The crossbows numbered over one hundred as two hundred guards pointed their weapons at Rune. Rouna was right behind him and Rena was up at the beginning of the staircase. Rune could see ten people in front of him wearing black robes with red, blue, green, and white outlines and designs covering their robes.

They were likely the ten priests who two of which carried keys to go to the fifth floor. They stood in front of Rune with two metal squares with square holes in them and a chain connecting the two.

They approached Rune with evil smiles on their faces and spoke to him.

“Put up your hands, prisoner!”

Rune moved his hands upwards from his sides so quickly that he broke the sound barrier and everyone flew back and Rena and Rouna braced for impact against a wall. Weapons flew everywhere as the air pressure blew them away.

Then, using [Gravity Control], Rune quickly moved the weapons into the air and and he pointed it all down upon the guards and the priests. When they finally realized what was going on, they started to back up and try to escape.

However, Rune kept them from moving by creating a barrier of weapons in the ground around them. He swiftly strode up to the man holding the square objects and grabbed him by the collar after yanking the object out of his hands and throwing it onto aspear. He glared into the man’s eyes as the priest started to try and punch Rune with weak fists.

“Where is your god?!”

Rune declared with enough bloodlust that the man he was holding and several around them fainted and started to foam at the mouth. Rune dropped the man on the ground where he sprawled on the cold stone floor.

Rune used gravity magic to bring a spear from the ground around them and it flew into his hands. Gravity magic was a type of magic that could be used to change the direction of gravity on an object or increase or decrease the gravity affecting an object. One type of magic that stemmed from [Gravity Control] was [Telekinesis]. While both could move objects about, the former could move much heavier weights and do many things to gravity affecting an object.

People started to scoot back against the wall of spears and Rena and Rouna started to interrogate the guards as well. Rune looked to his left, then his right and picked up a man by his scruff and asked him.

“Where is your god?!”

“I-I, do you want to know when he comes here or where he is now?!??”

“...Yes.”

“I, uh, wait. Does that mean you want both answers?”

Rune shook him a bit and he let loose an extremely shrill cry and became embarrassed. Several people around them looked bewildered as he did so and he started to sniffle like he was sad.

“I, if you destroy his shrine, he is bound to come now. Please, let me live. I have a cute newly born daughter!! I can help you! He has the keys!!”

The priest he was holding pointed at a man near him who started to bawl on the spot as soon as he realized Rune was going to “talk” to him next. He shook even more violently when the man Rune placed on the ground started to weep with his hands covering his face. Obviously, it was from shame, but the man who was being picked up by Rune now thought that the other guy was traumatized.

Rune dragged the third priest up to his feet and held out his hand. The priest was still crying and Rune gripped his shoulder and started to electrify it. This stopped him from crying as he shouted in pain.

“Hand over the key.”

“Of course.”

He quickly fished out a key from his pocket and handed it over to Rune. Rune dropped him and reached out his hand towards the wall of spears and they broke in half as if they were toothpicks. Rune stepped over them and could see a wide staircase leading downwards to a tall door. He saw a small key slot for the key and multiple metal mechanisms on the door.

He plugged the key in and turned it and the mechanisms turned with gears and the door slowly opened outwards. It led to a wide room with ten doors and a tall table with ten tall seats around it. They were at least twelve feet high and, under the table, there was a pentagram with five different symbols at each point of the star.

Rune stepped into the room and, immediately, he heard a blaring noise and blue and green flashes on the ceiling. Rune looked back up the stairs to see Rena and Rouna dragging the priests in chains. He wasn’t sure what happened to the guards, but he expected that they were restrained as well.

The priests could still walked and fumbled to move down the stairs. Rune walked up to them as they moved into the room.

“What is with those flashes of light?”

“T-those are the alarms we had to detect intruders in case they came into the fourth floor. Um, if you set me free, I can turn it off for you.”

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‘No, I will.”

“Nay! I say-”

“Be quiet. Go undo it with the chains on.”

Eight priests moved towards the table while two of them were unconscious and were being dragged along the ground. Every time they passed over an item or object, they hit their heads and bruised their bodies.

Two of the Priests started to work on things underneath the table with the table legs. The alarms stopped ringing and the flashes stopped. Then, ten trap doors opened on the ceilings and ten things blurred and hit the ground.

Rune pulled out his scythe as it was now useless to try and by sneaky. His scythe still blew up when it interacted with blood and could now, instead of exploding it, incinerate blood into ashes instead of exploding it.

The ten things that came down from the trap doors were black lizard-like beings that were as big as a person. They had two curved horns on each of their heads and their tails whipped around the floor.

Under the table, the priests huddled together and were smiling as soon as they had opened the doors. They had even dragged the two unconscious priests under the table. They started to cast magic and a barrier appeared around them that was a yellow color.

The lizard creatures moved into U formation and encircled Rune, Rena, and Rouna. Every time they breathed, a cloud of black smoke emerged from their nostrils and mouths. Rouna stepped back and spoke to the other two.

“They are Black Drakes They have to same abilities as Black Dragons, but don’t have wings and are usually lesser beings. However, these ones feel more powerful than me.”

Rune stretched his arms and cracked his neck. He turned his head to the closest Drake and slowly and nonchalantly walked towards it. It reacted by snarling and breathing a breath of acid at him.

Rune barely dodged as it was fast. It seemed that it was much stronger than the Hierarch Dragons he faced before.

In the Hierarch Dragon system, there were five different Dragons. They were ranked from weakest to strongest in the system of five. So far, he had only encountered the two weakest, ranks 4 and 5,  and the Black Drakes in front of him contained the power of a rank 3 from the Black Hierarch Dragon. However, it was unknown to Rouna and Rune about this system of five and they had no idea that there were different strengths for them.

The bottom of his shoe was smoking as he hadn’t evaded it completely and he got up with a partially broken shoe. Then he twirled his scythe in one hand and pulled out a sub-machine gun from his storage.

He moved back and fired into the crowd of ten drakes and they tried to block it with their paws and tails. However, the bullets used a homing enchantment and landed in their eyes and mouths.

Three of them pounced in his area and Rena and Rouna moved back to the door. Rune jumped above them and spun his scythe around. He only managed to grave one’s back, but it dripped some blood.

Immediately, the blood started to burn and al the blood touching it started to burn as well. It yelped as it was engulfed in flames with a dark purple color and its blue blood became ashes. One was killed and Rune quickly absorbed it.

The Black Drakes’ attacks seemed to be slower, but they were still fast and he could barely dodge the breath attacks in the air. He twirled around and fired off five shots in a single trigger pull and they each found themselves inside a Drake’s mouth.

So far, only two of them had a bullet in one eye each and five were bleeding from their mouths. Rune landed on the floor and threw his scythe at one Drake. He boosted the speed with his [Gravity Control] and the scythe spun for one rotation before ending up in the tail of one Drake. It started to burn and, when the lower half was already on fire, it exploded into ash and flesh that was littered around the room.

Quickly, while the Drakes were focused on the burning remains around the room, Rune drove his scythe into another Drake, but it evaded. He fired his gun and he also heard a shot behind him. It was Rena who shot a rifle to help him.

They both struck their mark and the Drake was now blind. It tottered to the left and the right, but kept its balance as it stood and sniffed the air. Its eyelids were closed, but blood spewed out of the closed lids and pitter pattered to the floor.

It took a weak step forwards and slipped in a puddle of its own blood, but, instead of feeling pity for the beast, Rune gave it his “mercy” as he decapitated it in a single strike. The body turned to ash as it fell to the ground and he absorbed as much of it as he could as quickly as he could.

Then he turned to the seven remaining and took out his two chain cleavers and threw them at the enemy. One hit its mark as the [Gravity Control] turned to make it aim at the creature. The blade carved up the victim and it was soon halved as both sides fell to the cold ground with the internal organs leaking blood and the lifeless eyes moved no more.

The other blade soon turned to dust as two Drakes breathed their acidic breath in its direction. The six Drakes left started to circle around Rune and he cast a spell six times for each one of the Drakes. It was [Unholy Smite] from his job as a Dark Paladin.

Six huge crosses appeared overhead and they moved downwards towards them and three hit their marks. The crosses crushed their legs and made them immobile. Blood spewed from their wounds and the scythe returned back to Rune’s hand.

He touched the scythe to the blood and it started a trail of fire before engulfing the three Drakes in an inferno. They yelped in pain as the fire entered through their wounds and they were soon burnt to a crisp.

Then, as a Drake tried to help one of its companions, Rune picked it up and drop kicked it into the last chain cleaver flying through the air. It was sliced into thick slices of meat before a pile of meat appeared on the floor.

The last two started to try and move back towards the door where Rena and Rouna were at and tried to make a run for it. While Rune was killing, Rena and Rouna had been setting up traps about the area around the door.

The Drakes’ focus had been on Rune as he had been slaughtering them all. They didn’t notice the traps until it was too late. The one who reached the door first was blinded by a shining light that appeared in front of its face. Then ten spears found their way into its head where it promptly died.

The last Drake saw his companion die and turned around to find that the last thing it would see in its life. A scythe. It embedded itself in its eye and he twisted it so that he destroyed its brain and snapped its neck at the same time.

Then Rune turned to the priests and held out his hand towards their barrier. He used [Dispel Magic] and the barrier dissipated into the air as the faces of the priests went from shock to utter fear.

He walked up to the group and, since they had unchained themselves, put on even stronger chains around each of them. It weighed them down and them each fell to the ground and couldn’t get up. The effects f the chains also made things much worse for them.

Rune looked down on the priests and smiled creepily. Then he spoke to them.

“I don’t appreciate that stunt that you ten have performed…”