Legend Of The Holy Sentinels - Night Hunters 21 Artemus's Surprise

"We're here as agreed so I implore you now, for the last time, deactivate your Amplifyers immediately," pleaded Reus to the ama.s.sing rebels some fifty feet from him. He is at a wide gra.s.sy plain somewhere a hundred miles northwest of the Northern Encampment trying to reason with the rebel group allegedly responsible for ambushing merchants harvesting rare herbs along the mountain range. "No one wants to get hurt here. We have been more than patient in giving in on your demands! All we want is a peaceful resolution to this conflict."

It is halfway till dawn at the negotiation site. They can smell the cool salty seas all around the thick fog they are in. The freezing breeze doesn't even help cool down the tension as demonstrated by Reus' cold sweat dribbling down his cheeks rolling down to his chin.

The Prince is wearing an impressive Battlegear worthy of a Nagozulian General: Golden plated vest with the Nagozulian Army insignia; black gloves with plated knuckles; a smooth silver helm showing his face still with his circular spectacles askew; black silk pants with steel knee protectors and a pair of silver plated steel boots. Still, with his formal attire in place, he carries his lumpy brown leather sling bag.

Behind him are nine strike teams consisting of five members each just standing in antic.i.p.ation. The Nagozulian Strike Teams are known for their elemental masteries, sothey require no weapons at all. They are also famous for their ten-minute handling time in disabling and pacifying any requested target making them very efficient and deadly but today they are just standing, awaiting Reus's order to strike. They all wear dark color coordinated Salakot identifying their elemental innates with the edges of the silver-plated base extending to level their brows, all wearing masks revealing only their serious piercing eyes. Each strike teams consist of two Casters, a Windblower, a Firestarter and a Molder, all of whom has their activated Amplifyers attached on their silver vests, lighting the plains as if they are torches placed as a totem.

Beside Reus is an unusual strike team of excessively muscled Daomagarians which are all wearing masks depicting gruesome and frightful molds of faces that have horns and fangs. They came from the Maskara Clan and they specialize on guarding a target with their monstrous strength and their almost impenetrable skin using the Deep Root as their clan's mastery. They are all standing six feet tall, breathing the crisp cold air without moving, emitting thick continuous smoke from their terrifying deep breaths. They are all grasping the hilt of their humongous swords with blades as big as a man that are planted on the ground half-buried, sleeping in the stillness of the night, waiting to be called upon to lay waste if need be.

"We do not take orders from you pigs!" shouted the apparent leader of the rebel wearing a red leather vest with his ruby Amplifyer burning bright, floating on his right side. "Especially from a kid like you! Do you expect me to turn all my men to you without any fight, you filthy swine!"

"Come on! Be reasonable!" Reus shouted, "We outnumber you all two to one. We don't want to hurt you. We just want to talk."

"Hurt us?" he snickered almost insulting him, "We surround you two to one! Deactivate your Amplifyers and WE would not hurt YOU!"

Reus looked behind him and was surprised to see illuminating fireflies of Amplifyers activating one after another with silhouettes of rebels walking to surround them. The commander of the Nagozulian Strike Team went close to Reus and whispered, "My Lord, they have deceived us. Should I signal to eliminate them all?"

"No," he whispered, "Goodness, no! No blood should be spilled in these lands."

"But your safety is our utmost duty."

"Don't worry about me, Major, or yourselves for that matter. I will protect us all."

"Hey kid!" shouted the rebel leader, "You are the son of that Artemus smug, right?"

Reus just looked at him straight in the eye activating his rare white diamond illuminating an area around his soldiers. He kneeled down on the moist ground closing his eyes.

"Oh, I see! You want to forfeit your lives, right? Well we can grant your prayers!"

"Sir," the commander persisted as the rebels charged their Amplifyers illuminating the fields as bright as day, "shall we maneuver a counterattack?"

"No, group your men closer to me," he instructed confident, "I'll be handling this myself. I have something special in mind. Please do tell your men to burn their Amplifyers to a maximum when I give the order."

The commander's eyes were filled with doubt, anxious to attack, but nodded to accept the order and then scurried of to meet all the Strike Team captains.

He smiled as he directed his attention now to the leader of the Maskara Strike Team on his left side who's wearing a frightful demon mask with long canine teeth soaked in red ink. "General Enro, I may need your help after all..."

Enro, known as the feared Bloodfang - who is recognized for his legendary mastery of the Deep Root skill that can stand the punch of even the strongest Daomagar, looked at his comrades that understood him right away as they lined up behind him. He then pulled his unusually blue-colored crystalline long sword the size of a man and feigned them for a couple of strikes in the air which the others did with theirs as if getting warmed up.

"Just remember," Reus a.s.serted with a friendly tone seeing his excitement with his impossibly huge crystal sword, "Please do not dismember them. We need only to disable them without so much as injuring them permanently. Do not let them enter my territory until I finish my ritual. Use any skill necessary but please do be careful with your strength."

The Maskara General just grunted in disappointment as he pushed his gigantic sword on the ground once more and stretched his arms giving the others the signal. They immediately obeyed the order and circled around to protect the huddling strike teams around Reus, standing on five major openings around them.

A white illuminating umbrella surrounded them forming like a dome housing the Nagozulian party. It stretched more than two hundred fifty feet in diameter and a hundred feet high with Reus at the center. This white energy field lighted the whole fields turning it as bright as a summer's day, robbing everyone inside it with elemental capabilities. This frightened the Nagozulian Strike Teams inside the dome creating a chatter of worry and fear as their Amplifyer's light began to dissipate one by one.

"Do not fret!" a.s.sured Reus now floating at the center with his whole body radiating with white light, "You're all safe with me!"

"You ARE the son of Artemus!" shouted the leader laughing thinking he has the upper hand. "Kill them all but capture the Son of Artemus alive!"

Within a matter of seconds, a bombardment of fire elemental energies hurled at the dome-like energy field in all angles. The Nagozulian Strike Team members flinched as they thought they are about to get scorched helplessly from all directions but was surprised to see the white energy eating the fire away, absorbing its power as if a sponge thirsty for water. The resulting heat from the fire explosions caused the fields to burn but not within Reus's magnificent territory that remained pristine - with its cool temperature and its green gra.s.s all safe inside. The Strike Teams watched standing, some smiling, as the rebels threw at them pitiful elemental techniques that some thought to be quite powerful and yet did not even penetrate even an inch of their protective barrier. Even the explosive forces of impact cannot be felt inside the White Dome. Wind, water and earth techniques are now being thrown at them endlessly creating a deafening noise on that early morning and yet they are still there, still watching with happy eyes as if inviting more fury to their enemies.

For about ten minutes, the continuing barrage did not stop until they saw Reus's white dome turn bigger and bigger moving inch by inch as if growing from all the energy it has been eating.

The Rebel Commander noticed this, sohe ordered all of his men to ready their weapons to a charge. The rebels did so, shouting as they unsheathe their weapons, but did not, at all, touch the white line that separates them. The Maskara Strike Team began dashing at the edges and as soon as one would get near Reus's magnificent territory, they would open their palms and start to throw the would-be attacker away at least ten feet either knocking them out or making them squirm in pain curling on the ground almost crying.

"Now!" Reus shouted giving the order to his commander which he obeyed almost instantaneously, pa.s.sing the directive to his captains.

The Nagozulian Strike Teams began concentrating their Amplifyers burning it bright as Reus s.n.a.t.c.hes it away, absorbing it making his Amplifyer glow brighter even more.

"That's why they call him the Sun Stealer..." mumbled the commander almost smiling in his ahmoment seeing Reus touch the ground finishing his ritual. The white radiating beams coming from his diamond Amplifyer pulsated ten blinding bursts and then he exploded robbing all lights from everyone leaving the whole expense of the fields pitch black.

"General Reus," whispered the commander almost afraid, "What shall we do?"

"Relax, commander," said a deep voice echoing from everywhere, "All of you, stay where you are. We'll be wrapping this up with a ribbon in no time."

The Nagozulian Strike Team is known for their supreme tactical intelligence, unparalleled brazen persona and their near-suicidal attack styles that are unmatched but if there's one thing that the impressive Strike Teams fear, it is not ghosts neither powerful enemies nor death, it is to be placed in an unknown state robbing them with their capacity to act and do something about their situation. These situations gives them a state of helplessness which renders them to be mentally, emotionally and physically distressed - after all, they have been training to become immensely proficient in the field of combat and yet being incompetent in the battle grounds lingers in their minds giving them a frightful chill. That's what they are experiencing now as they try to kneel down readying to strike on the cold damp ground hearing the rebels screaming and shouting and crying.

They can see their own bodies as if being illuminated by the sun, even though it is night at that time, but they cannot see what's beyond their bodies. They can touch and hear their team members murmuring on their sides, but they cannot see them. This is true with the others as they confirm what they are experiencing. Though they see some light blinking as if appearing from one place to another everywhere, still this didn't give them comfort - it only adds to the stress they are feeling.

Being acquainted with the unknown really isn't their strong suit as members of the prestigious Nagozulian Strike Team. They should know all there is to know that's why they are so proficient and yet this surprise seems to give them an unwanted experience they don't want to remember, so they just waited in agitation for the duration of Reus's unusual skill to last in hopes that their safety and that of their comrades is not compromised in their ineffective state.

In about more or less seven minutes, the black void suddenly crept away, dissolving into a mist releasing everyone out of that depressive bondage. The Nagozulian Strike Team immediately organized and activated their Amplifyers once more as they search out for the enemy and found them lying face down all lined up and apparently asleep. They are neatly organized in tens as if they are tally sticks amounting to a hundred and twenty-seven. Their hands are bound with rope all connected to the shackle found on their heels.

"General Reus!?" shouted the commander searching for their missing bulwark prince. He then ordered the captains to create a scouting party while they ready to transport the fugitives.

-------ooO0Ooo-------

"I thought I felt your presence there," grinned Reus behind a man all dressed in white with hands crossed, "I don't want to show off, but I have to show it to you somehow. I mean, I was planning on doing something less stressful, something simple, but I have to make an impression."

"Indeed," Artemus whispered without looking back as he watched the commander down the hill almost eight hundred feet away, "You sure know how to make a grand impression but I thought you're going to need a hand there."

"I completely have it under control. I intentionally kept on giving in on their demands for them to lure their comrades out in the open. It's better to capture one hundred twenty-seven of them instead of just a handful twenty, right?"

"But still, that's a risky move. Just don't be too c.o.c.ky in the near future. Sometimes a complicated solution can backfire and turn into a dreadful complication, especially if you have the lives of your command at stake."

"Yes father. My success is a collaborative effort so I can't take all the credit." He went near his father looking down too as the huddled soldiers secured the prisoners for transport with the commander still clueless and relentless in his search for him, "I had help from the strike team and your favorite Maskara Strike Force."

"I didn't know one can suck away the energy from the Amplifyers as a means of obtaining energy. I didn't even know you can rob away all the light and bend it to your will. That is a new trick you taught me here - though I think I wouldn't be able to replicate your wonderful technique with my miniscule Life Elemental essence."

"Well, I didn't come up with that. A little bird told me the nature of Light Energies."

Artemus smiled and tapped his son, "A certain little bird dog?"

Reus was surprised and was about to ask when he interrupted him turning away.

"Well," he said wearing his flat cap fixing his hair, "It'll be morning soon. You better go and fix the situation there. I have an appointment at first light, and I don't want to be late. Good job son," he congratulated looking back with happy eyes, "Every day you make me proud." And he blinked disappearing into the night like a star, leaving Reus alone smiling wide feeling confident as ever.

-------ooO0Ooo-------

The freezing wind rushes strong as if pushing back the traveling party of three, preventing them from going further on their path to the Shrine of Bakunawa. Prodea is leading the group striding with her famous red cloak together with Zeba and Karr on her sides.

A hundred flying needles came rushing through the woods beside the road jolting the Daomagarian bodyguard to quickly release his large claymore on his back, swinging it to deflect the reflecting pins. He then immediately pulled Prodea and Zeba to his back as a shadow appeared in front of him making his way on the foggy curtains of the horizon. The figure wears a black hood, with a mask covering his face only revealing the murderous look on his shining red eyes filled with malice. He's wearing his famous trench coat walking without a sound.

"Impressive," the shadow greeted with a deep voice almost sounding like an adolescent kid, "Now that I know you're not like the others, we might as well get on to the exciting portion of this engagement."

The mysterious silhouette pulled a foot-long dagger on his back and feigned it in the air with his left hand. The surprisingly odd dagger did not have any reflection at all, but this does not frighten Karr. He does not fear how he could turn his weapon pitch black like the daggers of the famous Sibara a.s.sa.s.sins. What bothered him was how this unique dagger did not produce any sound at all, not even the slightest vibration metals emit when pulled from its sheathe. This brought him to simulate different kinds of scenario on how he could antic.i.p.ate the impossible attacks he might give as he tightly grasps the hilt of his extensive claymore still fixated on the glaring red eyes of the murderous shadow.

Prodea moved behind him and quickly attacked the figure with multiple a.s.saults of fire, water and wind elemental attacks that are surprisingly powerful and lit the roads bright for about twenty seconds creating a deafening uproar of explosions. Zeba smiled for a while clapping her hands in excitement seeing the marvelous display of high-level elemental attacks but Karr did not feel any different. He just stood there in complete focus with his serious eyes growing even more concerned.

"That ought to do it," she sneered with her smug att.i.tude as she clasps her hands feeling satisfied. "I thought that Yiv character presents an inkling of a challenge..."

As Prodea started to step ahead, she was blocked with Karr's humongous arms pushing her back again on his sides.

"I'm sorry Prodea," the shadow murmured kneeling on the ground that has been etched with white circular symbols, "You're not the only one who can borrow powers from Mother Earth."

He then showed a cracked white pearl from his palms and flicked it with his middle finger aiming at Prodea's forehead which Karr instantaneously caught just in time. The force could've rendered a wide hole on her head but that didn't frighten Prodea. She puts her complete trust to Karr's impressive skills.

Karr gave the cracked pearl for Prodea to investigate which she did almost fastidiously taking it out of his palms without stopping.

"The Aegis of Ana'giel..." she murmured almost with fright moving close to Karr's back after inspecting the broken bead off from his bodyguard. "Do you know what you did!? You incompetent peasant?! You just wasted a very valuable artifact!"

As the shadow stood up, etches of a faint white circular rune began circling him as if being protected by very strong Magicks. Prodea's elemental attacks are of no match for him now. The figure returned his threatening pose with his hands at his sides holding the frightful dagger ready to charge.

"Wait," pleaded Karr, calm as he is always, "What does the Shadow Walker want from us. We didn't do anything wrong?"

"I don't have time for you, brother, and I don't want to eliminate you two. I just want the head of your master whose soul reeks of corruption. Her actions would lead to the demise of the Holy Lands, so she must be executed."

As soon as he was about to make his reb.u.t.tal, the Shadow Walker raced on dashing almost disappearing and in a quarter of a second, he reached them aiming the dagger right through Prodea's neck. Karr antic.i.p.ated this, sohe twirled like a whirlwind displacing his charges, Prodea and Zeba, and the deceptive Yiv.

Yiv stepped back twenty feet away from them. He is now on the other side of the road towards the Palace while they are on the road to the Shrine. This just infuriated Yiv as he switched hands holding his long black dagger now to his right hand and pulling a wide knife from his left boot.

"GO!" shouted Karr without taking his eyes away from the Shadow Walker, "I'll stop him from getting any further."

Yiv's eyes smiled to that statement as he suddenly vanished from his spot. Karr suddenly twirled again with his impossibly long claymore this time creating a ravage from the roads destroying almost ten feet of it throwing the Shadow Stalked back almost cutting his face in half. He had managed to precisely cut through his cloak and his mask. By that time Prodea and Zeba have completely hidden themselves on the flowing dark mist of the night running.

"You have underestimated me, Shadow Walker," he said pulling his claymore to his sides. "You will not be able to kill my charge without getting through me."

"I'm surprised," he said kneeling down, "You truly are one of Talim Clan's finest warriors. Your father would've been very proud."

For a quarter of a second, Karr's eyes flinched as if he pulled a very sensitive matter. The Shadow Walker noticed this as he smirked to continue. "Even Captain Gab would be happy to see you do that impressive technique your father developed just for me. I'm practically honored it has been pa.s.sed to you."

"Don't you dare drag my brother into this!" he shouted angry pulling his sword in his front at a ready.

"You know I am flattered your family has dedicated their lives in improvising techniques just to disrupt my Shadow Step. It's as if your mother and father devoted their remaining life span to counter my special move. Too bad for you I'm going to eliminate you too for knowing such an impressive and useful thing."

"You'll pay for what you did you fiend!"

As Yiv stood up pulling her now useless disguise, her long shiny black hair began to move with the breeze as her lovely face illuminated touching the moonlight revealing her secret ident.i.ty to the dumbfounded bodyguard with wide eyes. She threw it away on the side of the road and fixed her stance.

"Princess Liv?" Karr mumbled seeing her red eyes returning to her rare mesmerizing violet color as if relaxing herself. "You are the Shadow Walker?"

"I'm still surprised you know how to use that skill though," she continued ignoring his baffled expression, "Your father is the only one who perfected that and can counter me when I am communing with Mother Earth. I didn't know he pa.s.sed it on to you before I disposed of him.

"Don't be offended, but I just got to ask. Does anybody know how to do that? I need to a.s.sess if the elimination of your bloodline is viable."

"How!?" he shouted almost breaking his stance in bewilderment ignoring her ravings, "How can you stand deceiving Princess Anagea and Grand Prince Artemus after all they've done for you!? After they have taken you to their home and treated you like their own child!?"

"You're asking all the wrong questions here old timer," she interrupted his reprimanding speech smiling devilishly tilting her head, "You don't have to worry 'bout all those things. Those things are really not of import. What you should worry is your own life. There's a reason I wear my disguise. No one gets to see my face and lived to tell about it."

"I know," he said now determined scratching the earth to draw a line in front of him with his claymore, "There's only one person coming out of this alive... and I intend to be that person."

"That's the spirit!" she replied returning her calm violet hue to red, returning her murderous eyes still disturbingly smiling.

-------ooO0Ooo-------

"Prodea..." whispered Zeba tensed with the situation, "It has been an hour! Karr is still isn't here. What should we do?"

"QUIET YOU!" she hushed shouting trying to meditate creating a large rune summoning circle in the fields just in front of Bakunawa's shrine with all thirty Watercasters praying at the center with their Amplifyers activated to their fullest potential. "Stop pestering me. I have to complete this. If he does die before I finish this, then we all would die from Yiv's hand, soquit complaining."

The summoning circle etched to the ground began illuminating a yellow radiance and that made Prodea smile.

"And now, Zeba," she exclaimed with delight, "watch as I become the ultimate elemental in Nagozul!"

She floated for about forty feet above the skies making all the Casters look at her with awe.

"Cite the spells I gave you!" she commanded to the crowded Casters below her, "Pray deeply in your hearts that I may be granted permanent power..."

The summoning circle below her suddenly exploded with blinding white light. An energy surge began rising to Prodea. Rushing to her are enormous amounts of elemental energies making her bright as the sun illuminating the fields.

Zeba just crouched and squinted as she backed away far to avoid the suffocating release of energy coming out of the earth. The amount of elemental energies being transferred to Prodea made her body shake as if giving off a powerful vibrating pulse making it hard for her to breathe.

After a minute of transference, the light abruptly stopped and Prodea made her landing, touching the ground gently with her Amplifyers in her forehead - ruby, emerald and sapphire - illuminating brightly almost white. She then pulled of her cloak and started to shake off her long hair, cracking her neck stretching, getting ready for her greatest encounter.

"Prodea?" posed Zeba gradually turning greatly concerned, "Where are the Casters?"

"What Casters? We're the only ones here. Plausible deniability, Zeba, plausible deniability."

"Prodea!" she shouted almost angry, "Where are the Casters!?"

"I a.s.similated them. What's the matter? Seriously Zeba, your lack of deductive reasoning is quite astounding. You need not ask where they are."

"You destroyed them all!?"

"NO! Are you absurd!?" she shouted too now insulted, "I trapped their souls to my newly fused Amplifyers to give me power worth thirty elementals! I'm not that mental to just destroy them, minding their lives no importance whatsoever."

"Why did you do that!?" she shouted almost crying seeing the burnt-out grounds that once was the center of the summoning circle.

"How do you suppose I could defeat Bakunawa without this? Besides, they would gladly give their lives to me given any circ.u.mstance. I just utilized their full potentials in the process! Now I am twenty times the Prodea you know... minus some Casters who doesn't really have promising essence."

"What kind of person are you?" she raged teary eyed almost breaking down shaking on the ground.

Prodea went close to her and looked down at her with serious eyes, "The kind of person needed to make you Queen in this pathetic infernal hole we live in. Somebody's got to do what I did and I'm not rooting for you to do this, especially seeing how weak you are." She turned around aiming at the wall and spouted some weird language. She then pulled her hands in front of her and as soon as she finishes her ritual a white energy coming from her palms radiated to impact Bakunawa's wall blasting it all to smithereens, breaking the seal of the wall that once was. "Are you going to stay there sitting, looking pathetic? Or are you going to watch as I kick Bakunawa's sorry b.u.m!?"

It took a ten-minute walk from there to Bakunawa's shrine. For Zeba it took almost forever as she held her head down wondering what happened to Prodea. She's becoming more sinister than ever, killing thirty of those medical casters that some of them, if not acquainted with, are her good friends. She's not used to her new methods. Sure, she has been insufferable and mainly tortures everyone around her with hurtful words to get what she wants but she doesn't kill people in order to achieve something. The use of mind-games, finesse, and her Bathalgiven intellect is what she boasts around to people, not the use of Dark Magicks and forbidden rituals. Prodea has truly changed since their return from their trip to the foreign lands of the east. She just felt thankful that Prodea regards her as one of her closest friends and that she wouldn't disregard her existence like what she did with Karr, whom has been her loyal bodyguard for twenty years - at least that's what she wanted to believe.

"Prodea," echoed the voice of Bakunawa, disturbing and scary Zeba noted as she sees him walking out of his front porch in his ragged old cloak. "I see you got my message. Good thing too since you've foolishly offered your head willingly to me."

"I don't care what you think you senile old trash," she exclaimed stepping forward removing her cloak and evening gloves, revealing her five new Amplifyers to him glowing a bright radiating energy field around her, "but I'm done playing games. Let's just get this over with."

Prodea has two circular sapphire stones embedded on the back of her hands occupying its full width. Another two rectangular emeralds are to be found at the back of both of her forearms almost five inches long and about an inch and a half wide. The last one, the rare Red Emerald, is found on her chest that she formed as a little triangle which is the brightest of them all. All of these Amplifyers have tattoo markings around it acting as a runic spell to facilitate the free-flowing transfer of her elemental essence coming out of her spirit and her human vessel, which is her body.

Zeba was surprised to see that many Amplifyers in one person. She got three Amplifyers on her forehead already and that is more than enough to drain her every time she tries to conjure elemental techniques. She had helped her put the red emerald on her chest last night but that's because Prodea has some spare energy to fuse with it. She just realized why she needed the lives of those thirty medical casters. Fusing with Amplifyers needs life force emanated by the spirit and if the elemental essence of the spirit is not high enough it'll take a toll on the human vessel, absorbing further the basic life force essential in moving and thinking, incapacitating the person to a mere lifeless state known as the Sleep of Death. Based on the intense illumination of the Amplifyers, she did not just capture the souls of the casters to activate the fused Amplifyers, she trapped them to break the limits of the Amplifyers giving them to be activated to a near perfect glow mimicking the diamond Amplifyer activation, pulsating a near-white beam that look as though she had enchanted herself with the white fire.

"Impressive, little apprentice, but you won't get lucky this time."

"Yes, I will," she replied smiling jumping back twenty feet engraving the earth as she lands with a huge runic summoning circle stretching for about thirty feet in diameter, with her at the center. The summoning circle magically moved in a counterclockwise rotation with little rotating runic circles being etched inside as every second pa.s.ses. A moving summoning circle, gasped Zeba as she witnessed one of the few things only a Yagisivian can do. She is not a Yagisivian but because of her Dark Arts, she practically became just like one and with the help of those thirty naïve souls she has tricked into forfeiting their lives, she became much more powerful.

Zeba knows when it is not safe to stand around, soshe dashed on backwards to the sidelines, slow as she is, to get a glimpse of every second of the event on the great battle of the millennia: Prodea versus Bakunawa, Mortal versus Immortal, Nagozulian versus Yagisivian; A battle that has never been seen for a thousand years; A battle that Prodea is very confident in winning.

"I can't take any chances now," said Bakunawa that echoed all around as if thunder.

Zeba was frightened with this feat, talking while chanting a summoning ritual. It's impossible, she believes. There is an impaling voice coming from him reciting an unknown language of Bathala's Heralds, almost drilling a painful drive on her head but he can also speak fearfully loud as if two people are within him: a disturbingly scary high-pitched voice and his alarming loud normal voice which is reverberating fearsome vibrations through her body disabling her to move, forcing her to sit down weak and helpless. She could only see his eyes, his piercing blood red eyes with a bright yellow snakelike iris that never blinks. His whole face is pitch-black even though Prodea has been lighting the place like noon, a faceless monster without a left arm but still frightening indeed. She could imagine him more frightening if his body is complete and if his monstrous face is revealed.

In her life as a Daomagarian, she had never witnessed such an excessive display of energy emanation coming from a living being. This match is truly above anyone's level that she knows of. She just sat there frightened as her heart pounds fast feeling both their energies fight off as if dominating one another while they are readying themselves in combat. A very destructive, obviously dangerous, epic match that is reserved only to the most powerful beings alive and she now has half-mind to scurry off to save herself from getting caught in the crossfire. If only she could move. If only she could muster enough courage and fight the whispering voice of Bakunawa, his confusing and irritating voice that sucks away her will to move rendering her in a feeble state of just watching the fight. She wonders why Prodea can stand this challenging power and how she can still etch some complicated spells from the ground without breaking her chants and her stance and the activation of her Amplifyers. This just proves her enormous and unrivaled strength, determination, and concentration - she thought convinced as she tries to crawl further away, inch by inch, in hopes that his voice would escape her head as their distance furthers.

The grounds became deaf silent all of a sudden giving Zeba the energy to scurry further on the sides together with the tall gra.s.ses where she could hide. She is now curiously looking at Bakunawa floating on his front porch looking at Prodea who is still etching some summoning circle on the grounds. She was searching for something to help her figure out what's happening when all of a sudden, a high-pitched screech engulfed the whole shrine making her cover her ears in pain.

A huge splash of waters began erupting in the ocean near the shrine. In a matter of seconds, a towering sea dragon emerged opening its vicious mouth boasting two humongous fangs around countless of blades of teeth all lined up evenly. It rose reaching for the skies scaling to at least a thousand feet as if jumping and eating the moon, burning its color to blood red engulfing the skies with further darkness. The frightening dragon has two small arms with long dangerously sharp claws on each of its three fingers. It used this to land on the grounds to pierce the earth, stabbing it to bleed water to flow like flood as if it has created its own enchantment without having the summoning ritual performed.

The Nanreben has awoken again she screamed in her head in fright as she saw its bulging green snake-like eyes looking at them with its fiendish blue green mirror-like scales reflecting the red moon. She only saw the Nanreben at a distance when they last visited, and she was overwhelmed with joy that time having to witness the awakening of one of the five remaining Immortal t.i.tans. Now, being too close to the gigantic dragon, she feels an insurmountable amount of fear she never dreamt of ever feeling; a dreadful feeling that she believe is far worse than anything she could ever encounter in her lifetime akin to impending death. Its sharp eyes created a painful stab in her soul disabling her to move further while making her experience pain to radiate on every part of her body that can feel. She still wonders how Prodea, who's now looking at the huge sea serpent, can manage to block all this suffocating magic she's feeling. She understands she only feels the residual effects of Bakunawa's magic, and that of the Nanreben's, which is all directed to Prodea. She knows what she's feeling is only a tenth, nay even a twentieth, of what Prodea is now experiencing but still she is on her perfect stance with her fast chanting and her swift engraving on the earth with her summoning skills.

It screamed its long powerful shriek once more summoning a tidal wave to engulf the fields. Zeba felt the thousand pound force smashing her body to the ground but she saw Prodea still standing on the ground, still etching and chanting her ritual unharmed and apparently dry as if she did not even get touched by the deadly force of the sea.

She was about to turn around to move away further when the summoning circle of Prodea blasted a white light towards the sky. It illuminated the fields bright as day and burned almost all the things around it including a statue debris on the far corner. Zeba smiled for a second commending herself for thinking ahead and escaping to where she's at earlier. If she hadn't moved from her spot, she would have been burned to a crisp by now.

A screaming fiendish monster, extending almost the same size as the Nanreben, violently escaped the earth in just a matter of seconds. It is a raucous serpent with stacks of burning coal forming its body blasting a hot blazing coat of red fire from the head to its tail as if having a th.o.r.n.y pelt from the roaring fires that escapes its molten scales; it turned the temperature of the grounds to at least thirty degrees higher burning the air dry, making it thick and hard to breathe. It has no eyes, only a long snout with two large fangs that continuously drip magma but still it's as if it can see the roaring Nanreben, taunting it with its earsplitting shrieks. Its backbone has protruding huge scythe-like sharp spikes from its head to tail making it deadly if it got the chance to slither and constrict anything with its multiple smoldering lances.

Prodea can now be found on the top of the head of its summoned beast looking down on them. Bakunawa looked up and jumped to the head of his Nanreben making both of them match up eye-to-eye with Prodea now speaking in a surprisingly loud voice echoing all around, enchanting her voice to amplify murmuring some incantations.

Seeing this, Bakunawa ordered the great Nanreben to lunge forward to attack. The slithering Nanreben roared a fearsome pitch as it rushed towards the fiendish serpent. It released a thick jet of water from its mouth spraying the large serpent's face.

Prodea antic.i.p.ated this move and made his summoned beasts to bow parrying the blast but this left herself vulnerable to the t.i.tan's sharp claws, which the Nanreben expected. The great t.i.tan jumped and opened its claws directing its black lethal sharp force to the face of the burning serpent aiming to kill Prodea who's standing at the top of its head. Prodea managed to move away dodging in the last second but the mighty claws of the great beast managed to break-off half of the fiery snake's face.

As soon as the Nanreben landed on the ground from its attack, Prodea finished her incantations and spontaneously summoned two thousand fireb.a.l.l.s to counterattack, thinking about the small window of opportunity from the t.i.tan's vulnerability consisting of a few milliseconds it needed to ready and position its long body up to attack again. She released the fireb.a.l.l.s flying to Bakunawa at an impossible speed. One thousand of which moved to blast the face of the Nanreben and the other one thousand made its way to Bakunawa only to arrive exploding before ever making contact. Bakunawa saw to this earlier on, sohe made sure to create elemental defenses activated within his great beast leaving them to appear unscathed from her attack having only a thick black smokescreen to cover their vision as a result of the encounter.

IT'S A TRAP! Bakunawa figured as he magically waved his arms to expunge the black smoke all around him and the Nanreben's eyes only to reveal that he's been tricked once again! The fiery serpent's ten feet smoldering spike at the end of its tail came forth lashing at an inconceivable speed. The Nanreben moved quickly avoiding the sharp protruding spears of the blazing serpent but it didn't help much. It's fast gliding movements made it possible for it to stab the Nanreben's body just above its left arm below its neck. The t.i.tan roared a thunderous shriek of agony as the spike leak molten magma searing into the t.i.tan's scaly skin. The sliding fiend made its way moving closer trying to position itself to constrict the Nanreben while Prodea attacked with heavy fire Magicks into Bakunawa. Upon seeing this deadly scenario, Bakunawa called for cold waters to rise all around his legendary t.i.tan. The force of the rising waters cut the tail that's been stabbing the Nanreben in half. He then created a wind-water summoning much like a winter blizzard all around dropping the temperature down to at least fifty degrees colder with his Water Serpent blasting a furious jet of water trying to take vengeance by extinguishing the flaming serpent. Prodea smiled snickering as if mocking Bakunawa in his defensive enchantments as she retreated back moving at least two hundred feet away from him and his crying Nanreben.

Taking into account the ma.s.s of the fiery serpent and its reaction time to their successful attack earlier on, Bakunawa thought that she couldn't move it fast enough at her will. He was tricked into thinking that it is an Elemental Summoning just like what she did when they last met, and this mistake almost cost him his Nanreben. Elemental Summonings are much more like summoning a puppet. The bigger it is the harder it is to control and move, much so to attack with. He originally thought he summoned this elemental fiend to become her shield from the Nanreben's ma.s.sive attacks, but he's mistaken. Dim'ion's Magicks made it possible for Prodea to instill a living soul in its core. He sensed it being close to her gigantic burning serpent. She actually succeeded in trapping and enslaving a poor mortal soul into fusion with Mother Earth. An abomination! An immoral and repulsive skill made and perfected only by Dim'ion!

"I'm not the same Prodea you battled last time. I'm more powerful now!" Prodea shouted with an amplified sound that can be heard clearly all around the battlefield.

"I know," replied Bakunawa with the same loud resonance charging a huge blue water sphere the size of his shrine's dome that is in rubles on his left, "You've become so rotten that you're now relying on Dim'ion's Dark Magicks! Defiling an innocent soul is a great insult to Bathala. You should be punished!"

"OH, PLEASE!" she mocked with her arrogant tone, "as if you do not use Dim'ion's Magicks! The very foundation of Yagisivian summonings are based on Dim'ion's..."

"That's where you're wrong," he interrupted finalizing his channeling spell, "Dim'ion's skills is based on Ana'giel's Magicks and the majority of our summonings came from Ana'giel himself!"

Bakunawa released the bulging water sphere towards Prodea's fiery snake. The ma.s.sive water orb released hundreds of tentacles of gushing waters like blades piercing her summoned t.i.tan on impact, making it shriek in pain as it continues to extinguish its fiery skin. The Nanreben joined in as it clawed the ground once more to create a torrent of water below the shrieking monster, trying to put out its flames further.

Water is a tricky element. It is without form, but it is solid and is greater than the element fire making it that much harder to block. This property of water can become most problematic for anyone receiving an attack coming from an elemental summoner for the attacker can shape it to their will and surprise any would-be defender. Prodea knows this for a fact and she knows she'll be at a disadvantage knowing that her main tri-element attribute is fire and her enemy, the immortal Bakunawa, is fond of playing with water. But, as always, she has prepared for this day and thus she has another card up her sleeve that quite literally lies behind her sleeves if she's wearing any.

Prodea lifted her right arm and the emerald Amplifyer began to pulsate its blinding glow. Shortly thereafter, a gust of wind bellowed all around her summoned giant. It formed a field of rushing whirlwind that destroyed the form of the gushing tentacles of the huge water sphere and pushed the moving waters below her great serpent.

Wind Of course, is stronger than water for the wind can reshape its form or in their case disrupt it from forming and shake its structure making it lose its shape and be rendered useless. Certainly in order to do this, the Blower should have a Wind Summoning greater in force than that of the Caster's for gushing water rapids is much more harder to disrupt but because of Prodea's newfound power, with the souls of her servants being trapped inside her new Amplifyers modified through Dim'ion's Magicks, she can now come toe to toe with Bakunawa's powerful spells.

This jaw-dropping act surprised both Bakunawa and Zeba. Such roaring winds destroying everything in its wake are the elemental skills possessed only by Legendary Nagozulians that have lived thousands of years ago. Prodea's wind essence is nowhere near this powerful they thought as a crumb of fear began to shake inside their heads. The awakening of this stormy gust cleared all the clouds in the sky magnifying the moon's b.l.o.o.d.y glow.

"I didn't expect you could amplify your wind essence to ten times that of your true essence," Bakunawa shouted cramming another set of summoning to counterattack, "but you forget one thing! I'm still the most powerful summoner there is!"

Bakunawa retaliated using Earth Invocations to summon sixteen large slabs of hard stones - measuring at least twenty feet tall, thirty feet wide, and ten feet thick. He made it move about countering the rushing winds of Prodea until the wind blows weakened to a harmless strong wind.

"Impressive," ringed Prodea hinting an infuriated tone, "I didn't know you can summon the Sixteen Walls of Heaven. Must have drained you a lot bringing forth that kind of powerful defensive technique."

Bakunawa just scoffed revealing his smiling eyes as he positioned his slabs of silver walls around Prodea's malevolent beast. Prodea's eyes widened as he flipped all the slabs horizontally ready for an attack position.

The Sixteen Walls of Heaven is one of the most powerful techniques a Yagisivian can summon. It is a thick framed shiny silver-colored stone slab that is famed for its near-indestructible qualities making it the most powerful physical defensive barrier to ever been summoned. Every stone slab has a ten feet runic number starting from one marking every slab to sixteen. The strength of the stone varies and increases its durability as the slab number reaches the slab number one - which is the most indestructible of all the stone slabs. These walls are rumored to have been created and chiseled by Bathala's herald Ana'giel himself and that up to now, no one has ever scratched its surface - except for the sixteenth slab which has a boring hole on its center that is marked by the Emperor Dogal's ultimate skill a thousand years ago. Every stone slab is unique, but each shares its very sharp edges that can rip through piercing almost anything on contact. When placed on top of each other, the fast-moving velocity can act mimicking the movement of shears that can eviscerate and/or squash almost anything.

Bakunawa moved the stone slabs simultaneously attacking the wretched snake and Prodea in all directions. Like sheers, it forcefully slid through each and every stone wall snipping the fiery serpent. The resulting slams of those sixteen walls created an ear-splitting explosion vanquishing the flaming serpentine once and for all including Prodea in it. No one can escape that kind of attack. The Sixteen Walls of Heaven cannot be penetrated by any kind of Magic so there will be no hope for Prodea's escape.

The resulting cloud of black smoke and dust engulfed the fields as Bakunawa looked down feeling regret killing another soul in Nagozul which he hasn't done, and has vowed not to do for almost a thousand years.

He jumped to the ground from his towering t.i.tan now walking to the rubles of his shrine feeling ill. He knows it's the right thing to do but he feels rather miserable for killing her apprentice. He really did love Prodea as a father would her daughter.

"GRAND PRINCESS!" shouted Zeba screaming out almost sniveling, running to the silvery walls. "Grand Princess where are you!?"

Bakunawa turned around and noticed the lonely Zeba crying her eyes out running towards the stacked walls. The Nanreben was hissing to attack but Bakunawa stopped it before finalizing its resolve giving her time to mourn about her loss.

"PRODEA!!! WHERE ARE YOU?!!" she pursued clamoring for a reply.

"Go home you fool... Your master is now at peace..." said Bakunawa with an eerie pitch which Zeba noted stopping her further from saying another word.

Zeba then noticed him raising his right arm as if waving at someone far to the mountains, looking sorry as if giving a signal and an apology, but she did not bother dwelling on the thought for she had to search for Prodea's remains somewhere on top of the stack piles of those silvery walls.

A blinding light flashed on the skies illuminating it like day rushing from the stacks of those Sixteen Walls to the Nanreben.

"IT CAN'T BE!" Bakunawa shouted as he saw a figure of white light reaching the Nanreben.

The great t.i.tan roared in both fear and pain as the figure enveloped in white light grabbed its eyebrows burning it, punching cleanly through penetrating its head. The white figure released a violent discharge of roaring white fire cremating its head to charcoal black.

"The... the... the Cloak of Dim'ion..." whimpered Bakunawa as he sees his mighty t.i.tan slowly fall down to the ground dead, creating an earth-shattering ravage on impact.

The skies gradually returned to reveal the clear blue morning as the b.l.o.o.d.y moon slowly faded away being overwhelmed by the sunlight.

"Yes," she replied almost sinister with the emerald gem in her chest amplified to a maximum, "the cloak of the devil himself... the legendary white fire enchantment." Prodea smiled now walking towards him after jumping off from the Nanreben's poor incinerated face.

He miscalculated. Bakunawa put the sixteenth wall into the top thinking that he needed the much stronger force from the first wall below the base of the serpent and the less force on top a.s.suming that Prodea is a Nagozulian mortal whose skills wouldn't dream of scratching even the sixteenth slab.

The original Walls of Heaven consisted of only nine stone slabs. The only weakness of the first nine stone slabs numbering slabs number eight to sixteen was the force of the scorching White Fire of Dim'ion's cloak. Because of this, Ana'giel fashioned another set of seven stone slabs just to perfect this ultimate wall of Physical Defense that even the White Demon cannot penetrate.

Bakunawa did not know that she can conjure the White Fire and turn into the White Demon. He did not know that Prodea's triangular Amplifyer fused in her chest is in fact the rare Red Emerald developed by the renowned Royal Seer Juni Merl. He was not informed on the facts of this new revelation.

The prophecy suggested that she will kill Juni but did not specify that she would obtain the Red Emerald and yet she has it which only proves one logical reason: it is up to him to ensure that she doesn't escape his grounds with her Amplifyer still intact. It is in the prophecy that she wouldn't have one so he has to be the one who should destroy that thing even if costs him his life. That would explain his untimely death as an immortal, he now figured as he laughed thinking about the intricacies and the deception of Bathala's Prophecy.

"Why are you laughing you cretinous monkey!? Be afraid you buffoon! Even immortals are not impervious to the white fire!"

"I know..." he said almost forcing to hide his laugh, "I lost my face and my left arm being tortured by the same powers of the white fire you conjured..."

"Then you know you're going to die..." she enunciated making it clear to him, almost confused with his reaction standing twenty feet in front of him.

"I've accepted it a long time ago and I've come embrace it," he replied which puzzled Prodea even more, "It is as predicted. If my soul is being called upon by Bathala, who am I to sway against his will..."

"Again... that prophecy? What is that?" she asked maintaining her distance close enough to antic.i.p.ate his move but not too close to burn him in the white fire's intense heat.

"You didn't know about it?" he laughed almost making fun of her, "The one that your father wrote on Bathala's behalf? I thought you have pried it from someone's brain by now..."

"Tell me, you pathetic insect, or I'll make sure you suffer dying on my hands!"

"Grand Princess!" interrupted Zeba, "ON TOP OF YOU!"

Prodea looked up in the sky and marveled on thousands of runic symbols being etched up high on the returning blue skies of morning. She's been stalled to stand there long enough for Bakunawa to complete his ritual.

"Oh, silly Prodea," Bakunawa chuckled as he knelt praying finishing his incantations, "I've always known you're smart, but your persistent curiosity clearly disrupts your brain processes and attentiveness..."

Prodea tried to move but she's been glued firmly to the ground like a huge monument. She wryly smiled as she etched runic symbols of her own around her.

"I know this spell you imbecile! In a matter of minutes, I can free myself from here. Just one single touch to your head and I will end your miserable existence in an instant!"

"A few minutes is all need..."

Prodea scoffed at his ridiculous reply. "You can't come near me! You know that! And no elemental or physical attack can destroy me while Dim'ion's cloak is activated! I am now an immortal at par with you, you delusional wretched Yit'ard!"

A beam of light came down from Prodea coming from the circular runes on top of her. She began floating as she saw Bakunawa releasing one hundred Phantom Hands all around him. She fought releasing her own two Phantom Hands, but it was subdued easily by Bakunawa. Fear overwhelmed Prodea's eyes as she noticed the fingers from Bakunawa's ghostly hands to lighten up with different runic markings.

"Are you going to try to remove my cloak?" Prodea shouted now forcing a smile. "You cannot fight Dim'ion's Magicks with just the Phantom Hand! And you most certainly cannot remove the White Fire Enchantments completely even with one hundred of those!"

"Who says I'm removing all of it completely?" he smiled with smiling eyes as if satisfied.

Prodea knows that look. Juni looked the same way before he killed himself in front of her, soshe antic.i.p.ated what he's planning to do.

"NO!" she shouted fighting forcefully the energies that bind her. "I will not let you take my Red Emerald away!"

"Very good Prodea," he whispered almost ignoring her, "at least your observation skill is still as sharp as ever." He moved all of his Phantom Hands to sc.r.a.pe the field of energy that covers Prodea. The ghostly hands carefully pulled hard, layer by layer, the white fire enchantment as if uncovering multiple sheets of blanket on a bed, looking as though he is operating a surgery in her chest, only to reveal a small opening towards the triangular Amplifyer only four fingers can enter.

He pushed another Phantom Hand inside to pull the Amplifyers out, but it immediately backfired and burned the hand dissipating it.

Prodea laughed hysterically seeing him being puzzled from trying again and again.

"Look at you, you pitiful fool. Do you think I haven't thought of placing enchantments against the Phantom Hands? How do you think I got the emerald in the first place? I know that the Phantom Hands is the only one that can safely remove the Amplifyer without leaving any residual energy from the user. Its either that or you try to physically take it from me by obliterating your spirit simultaneously with your vessel to fuse with the gem which is completely impossible!"

"Hmmnn... I see... thanks for the tip Prodea..."

Prodea jeered clicking her tongue hiding her nervous eyes, "I dare you to try to put your hands near my chest. It'll burn your hands before you ever touch it... even if you uncover an opening in my cloak the residual heat all around my body will burn you to charcoal black..."

Bakunawa enveloped himself with blue cold waters and went closer to her. "I know that Prodea. I have dealt with the white fire before. don't try lecturing me on things that I know long before you're even born."

"H-how can you dream of destroying your soul and your vessel at the same time!? No one in the history of Yagisiv Haya can do such a skill! It is one of the missing spells created by Dim'ion and no one has ever acquired it much less know it!"

"That's where you're wrong..." Prodea's eyes widened as his eyes revealed a smile, "I know how it is done. It was pried out of my brain and used against me. It is transcribed to one of the missing scrolls a thousand years ago. It is the cursed spell placed on me by my great granddaughter and YOU!"

"B-but that's not true! If it is, then you should've been dead already!"

"Precisely my point. It doesn't work that way. One should perform the spell on himself, not on others. That's why it lost its potency. That's why you can only transcribe a set of rules to the person being cursed. In the end, death is a choice chosen by the cursed. In the end, free will is all that matters."

Prodea's fear became evident as a drop of tear acc.u.mulated in her eyes. "Just drive a blade right through my heart and be done with it."

"Ha! Good luck tricking me into submission. I know I only have one chance to get near you before your enchantments burn me. And I also know that you have your heightened regeneration in place brought by Dim'ion's Cloak, soyou need not play coy with me thinking you don't know that either."

Prodea shrieked in frustration seeing that he didn't fall being tricked. She's been playing vulnerable just to lure him to do that, but the events did not play according to her plan.

"So, you're going to reveal my secrets? Huh? To whom are you going to reveal it with!?" she laughed taking solace from the only thing she thinks she can control. "The only people in these grounds are YOU, ME and my loyal ZEBA! Your death will only be in vain! After destroying my rare Amplifyer, all my secrets will be buried with you through your grave - that is, if there's something left of you after you explode!"

"That's where you're wrong my dear Prodea. Someone is watching us from the sidelines long since the moment I've unleashed my Nanreben..."

Prodea's face began lighting an unimaginably fearful façade revealing a scared, vulnerable and lonely Prodea that hasn't been seen ever before as Bakunawa turned around and looked in the mountains.

"Goodbye my friend," he whispered with smiling eyes as he redirected his now normal eyes, his big blue round eyes, to Prodea as if composed and peaceful, "It is done." And then he pushed three fingers to the opening touching the Amplifyer, disrupting the glow of the red emerald before exploding a blinding light all around the fields.

"Prodea!" shouted the ever concerned Zeba running to her spot. "Are you all right?"

Prodea woke up lying on the ground with a burnt Amplifyer on her aching chest covered in trickles of blood.

"He really did it..." she whispered, not angry, not furious, but worried. This surprised Zeba much considering that she's not usually this calm and composed especially when losing. Though she won to Bakunawa, it cost her her precious Red Emerald which she thought to be worth being furious about. So, she got to asking.

"What's wrong Prodea? Why are you feeling so concerned about that Old Immortal Guardian? Isn't it your plan to eliminate him?"

"Yes," she said sitting down on the ground feeling glum, "It's my plan to kill him but not like this. I didn't plan on making him suffer. Now that he sacrificed himself destroying his soul and vessel by way of Dim'ion's Magicks, he will now wander off trapped in this world being flayed slowly, torturing him every day having no Physical Vessel but trapped in this world... much like the spirits of Karshivyk..."

"Isn't that..." asked Zeba with a glint of doubt which Prodea thought to be very insulting.

"It's not a myth Zeba. The Karshivyk are true..." she said surprisingly calm and woeful.

"Where do you think his soul is now?"

"I don't know Zeba, in between our realm and the underworld I suppose," Prodea murmured giving a deep sigh almost teary. "Let's just pray to Bathala I'm wrong about this one."