The three ancient beings of the forest quickly unleashed more and more of their power to keep themselves safe, which was like taking poison to quench their thirst. The more power they released, the more the Eldritch corrupted.

A great variety of environmental phenomena began to occur as the powers were unleashed—electric storms, spirals of flames, acid rain, and other combinations wreaked havoc on the surrounding nature. Fortunately, the three powerful creatures kept almost all of the Eldritch's attention on themselves, allowing the rest to find safety.

Creatures of all kinds began to run as fast as possible, fleeing in any direction without thinking, forming a large stampede that threatened to cause more damage to the already weakened herds due to the intense battle.

Meanwhile, two of the three beasts began to grow impatient; only the dragon remained impassive. He knew that the Eldritch's strength was only a small percentage of its total power and that it wouldn't be able to bring them down with that. The more it tried to suppress them, the more it broke the portal—that was their only fortune. They had arrived before the portal was fully developed.

"We call for reinforcements. If the other two come to help us, we can end this quickly before another tragedy occurs," said the griffin with a somewhat feminine voice.

"It won't be necessary. We can still handle it ourselves. Besides, if the other two interrupt their vigilance, the forest will have even worse enemies than this simple Eldritch," said the black dragon.

"And how are we supposed to handle it? At this rate, we'll be drained, and we'll have to spend a long time recovering," interjected the silver-backed lion.

The dragon did not respond. Instead, he turned his head to look in Alex's direction, the only one who had not left the scene, as he was the only one still holding the Eldritch's attention.

"You'll see soon," the dragon murmured almost in a whisper.

The other two were confused for a brief moment. They had known the dragon for a long time, and he wasn't one to speak in codes and maintain enigmas. But since he claimed to have a plan, they decided to trust and proceed with this war of attrition.

On the other hand, the only other presence in the place that hadn't acted was at a profound crossroads. The prolonged exposure to the unleashed aura of the Eldritch was almost like radiation, and Alex had no way to get rid of it. Fear gave way to terror, and terror to panic, causing his chest to tighten and his organs to slowly stop functioning.

Gradually, his heart went silent, and his blood began to stop flowing. His lungs refused to breathe, and the accumulation of CO2 in his blood caused his body to intoxicate, leading to hallucinations and spasms.

Alex was on the brink of death again, this time because of the call for help from his little friend, Lunaria.

It would be a lie to say he regretted helping. On the contrary, it was an honor to have been part of such a monumental effort to protect. He had witnessed how the forest races had given their all to repel the invader, and this scene took him back to when he fought on Earth, the desperate struggle to keep everyone alive and repel the invaders, when he still had hope of reclaiming the land.

"You can't give up yet," a voice sounded from the depths of his mind.

Alex's memory continued to wander in that slight limbo before death. It went back from his memories and those of his fellow warriors, his disagreements and heartbreaks in school, the despair and loneliness he felt every time he was on the school premises, and then home.

Warmth and love—his mother at home cooking his favorite food.

"I still don't know anything about mother," Alex murmured, spending the last breath in his lungs.

The memories of his mother, and the subsequent memories of his father, all together as a family, were the only things that could stay strong against this ancestral terror.

So were the memories of his father, his hobbies, and the lessons he gave, the strange meditation sessions and poems.

Trapped and sinking slowly into the recesses of his mind, instead of fighting this terror, he turned around and sank even deeper into it.

While his body suffered from the lack of oxygen and began to have multisystem failure, Alex searched deep into his consciousness.

He searched for the only thing that could save him in this situation.

And he who seeks... He who seeks always finds.

He murmured to himself some last words.

"In war's haunting grip, A mother's warmth, love's courage, Memory's last breath."

Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit.

In the depths of his memory, Alex finally found what he was looking for—a ethereal being with his outline, his features, his strengths and weaknesses, with the same history, yet with a firm ambition and unwavering resolution.

The specter stood still, like a mannequin posing in a store. Its ethereal appearance might make you think it wasn't really there, that it could be a reflection.

Alex stretched out his hand, and when it was close to touching the specter, it turned its head to look at him and suddenly grabbed his arm, pulling him towards itself, completely absorbing Alex's consciousness.

For a brief moment in this world, Alex was dead.

He finally opened his eyes, emitting a kind of crimson mist around them.

Who emerged from death was not Alex himself but a hidden aspect of him, a facet of himself that he had kept suppressed.

The first thing he did as soon as he woke up was to reignite his own life force and reactivate his entire body in an excessively fast way.

The three great protectors, as well as the Eldritch to a greater extent, noticed a sudden change in Alex. And though they were in a fierce competition to dominate the aura and the domain of the other, the four beings diverted a bit of their attention to look in that direction.

The spectral Alex began to build an iconic ability from his conscious part, the Ashen Bastion. However, unlike how he used the ability instinctively, the spectral one started in a much slower and more conscious way.

At first, the chest area illuminated with a crimson glow as the initial phase, Oath, was constructed. Slowly, it expanded through his upper body as it progressed to the next level, Honor, and then completed with his lower body, circulating all the way back and finishing at his head to close the circle and complete the Path of Ashes.

At this point, Alex's body had undergone a noticeable physical change visible to the naked eye. Not only did it glow and emit a strange crimson mist, but his body had gone through a sudden growth process and then readjusted, leaving behind a chiseled and sculpted physique.

He slowly rose from the ground and began to remove his armor piece by piece. Once finished, he started walking towards the battle site while still building his ability, this time creating the Ashen Bastion. It expanded from his body to create a kind of exo-armor that emerged from his own body and solidified from his crimson mist.

But he didn't stop there and began to create the next levels of the same ability, breaking by far the capacity his body could withstand and drastically increasing his powers, managing to break through the fourth phase of elemental fusion and the next two: Elemental Mastery and Union.

The three guardians had no idea what was happening, but the Eldritch could sense what would happen next and began to try to disengage from the fight against the three beasts momentarily to deal with the human.

"Now attack," the great black dragon gave the order the moment he detected a slight hint of the Eldritch shifting its attention.

The battle between the four began to intensify, and Alex simply advanced towards the portal, increasing his own power more and more.

"What are you trying to do, human? Get away before you die," the griffin shouted.

The great griffin was genuinely concerned for the human's health, who had shown up to help the forest in the fight against the invaders. Therefore, she genuinely respected him and hoped he would survive this event.

However, this did not deter the human in the slightest.

Alex finally gathered enough power to jump to the next level and reach a power above that of the Alphas who led the siege. His body began to morph and become ethereal, resembling more and more the spectral Alex he had seen in his mind, making half of his aura turn into a dirty violet color.

At this point, his own presence was able to negate the curses and blessings of those present. This implied that, in some way, he interfered with their ability to channel the energy of the three guardians.

None of them got angry or upset with him, however, because even though it affected them, the one who took the worst part was the Eldritch—more specifically, the portal that kept the Eldritch in this plane was weakening rapidly.

Again, the horror tried to attack the human, and although this time it was even willing to let the others land a solid blow on it, the black dragon reaffirmed his belief that the human was the key and blocked the Eldritch's path with his own body.

When the spectral Alex reached the vicinity of the portal, the Eldritch made an unexpected decision.

For the three guardians, the Eldritch was a creature completely out of their league. The only reason they could keep it at bay was that the reality of this world naturally suppressed it. Additionally, it wasn't present with its main body but rather through a vessel. Under normal circumstances, they would have already defeated the vessel, but this time, a vessel had merged with a portal, allowing it to borrow power from its main body.

In this way, the guardians knew they could defeat it; it was more a matter of when than how, as the Eldritch wouldn't risk too much since there wasn't much to gain from this situation.

However, the previous reasoning did not prevent the Eldritch from risking a large portion of its power and some mystical objects for a chance to launch a single devastating blow in Alex's direction.

The Eldritch reshaped one of its countless tentacles into a large mouth and spat out a ball of ectoplasm. Witnessing the attack coming his way, the spectral Alex, far from refusing the challenge, responded with an attack of his own, conjuring a great sword and launching two cuts that carried a large amount of ash aura.

However, the spectral Alex's attack didn't end there. Immediately afterward, he launched into a fierce charge and struck again, this time directed at the portal, shattering it immediately.

The Eldritch immediately felt its connection severed and knew it had made a grave mistake by investing so much to annihilate a human.

The three great beasts, although extremely surprised, did not waste a moment to besiege the Eldritch. Previously, they knew it could escape at any moment, leaving them empty-handed no matter how much effort they put into the fight. Now, however, there was a great loot to be taken right in front of them, all thanks to the human, and even though they didn't know him at all and, under normal circumstances, would be extremely worried about having someone of such level nearby while they fought another being, they somehow trusted him.

For his part, Alex could now feel a variety of presences nearby that did not match anyone he had seen before. One in particular was surrounded by a dense amount of curses. However, before he could do anything, he began to have problems with his body.

Once again, he had exceeded himself, surpassing by much each time he had punished his body. This time, he had performed forbidden rituals to extract more power, and the consequences of his actions would be catastrophic for many more people than he would know once he woke up from his spectral form.