In the eyes of the humans and the creatures of the gaps, the Defilers they were fighting against all of a sudden had some kind of golden glow around their bodies, and the Defilers in front of them either dropped dead suddenly, or had their abilities limited and their movements restrained. Most of them did not know what happened, nor did they care - because simply, the most important thing right now was to take advantage of this change and slay as many Defilers as possible.

But in the eyes of Tze Cha and Xyn, they could clearly see what happened - and they could already tell what was about to happen. The golden shadow of the buddha, instead of simply being a moving construct of energy, also had translucent golden chains connected the backs of the heads of many of the monks and exorcists to the right arm of its right arm. After the fist strike, the translucent golden chains were broken off from the monks and exorcists, and were then “transferred” to the orb itself and created a thin membrane around it, with new chains extending out and connecting to all of the Defilers on the battlefield. Even the Defilers that came out from the dark orb after the strike, when they ran or flew through the thin membrane, had a similar chain connected to it.

Tze Cha’s two tired and bloodied eyes glowed in a pale, gray light, and he lifted up his head to the sky and let out a high roar. Several bolts of completely black lightning were released from this roar, and a few of the Defilers around him were struck in the faces or backs without even a chance to escape. Almost at the same time, Xyn raised his translucent gray scythe, and slashed it down at one of the mid tier Defiler coming his way.

The initial targets of these attacks were incinerated and destroyed right on the spot. But unlike their previous attacks, whose destruction and power just spread out into the air and space around, mostly undirected and in a random fashion, the powers and energy in these attacks became concentrated and was transmitted through the golden chains as if they were electric currents flowing through wires. The attacks were redirected to the thin membrane, then were spread out towards at least a few dozen other mid tier Defilers present. Like fireworks, these mid tier Defilers exploded from within into pieces, spreading their blood and body pieces all over the battlefield.

After a successful strike like this, Tze Cha and Xyn exchanged looks - it did not take long or much effort for beings of their level to say pretty much anything to each other, but they still stayed where they were for a very short moment without any agreement beforehand, as a sign of respect for the monks and exorcists.

Right now, the chanting monks were still chanting, and the exorcists were still trying their best to unleash as powerful attacks as they could, but at the same time, their bodies was starting to become transparent, starting from their hands and feet, and then it just grew to their torsos. They did not seem to be in pain, nor did they seem to be in distress, if anything they seemed in a hurry to hurl out attacks and expend every last drop of their energy.

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“The chains of karma, and their names, it’s really that cruel, isn’t it?” Tze Cha asked, in a semi-mocking and semi-revering tone.

“They did more than him. And they were willing while aware.” Xyn sighed: “At first I did not believe him when he told me that there would be beings, much less humans, who were fully aware of the consequence and were willing to risk and even sacrifice their names and fate for this fight, effectively their chances to proceed to higher positions of this world and leave their legacies in it, I did not believe him.”

“You were too cynical for it as well?”

“No - I - I did not believe that they would be willing to do so without a present and guiding god above them.”

This was but a brief exchange, after which Xyn and Tze Cha continued with their attacks - the chains connecting the Defilers to the thin membrane was the construct of the sacrifice from the humans they once despised - it was a powerful spell constructed from the “repurposed” chain of karma and names from the willing monks and exorcists, which effectively chained all the Defilers that came out of the dark orb together, forcing them to share a temporary name, and thus share some of the fate that would befall them.

This spell would be effective and somewhat cruel, to any normal entity that might end up on the receiving end. If an entity had a firm grasp on its name, or had its name held by a much more powerful entity, then this spell wouldn’t have much effect on it. But as it seemed to both Tze Cha and Xyn, these Defilers didn’t have names - they didn’t even have paths of their own, which meant that the spell had been casted on a group of targets it would be especially effective against.

The portal opened by Xyn continued to spin in its place with a group of powerful creatures of the gaps guarding it, and after a series of quick flashes and flickering, groups of elite fighters in various shapes and sizes rushed out from it and charged at the Defilers with spells and elemental weapons in their hands, claws and tentacles. These are the elite soldiers of the elementals, the Fog Dwellers and even a few Depth Dwellers.

“They’re here.” The heavily wounded Nameless and Pei standing back to back, with their energy concentrated on their hands, and their bodies slowly fading into nothingness: “Looks like we indeed could stand a chance…”

“What happened?” Xyn grabbed Paulo Chang as he was about to rush into battle.

“The ones that escaped this realm, they attacked the edgelands.” Paulo Chang showed Xyn a glowing wound on his chest and his neck: “Many were injured, some of us fell. But we were able to slay them.”

A flash of memory almost caused Xyn to loosen his grip, but he quickly gathered himself and said: “And the bridges?”

“Damaged, but fixable. None broke through.”

“Good, good… Very good.”