Zen Phoron, the Phoenix Emperor, escaped out of the Mardana Kingdom’s capital using his Warp Magic, which brought him to the place where he and his two companions were at previously. He stood there and breathed a sigh with tension mounting in his mind as sweat started appearing on his face.
At that exact moment, he sensed a massive force of power unleash from behind him, and he turned around to see flashes of lights as combat began with great intensity. He could not see what was happening as he was outside the capital, but he could sense that the War Titan was outputting a massive amount of energy against the monster girl, whom he sensed was somehow getting stronger as they continued to fight.
“Sir!” Called a Phintex Rajas as he and nine others warped in around him. “What are your orders?”
“Immediately, leave for the Chand Family and inform them about what happened here!” He ordered them instantly while continuing to watch the flashes of light before waves of destruction were fired through the sky. “Hurry! Time is of the essence!”
“Yes, sir!” The ten Phintex Rajas replied quickly.
They were just about to warp out of there when they suddenly heard a sinister voice echoing inside their minds.
“Why leave so soon? Stay and entertain yourselves,” the voice said before letting out a cold sinister laughter.
As the voice vanished as quickly as it came, they felt a shocking sensation as a barrier was suddenly erected all around them. One of them attempted to activate their Warp Magic to leave the barrier but the magic simply got cancelled the moment it got cast, making them realise they were stuck inside the barrier until they get out of it by foot.
At the same time, they sensed multiple entities approaching them quickly and within seconds, a large number of different kinds of monsters appeared from both sides of the road leading away from the capital. They were shocked to see the monsters, especially from seeing the red gleaming eyes that they all seemed to have.
“There’s so many of them!” One of the Phintex Rajas remarked in surprise.
“It’s just numbers! Let’s get rid of them quickly!” Said another with great confidence.
He fired a powerful fire blast at one of the nearest monsters and it hit them clear, causing a strong explosion. However, as the dust cleared, he and his companions were startled to see that the monster did not seem to have taken any kind of damage.
In retaliation, the large two-legged monster let out a roar before firing a lightning strike at the one that fired the fire blast. The man tried to defend himself by casting a magic barrier, but it was somehow shattered by the attack and struck him with great force. He let out a scream from the pain of the impact of the attack before falling lifeless to the ground.
“W-What?!”
“No way!”
“I-I-Impossible!”
Zen was alarmed by how strong these monsters were considering he knew them to be at most C-Ranked Monsters. And yet, one of them was able to kill a Phintex Raja by just firing its regular attack. This set off alarm bells inside his mind as he realised that the monsters were somehow far stronger than average and something was wrong with them, which could easily be seen by all of their eyes glowing red just like that monster girl’s.
“Wait. Like the monster girl?” Zen muttered, seeming to realise something from his own chain of thoughts. “Could it be…?”
He could not finish his thoughts when the monsters roared and charged at them with murderous intent. They began to engage in combat against the monsters, doing their best to dodge their deadly attacks while trying to take them out. However, their efforts seemed to have failed as none of the monsters seemed to be taking any kind of damage.
“Dammit!” He snarled, looking around at the monsters with frustration before complaining, “If only I knew a cancelling spell like Lucky, we would’ve gotten rid of this barrier in an instant! Dammit!”
Just then, the ground shook heavily as a heavy impact occurred against the ground and turned around to face the Mardana Kingdom’s capital apprehensively. He was suddenly feeling scared because he sensed that Nara’s power was quickly dwindling while the monster girl’s power was apparently rising rapidly.
“Dammit all! I don’t have time for this!” He shouted in a frustrated voice as he felt scared for the safety of his comrade.
He tried to use Warp Magic to get out of there only for his magic to get cancelled the moment he invoked it. This made him feel frustrated and began frantically looking for the border of the barrier that was stopping them from using Transport Magic Spells.
“There!” He shouted as he finally sensed its location and began running towards it.
The surviving six Phintex Rajas followed after him from the rear, however they were quickly chased after by the monsters and attacked. One of the Phintex Rajas were caught unaware and was killed instantly while another quickly got in the way of an attack aimed at the Phoenix Emperor and lost his life in the process.
“No!” Zen shouted, turning around to watch as one of his men died while defending him.
Following that man’s lead, the four remaining Phintex Rajas began to cover for the Phoenix Emperor by using only defence magic to try and block the attacks as best as they could. However, the compounded attacks caused the attacks to slowly break through the barriers and kill a Phintex Raja that was protecting the Phoenix Emperor’s retreating back.
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“Stop it! Don’t throwing away your lives like this!” Zen shouted at them desperately.
“Don’t worry about us, sir! You must leave this place and inform the others!” One of the Phintex Raja that was right behind him replied as another of the Phintex Raja was taken out by another monster’s attack.
“I can’t do that!” Zen shouted back at him, but a sudden explosion erupted
Before the Phintex Raja could reply, another of them suddenly shouted, “Look! The barrier’s end is just over there!”
He pointed to something in the distance, and Zen turned to see the border of the barrier shimmering in the sunlight.
It was then that a Phintex Raja said, “Now’s our chance.”
Before Zen could ask him what he was talking about, a powerful explosion suddenly occurred behind him. In the next second, he found himself flying through the air at high speed and flew past the barrier before managing to land on his feet. As his feet got dragged on the ground and came to a stop, he quickly turned around and looked back with shock as the three remaining Phintex Rajas tried their best to fight back against the monsters, which seemed to have increased in numbers.
“Hold on! I’m coming right now!” He called out to them.
“No!” Came the return shout, putting a stop to his movement and looking at them with in shock. As another of the Phintex Raja was killed, the man that had sent the Phoenix Emperor flying smiled sadly at him and shouted, “You must leave right now and inform the others about this, sir! Please! We cannot fulfil the mission you’ve tasked us, but you can! So, please, go! Now!”
His words hit Zen with such a heavy impact that it rendered the Phoenix Emperor completely speechless. He knew that returning to them is suicide, and that was not acceptable as there was a more serious situation at hand that needed to be focused on. As such, the Phintex Raja did the logical thing by sending their leader forward to escape as he knew he and the rest of the Phintex Rajas were not going to make it as the monsters quickly increased in numbers.
The man suddenly removed his mask to reveal a young face and smiled proudly at his leader before saluting to him and shouting, “It was an honour serving you, sir!”
Then he turned around and began to assist in his comrade fight off the monsters as best as they could to give time for Zen to warp out of there. The Phoenix Emperor watched with a stricken expression, but he knew what he had to do. So, he whipped around and activated his Warp Magic with the destination for the Floria Kingdom’s castle before warping out of there as the death cries of the two remaining Phintex Rajas echoed in his ears.
A few seconds later, the warp magic exited, and he arrived standing in the middle of the Floria Kingdom’s capital. He had his hands clenched into fists, which shook from clenching them tightly. Then he fell to his knees and let out a cry filled with mixed feelings of anger, hatred, sadness, grief, and helplessness and began punching the ground. This caused the ground to shake as it sank from each impact he made on the same point before he finally stopped while tears flowed down his face at the loss of his men.
At that moment, the voice of the man he was after suddenly called out his name.
“Zen! What are you doing?!”
It was Dominic, and he was not alone as the Magic Titan, Amaranda Lefrity and Wolfenstine were close behind him. They hurried to where Zen was kneeling and looked down at him with looks of confusion on their faces.
“What are you doing here alone? Where’s Nara and Valerian?” Wolfenstine asked suspiciously.
Zen rose to his feet and wiped away the tears with a hand while saying in a serious voice, “They are in deep trouble,” and he explained the situation they were faced with when the sinister voice called forth this monster girl to come and fight them, which seemed to be some kind of undying being and made Nara and Valerian decide to call for backup.
As he finished explaining about the monsters and the death of ten Phintex Rajas, there was a tense silence around them from the shocking information he informed them.
“Undying, you say?” Wolfenstine muttered thoughtfully. “You sure?”
“Yes!” Zen replied in a firm voice, which made the hybrid vampire-werewolf go back to thinking.
“Could it be a vampire?” Amaranda asked telepathically. “Don’t they have such regenerative abilities?”
“Possibly,” said Wolfenstine slowly while continuing to look doubtful, “but if they are a Vampire, they should be turning to dust since they appeared in broad daylight.” He turned to Zen and asked, “Did that girl seem like she was feeling any discomfort, or any part of her turning to dust or worse, part of her body was glowing like golden glitters?”
Zen blinked at him in confusion before replying, “No! I didn’t notice any of such detail!”
“Hmm,” said Wolfenstine as he went back to thinking. “Then that doesn’t make sense, and she didn’t seem like a Werewolf type either, plus I don’t remember there being any race or creature that could resist such deadly blows.”
As he fell silent while thinking about it, Zen suddenly grew very angry and snapped, “I don’t care about all those details! Zen and Valerian are in trouble and it’s not just them; the innocent people in the Mardana Kingdom’s capital are in danger from that monster!” He turned to Dominic and said, “Please, Dom! Hurry and help them!”
The Sword Titan immediately nodded his head in agreement and said to them, “Alright. I’ll go right now. Zen, make sure to let everyone at the Chand household know what’s going on so they aren’t kept in the dark. We need both Lakshman and Lagron to be up to speed on the things happening when they eventually wake up and join the fight.”
“Yes!” Zen nodded, and Dominic smiled as he placed a hand on his shoulder.
“Be proud that you made it back, Zen and most of all, be proud of the brave warriors that are the Phintex Rajas. They prove themselves from time and again how important their role is as part of the Phoenix Clan,” he said with a smile, to which Zen nodded silently with a small smile forming.
Dominic nodded when he was satisfied to see the young man smiling from pride. He withdrew his hand back and pulled out his sword, which he flipping around in mid-air before stabbing it firmly on the ground. As he did, he began to channel Energy Force into it and activated the technique by saying it out loud.
“Teleporting Blade.”
In an instant, a bright glowing light erupted around him and enveloped him before he and the light vanished into thin air, leaving Wolfenstine, Amaranda and Zen behind. Then Zen began to question them what was happening in the Floira Kingdom’s capital, and Wolfenstine informed him of the damage that was wrought by a small group of people. This made the Phoenix Emperor furious, and he wanted to deal with them immediately.
While Wolfenstine tried to calm the young man down, Amaranda remained silent as she was deep in thought about the monster girl that Zen mentioned. The description of the undying method that the girl possessed somewhat reminded her of something she had read from somewhere a long time ago, but she could not remember what it was exactly.
As she was trying to remember what it was that she read, a surprising distraction in the form of a voice appeared in her mind as a familiar voice communicated with her through telepathy.
“Ama, get over here. You have a lot of healing to do,” said the voice of the Dragon Titan, Lagron Rodraigan.