Illya stood in a small clearing.

Standing right beside one another, every remaining member was seemingly out in plain view—more than 50 cloaked people stood in the middle of an exposed clearing.

Yet, as another group of soldiers combed through the nearby woods, they walked right past them, completely failing to notice their presence.

What kept them hidden was a large illusion array, one of the most expensive ones money could buy. Even then, while it was a miraculous piece of etherology, it was child’s play to anyone at the third star or above.

Hell, if anyone paid close enough attention, it was apparent enough that the “empty stretch of grass” appeared slightly distorted from the outside.

Needless to say, this hiding tactic wouldn’t keep them hidden for long.

A deep frown hung on her face the whole time. Could it be that Master hadn’t even noticed that something was off?

If so, were they not simply waiting to be discovered and killed?

She knew that their situation was desperate; she had known it from the moment the Avatar of Dominion smashed through the barrier, but waiting for something to go wrong wasn’t how their groups ever operated. There was always a plan B, an alternative move they could make.

And, indeed, they had made plans in case the empress arrived.

But all Master had said about that possibility was that “he would take care of it” if such a situation were to occur.

Not that she was doubting him, of course. And she would never openly say such a thing, gods forbid, but… so much had already gone wrong. She couldn’t stop the paranoia from creeping in.

Suddenly, a massive sound echoed through the whole realm. A shockwave blew through the leaves, lifting the dust and breaking the illusion barrier keeping them hidden.

She cursed. They would have to fight. Just as she was about to make the command, she noticed something strange through the cloud of dust.

Her people were… writhing? Why?

Suddenly, she noticed something else. She felt burning. Intense burning. A fire spread through her body. A strange force was gathering on her forehead, and she raised a gentle finger to touch it. As she did, the abject agony she felt was washed away by relief, and she smiled gently.

“So you did have a plan for us, after all.”

***

Dust hovered in the air.

In a small clearing, not too far from the entrance to the gorel realm, the empress of the American Empire stood with her arms crossed as her avatar pulled its massive fist back.

Her hawk-like eyes scanned the environment, and it wasn’t long until she spotted the shackled man, standing barely a few feet to the side of the impact. He strained his muscles and, with barely any effort, tore the constraints that kept him shackled as if they were made of paper.

“Slippery bastard,” she cursed as she gave a mental command to her avatar.

The Avatar of Dominion swung one fist down, then another, hunting for the tiny target, only to barely lose it every time. She clicked her tongue as she pulled the massive limbs back.

Her muscles suddenly bulged, and with a titanic force, she clapped her hands together. The shockwave instantly cleared the dust, revealing the figure in plain armor.

Just from the looks, it was impossible to tell who this was. He had used no abilities, either. But even then, she didn’t recognize the aura.

Five-stars were few and far between. This was either someone who had remained hidden within the empire or someone from a foreign country.

At any rate, he was an enemy.

“Who are you?” she asked authoritatively.

“Who? Me?” the man said disarmingly, gesturing at himself as if he were no more than a harmless old man. “I’m just a passerby, Your Highness.”

A sudden pulse of essence spread from beneath the empress’s leg, rushing right under the man. In the next moment, spikes of stone burst from the earth, but the armored man leaped up, contorting his body to avoid every sharp edge. But that left him afloat, where another giant fist was flying right at him.

Rather than float helplessly as death rushed at him, a small black tentacle extended from his hand, wrapped around a nearby spike, and pulled him out of the way. This time, however, rather than cleanly dodge the incoming blow, the man found himself standing in the way of the charging empress, who was running at such immense speed that the ground cracked beneath her every step.

“Tectonic Strike,” she whispered as her arm adopted the momentum of a falling mountain.

A dark mass materialized beneath the man’s body, taking the form of a rapidly inflating pillow of black that sent him flying up in the air and out of the way of the strike while the empress smashed her foot down, sending chunks of stone flying into the air, and then punched one of those chunks. The immense force pulverized most of the rock into dust, but small pieces flew up at the floating man at such an immense speed that they simply couldn’t be dodged.

Each packed with more force than a Stone Bullet, they shredded the man’s armor and embedded themselves into the skin beneath, and a moment later, the Avatar of Dominion’s fist caught the man mid-air, sending his form crashing into the ground and sending another cloud of dust flying. Before it pulled its fist back, the avatar jumped, smashing its feet down on where the man had landed.

The subsequent blast made the whole realm shiver with the force, but the empress stood as if glued to the ground beneath her feet.

“That is quite the rude greeting, I say,” a voice echoed from her left, over 40 meters away from the blast.

The man’s armor was mangled quite heavily and filled with holes, with visible streaks of blood serving as evidence of her attacks’ effectiveness. Yet he was bleeding no longer, and despite the decrepit state of the cheap metal armor, there were no signs of visible damage on the body beneath.

The empress scowled at the sight. Her mind rushed with thoughts.

She had faced no small number of bastards like this. He stood confidently—part bravado, part hidden plan, she was sure.

Without knowing what he was planning to do, she had no idea how to prepare. But from experience, she knew that not letting the opponent stall was always a good idea.

With a flick of her wrist, a simple-looking blade appeared in her hand. It was unadorned, with an incredibly simple ergonomic grip, a plain guard, and a straight, pure blade. She flexed her metal affinity, exerting her will upon the blade with Sharpen, tightening its edge so thin it could cut a grain of sand in two. Wind gathered around her back, compressing into a propelling force, while the air before her chest grew thinner, creating both push and drag to move her forward, and her muscles briefly flared, flashing an outline of her body as a streak of lightning seeped into her form.

With an explosive leap, she flashed forward, moving at nearly half the speed of sound. Her blade rushed at the bastard before her, cleaving him in two well before he could muster a defense.

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Before his two pieces could even fly apart, her sight blinked out, replaced with pure darkness.

A curse! she screamed internally. She had run right into it without noticing it. Several barriers of earth appeared before her as she leaped back, creating distance between herself and her opponent. Then, she made a gesture with her free arm.

***

Leona spotted the empress’s sign and immediately rushed in, completely invisible, without a hint of sound coming from her footsteps.

Yet, she rushed with the precision and determination of someone who might be at every disadvantage. No fight between five-stars was won by taking things for granted.

Within a second, she was out of her hiding spot and swinging a dagger to decapitate the target, all five of her stars active as she employed Negative Pressure for maximum effect, but as soon as she stepped within range, the man’s torso also lit up with five stars.

She didn’t hesitate, carrying through with her attack. There was no way the man knew she was there. A moment later, her suspicion was confirmed, sort of. The man’s body was suddenly surrounded by black tentacles, which spread out in every direction, wrapping around everything in the area, including herself.

It was a nonsense attack. Technically, it had landed, and it did interrupt her assault, but she would be free within—

Suddenly, a sinister energy radiated from the man’s form. A ritual circle shone through the armor, inscribed upon the man’s forehead, and an instant later, just as she was about to release herself, a blood-red barrier in the shape of a dome surrounded her and her target, trapping them together.

Leona had no reason to panic. If anything, this led her to believe that the man was using everything he had as a last resort. She wasn’t trapped in here with him.

He was trapped in here with her.

With a flex of muscles, she loosened the grip of the tentacles and slashed them apart with her weapon.

She went invisible again and, a moment later, appeared behind the figure. With dozens of rapid slashes, she cut off both the man’s arms, his head, and chopped his torso and legs into pieces. Then, she kicked the parts as far apart from one another as possible, given that the man’s talent likely had something to do with healing. Her suspicion was on point, as the torso started putting itself together, but she pulled out dozens of special needles and pinned the chunks to the ground, hindering the regeneration, crippling the essence flow, and keeping it restrained.

It was only then that she noticed something odd.

If the body and head were separated, the soul always remained attached to the head—not the body. Even if the man was immortal… why was the torso healing by itself—while the head was completely unaffected?

“Your Highness!” she exclaimed. “There is something off!”

The empress blinked. The haze of the Curse of Blindness finally vanished from her eyes, and she looked forward, noticing the red barrier.

She scowled as soon as she saw it. The Avatar of Dominion moved, burying its fingers around the barrier as it pulled up. The barrier didn’t budge. Her avatar punched the barrier, but the impact didn’t even make it flare, let alone crack.

Leona tried using her talent—Phase Shift—but as she already knew, it was useless against energy barriers. It wouldn’t let her through—not without vaporizing her body first.

Both the empress and Leona knew that something was horribly wrong. This was no ordinary barrier. It appeared to be the same type of barrier as the one that blocked the passages, but it was different not only in color, but this one was clearly far superior.

Leona peeled the mangled helmet pieces off of the disembodied head. What she found beneath was bizarre.

A grinning man with a burned-out ritual circle inscribed upon his forehead, the light gone from his eyes. The face belonged to nobody she recognized.

She thought she could feel scattered hints of soul aura flickering through the decapitated head. Whoever this was, they had used a spirit ability. Not just any ability, either—they had sacrificed their own life to create the barrier that was keeping her trapped.

Suddenly, something in the air changed. It was hard to tell at first. The strange aura of bloodthirst still coated the entire realm, and the empress’s presence was so overwhelming that it made it hard for other auras to peer through.

But this was different.

It was loud.

Overbearing

Authoritative.

The two women turned to the nearby forest. The sounds of fighting echoed from within. And there, from the darkness, a figure emerged.

Leona’s eyes widened slightly once she saw the man’s face. “No…” she whispered, feeling a pang of anxiety for the first time in a long, long while.

It was a gaunt, skinny man with a tall hairline. He was missing an arm and a finger on the arm he still had. He raised his open palm.

A second later, the squirming torso on the floor beside her stopped regenerating and an organ floated out from it. It was a heart that looked to have been cast in metal. A metal that strongly resembled silver.

The next moment, the heart flew through the barrier as if it wasn’t even there, reaching the man on the other end within less than a second. It sank into his torso.

Instantly, his decrepit form started to change. His deflated muscles bulged, his hairline moved down slightly, the overall sickly shade of his body disappeared, replaced by a healthy hue, and even his missing finger regrew—but his arm didn’t.

The man took a deep breath and smiled at them. Gone was the timid form of a skinny man. In his place stood a muscular beast, his eyes predatory and his smile wicked.

A second later, the aura they had been sensing appeared behind him.

A massive, nearly three-meter-tall eidolon strode with a royal step, moving with the pride and authority of a king.

Leona gritted her teeth as she realized what was happening.

The empress’s posture shifted as she balled her fists. “You goddamned psychopath…!” she spat through gritted teeth as her face morphed into the picture of fury. “How the hell are you still alive!?”

***

Jacob stood frozen, eyes wide open and sweat dripping down his body.

A soldier to his side dished out commends. “Cover the flanks! Three men to the—ack!” the soldier spluttered as a bulging cloaked figure grabbed his throat and snapped it like a twig.

The terrorists were back. Their heads were lit up with ritual circles, and their bodies inflated, burning with the fire of their stars burning to a crisp as they extracted every shred of power they could.

Karen moved with absolute determination and supernatural swiftness, unerring with her swings as she carved the restraints off anyone still tied up.

Even Phillip, despite the visible dread on his face, took his shield from his storage ring and raised it, eyes shifting for anyone to defend.

Meanwhile, Jacob stood frozen, completely unable to move.

His knees quivered, and he balled a fist, punching himself in the thigh as he tried pushing himself to move, but he could barely budge.

The soldiers were getting torn to pieces.

He saw the scorpion-tailed woman appear from behind a tree. Briefly, his mind flashed with the “plans and predictions” they had strategized beforehand. Those pitiful ideas came crumbling in a second.

The woman’s form pulsated as her tail grew three times its size.

Despite her intimidating presence, Karen lunged at her, raising her sword high as she prepared to fight. The scorpion tail flashed with such horrifying speed that Jacob would have missed it if he could blink.

One moment, Karen was bravely charging at her opponent.

The next, she had been impaled through her chest. She spat blood as she tried resisting one final time, but the next moment, her body was flooded with venom, and her flesh was rotting apart.

He saw Jack go briefly invisible as he scored a swing, cutting a terrorist’s head off. In the next moment, a massive fist was rushing straight at his face, but Jean appeared to parry it.

Jean negated the blow, but the massive man didn’t even stumble as he threw a second punch. The woman’s body was broken in two as she failed to dodge.

Jack screamed, but his face was grabbed with supernatural speed, and his head, just the way Rachel’s had been, was smashed into the nearby tree. Once. Twice. Thrice. Then over and over and over until there was nothing but a bloody pulp left.

Briefly, Jacob spotted Theodore. He met the man’s gaze for a brief moment. The next second, Theodore picked Beatrice up and went invisible, vanishing into nothing as he made his escape.

With a trembling step, Jacob turned around and did the same thing. He ran for his life.

One shockwave after another washed over the battlefield, raising plumes of dust and deafening him. He didn’t hesitate. He didn’t turn back.

Briefly, he ran past that man—Liam—and saw him staring at another bulging figure. It was that woman he had been with. He didn’t have the time to ponder that scenario.

He simply continued running.

***

Freddy watched Sophia’s body inflate slowly as the constraints around her wrists snapped. She screamed, shouting in agony as she resisted whatever was happening to her. He watched a life spark flash in her body as it burned. It did nothing. But then a second lit up. And a third. And a fourth. And finally, a fifth. With that, she stopped inflating, and the circle on her forehead finally shattered, losing its sinister glow. It left a deep, black mark.

“Holy shit!” she screamed. “What the hell was that!?” In the next moment, an arrow embedded itself into her stomach.

Freddy turned with horror to face the soldier who had fired the arrow.

The soldier looked panicked as he turned around and shouted. “Two on the flank!”