Damien grunted, disoriented, as he was forcefully spat out of space and onto a hard surface. He groaned, turning onto his back. His head ached badly, and he, for the first time in many years, felt like outwardly disposing of everything he'd eaten up to this moment. That... I don't want to experience something like that ever again.

"What... Was that?" He said out loud since his head still ached and he couldn't speak mentally.

[That was a domain.] Gray answered, appearing in Damien's view. [You were rejected out of another's domain.]

Damien, head still spinning, could only groan out, "A what now?"

[A Domain.] Gray repeated, smirking. [Why do you think they're called Spirit Kings?]

"Ahhh. My head's not in the right place for this. I think Solaris did something to me... Keilan, can you help me up please?"

Damien frowned when he received no reply, so he tried again. "Kei?"

[Damien... I'm so sorry.]

That was when it hit him. His brother was gone. Keilan was in danger. Damien stood up so fast he staggered into a tree. "We need to find him!"

[Damien, stop! You aren't in any shape to be worrying about anybody else right now!]

But Damien wouldn't listen. His brother was in mortal danger, and he didn't even know where he was. That thought immediately flung his imagination down a negative spiral as he worried about what Keilan must be going through right now. Scenarios of Keilan with his arms and legs cut off flash through his mind. And when that didn't seem to terrify him much, more images began to pour into his mind. Keilan being spiritually tortured, with his unknown torturers using unknown means to pierce through the physical layer and into the Spiritual to slowly mutilate his brother. He knew how painful a minor spiritual injury could be, and the thought of Keilan being slowly carved into pieces sent his thoughts down the deeper end.

He panicked, summoning his spear as he prepared to tear through space to find his brother. Even if he didn't know where Keilan was, someone would know, and the world would pay should anything happen to his brother.

[Damien stop!] Gray's voice slammed into his mind, making him stagger. Still, he didn't slow down. Damien spread out his senses, pushing through the mental pain as he tried to find a tiny location where space was fragile and easy to break through. His senses brushed through the location he'd just arrived in, finding the spatial cracks already healed.

Finding nothing fragile enough for him to pierce through, he began making preparations to bludgeon open space, fragile or not.

[Damien, I said STOP!] This time, Gray's voice managed to slow him down. His annoyance bled through, and he was about to continue when Gray's next words finally stopped him. [You're in danger! Can't you see that we're being surrounded!]

And as if he was being dowsed with frozen water, Damien's senses revved into action, immediately sharpening and catching the irregularities in his surroundings.

The first thing he took notice of was the mist. A dark and extremely dense mist had begun to slowly creep into the woods. Already, he knew he was already surrounded. And as the mist became denser and denser, his perception was slowly pushed back by.

Damien immediately went into combat mode, his spear snapping into a defensive position as he finally became an island in a sea of mist.

"Shadow Hall." It didn't even take much to guess.

[Shadow Hall.] Gray repeated. [I assume this was the trap all along. Solaris couldn't fight you while also dealing with the others, so he found a way to keep you occupied.]

Damien couldn't help it, he chuckled. "I was beginning to wonder why Shadow Hall suddenly gave up on me. I mean... They're renowned for completing a contract within a few days of receiving it, and mine has still been up for at least a month now."

[Well, now they've come and I'll advise you to clear your head of any distractions and focus on this battle. You won't be helping anyone if you're dead.]

Damien agreed. "If Solaris thinks a mere Mist wielder is going to hold me down for long," Damen growled. "He's going to be sorely let down."

[Hold your horses there, Damien. It seems you aren't still thinking straight. Do you think Solaris would be foolish enough to send a single assassin against you?] And then Gray did something to his perception— Up'd it somehow— and like a lamp switch, his senses were able to bypass the mist, only a little, but it was enough. And what he caught immediately turned his mood somber.

Hanging from a tree to his right, on one of its highest branches, was a cloaked figure with a bow and an arrow pointed at him. He couldn't get the color of the cloak but he didn't need that to figure out that the figure was a Shadow Hall assassin.

Another tree to his left took the weight of another figure in a cloak, but this one wasn't wielding a bow, but a spear. Below the figure stood another with twin daggers in their gloved hands. This one was somehow different, standing with their waist cocked to one side and their body angled forward in a predatory manner. He took in their appearance and immediately identified them as a female.

Another figure appeared behind him—still inside the mist. They were cloaked like the rest and held a staff in their hands. Damien might have had some guesses as to the affinities of the earlier ones, but this one came up null. They were probably extremely adept at holding back their passive aura. What he did notice, though, was how the distance between him and the figure seemed to flicker, going from short to long in a flipped instant. One moment, they were close enough for his spear to reach; the next, they were so far out of his reach that it would take multiple burst steps to reach them.

[That's a Space wielder.] Gray said just as Damen figured it out.

Inwardly, he cursed his bad luck. Having a group of assassins surrounding him was one thing, but a space user being one of them now put him in a world of trouble. Now, he'd have to be careful of how far he stretched.

[We have a Nature wielder, a mind Wielder, a shadow wielder, and a space wielder.] Gray said, an orange arrow pointing at the assassins consecutively. [Now where's the mist wielder?]

"They should be deeper in. Since they're the ones keeping me boxed in, it stands to reason that they'll have to keep themself safe. However, I believe that once this fight starts, they'll eventually have to make themselves known. Both they and the space wielder are probably responsible for the spatial lockdown keeping me in. Once one is dead, the other won't be able to keep me locked in again."

'And then i'd be free to look for Keilan.' He didn't say that part out loud.

[That's one thing, though you'll have to find a way to deal with the rest. A full cadre isn't going to be easy.]

"Yeah..." Damien murmured. "Makes me afraid of what the second team is up to."

[Be thankful that you don't have to deal with two.] Gray scolded. [Now, they still think you're unaware of their exact numbers, this should give you a good opportunity to get ahead. The outcome of this fight will be determined by how it starts.]

Damien agreed wholeheartedly. However, instead of feeling good that he was having to deal with a single cadre instead of two, he still couldn't help the nervousness that was slowly creeping in at the missing enemies. In situations like this, it was better to keep your enemies at eye distance.

While Damien would have loved to begin this fight with the death of the space Wielder, he knew how impracticable that would be compared to his imagination. Not only could they conjure up some space weirdness to slow him down, but they could simply just locally teleport away, which would give away Damien's hand and set the other down on him in an instant.

Now, he had the upper hand, so he had to make good use of it. The choice was somewhat complex, so he simply selected out those that would take him a while to deal with.

The mind wielder, unique In the sense that their ilks never bothered to come within melee distance of their opponent, always preferring to hammer at the mind from a distance, was cut off. Though they might be weak physically, Damien didn't doubt that they could still manage to hammer him one before he got too close. Besides, he had the shadow wielder who was standing below the tree. She'd definitely catch him long before he could so much as smell the mind Wielder's perfume.

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The Nature wielder was out of the question. While he'd also have liked to remove the archer since they were likely to be a pain in the ass, Damien considered the distance. By the time he crossed the distance between them, he'd be riddled with at least half a dozen arrows. He also knew that a spatial step towards them would instantly be sensed by the Space wielder, which would definitely undo his entire planning since they could probably contend with him for dominion over space. Damien wasn't a space Wielder, so he knew he'd undoubtedly lose in that department.

Eventually, it all came down to the Shadow Wielder. He reasoned that, while she was certainly agile, Damien believed he could catch her off guard if he timed it right. While hopping through the air at the physically weak mind wielder would have been expected, outright going for one of the strongest melee fighters was something they'd definitely not see coming. Besides, the shadow, to his knowledge, had nothing that could physically impede him.

[Good luck.]

Damien gathered all his strength, focusing everything on his feet, and in a burst of speed that cracked the sound barrier, he dashed to the left.

The lady, extremely agile that she was, would certainly have had a high perception, so she quickly got wind of his true direction the moment he moved, but by then it was already too late.

His spear came down on her in a vertical slash, aimed at bisecting her from head to toe. Unfortunately, she was fast enough to move out of the way, but not wholely.

Seeing the lady with her left arm missing, blood spurting out of the shoulder stump like a burst pipe, Damien finally realized one thing: there was no healer. He'd been so worried about being overwhelmed that he didn't stop to consider the situation his attackers would be getting themselves into by attacking him. While people of their realm could certainly heal and regrow an amputated limb, it usually took time and a massive amount of energy. They definitely couldn't do that while still in the middle of a battle.

Damien sensed the others moving at him, so he quickly took advantage of his luck. He gritted his teeth as he forced through the mental hammer that soon slammed into his mind, coming out the other side toward the retreating shadow wielder.

Retreating, she didn't do anything to stem her wounds, fully focused on putting distance between them. Damien didn't let her.

From his body erupted three conjured stars, flashing towards the retreating shadow assassin. She dodged the first one, used her working hand to deflect the second—not without suffering some fractures—and then her luck ran out when the third star impacted her left leg, blowing it clean off.

Unfortunately for him, he didn't get to finish her before she was quickly teleported away, replaced with the form of the archer as she quickly released a single arrow that split into two, then four, then six. By the time the arrows were already within a few feet from him, they'd already multiplied into a dozen.

Damien didn't stop to block.

He stepped forward, his foot cracking through space. He was already prepared for the space wielder to mess with space. And surely, that was what happened. Damien felt space resist him as he tried to teleport, so he didn't fight back, saving his already lessening mental strength. He wove to the side, pushing his body to its limits. And though he dodged most of the projectiles, a couple managed to impact him. Luckily, they didn't impact any of his exposed part, slamming into his armoured chest.

Damien grunted from the force of the arrows, finding himself carried through the air and then slammed into a tree, breaking it and crashing into another. He went like that for a few seconds, breaking half a dozen trees, before he finally slammed into a tree that managed to hold him.

He was already up before he knew he knew it, lucky enough to move away before another flurry of arrows reduced the tree to cinders. He didn't get a moment to breath as another attack slammed into him. Damien grunted, staggering as the mental equivalent of a sledgehammer crashed into his mind.

'that mind wielder has to go'

He knew his mental ward, quivering as it was, couldn't take much more of that, so he resolve to remove the mind wielder from this fight. It didn't take them much to notice his next victim as Damien immediately changed direction from the rock he'd been planning on taking cover in to the mind wielder.

Now, Damien couldn't see their face because of the hooded cloak they were wearing, but he'd like to imagine their eyes widening as they saw him dash for them. A spear in his right hands, Damien fired out a breath of destruction from his left, bisecting the trees on its path as it sped towards his victim. As planned, the space Wielder interfered, elongating the space between his spear and the mind wielder.

Damien didn't mind; that already proved a part of the theory building up in his mind. Knowing his attack would soon sputter out due to the distance, he threw his spear. Now the space Wielder had two things to deal with. Either they left the breath attack to stop the spear, or they left the spear to soar towards its destination.

They chose neither.

Damien watched his spear slow down as the influence of space constrained it. Now Damien knew his spear couldn't be forcefully teleported because of its metaphysical weight, but that that didn't exempt it from succumbing to some space shenanigans as the distance was increased again. He didn't mind, and this time he conjured a dozen star falls, raining them down at the mind wielder.

Finally, he saw the limit of the space manipulation. In slowed down time, he watched the space Wielder choose between three attacks, all of which were deadly to the someone with such a frail physique as a mind wielder.

Again, the space Wielder choose neither, and like a rock breaking, Damien felt space slowly crack as the mind wielder was being moved.

And like a controlled projectile, Damien changed direction.

All this while as he'd been running and avoiding the techniques flying at him, Damien hadn't forgotten his first goal: to remove the shadow wielder. He'd made sure to at least be within burst distance of her, but because of the space wielder he couldn't afford to get much closer.

Now as the space wielder saw him speed towards the shadow lady who was on the floor, bleeding from two amputated limbs, they had two choices to pick from: either they chose to save the mind wielder, who was basically still whole and filled with energy, or they could save the Shadow wielder who was missing two limbs and a quarter of her energy which were already being drained just to heal a single limb.

The choice wasn't hard to make.

Damien's fist, coated in a not-so-small amount of destruction essence, came down on the lady's head with shattering force. There was a dull crack, like a something about to break, and then like a burst melon, her head exploded in blood and brain matter.

'One down.'

Damien stood up, not calmly, since about two dozen arrows were already whistling towards him. He clenched down on his stomach at the smell of internal matter smeared all over his body. No matter how many times he'd seen and done this, somehow, he couldn't get rid of the same reaction he'd always had since he was a kid. Gore was disgusting.

It seemed the death of one of their numbers suddenly lighted a candle on the reality of what this was. Damien was not one to be underestimated. Despite their numbers, they could still die.

They attacked him in force.

The concept of time slowly bled off as Damien found himself assaulted from all sides. He ran from a rain of arrows while having to weather another mind attack. Surprisingly, the mind wielder immediately came into melee range, their spear against Damien's. At first, he thought the assassin's ego had finally gotten to them and they'd made a grave mistake, but after he tried to retaliate, he realized what was happening.

Anytime he tried to strike at the mind wielder, he somehow found the distance between his spear and his opponent elongating, widening till he either had to pull back or risk over extending himself. But when the other person did the same, the opposite seemed to happen, as he then found space contracting, shortening the distance between his body and his opponent spear.

Damien, already getting frustrated, tried to fire off another flurry of star falls, but just as he thought to do it, another mental attack slammed into him, breaking of his concentration. So Damien improvised.

He spun into a roundhouse kick, and while he was still in the air, spinning, his leg aimed at the mind wielder, he twisted a little, angling his spear towards the space wielder and then he threw.

Now, having witnessed deadly attacks aimed at their comrades, Damien assumed they were already inured to things like this and would not panic when they eventually became the focus of an attack. But no, that was not what happened.

Damien could practically smell the fear radiating off of the space wielder as his spear sped towards them. Seeing that they couldn't move his spear, they decided to move themselves. And in that brief moment of panic, they lost their concentration on space.

Like a rope suddenly being loosened, Damien felt his body free up, fresh air entering his lungs. And then his feet slammed into the shoulder of the mind wielder.

Apparently, Damien had overestimated the physique of the wielder, as he'd been expecting them to at least survive such an attack. He didn't doubt they wouldn't come out without a serious injury, but atleast he expected them to survive.

Landing, he looked down on the torn body of the man? Now that his hood had been removed, Damien saw that it was a man. His foot had torn through the shoulder sideways down and deep into the middle torso, leaving the man to fall dead in an almost divided form.

Damien blinked, suddenly feeling his head clear, the headaches slowly receding. With widening eyes, he looked down on the small circle they were all standing in, taking in the presence of a formation that had been subtly diverted from his attention all this while.

He looked up, catching the space and nature wielder who were now standing close to each other, a third figure appearing between them.

The space wielder snapped their fingers, and then Damien found himself somewhere else. He felts something clamp down on him and he looked down, finding all his limbs enclosed with mighty chains that ran down the floor and into the mist shrouded distance.

The room he was in was dark and filled with barely seen moving roots that slowly began twirling up his legs. Already, he was feeling something being injected into his body.

But none of this really stuck in his mind.

What Damien was really thinking of was Keilan. His brother was going through some form of extreme torture and here he was, shackled, and slowly drained of his strength. He was being taken away from his brother. Keilan was going die and Damien was too weak to do anything about it.

Through blurry eyes Damien caught sight of the latest arrival pull out something from his cloak. A lamp? The thing looked like a lamp but radiated a powerful amount of mental energy, more than a single Spirit lord could generate without draining themselves multiple times.

Something slammed into his mind and his mental shield broke open like an egg. Damien sagged, feeling his vision darkening.

Gray's voice came in then, audible at first but soon began quickly fading. [Damien! Don't let go! Hold on to me! Damien...]

But Damien was already gone.

And then something else took over.