The inside of the coronation room was… gone, the room had been destroyed to the point that all the walls, the roof, the floor, etc were now piles of rubble on the ground. Looking at the destruction Damien's jaw was on the floor.

‘Did the head cause all of this?’ he thought, still shocked at the room's damage. Walking into what was reaming of the room Damien looked around trying to find Kingstone, amidst all the debris he spotted multiple bodies which were all bloodless members.

After looking over every crevice he was surprised to find that the head was nowhere to be found… ‘Did the ability he used eradicate his body?’ Damien was honestly at a loss for words. Before he could think further however the sound of something moving quickly came from behind him prompting Damien to quickly move out of the way.

After swiftly dodging to the side he looked at the attacker causing his eyes to narrow upon seeing who it was, “You’re alive?” Damien said aloud scanning the man in question who somehow managed to live. It was the man who tried to challenge the young head.

In response to Damien’s question, the man chuckled and said, “Barely, Kingston sure was a crazy bastard for using that ability had I known he would I would have never confronted him the way I did.

Hearing the man's words it was obvious he was aware of the ability Kingston had used making Damien quite curious as to what had happened and why the technique was such a big deal. “What are you talking about?” Damien asked wanting to find out what the ability was.

The man looked up with a subtle look of shock, “Oh? Kingston’s right-hand man did not know about the ability. Well let me go ahead and break the sad news to you about his fate, it’s quite sad really.

“You see, the ability he used was one we all obtained a long time ago when Kingston and I were almost as close as brothers. The ability allows the user to take all the mana in their bodies and multiply it by five, sounds great right? And it would be were it not for the fact that the energy keeps multiplying and there is no way to stop it until you eventually… explode.”

A look of understanding appeared on Damien’s face having realized the reason why he could not find Kingston along with why the room looked like a nuke had gone off. “Wait you and Kingston were friends? How did you end up this way then?”

Upon asking this question a look of nostalgia could be seen on the man's face seemingly reminiscing, “How we ended up this way does not really matter, but in the case he has told you about me I will just tell you my name. Duluth.”

The second Duluth spoke his name information once more began to appear in Damien’s mind, Duluth was the current head of the bloodless organization and the sole reason for the temple's downfall. He was a man of unfathomable power and was not someone he could face.

Now knowing this cold sweat began to form on his back as he had almost died. The only reason he had not was because the man was injured or at least Damien believed that was the reason for his survival.

Seeing Damien’s reaction to his name Duluth smiled, “You're quite lucky you know? That was the only attack I had left in me and I will also be dying soon myself.” Although Duluth said this Damien did not believe him in the slightest and raised his guard even further.

Even though he knew this was another trial and the person in front of him had truly died a very long time ago that did not mean he could not feel pain in there Damien was not a masochist so he’d rather avoid the pain of death.

Duluth chuckled seeing Damien tense up before his face became strained and he fell backwards onto his back coughing up a mouthful of blood. “Let me give you some advice, don’t take the head’s son to the location he gave you otherwise his son will die.”

This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it

Shock once more crept up Damien’s face, “Why are you telling me this? Do you not want the death of his bloodline?”

“Indeed why am I telling you this?” Duluth said cryptically as if speaking to himself, unfortunately, Damien was not able to hear these words as a resounding boom sounded out almost making his eardrums burst from how loud it was.

‘What the hell is going on now’

Outside the temple a battle of massive preparations was happening, the entirety of the bloodless organization could be seen battling the thousands of temple members, on the ground countless craters and bodies could be seen dying the ground in a sea of blood and destruction.

Off to the side of the battle ten people could be seen staring at each other warily, three of the men appeared to be temple members, two were guests who had attended the ceremony and the last five were bloodless.

Currently, they were in a standoff as all the men present were of similar strength, and while the bloodless members had the upper hand if the two guests joined them…

After a brief moment of silence one of the members of Bloodless spoke up seemingly impatient, “Decide now. Are you going to help them or are you going to stay out of our way?” the member of Bloodless asked glaring at the two men with a piercing gaze.

Upon hearing the question the two men glanced at each other with varying expressions before looking over at the temple members of which all three had grave expressions. “What do you think Tobisha? Will they help us?” Said one of the temple members in a whisper to the man next to him.

In response, however, Toibsha did not answer, instead the expression on his face became more grave. “Prepare yourselves, should they choose to not assist us I will use an ability that will let me have strength equal to the head for a short time.”

“We will stay our hands.” upon hearing those words Tobisha immediately took action and activated the the ability he had told the other two men about, the aura around his body became completely red and his expression became a bit crazed.

“Stay out of my way while I am using this, otherwise I might kill you by accident.” After saying those words Tobisha flashed forward and began clashing with the five Bloodless members leaving the other two men at a loss about what to do.

Back inside the temple, Damien could be seen talking into the air like a crazy person, “Yo bastard old spirit can you please tell me what the fuck I am supposed to do? Kingston is dead, his son is safe and I did not take him to the location the head told me about, why has the trail not ended?”

After a few minutes of waiting for a response and not getting one Damien was about to start cursing loudly before he heard a sigh. “I guess not telling you anything is a bit too harsh, the goal for this trail has already been accomplished when you did not take his son to the meeting point.”

“Then why has the trail not ended?!” Damien exclaimed loudly in frustration.

“Because I wanted you to gain experience, along with seeing what truly happened when our temple fell, and learn some of this planet’s earlier history.” the old spirit responded calmly.

“What experience am I going to get from being around people ten times stronger than myself?” Damien did not understand how he was going to benefit from being inside this trail any longer, everyone in here was way stronger than he currently was and all of them could flatten him with a single attack.

“Listen, boy, I have an offer. Do you want to leave this trail now and miss out on seeing higher-level beings fight or do you want to watch the rest of the events that happened and maybe learn some things about this world's past along with deepening your understanding of power levels?”

Hearing his question Damien was tempted to choose the first option but upon thinking about it he realized that missing this opportunity would be truly stupid, he was being given the chance to watch people stronger and more experienced than himself fight passing it up would be truly stupid.

“Alright fine I choose the latter option, you owe me though for having me almost die to that Duluth bastard.”

The old spirit laughed loudly at his words, “Alright, I will be sure to make it up. Now how about we go check out Tobisha fight?”

Excitement bloomed in Damien's eyes hearing his mention of Tobisha “lead the way Sokai.” Damien said while looking for a reaction to the way he referred to the old spirit.

In response, the spirit laughed but showed no visual reactions to Damien calling him that name. “No need to try and surprise me, boy, if you had not figured out that much I would have never chosen you in the first place.”

With that, the old spirit placed his hand on Damien’s shoulder before both of them disappeared in a flash of light.