As the party waited patiently, they saw the black wall slowly crumble and dissipate into nothing. Meaning that their friend had successfully rid the gate guardian of its life. Slowly, he came into view, donned in his knightly armor and sheathing his blade. Bixby stood on his shoulder with a satisfied look, hooting peacefully while his master looked less amused than a three year old at a dining hall.
"You did it, mister Lanos! Great job!" Namir exclaimed as he ran up to Lanos.
"Good job, you actually came out unscathed, huh? How was the slime? Or well, was it a slime?" Sereia quizzed.
"It was, how did you know?" Lanos raised a brow while Namir started playing with Bixby the owl spirit.
"We figured from the available information we had upon entering this room. Seems like we probably could have attacked it way before the trail even started? A bit late to come to that realization though," Elyenora chuckled at the idea. She scratched her cheek whilst wishi
I hope you enjoyed the chapter! :D
The next day, of course there would be. More caves. More coldness. More monsters. More wonders to see. More of everything there would be. First, however, they had to start the day's trek. Samuel was the first one up in the morning. He'd been the last one on watch duty, and he watched as Elyenora sauntered out of her tent. She yawned. "Good morning Sam." "Good morning," he replied as he stoked the fire he'd started. It burned in the shade of the nearby tent. "Yo, Samuel!" Namir greeted the night guard whilst coming out of his tent. "Good morning," "Don't suppose you brewed some coffee for us this morning?" Sereia asked, a grin on her face as she left the tent and assumed a stance near the fire, overlooking it and its surrounding area. "I'm entirely capable of making coffee," Samuel retorted, feeling offended at the implication. "I know, Sam, but..." Sereia looked at him wry
The ground remained layered with snow everywhere they went to, with thin ice acting as a gentle sheet, and trees here and there covered in snowy bundles. The fact there was any vegetation at all this far underground was already a miracle, although when you consider this whole sight that seemed like a winter fairyland, miracle was probably an understatement.The party had been walking for about two hours now, with many more left to go. The snow had gotten deeper as they'd traveled forward, leaving behind a good amount of space between them and the plants from before. As they walked, the serene environment which looked like a wonderland receded and instead turned into a wasteland of white, like a desert of snow. Eventually, their path narrowed down more. A cliff or wall of sorts blocked their further inquiry, and it took quite a while before they found a small enough route to continue their frigid march.It was a wide, narrow path, much like if someone had carved it or c
The gang stood silently watching the creature stand there, watching them without movement. It was menacing, frightening, chilling.Her skin was rigid, covered in crystals that reflected the light of their torches; reminding one of her cold nature. Upon closer look, her white hair was in fact made up of thorny, sharp reeds atop her head that just acted the part. She was thin and short, but twisted with a hunched posture as she stood on two jagged limbs that were almost like a spider's legs, only larger and more translucent. Her small tanned belly was slightly exposed from her loose-fitting garment, which looked like it had been birthed by nature rather than the work of a seamstress, as if made from shards of the many ice crystals stuck to her skin. Her blank eyes stared at them with solemn curiosity, the pupils a murky blue."A corrupted spirit?" Elyenora turned to Lanos."Yes, this is seriously bad news," Lanos grimaced, defending Elyenora with his hand as he pu
The pleading eyes grew higher and wider - a cornucopia of tears."Stay back," he warned her."Mon'Ter," Elyenora spoke, her voice deceptively scratchy. "Is everything... Okay?" she could see the corrupted spirit girl in front of her. Eyes burning away. Tearing at the soul trapped within her tiny frame as she struggled in between the spikes. Crying out."Anna," Mon'Ter said, his body shook, but he maintained his posture. "Child of snow, daughter of Livia, treasure of Orph."“What the...” Sereia mumbled at the chimera’s words.“What is he saying...?” Samuel looked on in astonishment.The light in Mon’Ter’s magenta eye grew in luminosity, as did the volume of the voice in his head, one of which he repeated word for word."Through the Guide of Spirits’ authority, I invoke thy purity," Mon'Ter's voice sounded monotone, his eyes softly closing as the murky tears of the spirit girl cleared to c
After a solid rest at the exit of the tunnel, the party began their trek through the snowy wasteland anew. Only this time, like through the tunnel, it had been filled to the brim with darkness, imperceptible to the normal eye. Here and there stood some small pockets of light, generated by the shining crystals that popped out of the ground, however, those tended to generate some minor threats to the party. Quite a few creatures basked in the light of these crystals, so it was safe to assume them as breeding grounds for the various species living down on the second floor. To these crystal formations, the party gave a wide curve every time, wary about the type of beasts which may emerge from these strange places.The endless wastes of snow may seem all too intimidating on the outside, however, they were not any more dangerous than the hallway which the party walked through earlier. As a result, not much happened for a long while after that. Mon'Ter and Lanos paved the way forwar
Mon'Ter ran up the stairs of the temple, passing by the enormous torches on each side and reaching the peak moments after. The five pillars holding the ceiling together were even more complexly drawn than first anticipated, with runes and glyphs etched into each corner. He stopped in front of a coffin-like structure; it stood upright and seemed like a stone door of sorts in this weird arrangement. The coffin towered over him at least twice over, and on it was a drawn shape of an upside down five-point star."This should be where we'd find the guardian," he mumbled whilst looking around.The rest of his group soon made their way up, torches still in hand, as the upper level was a tad dark. Still illuminated by the lower light, but more so a tinge rather than a proper light up."Hey, Mon'Ter!" Elyenora shouted his way. "How is it looking up here?""It seems safe enough," Mon'Ter replied with a wave. "Come check this out!"“Whoa! What’s th
"A Hydra?!" Sereia bellowed, slowly scurrying away from the coffin-like structure. "Oh, I'm not moving anywhere close to that thing!" "Oh, you mean those super dragon-like things we hear about in the legends?!" Namir hopped up and down on his toes. "Man! I so wanna duke it out with a legendary beast! Blow up its head and turn up the heat with some blaze!" "No, you can't do that," Lanos said, "and I'm immensely glad you didn't go in, Namir." "Eh? Why?" the child asked, his excitement waning a little. "I know now why I hear most people don't make it past the second floor guardian..." Samuel frowned. "Hydras' are practically immune to magic based attacks." "Ooohh!" Namir wowed, then huddled down. "Oooh.... Oh, I almost died, didn’t I? ...Huh?" "Yeah," Lanos affirmed, "almost." "So, who is going?" Sereia quizzed, with her hands crossed. "Me definitely no, no. I do fight primarily with the sword, but... Yeah... I'm not fighting a bl
Mon'Ter found himself within an expansive jungle, with plants dozing here and there. At the end of a wide path, filled with sunbeams reaching up to the canopy lit by the many stars in the sky, sat a gigantic structure.But Mon'Ter couldn't tell if it was a building or not. He could not walk up to see it clearly. It appeared as a black dome, shaped similar to a sphere. Invisible in the darkness, it excluded the surface, towering above everything.It was huge, very tall. Very wide.This sphere-shaped structure, Mon'Ter saw, was black like coal. It looked almost as if made of diamond like dark gems, with similar properties at the very least. It appeared so smooth, like water would slide off it instead of sticking to it. His eyes weren't able to distinguish its edges. There was nothing behind it, he could see that much. The dome was perfectly round.'Wasn't I supposed to be fighting that Hydra thing,' Mon'Ter wondered as he walked towards the dome, unsure of
Just as Mon’Ter was busy rotting on the inside, Samuel and Sereia were finally able to get back on their feet. Samuel could now see properly and move around, and Sereia had drunk a high grade healing potion that brought her back up to speed. “Agh… My back was killing me there…” Sereia said as she stretched, trying to get herself back into shape. “Do I even need to mention my head…?” Samuel held it, he still felt like it would start spinning again but thankfully it was over. “We really need to go and help Mon’Ter out,” Sereia mumbled out loud. “It seems like he got two of them but he’s facing that guy that my dad said was the best assassin in the world…” Still, they were a bit far away from the chimera and couldn’t assist him right away, especially since Mon’Ter’s fear came true. “It seems like we have our own troubles to deal with first…” Samuel pointed out as he gazed at the sky above them. “Huh? That guy again?” Sereia said in annoya
As Mon’Ter stood in a confrontation between himself and the three assassins, Sereia and Samuel did their best to catch their bearings and get to assisting him rather than being a burden for him. Thankfully, Samuel had some recovery potions on him, but due to his issue with coordination caused by Hendrick’s eye ability, he couldn’t move his arms in the right direction much less find where he’d stored the bottles.And as for Sereia, she actually did try to get to Samuel and find the potions for him, but, given how wounded her back really was she was having some difficulty pushing herself to stand back up and move towards his bag. Of course, this would only take her seconds to do in real time, maybe ten or twenty, but in the moments of combat those seconds would be more than enough for her and him to lose their lives at once many times over.They were dealing with assassins after all, and while these assassins were definitely slowed down from the g
Just as Elyenora was dealing with Alinesia with the help of Randus’ Gravity Zone spell, so were Sereia and Samuel working on using the spell to their advantage too. Seeing as they were able to outmaneuver their respective match ups and bring down two specters, they had now managed to get away from the other two old men who’d targeted them and made their way towards where Mon’Ter was being held down by Alinesia’s parents.That, of course, didn’t take long at all with the help of Samuel’s teleportation magic.Sereia quickly landed right over the female assassin with super long nails, Allison, while Samuel waltzed right into her husband, Hendrick, and swung straight at his arms that were holding Mon’Ter’s head up close to his eye level.On Sereia’s end, things were quickly and easily dispatched. Having had the jump on the opponent she was able to instantly get Allison to dodge her first blow and leave Mon’
With Alinesia’s light blinding everyone, Randus was able to easily move about by practicing a simple spell to allow his eyes to perceive past the blinding shine of her. He had basically created pseudo shades on his face which he used to escape from Lerroy’s immediate reach.During the course of the battle so far, the two of them had been flying high up in the air and blasting each other with all manner of magical spells, it had gotten to the point that most of the soldiers down below were getting nervous just by standing underneath them. However, Randus hadn’t just been mindlessly flying about and chucking explosions at his old master, no, of course not, he wouldn’t be where he is at today if he did something so basic.The whole time they were moving around the air space, Randus had been leaving small sigils in specific locations high above the ground and laying out a layer filled circle of magic large enough to encompass most of the existing su
Alinesia had completed her transformation, however, she wasn’t the only one making moves during that last minute of action. There were still many people on the battlefield, and the ones who made the biggest change aside from her, were definitely Randus, Samuel and Sereia who all made good use of the previous minute or so of time.On their side of the field, just as Elyenora and Alinesia were having their clash of wills, Samuel and Sereia both found themselves pushing against their respective spectral opponents. It had gotten to the point where they were chasing after these Low ranking Arch Lord Class entities as if they were hunting rabbits.It was at this time that both Gandar, the court mage of the Royal palace and the elderly master of the assassin’s guild intervened on their little chase. Gandar shot through the sky atop a conjuration of wind and flew near enough to be within his range of Samuel, he weaved his staff and made a spiraling motion with it b
Back to the princess’ side of the field, where she was facing off against a previous foe. Elyenora could feel that things weren’t going her way at all, she knew it in her heart with every strike she sent towards Alinesia and every second she wasted on fighting against her. But what could she do while everyone was being held back like this? There was one and only thing she could really do to try and help out.Ending the fight swiftly.Alinesia had certainly grown significantly since their last fight, she was more than the princess’ match even after Elyenora had gotten her significant growth spurt after releasing the spiritual cultivation shard from her body. However, it didn’t seem like the Lioness would be able to keep up with Elyenora if she just made a simple action and unleashed her newly acquired artifacts.“I’m sorry, but I’ll be ending our little rematch early,” the princess said as she pushed back on the fla
Cazimir fell, cut in half and in a completely stupefied state. Someone meant to have been on his side, an ally, had just taken him down. His bloodied eyes shone with a bright light and created shadow soldiers that tried to hold him back together, barely, even as his own blood and organs left his body to splatter down on the ground. “W–wh–y…?” Cazimir asked as only one of his eyes barely managed to move and look at Finn. “Because you interfered where it was not your place, stupid assassin,” Finn said, his eyes wider than an open door and staring the vampire down with intense pressure behind his every word. “Couldn’t you follow simple instructions? I told you. Don’t interfere with my fight. Leonidas is mine to do battle with.” “Bast–ard…” Cazimir barely mumbled out, and with another glow of his eyes he forced the soldiers to move him about ten meters away from the now enemy. With yet another glow, he summoned out a potion that fell from a litt
Alinesia glared at Elyenora with her fiery blade burning at her side. “It’s sure been a while, hasn’t it?”“You again?!” Elyenora clicked her tongue, she had been forced to stop right in her tracks by her once again, for the second time. “Why are you here!?”“Why?” Alinesia grit her teeth. “Did you seriously ask me why, you blond bimbo?!”“What?” The princess felt a little taken aback by the assassin’s words. “Don’t you understand what you’re working towards right now? Do you even know what my brother is trying to do!? It’s all foolish! Why would you work for him? You’re smarter than that!” Elyenora tried to change her mind if she could, though, it didn’t seem like Alinesia was here for money or anything of the sort by the look on her face.“You think I’m here just because that prince twat brother of yours asked t
“We kill all of them to get to him,” Mon’Ter’s voice reverberated throughout the entire space, being heard by everyone that surrounder him and his comrades.It caused several laughs to erupt, which then continued into multiple more and more until the entire enemy legion made a laughing stock out of Mon’Ter’s words.“Bold words from someone bound to die,” Gandar, the royal court mage, snickered at his words. “Who even are you, boy? Another knight? Not with that get up you’re not. Perhaps a mage? Shall I teach you some proper manners in speech?”“I’d actually like that,” Mon’Ter said truthfully. “But it’s not the time to be learning manners.”His hand extended and his fingers grew as his nails elongated into sharp swords capable of piercing the thickest of hides and slashing the hardest of steels. The strange development caused many to put their guard