“Oh no!” Lakshman exclaimed as he sensed the battle raging between the Titans and the Ancient Evil. “Dominic and Lagron seem to be taken out, but Valerian is putting up a good fight to stop him!”
“Yes,” agreed Asura, looking impressed. “That kid is really impressive to fight that hard against him of all opponents.” Then he turned to his current-self and asked, “So, what should we do?”
“We go and help them in the fight!” Lakshman replied firmly.
“And get ourselves killed like last time?” Asura asked in a flat voice, to which Lakshman was taken aback.
“W-What do you mean?”
“Stop and think about it, Lakshman,” Asura began to coolly reason with him, “about the time when we first fought it. The Ancient Evil was extremely powerful and did not even faze at any kind of attack I used against it. Instead, I and Lagron kept get blasted back and always had to be on the defensive due to how ridiculously powerful each of its attacks were.”
“That was back then and—!”
“Nothing. Has. Changed,” said Asura flatly, cutting off his current-self with a depressed expression. “We have gotten stronger, way stronger than when I first fought it, but the outcome will still remain the same; we will lose.”
He spoke those words with a depressed expression and seemed like he felt the situation was completely hopeless.
“He’s an immortal, Lakshman. That much is clear at this point, so don’t even pretend with anything else.”
Asura, the man that once waged war against the world and ruled the world as the first Phoenix Titan in the ancient times, now swung back and forth on the swing with a dejected look on his face. He felt hopeless about the situation and helpless of being able to do nothing against an unkillable enemy.
Lakshman looked at his past-self’s depressed state and began to think of what needed to be done. Truth be told, he had no idea how to deal with an immortal being since they are considered entities similar to Gods. As such, it angered him greatly to wonder who in their right mind had granted such an absurd gift to a creature of destruction like that.
“Could it be the God of Calamity? He holds the highest animosity towards us and all of creation from the looks of things,” he pondered aloud.
“He does possess a great level of hatred towards all of creation,” replied Asura in a dull voice, “but I don’t think he possess the power to grant such a thing. In fact, I suspect that the creature is one of his creations but… I doubt he was responsible for granting it immortality.”
“Then, who could it be?!” Lakshman agonised with great frustration. “Who in their right mind would grant such a destructive being a gift like that?! No other God that I know of would do it, including the God of Destruction no matter how prideful that guy is from what I remember from your encounters with him.”
“I don’t think its him either,” agreed Asura with a nod of his head.
They were silent for a few more seconds before Lakshman rubbed his head with great frustration and shouted, “Argh! Dammit! While we’re wasting time here thinking about this nonsense, my friends are going to get destroyed! Dammit! What to do…?! What to do…?! What to do?! How do you deal with an immortal?!”
Lakshman kept asking himself the question repeatedly while trying hard to think of a solution, but nothing came to him immediately. For a few seconds, they remained in complete silence before Asura made a wild suggestion.
“We could toss him into space.”
“Space?”
“More precisely, the void.”
“Oh…! Like that one the God of Calamity opened when he attempted to destroy our world, the same kind that we ended up closing and falling through in the end?” Lakshman asked, and Asura nodded in agreement.
“It seems to be the best thing to do right now considering the situation.”
Lakshman remained silent as he pondered his past-self’s suggestion before replying, “While the idea is good, I don’t think I’m currently capable of opening a portal to the void.” As Asura looked surprised, he went on to explain, “remember how we tried to open a portal to this world from the Alzard World? Remember how small it was?”
Asura suddenly remembered and looked perplexed as he asked, “That was because we had to reply on my own power. Since you’ve acquired my power as well, we should able to make the hole large enough to throw him in.”
Despite him starting to appear positive of their chances, Lakshman shook his head and stated, “The problem with that is that I need to hold the portal steadily for a few seconds and within those few seconds, we have to throw him in. Do you think he will give us those few seconds to allow himself to get thrown inside, or he’s going to make our task that much easier? Besides, there is another problem from doing that.”
“Another problem? What’s that?”
“It’s that he would be capable of going to wherever he wanted and continue his reign of destruction to other worlds since he would still have his powers and may be able to use magic to breathe in that supposedly unbreathable space.”
These words stunned Asura and made him grit his teeth as he suddenly imagined the kind of destruction that could happen to the other worlds if the creature was left unchecked. This disheartened him once again, and he continued to swing back and forth with a gloomy expression on his face.
“Now what…?” He asked feebly.
“Oh, don’t get so down just because of that! My mother always told me: where there is a will, there is a way!” Lakshman said confidently.
“What use is there when there doesn’t seem to be another way!” Asura replied, looking irritated.
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“There is…!” His current-self said slowly as a plan began to form inside his mind.
“What?”
“I think… I have an idea on how to deal with our enemy!”
“You do? What is it?”
“Well…” began Lakshman with a smile.
He began explaining his plan to his past-self, who was very surprised upon hearing what it was. He provided some suggestions, and received a compelling reply from his current-self about the solidity of his plan.
“Hmm…! That just might work!” Asura said, after thinking for a bit. “We still wouldn’t be able to kill him, but,” and a smug smile formed on his face as he finished with, “it sure as hell will won’t let him live in peace!”
“Exactly, and that’s the best plan for a brutal creature like him!” Lakshman stated with a confident look.
Asura nodded and said, “Alright then. You better hurry though!”
Lakshman nodded and closed his eyes as he attempted to surface his consciousness to take control of his body. However, as he stood there and continued to reach to control his body, he found that for some reason his body was not responding to him.
“What are you doing?” Asura asked him after watching him standing there with his eyes closed for a few seconds.
“I… I don’t seem to be able to reach my body,” replied Lakshman as he reopened his eyes with a troubled look.
“Huh?!” Asura exclaimed, looking stunned. “You can’t… reach your body?! What do you mean?!”
“Like, my body doesn’t seem to respond to my will at all! I just can’t surface my consciousness for some reason! I don’t understand why!” Lakshman said, beginning to panic.
Asura stared at him in alarm before saying, “You’re kidding me! But…! We’re inside your body though! Surely you’re missing something!”
“How the heck would I miss something to let me get back in control of my own body?!” His current-self rounded on him, which made Asura realise the problem.
“Dammit!” He said, looking worried. “Looks like our connection with our body has been disrupted!”
“Disrupted?! How’s that possible?!”
“Most like the result of you taking on that attack in your astral form! Damn! What now?! How do you take control of your own body that you’re facing a strange disconnection from?!”
They felt silent as they began to think feverishly of any kind of method to get them out of that situation. It was then that Lakshman suddenly reminded of the words that his mother always told him during his childhood.
“Mind over body.”
“What?”
“Mind over body!” Lakshman emphasised firmly. “My mother always told me that the mind is stronger than the body, and sit can make our body do things that our body would not like to do under normal circumstances! Same with this! We just have to force our connection working again by focusing our mind or will for that matter.”
“Agreed,” said Asura by nodding his head, “but how do you plan to do that? Just focus our minds in reconnecting? I it that simple?”
“There’s no other way but to try it out!” Lakshman said firmly.
Thus, the two Phoenix Titans closed their eyes and began to concentrate in reconnecting their spirits with Lakshman’s body. It began to look difficult as they were able to sense the link to the body but it felt like it was a long way away.
“Damn! It feels too far away!” Asura shouted in annoyance.
“Then, its time we use our powers to reach out!” Lakshman said firmly.
“Wait! You just recovered from your spirit from nearly being torn away from that attack! If you use your powers now, you’re basically using up your spiritual power!”
“There is no other choice!”
With his insisting, the current Phoenix Titan activated his spiritual powers and began to push his consciousness into reaching the link to take control of the body. Asura watched with amazement at the sheer determination that the young man possessed and made him smile with pride.
“You can do it!” He encouraged him firmly with a determined expression.
“Yes!” His current-self replied.
Lakshman could see the long thread hanging in front of him, and he pushed his hand forward forcefully to grab it. However, the wind against him was very strong as his body tried to defend itself against him and began to charge him with lightening. Even so, the Phoenix Titan pushed past the pain and the obstacles and finally grabbed the hanging thread.
As he grabbed it, there was a blinding flash of light that spread everywhere before turning everything white. A moment later, his eyes flashed open as he found himself in his body once more and saw himself staring up at the ceiling of his room as he lay comfortably on his bed.
“Phew…! I got back…!” He muttered triumphantly.
“Good job,” praised Asura, and Lakshman could feel him smiling at his success. “The worst that could’ve happened is that we would be stuck in a state that we couldn’t do anything with our body.”
“Almost like a coma, huh,” muttered Lakshman, and he sighed wearily. “I’m glad it didn’t come to that. Now then…!”
He slowly pushed himself into a sitting position just as Silvera, Tetra, Cantia, Priya and Indira entered the room. They saw him siting upright and without warning, they all leaped towards him while shouting his name with great happiness.
“Annayya!” His two sisters called out.
“Lucky!” His three wives shouted happily.
“You’re finally awake!”
He panicked when he saw them leaping at him and crashed into him, forcing him back into a lying position as they hugged him tightly. They began to cry with happiness and began to express how much concern they had for his health and safety and were glad he had regained consciousness.
“T-Thanks but… if you strangle me like this, I’ll be out cold again!” Lakshman joked with them with a big smile while patting each of them on the back.
“Oh.”
“You’re right.”
“Sorry about that.”
With that, his three wives and two sisters got off him, and he managed to sit upright again while smiling happily at them. At that moment, the rest of the house occupants except for the babies entered the room in a panic. Emilia, Venezuela, Erza, Sonia, Sumara, Ondine, Shalany and Mariana all entered and saw him sitting upright before smiling widely. As they moved forward to hug him by taking turns, Amaranda entered the room and smiled towards the awakened Phoenix Titan.
“Your family has been worried sick for your safety,” she spoke telepathically.
“I can tell,” he agreed and looked at all the happy faces in the room before becoming serious and asking, “Ama, I need to go quickly. Please use Restoration on me.”
“Of course,” she agreed telepathically and smiled as she moved forward.
As she sat down and aimed her hand at him, all of his wives except Cantia, Tetra, and Silvera offered to heal him simultaneously. At first, he refused them, but they continued insisting that they help.
“You never let us help you normally, so let us at least heal you this time!”
With no other choice, he relented and they became happy and all of them began using their strongest healing spells to heal him. Restoration was much faster, but they added assistance with their individual spells somewhat lessened the burden on the Magic Titan since she was attempting to fully heal the Phoenix Titan back to normal.
Only Cantia looked displeased that she was unable to help as she stated, “I wish I can also heal you, but… I’m not good at magic like the rest of them.”
“That doesn’t change that fact that you care for me,” he told her with a smile and reminded her of the time she, Tetra, Venezuela, and Emilia came to rescue him when he was kidnapped by the Shadow Dragon King.
“Oh… Lucky!” She said happily and hugged him warmly for remembering such a thing.
“If you think you’re useless, how should we feel at not being able to heal him?” Silvera asked, looking annoyed.
Lakshman reassured his wives of their use by stating, “I want you two to be at full strength! We have a battle to win!”
Feeling glad at the thought of being able to help their husband, the two wives smiled happily.
It took them over half-an-hour before finally restoring him to the maximum that they could, which left him feeling half recovered. But he was glad of their help and thanked them profusely while they sat around panting from exhaustion. As he rose to his feet and activated the Phoenix Portal to leave with Tetra and Silvera transformed into their sword forms, Emilia stood up and wished him a warm farewell.
“Go and come home victorious.”
Lakshman beamed at her and said, “I definitely will!”
He waved at her and the others goodbye before entering the Phoenix Portal with the Phoenix Blade and the Demon Slayer in each other and disappearing before the portal closed and vanished from sight.