Shackled against his will, Xeril was detained with numerous chains holding him back. Even worse was that he was stuffed inside a cage small enough to barely give him enough room to sit in. This particular cage was currently placed by Bargom’s side. As a valuable hostage, Bargom made sure to keep an eye on him. They were the situation in a temporary camp that Bargom had taken on for himself.

It had previously been a guard station. As it was filled with weaponry and rations, this made for an ideal place to settle down for the time being. Bargom took out some meat from his plate and consumed it whole. The origin of this meat was unknown but fortunately, it seemed to be larger than what a human could create. Turning his gaze towards Xeril, he finally reached his hand out.

“Want some?” Bargom said with a grin. He tried to shove it down Xeril’s mouth but he refused. Despite suffering for the past day, his will didn’t break.

Xeril turned his head, trying to pry his head away from eating this meat. After positioning his head well enough, he bashed his head towards Bargom’s hand. Unfortunately, he was far too weak to do any reasonable damage. Xeril merely bruised his forehead.

“Eat. A hostage needs to be alive after all.”

Xeril cannot stomach it. His gaze wandered to the side where countless humans were piled on top of each other. Bargom had specifically chosen to pile up countless people to give as a present. It was a small gift that spoke volumes of his inner feelings.

Resisting to the bitter end, Xeril bit his lips closed, refusing to take part in this. It was to the point that his lips started to bleed from the force he was exerting.

Bargom pushed a bit more but eventually grew bored. He had already managed to do what he needed to do. Staring at the small sigil on Xeril’s neck, it was infused with a magical power with one simple condition to activate.

If Bargom dies, then the sigil will activate, taking Xeril’s life as well. But if Xeril died then it wouldn’t affect Bargom at all, a one-sided effect. With the power difference between them, it only served as a safety net in case the deal broke through. With this measure in place, Bargom was much more lax in his approach.

A messenger systematically knocked on the door to Bargom’s quarters. He was let in and started to report on the current situation.

“Lord Bargom, Weston has not responded yet. He still seems to be preoccupied with the Great Dragon of Moonlight’s constant barrage. Even the front lines have started growing weaker from the ever-increasing power of the beasts.”

“Hear that, Xeril? They already forgot about you.” Bargom snickered on the outside but internally, he was slightly agitated. If Weston didn’t value Xeril enough then there was no point in going through all of this. It would've been such a waste of time.

Xeril didn’t respond, merely keeping his silence. He was helpless to do anything.

“Even more news, it seems like the fiery monster has claimed another leader of the Monster Faction.”

Bargom’s expression didn’t change at all. “Who was it?”

“Urtheun, the two-headed deer. He managed to place a nasty infliction on the fiery monster. The monster’s flames have started to weaken.”

“He was one of the weaker ones. He was bound to die in this war. Fortunately, he did something decent as his life ended. Anything else I need to know about?”

“Nothing else to report. The current situation is as expected, slowly favoring our side. The humans are slowly getting spread thinner and thinner. We are bound to find the Hatchling eventually.”

Bargom narrowed his eyes and looked over to the horizon. “If the Hatchling isn’t out here then it could only mean that it's hidden within the human’s headquarters.” Their conflict was eventually going to escalate to the point where the strongest of all the sides would battle it out.

A misunderstanding that came about from not fully understanding the whole situation. The Monster Faction might have been contacted by the Radical Faction of the Genesis Foundation but it didn’t mean that they spoke of the Hatchling’s current situation. They merely offered their help in finding the Hatchling to which the Monster Faction refused.

As the Monster Faction had chosen to not associate with them, they lacked certain information that was crucial to their goal.

With the Genesis Foundation having a strong front, internal conflict was suppressed from the lenses of the outsiders. The Radical Faction, no matter how drastic their actions and ideals were, will not actively sabotage the Conservative Faction. At the end of the day, they both desired to see the future of the world. It’s just that their methodologies were different.

“Send one last message to Weston, if he doesn’t want the kid then I’ll just get rid of him. One less headache in the future.”

“Yes, sir!” The messenger then promptly left the scene. With Bargom and Xeril left in the room, Bargom went over to take his great axe and polished it. He calmly grinded down the edges into a fine sharp line. The battle would commence.

“I just need to wait now.”

~~~

On the southern side of Aganth, Sadin was currently recovering as blood kept pouring out from within his orifices. Despite the numerous blessings he had activated, he was still severely injured by Urtheun. He grabbed his stomach tightly and kept on vomiting blood. His injuries were nearly fatal. As expected, although Sadin could garner the power to smite those in the Revelation Realm, it didn't mean that he was completely immune to their attacks.

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A small green being sighed from the side, “You shouldn’t have done that. I can only do so much, you know?”

“Where’s Naia?!” Sadin’s body was convulsing in pain. He tried to purge himself of all the poison in his system but he was struggling. It was the clingy type of poison, getting rid of a part of his blood that was infected didn’t matter for as long as even a smidgen of it remained within his body. Unless he purged himself, it was impossible to get rid of it.

“You didn’t worship her enough to make her appear again. I told you that you can only take advantage of us for so long. You’re lucky I’m still even here.” Sylph's cheerful tone was antithetical to Sadin's current state.

“[Perfect Affinity] my ass, what’s the point if I still have to worship you?” Sadin gritted his teeth, recovering within a sea of fire. He was cleansing the potent poison with his own flames.

Slyph sighed, she tilted her head and rotated her body in mid-air. “You could just die, I don’t mind. But… I’ll have to be bored again… so don’t do that, alright? It’s been so long before someone could already call me directly.”

Sadin clenched his fists, the agony he was in could not be understated. Feeling such torment finally made him break. “Fine! I’ll do the bloody ritual! Too bad, there’s no body of water around here!”

Flying freely in the air, Sylph giggled. “There’s water here though?” She manipulated the air to bring over a river of red liquid towards Sadin. It couldn’t be burned due to Slyph’s air preventing temperature from affecting it. She was looking forward to this. "Blood... water, it's still moisture. You just have to think more creatively."

Compared to suffering like this for a few more hours, he’d rather skip it entirely and put down his pride. With a river of blood slowly forming all around him, he closed his eyes and breathed in a specific pattern. This was a meditation practice that he had learned from Naia to give her an offering.

Muttering different incantations in rapid succession, Sadin started embodying the stature and position of a worshipper. He manipulated his hands, turning and twisting them as he placed them directly above the sea of blood.

“Purify the waters, huh?” Sadin placed his focus entirely on the task before him. He wasn’t concerned about the stench of blood at all due to how accustomed he was to it.

Slowly, a small droplet from the sea of blood before him started to rise up into the air. Sadin didn’t stop, he continued on until another small droplet of blood arose. Numerous droplets formed directly above the sea of blood. They started merging, one by one yet oddly enough the size of the droplet didn’t increase.

Fragments of red mist escaped the droplet, the red tint from within this recently formed droplet was fading away. From the sea of blood, a clean and pure droplet of water formed before Sadin.

“Ah! Do that with mine next! I want-”

“Shut it. I’m concentrating.” Sadin’s eyes were entirely focused on the task before him. Sylph didn’t get angry at all since she was more interested in how this would unfold. It had been ages since she had found such an interesting person.

I wonder if Naia would like it if I made it a little more… interesting. Slyph giggled to herself as she started adding more blood from all over the city. Puddles of blood turned into streams, and streams of red liquid formed into a great river flowing directly into the center of Aganth. People initially ignored the slight change but as it began to condense as it reached where Sadin was, people quickly took notice.

Within the middle of everything, flames raged on as they protected the very core of it. Blood from all over the city started condensing into one specific area. Even the bloody battlefield where humans and beasts fought wasn’t free from having the blood siphoned away from it.

Sadin sensed Slyph’s antics and wanted nothing more than to bash her head in but he was far too occupied with this to pay her any more mind.

The city was initially starting to somewhat settle in but the sudden shift in all the blood in the city conglomerating into a specific area made everyone unsettled. Both the Monster Faction and the humans were terrified of what was to come from such a strange scene.

Soon enough, Weston finally made his announcement that this was beneficial for humankind. He made no further comment on it but this gave people enough information to stop panicking. In fact, the soldiers on the front lines started to be even more proactive in their slaughter.

As the city experienced this strange phenomenon, Aganth was one step closer to the end. Tension was rising, slowly making the Monster Faction unsettled with how they were unable to do anything.

Yet they weren’t the most unsettled ones in Aganth at all for the title was rightfully bestowed towards Fian.

Within the rift in space that Fian had created, Sammuel, Marie, Lawrence, and she was currently sitting around, biding their time until Alyur gave them an opportunity.

Sammuel was currently sifting through countless [Ego] and [Skills] to see which combinations would properly show off his full potential. Marie had already started distancing herself from Fian. She just hung around Sammuel, watching him go about his training. Lawrence was surprisingly still working on his manaphobic cloaks. The equipment he required was given to him by Sammuel by scavenging his equipment back from his house.

“This isn’t good.” Fian took in a deep breath. She couldn’t believe it. “The Radical Faction found us. We no longer have a week left, at most, two days. They… I don’t know how they found us.”

Sammuel’s ears perked, this was impossible unless... “How many people from the Conservative Faction are here?”

“One other person. As for the Radical Faction, I have no idea.” There was no point holding back information at this point. “Sammuel, we need to make our move sooner or later. Everything’s going to explode in a while. We need to get out before that happens.”

“That’s true… but I need to know. If someone from your side snitched on you…” Sammuel needed to make sure. He didn’t want to put blame on someone if he didn’t know the exact facts.

Fian responded. “The only way someone could pinpoint where we are is if someone gave them the hints. Sammuel, I won’t lie, it’s most likely that I’ve been sold out by someone in my own faction. But at the same time, it’s odd.”

“What is?”

“If they did this out of their own agenda then the Radical Faction could’ve already found me but they didn’t. They gave us a few more days to work with. Just keep that in mind.” Fian got a sneaking suspicion of what was happening but kept her tongue. It wasn’t her place to intrude.

Sammuel remembered this.

“Two days. I have to do something drastic then. Alyur’s struggle to break through from the outside means that I have to do something from the inside.” Sammuel prepared himself by picking out everything properly. “ I’m heading out.”

“Don’t leave…” Marie hugged Sammuel’s back.

“I’ll be back and the next time you see me, you’ll be home free.” Sammuel pried Marie’s hands away and walked off. He left the rift and was welcomed with a very disgusting atmosphere. The very air itself had a red tint to it as it smelled like iron.

It was an omen of what was to come.