With their resolve steeled once more and together with the rest of their squad, the fourteen paladins rode through the sky on their trusty pegasus, straight into the jaws of the raging beast before them. Their final destination was obviously the afterlife, their souls plucked away from the cycle to spend the rest of eternity in the small heaven of their patron god. Each and every paladin in their squad was just as devout as the twins, following them to certain death without even blinking, all in the name of one last service, before being rewarded for their loyality.
The group of pegasus knights ignored the enourmous dragon that was rampaging through the berserking wariors of their nation, their eyes dead set on the obvious master of the horde. They had little hope of winning, if any. No, their greatest hope was to die a glorious death in the face of unstopable force and what better target than the most likely SSS class entity that was clearly on a path of Echlisiarchies destruction. There was simply no better story to tell of their final act of service.
The group took on a wedge formation as they closed in of their human enemy, their lances lowered in an atempt to skewer their target in the charge. An action made much harder due to the constant incredibly fast movements said target was performing, moving from one position to another, slaying multiple men with each reposition. They did however find the perfect opportunity to 'connect' with their charge, only to be met with a resistance beyond reason, as their pegasus got stuck in place, mere meters away from Rex.
"Just look what the cat draged here. An extra offering?" Rex chucked as he glanced towards the oddlly unmoving group of knights, their mounts stuck in place for some reason. Rex of course knew why. He was the reason after all. It was a simple deal for him to freeze the blood in their weins just enough to technically stop them in place, reinforced with the thick mana layering he had deployed for quite some time. Sorianna and her squad sensed nothing due to the natural thinning of his aura the further out it went, as well as the numerous constructs that were around, explaining the thickening of the natural mana density in the surroundings.
A small frown adorned Soriannas face, not geing recognized as a warrior, but the frown quickly dissapeared, her being aware that it did not matter, her death would follow sooon regardless. With their mounts unwilling, or unable to move, she quickly moved towards the next best option, forsaking the heavy lance in her hand, for the much more wieldy sword and shield combo as she jumped of her horse and charged at Rex, her remaining group following soon after. their charge was swift and precise, with Sorianna reaching Rex first and delivering a well executed swing in a dionagal fashion, aimed from his left shoulder to reach his right hip, cutting through most of his torso.
Her eyes did widen quite a lot when her blade was not blocked with his own, nor was the strike dodged, as she would have expected, though maybee she should have been ready for such a result. The enemy simply caught her blade with a single empty hand, clearly indicating the absolute difference in the two sides power level, as well as his sheer confidence in his ability to overwhelm her. Still, that did not deter her one bit, as the next second she flared her own mana, raising her strenght a notable margin higher and tried to pull the blade back as she atempted to start a spining slash to gain even more momentum for the folowing strike.
What followed was a slightly comical slip of her body as the blade did not move one bit from the steely grip of her oponents hand and thus, the momentum her body had achieved with the initiated spin had nowhere to go due to her refusal to let the weapon go, in result causing her upper body to halt while her legs followed the started motion, causing her to go airborne for just a moment and then, with the suddenly released blade no longer being attached to anything, she ungracefully landed on her but, causing not only hers, but the now charging members of her groups eyes to grow wide in the embarasment of the situation. The comander had just been manhandled like some child and worse still was the fact their oponent had not capitalised on the insane opportunity the blunder had provided for him. Luckaly for her, the suprise and second hand embarasment her squad felt had not stopped their charge to join her innitiative.
The next development though was recieved with an entirely different reaction, as her charging squad suddenly collapsed to their knees, as if pressed into the ground by an invisible, but irresistable force. Heavy groans left her subordinates mouths as their muscles bulged to their limits, flared with mana to their full capacity and even beyond, but no matter the effort, they could not even lift their their heads, let alone their armor clad bodies, as a shiver, colder than aything she had ever felt, ran down her spine. It was not the fear of death that she felt just that moment. No, she had a much more dreadfull though that flashed in her mind with the display of the overwhelming supression of her squad.
"Ahh, the infamous Holy Blade of NAMON and her squad of pegasus riders. How sweet of you to offer yourself and your squad on a silver platter like this." The man spoke, a slight chuckle escaping his lips.
"Have you come to recieve your glorious death, to join your god's side? has qour squad come to do the same?" he asked with a slight mocking tone, then his light chuckle turned into a full blown laughter.
"That would be such a waste." he spoke amidst his laughter, his tone still light with the same slight sarcastic undertone, though the next sentence was filled with malice and mocking that made her entire group feel true dread deep in their hearts.
"Dont you think so too, sweetie?"
"A group of innitial SS class entities should not be wasted like that." With the cheerfull and sarcastic tone their enemy spoke once again.
"No, I think not. And besides, death right now would be a reward, not punishement that you deserve. No, no no no, I have a much better plan, yes I do." He held a momentary pause for a dramatic moment, before going on with his evil boss mini speech. Any nerd has thought of such a thing at least once and Rex reasoned that this was the moment he could afford to check that one off his bucket list.
"I think, that a proper branding would be, oh, so much better. And then, as the blades that you have deemed yourselves, you will fullfill the last mission in that state of being, though now in my hand."
"NEVER! WE WILL NOT BEND TO YOUR SICK WILL!" she shouted from her sitting position, a strained groan of agreement echoing from her collapsed men.
"A blade does not choose the hand that wields it. You dont have a voice in this." Rex smirked as one of his hands gripped the back side of her armors by her neck, the other doing the same on the front side, followed by a creaking of metal, as her breastplate was torn open, revealing her form fitting undersuit. With free access to her torso and neck, one of Rex hands then rather tightly captured her neck, his magic flaring with overwhelming intensity, as a pained scream escaped Sorianna.
"No, no, no, no, no." slight whimpers escaped her mouth as she had collapsed after the brand was placed. Then, a desperate wail followed.
"NOOOO!!!"
Tears streamed down her face as the reality settled down on her. She was denied the one thing she had worked her whole life for, the one reason that made all those repugnant actions she and her squad had done bearable. She understood well and trully, she could never be by the side of her god. She was branded, claimed by the archon before her, denied for all eternity from her Gods side. Yes, that realization struck her hard, much harder than the understanding that the monstrous fighter Neo, who was believed to be the reason for this attack, was also the unreasonably powerfull blood mage Rex, that Echlisiarchy had been building more plans to get their hands on. No, that realization and the ridiculuousness of the situation struck her already shocked form a while later.
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Rex did not waste his time however, effortlessly branding the rest of the pegasus riders, including her brother, though he did not even tear their armor to achieve this. No, they additional shock was delivered with breaking the unbending form of their comander, leaving them much easier to brand in their shocked states. The despair on their comanders face and her wails were more than enough for Rex needs. He so disliked wasting energy on little games he did not have to.
With the squad branded and Soriana still in her daze, struck by one heavy realisation after another, Rex switched his attention the the rest of the berserkering horde of the enemy, now mostly slain by his colossus eastern dragon as well as the rest of his force. Though he noted that quite a lot of his constructs had been torn down as well, so, as the nice enemy he was, Rex quickly activated his magic once again, trying to right that particular wrong as soon as possible. They could not have too few constructs for the enemy to kill, after all. No, Rex's consciousness did not allow for such a thing, no sir, it did not. And so, the good samaritan that he was, under the influence of his mana, many blood red circles appeared, sucking up the rivers of blood that were once again forming in the body filled battlefield and just moments later more and more blood constructs emerged from aforementioned circles, quickly replenishing his numbers. Echlisiarchy however, did not have such convinient methods, what with them not being proper blood or soul mages as well as the fact that Rex was employing constructs as his own army, seriously limiting the ability to repurpose the quickly disipating remains of the fallen ones.
With the quickly replenishing numbers on his side, as well as the enourmous collossus on his side, the speed at which his forces advanced suddenly rose notably, giving him more and more energy and status growth, no matter how small per instance, as, at the far end of the corpse field, his ravens were working overtime to drain the bodies left behind, refilling his energy reserves and cleaning out the corpses. There was no way Rex would leave such an enourmous biohazard behind for the Svergi to deal with. These would become their lands after all.
With the last ditch effort of Echlisiarchy taken care of and the presence of his collossus, Rex no longer had to be on the very front lines, allowing him to sit back in the palaquin on his carrier construct and focus on controlling his construct army a bit more. the pegasus riders, Soriana excluded, had been ordered to keep to the skies and take out any points of resistance that managed to notably slow down the advance of his constructs. And with a bit more leasure at his hands, Rex decided to unite a few of the tasks he had to deal with due to his absence from home for a few days.
With Soriana sitting at the side, still shocked and listless to her surroundings, Rex opened a gate to Elysion, and moments later through came his readheaded Veran Seriss, his 'fallen angel' Eira and Vivian, all three women beaming with joy and unhidden desire in their eyes.
"The more focus intense part of this cleansing is done, allowing me to focus on other important tasks." Rex smiled at the trio as he spoke, leaning bakc into the rather comfortable sofa, spearding his legs apart and patting with both hands on the sofa by his sides. Eira, being the thirstiest of them all, nearly dived forward, sliding between his legs as her wings fluttered with happiness, causing the other two to pout for a moment and then take a position on either of his sides, leaning into Rex, his arms enveloped in their magificent busts, as Eira pulled at his pants and dived in. Rex could enjoy the last leg of his conquest after all.
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"Fuck, FUCK, FUCK, FUCK!" raged one of the councilmen sitting at the table in Rahen's main castle.
"How is this even possible?" cursed another one, having witnessed yet another failiure of their side to stem the advance of the enemy forces.
"Huffff." Heavy exhale escaped the lips of lord Bairon, as he adressed the advisors and mages by the tables side. "Do we have any other last measures that could possibly solve the conundrum before us?"
A heavy silence hung in the air, the sorcerors going over any and all fringe knowledge of less than questionable methods in thier arsenal, but in the end they all came up short. What could even hope to stall, let alone take down a goddamn SSS class entity? They were the pinacle existances, demigods in all but name. It was clear that eventually their enemy would conquer one of the deep floored dungeons and claim the spark that was contained within its core, begining his ascent into godhood, eventually joining the rest of the gods on a throne of his own, leaving behind a legends for millenia to come. And they, they would be just a footnote in his legend. One of the first of many of his unreasonable achievements on his path to his rightfull place.
"Hufff" another heavy sigh escaped from the most respected and feared mans lips in the room, "I suppose you can all scurry away now, indulge in whatever fetishes you have. I doubt any of us here will have the luxury of escaping whatever is coming for us."
'Indeed, I would go so far as to advice you to end your lives before HE reaches the city.' He thought in his head, but not spoke out loudly, clearly aware of more than the rest here, but still keeping it to himself. He reasoned it was a just punishement for their failiure as the council to asess the thearts and deal with them apropriatly.
"The councill is hereby dismissed." He spoke one last time as he rose from his seat and slowly left the room, having come to terms with both his and his nations absolute fall.
The rest of the councilmembers did not seeit that way. Be it their arrogance or the corruption from their detestable hobbies, they still had a glint in their eyes, a few sinister plots trying to actualize in their rotten minds.
"What if we surendered? Place a few pupets in our place, sacrifice them and then when a new leadership is installed under the coman of the dman forsaken, we come out of the hiding and controll the country from the shadows. There is no way a purge like in the counties could be actualized here. There can't be anyone as shortsighted as that, can there?" one of the remaining councilors questioned.
"Of course not. The amount of wealth our capitals and Rahen combined provides over a year is too large for any man to ignore. yes, lest do just that. We need to quickly find a few fools to use as the replacement. What of lord councilman Bairon?" questioned another.
"Heh, if he so wishes to fall, who are we to object?" smirked another one. Why would they not remove the one absolute pillar of authority from the councill if they themselves were not said pillar.
They quickly came to an agreement and set out to find their puppet replacement and prepeare what they could for the coming 'change of leadership'.
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The next couple of days Rex spent leisurly anihilating the remaining forces defending Rahen, though he had noticed that some of the parts of the army had silently retreated during the chaos. He noted tha tit was no more than a few hundred soldiers at a time, those fleeing in panic not including. No, those retreats were organized and planned, slightly peaking his curiosity, so a raven or two were asigned to spy on said units. None of the three ladies who had arived a few day ago was willing to return, with a few others coming and going every now and then. They all had their needs, and Rex, being the hard working and loyal man he was tended to them all, not neglecting his current task either.
Seriana was also lucid now, having been jolted out of her listless state by a small soul pain just a few hours ago. A heavy blush, as well as a frown adorning her face. She was now dressed in a rather revealing low cut dress, displaying a large cleavage cut in the dress from neck to navel, providing an exotic view at her voluptious bust while still being acceptabe wear in public. Her toned legs also were on display, the large cut in the dress side making sure of that.
Rex saw her brooding expression, cleary due to his relaxed nature even as his constructs culled people by the hundreds every passing minute. And the blush obviously due to the sexual nature of the acts Rex had been performing with his women.
"Ow, stop your brooding Seriana. Soon enough you will be on your knees and pleasing me just like the girls you saw before. Why do you think I have you watch and learn?" he smirked and spoke, causing even larger furrowing of her brows.
"You did not think I would stop with only denying you the chance to be by the the side of your lord, did you? Ha ha ha ha. By the way, it seems your council has the foolish asumption I am not going to purge your sicophantic nation. Funny isnt it? They are still desperately clinging to whatever delusions they can come up with just to not admit their failiure and inevitable end."