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"Still no trace of Luke's group. This is turning into real trouble." Somewhere in the Dark Purgatory, the Simurgh hung in the empty air, and Selene and Moira traded a glance. Both of them could feel it. Things were sliding toward the thorny end.
Riding the coordinates Pegasus had traced, their party had been inside the Dark Purgatory for a good while now.
The problem was the Purgatory itself, vaster by far than any of them had imagined. Their strength ran deep, and with Drake, an elder of Dragon's Valley, traveling with them, even the grudge-beasts they met couldn't so much as slow their advance. And still, no Luke. Little wonder the anxiety was starting to show on the two women's faces.
"No news is the best news." Of the four, Tobias kept the finest composure, level from the moment they'd entered. Not that he'd been idle.
Beneath him, Pegasus had been probing the Purgatory without pause since the moment they crossed in. And gliding beside the crystal sky-horse hung a colossal dragon-kind wrapped head to tail in stormwind, the Windsoar Dragon. One of Drake's own trump cards.
SCREE!
Pegasus loosed a sudden long cry and shot toward the northwest, Tobias's voice carrying back through the space behind it. "Keep up. Pegasus has caught a violent energy fluctuation to the northwest. It doesn't read like the Purgatory's native aura, and in all likelihood, it reaches the Eight-Star grade."
"Move!" Drake reacted first, the Windsoar Dragon surging after. Selene fell half a step behind, then sent the Simurgh to full speed.
Eight-Star meant nothing to the four of them. Even Selene, the lowest-realmed among them, could resolve one without strain. But if it was Luke's group standing across from an Eight-Star enemy, the arithmetic changed entirely.
However much faith Selene held in her little junior brother, she did not believe he could match Eight-Star combat strength at this stage of his life. Iris and Elise, who ran a notch below him still, even less so.
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*「 Abyss Devourer 」*
Race: Extra-Domain Fierce Beast
Quality: Perfect
Level: ★★★★★★★★ (Eight-Star)
Skills: Predator, Forced Devour, Abyss Shield, Cruelty
Description: A devourer that wanders the alien dimensions year upon year, consuming every living thing it finds, day after day without end. It can extract the skills of what it devours and turn them to its own use.
What had come through the Black Gate was not the Abyss Predators alone. Something stronger had followed them in, an Abyss Devourer. And with the Gate still yawning wide, no one could say whether something stronger still might step through in the very next breath.
"An Eight-Star Perfect Abyss Devourer, is it?" Luke skimmed the creature's information and arched a brow. Credit where due, this Renegade really was a talent, conjuring up a Black Gate and a whole menagerie of extra-domain beasts. "Though these things run crueler than any ordinary beast. You're sure this isn't lighting a fire while standing in the kindling?"
Elise, Iris, Viola. All three girls had gone white in the same instant.
Never mind the Eight-Star Devourer. The eight Abyss Predators alone were more than enough to bury the three of them.
And of the three, only Elise, who had ridden at Luke's side the whole way, remained in decent fighting shape. Iris's and Viola's main cards were dead or crippled, and neither of them could tip this battle much in any direction.
"Why do you think the Dark Purgatory became Dragon's Valley's burial ground in the first place?" Silas swayed on his feet under the Gate's backlash, but his voice ran thick with malice, his face all madness and killing intent. In his hand sat another Dark Prison Transfer Writ, and off it rolled a strange, particular aura.
Touched by that aura, the Abyss Devourer, which had been a heartbeat from making Silas its first meal, stopped at the very last instant. Then it moved behind him and stood quiet. The Predators did the same.
"The Writ does rather more than teleport you into the Dark Purgatory." Watching the girls' faces transform, something sick threaded through the twist of Silas's grin. "It holds the power to command extra-domain fierce beasts."
Silas would never permit Luke's group to leave the Dark Purgatory alive. The Valley girl least of all.
And after her, Luke. That strength at that age, and two of his plans broken across the boy's knee besides. The jealousy had long since stopped fitting inside him. The thought of destroying a genius like this with his own hands left him trembling with excitement, and twisted him another turn tighter.
Viola felt that killing intent land on her like a physical weight, and her already bloodless face went whiter still. The greater share of it was aimed squarely at her, and the girl swayed where she stood.
Elise's and Iris's faces ran little better. Both of them finally, truly understood what Renegade madness meant. To kill them, this man had torn open something as dangerous as a Black Gate. And worse, he could command what came through it.
But the heavier fact was simpler. The strongest cards in their hands topped out at Seven-Star. High-grade, yes. A match for the Predators, yes. The other side held an Eight-Star Abyss Devourer.
Never mind Iris and Viola. Even Elise, who trusted Luke most, who knew he carried Red-Eyes Black Dragon and the Dragon Knight Dark Magician Girl both, felt the despair closing in. However many Seven-Stars you stacked, they were Seven-Stars, not Eight. And whether even that absurdly unfair holy binding of Angewomon's could take hold on an Eight-Star Devourer, no one alive could say.
"Luke. We do this together." Elise drew a deep breath and stepped up beside him. Whatever came, she was not letting him carry all of it alone.
And not only Elise. Iris and Viola crushed the fear down and stepped forward too. Running was impossible, and likelier deadlier. If there was no road out, then bet everything on the road through.
Viola above all. The guilt sat heavy in her. They had been dragged into this filthy water because of her, and they might well die in it because of her.
"You lot. Is all this drama strictly necessary?" Luke looked at the three of them, halfway helpless and, despite everything, a little moved. He reached out, gave Elise's little face a pinch, and then, under three stunned stares, turned toward the massed extra-domain beasts with his eyes gone bright. "After all this wasted time, things are finally getting interesting."
Last time, resolving a single Abyss Predator had put the Doll Key, the Night Veil, and the Worm's Heart in his hands, three rare materials off one kill. Now there stood eight full Predators and a stronger Devourer besides. Clear the lot in one wave, and even with rotten luck, he'd walk away with a fistful of rare materials at minimum.
"What is that supposed to mean?" Silas had stopped being able to follow this boy's brain-circuitry entirely. There was no fear anywhere on him. If anything, he looked eager. What KIND of look is that supposed to be?! Could you not act NORMAL for one moment?
A normal rookie, facing this many extra-domain beasts, should be shivering where he stood. The three girls, THAT was the correct reaction!
"The literal meaning." And as he said it, Luke raised his hand and summoned out the rest of his card spirits.