatened them; only by doing that did panic actually hit them.
"If you're not going to answer, I will remove the protecting ice."
"No, no, no, no...wait! I will tell..."
She raised her eyebrows, "So..."
"It's a restriction drug, okay?" Bella said.
Daniel took the rest of the explaining by himself. "You see, this drug is used in prison to control criminals during interrogation to stop them from using their magical abilities by enabling them to gather their mana so that the other party won't get hurt in the process."
Serenity said with a voice full of confidence,
"Impossible...there is no drug that can actually affect mana; it's simply unimaginable."
Bella scratched her head, feeling confused. "I don't know where your confidence came from, but I myself have used it countless times in AVALOR, so I am sure of what I saw."
'Is my information so outdated to such an extent?...Maybe I was away for too long and missed a lot of things; I will see about this when I go back.'
She turned to Bella, asking, "What exactly is it made from?"
Bella hesitated before answering, which made Serenity doubtful.
"Why are you hesitating?"
"It's just that...this drug is the most unethical thing you may see in your life. I don't know how you're going to react to what I am about to say next…"
"I doubt something might surprise me at my age, so what is it?"
'What age does a 16 years old kid could talk about? ' daniel thought
Bella looked at Daniel still hesitating, so he took it from her and spilled it out.
"Ashes of the dead...that's what it's actually made of."
"I see."
Seeing how simply and quickly she accepted it, both went into an amazed state, looking at each other in a daze.
Serenity thought, 'I smelled the dead scent and felt the resentment. It turns out it's a CADAVER in the end. We can't actually escape it...even at this timeline, something like this actually existed...it seems like the mess from the past might repeat again sooner than i expected, better hurry up with my plans the sooner the better.'
Serenity turned at them. "What?! ...I already smelled the scent of death outside. It's not actually that surprising, but here's a piece of advice..." Her expression turned stiff, stating a warning for them. "It's best to never use that thing under any circumstances, got it?"
Not understanding anything, they nodded anyway, thinking, 'What worse could happen anyway?'
Daniel had enough of the cold but had no idea what to do, so he asked, "What should we do then?...We can't stay here forever , leaving them outside doing god knows what..."
Bella had a sarcastic smile on her face, "as if they would leave us be when Serenity already attacked them...sooner or later we will go against them."
Serenity touched the thick wall of ice, pointing in their direction and saying, "They already started digging into the ice."
"Shit...how much do we have?" Bella asked.
"Five minutes max."
"So we're running out of time; this is trouble...Do you know how many are out there exactly?"
"Excluding the two I knocked out, the rest are about 28 already in the stadium and about 24 outside in different places around the flying island."
"What about the magical level?"
"Most five or six circles, but ..."
"But what?!?!"
Serenity started counting what she knew: "Among those in the stadium, one is at the eighth circle, and those outside have more than ten of them between the seventh and eighth circles."
Daniel was in chaos watching their conversation carry on without any trouble. "Wai wai wait...How did you know all this?!"
Bella pointed both hands at Serenity, saying bluntly, "Ah...She got strong senses."
Daniel got the shock of his life hearing those words: "Are you kidding me?...If a strong sense could be this accurate, I want one too."
She smiled at him. "I know, right...when I heard about it, I didn't expect something like this, but I don't want it the same way she did."
"Why...how did she get it?"
Serenity's cold voice snapped them back to the reality of their situation. "I think knowing how I know isn't important...but what actually is will be how to get tge hell out of this situation alive."
Bella stopped for a while then talked in despair, "She's right; we're screwed...taking those in the stadium might be a handful since we're outnumbered...especially the eighth circle centered out there. I myself am only sixth circle, so basically we're done for."
"Don't be like that, but..." Daniel pointed something out for them that they missed: "There is actually more than one problem for you to worry about; don't forget that once we're out of here we will be affected by the constraint...have you thought about how to avoid it?! If not, we're truly screwed."
"Shit! Now we're stuck again." Bella felt hopeless in that situation and started moving back and forth, exhausting her brain trying to figure out how to avoid the death trap outside.
Serenity thought about it for a while, then asked them, "Do you have any masks on you, or anything to blook the airway?"
Daniel asks, "I do have some masks, but why?"
"Did you come up with something?" bella asked
"Kind of." She extended her arms toward Daniel. "Give them to me."
Daniel took out three face masks and gave them to Serenity. "Here you go."
Serenity took out an alchemy pen and wrote a rune circle on the inner layer of the mask, then gave them back to Daniel.
All confused he asked ,"I didn't know You can do that.....What did you do?!"
"Wear it and you won't be affected ... One for you, and one for Bella. As for the last one, give it to someone who can actually help us."
"What about yours?!" Bella asked.
"I will be fine without it"
"O...okay, I guess."
Daniel took it and gave one to Bella, and both wore them immediately, but Bella took the extra third one, saying,
"I know who to give it to."
"I will leave it to you then," Daniel said.
Bella turned to Serenity, asking, "What's the situation outside exactly?"
"Let me see..." Serenity closed her eyes and spread her mana all over the place. "One fifth circle standing guard on every gate, which makes them 16 since we closed this gate; about four are trying to break through the ice, and two of them are sixth circle... On the arena there are three, two sixth circles controlling the host and the other two while one fifth circle is monitoring around them."
Daniel counted them on his hand, asking, "That's 23... What about the other five?"
"Two sixth circle are standing near the second gate while the other three are nowhere to be seen on the surface but i felt their presence disappear underground, among them is the eighth circle one"she said
Bella rubbed her chin, thinking about the positions. Serenity said, "This is not a rob-and-run operation...it's more like we're being guarded."
Daniel said ,"more like taking hostage "
"Guarding a perfectly edible meal is how i see it, don't forget the strongest among them went underground, which means that what's there is what really matters for them"
The way she coldly said it, like nothing made them freeze, both of them stopped for a second there, realizing what was going on around them.
"What exactly is under the stadium to need an eighth circle magician? "
Both looked at Serenity for answers, but Serenity shook her head.
"Don't give me that look , i have no idea what's going on here or why they need all those living sacrifices in one place, but what i know for sure is that this stadium must be freed from this siege sooner rather than later or who knows what disaster might happen..."
Daniel terrified from her choice of words complained ,"can you please stop using the word sacrifice,the situation is already bed ,there is no need to make it sound even worse..."
"Apart from the cold attitude, at least we're thinking the same..." bella said
After this discussion all of them felt the gravity of the situation, realizing that the lives of all the people in there depended on them; their weight felt unbearably heavy.
Daniel said to summarize what they needed to do, "So the plan is like this...get out of here, find an ally who can help us get rid of those people before the red flag comes back or god knows what...will come get our heads, easy, right..."
Serenity gives him a thumbs up, while Bella's jaws are still open wide at how his way of saying it makes the situation look so simple.
Serenity turned to Bella, snapping her back to reality. "What is our ally's power?"
"Wind magic, why??"
She pointed her index up, "Create a tornado in the middle of the arena and direct it to the sky."
Bella understood what she meant by her words, and the situation suddenly didn't seem that hopeless anymore.
"Now this seems like a plan to me."
Serenity added a small detail for Bella: "Since you will get our ally, know that for someone under the effect of the constraint, it will take at least five minutes for him to regain control over his mana. I will cover for you against the people on the gates; Daniel will take care of the ones outside, but whoever is beside our ally will be your responsibility. We're running out of time, so this rushed job is fine for now."
"What rushed job…it's a perfect solution for a situation requiring quick thinking like this one." Bella gave her a thumbs up.
Daniel nodded in agreement, "A mind that works perfectly during crisis is a given."
Serenity took out a pair of thick black gloves and wore them on her already worn one, making Bella confused.
"Why are you wearing another pair when you have one already on?!"
Serenity kept staring at the gloves in her hand, emotionless, and said coldly, "In case we have direct contact during the fight...either this or I might lose my mind and do something I shouldn't."
Daniel shivered all over remembering the eternal fire, "Creepy words...but I believe you could..."
"Daniel, come here; let me tell you something..."
Serenity moved towards Daniel and whispered something in his ears, making his eyes widen as he looked her way.
"Are you sure this could work?!"
"Unless you want to be a burden for us during the fight...it would be best to do it the way I told you to, or else I can't guarantee your ability to hold on against the four outside."
Serenity's cold eyes shifted targets toward the thick ice wall and walked behind Daniel since he will be the first to get out.
"Punch when you're ready."
Daniel took out a pair of golden wolf's gloves covering all of his arms. His gloves started boiling like boiled water. Black chains suddenly extended from his shadow, clinging to his gloves, turning the flame symbol black.
Bella changed her appearance to dark bloody hair and eyes that of the daytime sky, changing her vibe completely, with the red-shaded golden butterflies around her.
Daniel blushed all over once he laid eyes on her. "Since when could you do that?!?!"
"Yesterday"
"Huh?!? What!?!?!"
Bella brushed her red hair back, and with a smile on her face, she said, "Talk after the fight is done, okay?"
Daniel bumped his fists together, leading to the appearance of sparks of fire. Excited for what's next, "Now that's something to look forward to."
He punched the icy wall with a big bolt of black fire, causing a grand explosion, pushing those on the other side far away.
-Boom-
"Ugh...waaah...kegugh..."
"What the hell was that?"
Daniel didn't waste any seconds and quickly rushed at them with full force.
"I am here, you bitches..."
He hit the ground in the middle between them, turning it into a sea of fire that rose up, swallowing them with him; as a result, the two of them who didn't react in time passed out from serious burns.
Daniel stood in his place in the middle of the sea of fire, glaring at them. 'Looks like I missed two of them, even though I attacked them when their guard was down. This won't be easy, just as I thought.'
At that point he managed to draw their attention, leaving space for the other two to move on their way.
Bella rushed forward towards the arena while Serenity jumped up towards the highest point of the stadium, standing tall at a point where she could see everything, allowing the dragon bracelet on her hand to appear and activate.
Closing the fist of her right hand as if she were holding something, a bow as clear as glass was formed in her hand. You couldn't see it, but the runes on it were as clear as day.
Both hands were covered with crystal claws. When she pulled the string, snowfolks gathered from thin air, forming an arrow.
She started throwing them on the people who rushed toward the commotion, who couldn't escape the fate of turning into ice statues under her arrows.
Bella felt relieved saying ,"Feels good to have someone on your back indeed."
Bella didn't have time to look behind; instead, she had to keep moving forward. 'Time is so tight right now; if not, I would've thanked you this second, Lady .'
She found the road long ahead, so she took the short way, sliding on the metal bars between the crowd till she reached the end of the seats; she jumped straight into the arena.
"Woohoo...that was so much fun."
One of the sixth levels in the arena spotted her running towards them with six circles drawn over his left arm; he clenched his fist, and a huge fireball came rushing towards Bella.
Serenity saw it and threw an arrow on the grounds of the arena, forming a mountain of ice crystals, absorbing his attack before it hit Bella, and returning it to him in the form of a lightning bolt.
Bella landed on the snow, then jumped on the land before it disappeared, taking advantage of the guards beeing distracted she threw the mask to lana,
She looked towards Serenity, who was guarding them from above.
"That felt refreshing; I'm glad she's on my side."
Serenity noticed her but didn't have time for more than a glance because the people guarding the far gates started rushing towards them.
"New targets I see..."
She raised her bow, aiming at every single one that moves, turning them into ice statues.
Daniel, who saw the attack being reflected, felt cheated. "Shit...that woman could've actually won without lifting a finger, seriously?!"
He powered all his anger on the two in front of him. "She's like a complete cheat code, and I can't do anything about it, but you're another story...let's see what I can actually do against you, shall we?"
Daniel wrapped his body with fire; the water fifth-circle magician in front of him made a huge wall to separate them, making Daniel even more pissed.
He lunged his claws through the water and grabbed that man's neck, snapping it in half.
-crack-
"Who gave you the courage to think a mere fifth-circle shitty bastard stands a chance against me, huh?!"
He threw away the dead corps in his hand into the wall and quickly jumped at the last one, who was still trying to collect mana, but the impression Daniel left after taking down the other two made him too distracted to even cast a simple spell; as a result, Daniel crashed his head into the ground.
Daniel stood tall in the middle of the corps. "I'm a 60% bloodline user, you bitches...how dare you raise your heads against me?!"
Serenity's cold voice suddenly came from above.
"You lier...Since you're done here, find the machine that spread this smoke and burn it into ashes."
'Ugh... i've been caught' Daniel looked at her complaining like a child. "Young lady, this place is huge. How am I supposed to find anything in this crowd?"
Serenity saw the people tied into their chairs, unable to move, and started throwing arrows toward different seats in the crowd.
"Here you go...destroy the machines under the chairs."
"Right away."
He didn't even think about it and rushed forward toward the nearest arrow passing through the crowd.
"Sorry about that...make way...I am sorry..."
When he reached the arrow, he plucked it out and patted the head of the child that was sitting there.
"Can you raise your legs, kiddo?"
The kid nodded and raised his leg while the woman next to him helped him to keep it up. Daniel squatted on the ground and pulled a strange black bag from underneath it.
"What is this?!"
He opened the bag and found something like a music box tied with a huge glass containing red liquid inside. He turned his head at Serenity and raised the bag at her; only when she nodded did he finally throw it in the sky and attack it with a fireball, turning it to ashes in the sky.
"Now this is satisfying, but still...." He turned to look around at the arrows Serenity threw. "More than a hundred, I guess...this will take forever; better start working already."
One of the people sitting among the crowd suddenly grabbed his hand.
"Wait ...why don't you help us out of these restrictions so we can lend a hand?"
"That..." While he was hesitating to answer, a sudden explosion came from outside the stadium.
Daniel looked at the smoke that was rising to the sky from different directions. "Seems like the situation outside might be worse than we thought…"
He looked at the woman grabbing his hand, about to say something, but she let go of him first, saying,
"You know what? Forget I said anything...go do whatever you wanted to do young hero."
Seeing the woman's quick change of attitude Daniel got confused, but the situation was so critical that he had no time to waste.
"What was that?!"
On Bella's end, she threw her needles at the three of them, causing some small scratches on their bodies.
The one who attacked her before, wiped and touched his arm where the injury was, and burst into laughter.
"Pwahahahahahah...is that all you've got?" He walked slowly toward Bella, who put her hands in her pocket, standing there without moving.
Not until he stood right in front of her saying,
"When you rushed toward me, I thought you might be something special, just like those two, but too bad it's a disappointment."
"But it's bleeding."
"Huh?!!!"
Bella extended her hand, touching his stomach muscles. She raised her gaze at him, saying, "Goodbye."
"What?!!?!"
His open wound started bleeding heavily nonstop, but what was truly creepy was the drops of blood coming from him turned into bloody butterflies storming around both of them till that man bled dry.
The sight of the bloody butterflies made the other two drop to their knees.
"We give up...don't...don't kill us."
Bella looked at them with glowing dead sky blue eyes; she pointed at them, and they met the same end as their friend in less than a second.
"Who told you to attack a noble bloodline user...you simply asked for it." Then she turned her head at lana pointing at the sky,
"We need a hurricane"