The golden brilliance of Sir Vael and the oppressive shadow of Sagha Vain Damuire had vanished from the immediate vicinity, leaving behind a vacuum of power that was instantly filled by the cold, heavy tension of the remaining combatants. The reddish-black mist of the theater began to coil around us once more, no longer held at bay by the masters' presence. The blue sphere barrier hummed behind me, protecting the newly returned twins and our fallen comrades, but out here, on the fractured obsidian floor, we were about to face another problem.
Tokine and Zaltraf stood before us, their silhouettes sharp against the dim, churning backdrop of the dimension. Tokine remained unnervingly still, her gaze fixed on us with a hollow, detached intensity that sent a chill through the air. Beside her, the Demonking Zaltraf loomed, his presence a dark weight that seemed to actively compress the space around him.
I felt the "Body Enhanced State" thrumming in my veins, my heart beating with that same slow, rhythmic cadence: thump, thump, thump. My skin was tight, my senses were razor-sharp, and I could feel the invisible currents of energy flowing between us. We didn't have the luxury of time.
I turned my head slightly toward Celdrich, who stood ready, his hands white-knuckled on his weapons. I knew the specific threat Tokine posed—a threat that could freeze us in our tracks before we could even blink.
"Fight Tokine, since you're the only one who can fight against Tokine's time magic," I told Celdrich.
Celdrich didn't hesitate. He didn't ask for clarification or voice his doubts. He simply adjusted his grip, his eyes locking onto the girl who had once been our ally. With a sudden, explosive burst of movement, Celdrich charged against Tokine. The impact of his takeoff shattered the obsidian beneath his boots, and the two of them moved with such velocity that they went a bit far from us, their clash becoming a blur of steel and flickering temporal distortions in the distance.
On my side, Euphyne stepped up. He adjusted his stance, the air around him beginning to shimmer with his own gathering power. He looked at me, a brief flash of the old, reliable camaraderie breaking through the grimness of the situation.
"We can do this, best friend!" Euphyne said.
The words were a spark of warmth in the freezing void of the theater. Without waiting for a response, Euphyne lunged forward. He swung his one-sided war axe in a massive, overhead arc, the heavy blade whistling as it cut through the crimson mist. The strike was aimed directly at the center of the Demonking, a blow that should have split the ground for miles.
But Zaltraf didn't move. He didn't even raise a hand. Instead, a shimmering, dark energy manifested around him in a fraction of a second. Zaltraf's barrier tanked it. The edge of the war axe slammed into the translucent surface with a deafening clang that sent a shower of sparks flying across the floor. The barrier didn't shatter; it didn't even ripple. It simply absorbed the catastrophic kinetic force as if it were nothing more than a gentle breeze.
Euphyne pulled back, his arms vibrating from the feedback of the strike. He looked at the unscathed shield, his expression hardening as he realized the sheer scale of the defense we were facing.
"Zaltraf became stronger," Euphyne said.
I could feel it, too. The Demonking's aura was denser than before, more refined, as if he had evolved in the short time since our last encounter. But the "Body Enhanced State" didn't allow for hesitation. I shifted my weight, the obsidian floor cracking under the pressure of my foot, and then I charged at Zaltraf.
I was a streak of emerald and white light. I bypassed the distance in a microsecond, the white gold sword held in a two-handed grip. I put the entire momentum of my dash into a singular, vertical strike. I swung my sword, and the impact was a thunderclap that echoed through the entire dimension. The force was so immense that Zaltraf's barrier first crumbled. The dark energy shattered into a thousand jagged fragments, dissolving into the mist before they could even hit the ground.
For a heartbeat, the Demonking was exposed. I didn't waste the opening. I pulled the blade back for a lightning-fast follow-up, aiming to carve through his chest while his defenses were down. But before the metal could touch his skin, the dark energy surged again, more viscous and more solid than the previous iteration.
He regenerated his barrier.
My second swing connected with the new shield, but the result was fundamentally different. The white gold blade hit the surface with a dull, hollow thud. There were no sparks, no cracks, and no displacement. The barrier had completely neutralized the vibration and the pressure of my strike. My second swing didn't do any damage.
I pulled back, my breathing steady despite the exertion, my eyes narrowed as I observed the way the dark energy was swirling and hardening in response to my specific attacking style. The barrier was no longer just a wall; it was a reactive organism that was learning from every hit.
"You have a monstrous amount of adaptation, huh?" I said to Zaltraf.
Zaltraf just laughed. It was a deep, guttural sound that seemed to vibrate the very air inside the theater, a sound filled with the confidence of a predator that knew it couldn't be caught. He didn't speak; he didn't need to. He simply raised his arms, and the shadows around him began to boil.
The ground beneath him cracked as a new, darker energy erupted from his core. The temperature in the immediate area plummeted, and the reddish mist was pushed back by a sudden, freezing wind. Out of the darkness surrounding him, two horrific entities began to manifest, floating on either side of his shoulders.
They were two floating skulls, their surfaces etched with ancient, demonic runes. But they weren't just bone; they were burning with black fire, the flames licking at the air with a predatory hunger. The eyes of the skulls were hollow pits of flickering violet light that seemed to track my every movement with a cold, spectral intelligence.
He calls them. The Skulls of Burning Souls spirit,
The atmosphere in the theater had shifted from a duel of gods to a desperate, claustrophobic struggle for survival. The reddish-black mist was thick, tasting of iron and old secrets, while the blue sphere barrier provided by Sir Vael hummed with a protective, rhythmic frequency that countered the suffocating pressure of the Demonking's presence. I stood with my feet braced against the invisible, fractured floor, the "Body Enhanced State" maintaining its cold, mechanical grip on my nervous system. My skin felt like reinforced leather, and my heart was a slow, heavy thrum—thump, thump, thump—that echoed the vibration of the dimension itself. Beside me, Euphyne gripped his one-sided war axe, his knuckles white and his golden aura flickering like a candle in a storm.
We looked at Zaltraf, and we looked at the two horrific entities he had summoned. The Skulls of Burning Souls hung in the air, their hollow sockets leaking a violet light that seemed to pierce through the very concepts of distance and defense. The black fire that wreathed them was unlike any flame I had ever seen; it didn't flicker or dance—it churned like boiling ink, consuming the very light around it.
As we tried to attack him, the silence of the theater was shattered by a high-pitched, ethereal screech.
The Skulls suddenly shoot towards us.
They didn't fly; they tore through the air, leaving twin trails of scorched reality in their wake. They were faster than the eye could follow, two streaks of black fire and bone aimed directly at our chests. I had no time to bring my sword up, and Euphyne had no time to swing his axe. The momentum of the spirits was absolute, a concentrated delivery of demonic malice that bypassed the laws of inertia.
In impact they exploded.
The sound was a hollow, soul-crushing boom that felt as if it were happening inside my own skull. The force of the detonation was enough to ripple the invisible floor for miles, sending waves of distorted space outward in every direction. The Skulls didn't just break; they detonated into a catastrophic release of energy.
And black fire spreads everywhere.
The oily, dark flames erupted from the point of impact, expanding with a predatory hunger. The fire coated the interior of the theater, climbing the invisible walls and dripping from the ceiling like burning tar. It was a sea of obsidian heat that sought to melt anything it touched, turning the air into a thick, unbreathable miasma of ash and shadow. I watched as the flames licked at the floor beneath my boots, ready to incinerate the very ground I stood upon.
But the protection held.
The barrier of Sir Vael prevented the black fire from hitting us.
The clear blue sphere flared to a brilliant, cerulean intensity as the black flames slammed against its surface. The fire hissed and roiled, trying to find a single crack in the knight's magic, but the blue light remained absolute. We were in the eye of a dark inferno, protected by a thin, humming wall of gold-tinged energy. I could see the fire churning inches from my face, a wall of living shadow that was being held at bay by the sheer will of the man who had escaped the seal.
I didn't wait for the fire to recede. The "Body Enhanced State" pushed me forward, my mind locked on the singular goal of ending the Demonking.
Euphyne and I charged towards Zaltraf.
We moved as one, a pair of projectiles launched from the safety of the barrier. I broke the floor with the force of my takeoff, the obsidian shards flying into the black fire behind me. Euphyne was a blur of golden light at my side, his war axe raised high, the heavy blade gleaming with a desperate resolve. We ignored the heat, we ignored the roar of the fire, and we ignored the terrifying stillness of the man standing in the center of the carnage.
And we started attacking.
I unleashed a whirlwind of slashes with the white gold sword, each strike carrying the full kinetic weight of my hyper-accelerated body. The air screamed as the blade carved through it, the "thrum" of my heart accelerating to match the frequency of my movements. Beside me, Euphyne was a storm of raw power, his axe falling again and again in heavy, bone-crushing arcs. We struck from the left, from the right, from above—a relentless, frantic symphony of steel and light.
His barrier tanked all of our attacks.
The dark, viscous shield that Zaltraf had manifested was an immovable object. Every time my sword connected, it was met with a dull, hollow thud that reverberated back into my wrists, threatening to shatter my bones. Euphyne's axe slammed into the energy with enough force to level a mountain, but the barrier didn't even ripple. It was an absolute wall of adaptation, a defense that seemed to laugh at the very concept of physical impact. The Demonking stood behind the translucent veil, his arms crossed, his eyes watching our struggles with a cold, detached amusement.
I felt the frustration boiling over, the "Body Enhanced State" straining to find a way through the stalemate. I pulled my sword back for another strike, my muscles coiling with a force that threatened to tear my skin. I swung with everything I had left, aiming for the exact same point I had struck a dozen times before.
Till my sword did something I didn't know it can do.
As the tip of the white gold blade touched the surface of the dark barrier, the emerald light of my creation magic didn't just flicker—it transformed. The metal began to hum with a strange, resonant frequency that I had never felt before. It wasn't my energy; it was something ancient and hungry.
It suddenly absorbed Zaltraf's barrier magic.
The dark energy of the shield didn't deflect the blade. Instead, it was drawn into the sword. I watched in stunned silence as the viscous shadow of the barrier was pulled toward the white gold metal, spiraling around the blade like water down a drain. The barrier didn't shatter; it was simply deleted at the point of contact. The sword acted as a vacuum, drinking the Demonking's defense and converting it into a raw, piercing edge.
And penetrated and slashed him.
The resistance vanished. The sword glided through the space where the barrier had been and bit deep into Zaltraf's chest. The sensation was clean and terrifyingly smooth. The white gold metal cut through his dark clothing and carved a jagged, horizontal line across his torso. A spray of dark blood—viscous and cold—erupted from the wound, painting the floor between us.
Zaltraf stumbled back, his eyes widening in a rare moment of genuine shock. The immovable god had been reached.
I felt a surge of adrenaline that threatened to break the mechanical calm of my enhanced state. I tried to swing again. I wanted to follow up, to drive the blade home and end the threat while the barrier was down. I put my entire weight into a second horizontal slash, expecting the metal to drink the magic once more.
But I can't do it again.
The sword was just a sword. The white gold metal hit the newly regenerated surface of the barrier with that same, familiar, hollow thud. There was no absorption, no resonance, and no penetration. The "Body Enhanced State" pushed the blade with all its might, but the barrier held firm, the dark energy having already adapted to the anomaly I had just produced. I was hitting a wall again, and the sword remained silent in my hands.
Zaltraf looked at the sword.
He didn't look at me. He didn't look at Euphyne. He looked only at the white gold blade, his gaze tracing the runes and the metallic grain with a terrifying, ancient intensity. The amusement was gone. The detached curiosity was gone. In its place was a cold, sharp recognition that seemed to chill the very air inside the blue barrier.
Zaltraf said, "That sword is the same sword that the first hero used against me."
The words carried the weight of eons. They were a declaration of war, a confirmation that the tool I was holding was a ghost from a past I barely understood. The Demonking's posture shifted, his shoulders squaring and his hands unfolding from his chest. The dark energy around him didn't just swirl; it solidified into a jagged, oppressive aura that made the reddish-black mist scream in protest.
He suddenly got serious.
The air in the theater became impossibly heavy. The "Body Enhanced State" told me to move, told me to retreat, but my feet felt as if they were made of lead. Zaltraf didn't use a spell. He didn't use the Skulls. He simply stepped forward, his movement so fast it was less of a dash and more of a teleportation.
And he punched me.
The fist was a dark blur that bypassed my guard before I could even blink. It wasn't a punch from a mortal; it was a physical collision with a fundamental force of nature. I saw the knuckles approaching, the dark energy coiling around his hand like a serpent, and then the world exploded.
I didn't feel any pain or got any damage because of the barrier.
Sir Vael's blue light absorbed the catastrophic impact. I felt the vibration of the punch travel through the air and hit the cerulean shield, the energy dispersing in a massive, shimmering ripple. My internal organs remained intact, and my bones didn't shatter, but the kinetic force was not something that could be ignored. The barrier protected my life, but it couldn't protect my position.
But I flew far and into the floor.
I was launched backward as if I had been hit by a high-speed train. I became a projectile once again, hurtling through the dimension at a velocity that blurred the theater into a smear of red and black. I skipped across the invisible floor, the friction of my passage igniting the air around me. I finally came to a halt hundreds of yards away, my back slamming into the base of the massive blue orb that held our classmates. The impact sent a jar through my entire being, the "Body Enhanced State" struggling to keep my consciousness from slipping away.
Same with Euphyne.
I looked to my side, my vision swimming as I tried to regain my bearings. Euphyne was there, his war axe lying several feet away, his golden aura nearly extinguished. He had been hit with the same terrifying force, his own defenses unable to compensate for the sheer physical power of the Demonking's serious intent. He lay in the wreckage of the floor, gasping for air, his body trembling from the shock of the displacement.
We were far from Zaltraf now, the distance between us a vast, burning plain of black fire and reddish mist. The Demonking stood in the distance, a dark silhouette against the golden light of the far-off Sir Vael, his eyes fixed on us with a cold, unyielding patience. He wasn't playing anymore. The "first hero's sword" had changed the rules of the encounter, and the price of that revelation was the absolute, overwhelming violence we had just experienced.
I forced my hands into the cracked floor, my fingers searching for the hilt of my sword. The "thrum" of my heart was jagged and erratic, but the determination to kill Sagha—and anyone standing in my way—was the only thing that remained solid in a world that was falling apart. I looked at Euphyne, and I saw him struggling to rise as he got sent next to me, his eyes meeting mine with a shared, desperate understanding of the nightmare we were currently living through.
He was there, broken but not defeated, and as I watched him cough out a mouthful of ash, I felt the "Body Enhanced State" begin to recalibrate, preparing for the next, inevitable collision.