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Within the world of the red sun, Willard sat down meditating on the feeling he got from the red sun. The more Willard thought about the more he was certain that the red sun wasn’t a star, but rather the genesis of some energy. Within this red world, the concept of time seemed displaced. To Willard, he had spent over a hundred years wandering this strange world and then regaining the memory that explained how he got to his current situation. In the mortal world, less than two weeks had gone by. After spending what seemed like an eternity to anyone, Willard gave up on understanding the red sun. Instead, he decided to continue cultivating that red energy. “No use in forcing myself to understand something beyond me. It should be more beneficial for me cultivate instead.” Willard sat in a meditative posture and started cultivating the red energy.

 

*************

Life went on as usual in Marquis city. A rapid change was sweeping through the city. The formerly dormant Gerret household had risen to one of its highest states since the founding of the city. All the remnants of the great family were swept through by both the Gerret and Marquis households. All the leaders and high-ranking members of the great families were all publicly beheaded. All the family members were hunted down and exiled to the northern and western battle front. No one was spared in this cleansing.

 

Within Marquis city, a horsed messenger was riding through the inner city. His target was the Gerret household. Arriving in front of the Gerret household, the messenger couldn’t help but sigh in surprise. The current guards of the Gerret household had heavy armors on and stood in an imposing manner. The messenger couldn’t believe these were the same Gerret guards. From his memory, the Gerret household was a noble household on the decline, but now the atmosphere was different. He couldn’t help but breath heavily as he approached the gates.

 

He timidly spoke to the guards before he came off his mount, and walked towards the direction one of the guards had pointed. As the messenger got towards the main entrance of the main mansion, the doors opened up with two warriors walking out. The warriors both glanced at the messenger once before looking elsewhere and continuing their walk. Before the messenger could take a step into the mansion, he noticed another set of guards standing beside the doors. The messenger approached them and relayed the same message he gave the guards at the gate.

 

One of the guards lead the messenger directly into the main house and instructed him to wait. Moments later, the current master of the Gerret household, Jayesh, walked out. “Greetings house master. The city head has instructed me to hand you this invitation.” The messenger said respectfully as he handed Jayesh a scroll.

 

**************

At the marquis household, a grand celebration was being held. The leader of the house  was currently present in the mansion. He was having a conversation with one of the guest as he caught a glimpse of Lyon. As he saw Lyon, the smile on his face was replaced by a sense of anger. After hearing the stories of Lyon’s reaction, he couldn’t help but feel a sense of shame and anger. How could his heir, the current future leader of the city, be that cowardly? This wasn’t something he could hide or deny, it was public news at this point. Whenever he saw Lyon, the angrier he got. “Useless! I am to blame for all this. I have given this child way too much freedom and privileges that have made him this way.” He thought before moving his gaze back to his guest.

 

The giant doors that lead to the main hall where the celebrations were currently ongoing, cracked opened. A figure that wore military attire slowly walked in. Standing directly behind this figure stood a young slender man. Everything about this young man seemed noble and divine. His attire was golden, matching his hair, and his slender figure was well fitted to this attire. The figures were Jayesh and his son Sebastian who had finally joined the celebrations. As both of them walked in followed by high ranking warriors of the Gerret household, the entire hall became silent. How could they not be? The current Gerret family was at one of its highest status since its founding. The Gerret family had almost single-handedly beaten more than half of all the forces within the city. They had shown a might that capable of rivaling smaller kingdoms, given the fact they were able to fight against a saint and still survive.

 

“Jayesh, welcome,” the leader of the Marquis household said with a bright smile on his face.

 

“Florence! It’s good to see you again.” Jayesh responded.

 

“This time around, my Marquis family owes you a great debt. If the heavens are fair, I shall someday repay this huge debt.” Florence Marquis said with an honest expression.

 

“Haha. You shouldn’t worry about simple matters. Have you forgotten the bond between our families, the oat our ancestors swore.”

 

“That’s right, the ties between our families transcends this city. But this time, we are all in your debt, or should say in the debt of your son Sebastian,” Florence said smiling towards Sebastian.  

 

“You flatter, city head!” Sebastian said respectfully.

 

“It is no mere flatter young one. A good father produces a good son. It seems I failed in my duties,” Florence said turning to look at Lyon. The atmosphere of the entire hall changed a little after they heard those words from Florence. None more so was under more pressure than Lyon who was a little startled as he heard those words from his father. Lyon could not help but feel a sense of rage burst through his mind. “This ******* Sebastian must be taking pleasure in all this. I swear to the heavens I will pay you back a hundred folds. No, a thousand folds for all this shame you have brought to me.”  Ever since Florence had gotten back, he had not said a single word to Lyon, but in the presence of Jayesh and his son, Sebastian, Florence had not only reprimanded Lyon, but he had done so in a self-deprecating manner. All that serve to fuel Lyon’s anger even more. All Lyon could think of was ways he could make Sebastian suffer.

 

Florence stared at the ugly look on Lyon’s face for some time, before nodding his head disapprovingly. He knew he had always favored Lyon, leading to his son’s current character. Florence sighed for a bit before he turned to face his guest. “I have an announcement to make,” Florence said while he stared at his guest. “From today henceforth, I relinquish the title of future city head from my son Lyon, and banish him to the northern borders,” he said with a slight pause. Looking at everyone’s faces, Florence could see the apparent shock he had caused.

 

Every single person present that had heard those his words were stunned. This was the first time he had raised the topic of the next future head to the public. No one was more shocked than Lyon himself who was getting banished. Lyon was speechless for a couple of seconds as he processed what he had just heard. It was one thing for him to lose his position of the next city head, and another to be burnished to northern borders. He knew within a couple of years, he could win back his father’s approval and get back his position. But for him to be banished to the northern borders was true torture. He would have to fight for his life on a daily basis protecting their borders against the warmongering northern continent. The northern borders had the highest fatality rate of all the conflict regions within the continent.

 

“Also with a heavy heart, our very own primero knight, Sir Allan, would be leaving our Marquis city and embarking on a cultivation journey. He would be vacating his position as the primero knight to roam the continent.” Florence said ending his announcement. Allan who was currently standing at a corner of the hall with other guest had a gentle look on his face. The remaining guest all turned and stared at the primero knight. This was a man that had gained the complete respect of the entire city. He had been diligent in his duties and had never taken advantage of his authority. Even his current living standards were of lower splendor as compared to most warriors at the elemental energy level. He was someone who was truly respected by every single citizen of the city.

 

Florence comments were like heavy explosions that rocked the entire hall. First, he had banished his son to the northern borders and immediately following that, he had announced that the primero knight was leaving the city. “The city head is too fierce in his punishment.” Sebastian thought as he looked towards Lyon’s side. Although he had never really gotten along with Lyon, he also had nothing against him. Sebastian might have felt less sympathy for Lyon if he knew exactly what Lyon had been thinking of doing to him.  

 

As the banquet continued, more people made their way to Allan and offered him praises. Some gossiped as to who the next primero knight was going to be. While others spoke about Lyon’s punishment. Lyon quietly made his way out of the banquet. He was currently in a state of utter panic. He was currently trying to figure a way out of being sent to the northern borders. Given the severity of his punishment, he knew there was no way he could talk his father out of sending him out of the city.

 

******************

 

A couple of months had passed since the banquet. Lyon had already joined the northern army at the border. Allan also had left on his cultivation journey, searching for an inspiration to break through to the saint level.

 

Within the Gerret household, Willard was still on a bed unconscious. His breathing had improved a long time ago. His breathing had a rhythmic tune to it, one that eluded everyone that periodically came check on him. After Willard had gained a basic understanding of his current situation and red sun, he had almost exclusively spent all his time cultivating that red energy. A couple weeks back, while he was cultivating, Willard had noticed the strange energy could be compressed to a more liquid form. Although he noticed that, he still hadn’t been able to compress the red energy from its current ethereal form.

 

On this day, Willard who was currently seated in a meditative position opened his eyes. “Finally, I have been able to condense a single drop.” He said with a little smile. “Time to investigate this drop.” Willard got up and walked towards the single drop he had condensed. It took him an enormously long time and a large amount of red energy to condense this single drop. As he inspected the drop that was floating in mid-air, Willard couldn’t notice a single thing different from its previous form, except for the obvious liquid nature of the red energy.

 

After carefully scrutinizing it and still no result, Willard gave up on observing the drop. He reached out with his right hand to grab the drop of the red energy. As his hand made contact with the drop of red energy, the red energy immediately got absorbed into a corporeal body formed by his soul. His body had a red glow, almost as if the red energy was forming an extra red layer of skin around his corporeal soul body. At this moment, a different form of energy was flowing through Willard’s body, it was something formless, in the aspects of elemental relation, but still possessing a strange sense of majesty. In the real world, the formal dull coloration of Willard’s skin was rapidly changing to one full of life. As all these changes were happening, Willard noticed his soul was rapidly getting nourished, the red world he had previously been stuck in, was also rapidly changing. After his battle with Svecko, Willard’s soul had been seriously injured, which lead to his eventual coma, but at this moment, his soul was repairing itself with frightful speed. The red world that was full of nothingness finally broke to give way to different colors. The moment this happened, Willard opened his eyes in the real.

Finally, his soul had recovered.
“How long has it been?” Willard said as he stared at the empty room.

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On the battleground where the two parties were currently facing each other, what seemed like a meteorite fell from the skies and caught everyone’s attention. With a loud deafening sound, akin to an explosion, rang out as this seemingly strange activity occurred. From the huge dust storm that swirled around the area of impact, a man with ghostly looking eyes walked out. This was Svecko who had landed and disrupted the current squabbles.

 

“Sir Svecko!” the Minya warriors called out in joy.

 

Svecko ignored their calls and immediately dashed towards Ducarte and his daughter. Without saying a word, Svecko grabbed both Ducarte and his daughter and immediately flew towards the sky again. Everyone’s expression became confused as they had no idea what Svecko’s action meant. Both parties were equally nervous as Svecko’s actions were not entirely clear. On the one hand, the Minya warriors were nervous and secretly hoped Svecko was not abandoning them, and on the side of the warriors were hoping Svecko wasn’t going to interfere. No one knew what the conclusion of the battle between Svecko and Willard. Each side could only hope for the best.

 

After waiting a couple of minutes and realizing Svecko wasn’t coming back, the Gerret warriors found a new source of courage as they quickly mobilized to kill fight the Minya warriors. To add on to their delight, they saw reinforcements in the form of the Marquis city’s primero knight join the battle. Allan’s fame as a knight within Marquis city was second to none. And for him to join the fight meant one thing, he had killed Aswan. Without Ducarte and their military leader, the Minya warriors knew they had lost the battle. At this point, the Minya warriors had lost the will to battle, one by one they each dropped their weapons and proceeded to kneel in submission. In a matter of minutes, the surrendering Minya warriors were all rounded and escorted to a prison camp.

 

The battle that had seemed almost impossible to lose, had been lost. A wild sense of jubilation filled every surviving member of the Gerret household. Who would have thought their suicide battle would have been won today? And in their celebrations, one person’s name rang the loudest. The youth that had had personally intervened to save their lives against ranked spells and had thoroughly held his own even against a saint. From that moment on, a new legend had been born to the people of Marquis city. For generations, people would tell tales of a youth that had fought a saint at the elemental level of power.

 

***************

A couple of hours later, within the Gerret household, a banquet was currently being held. All the Gerret warriors were celebrating their victory with wine and food. Within a private study in the house, stood Jayesh, Sebastian, Allan, Bryant and a couple of higher ranking warriors. This list included both knights that had joined Allan to reinforce the Gerret household and Baya. At this moment, everyone’s gaze was Willard who was currently laying on a bed. “This child

Is currently in a grave situation,” Bryant said as he touched Willard’s forehead.

 

“Is there anything we could do to help him?” Baya asked with a distressed look on his face.

 

“He used up all of his elemental essence during his battle with the snow saint and ended up using his life essence. At this point, it would really be up to him to survive this,” Bryant said.

 

“It is thanks to this child my Gerret family was not completely killed out,” Jayesh sighed as he stared at the Willard. As someone who had almost reached the level of a saint, he knew what dangers Willard was in right now. It was taboo for any warrior to use their life essence to battle because that meant suicide.  

 

Everyone remained silent for a couple of seconds before the silence was broken by Allan. “Esteemed saint, lord Jayesh. We would be taking our leave right now. We have to wait and report the outcome to the lord of the Marquis household.” With that, Allan and the rest of the knights paid their respects and left.

 

Jayesh looked at his son Sebastian and gave a gentle smile. “You did well,” he said.  “You might not have the body of a warrior, but you more than makeup for it with your bravery.” Hearing those words from his father brought a smile to Sebastian’s face, which was immediately overridden by a sense of guilt Sebastian felt for the current situation Willard was in. Jayesh felt a great sense of pride looking at his son and seeing how he managed the situation. Not only did Sebastian not completely cowering in fear, he also chose to fight rather than submit.

 

************

At the Marquis, a quiet maelstrom was slowly brewing. Rumors of the complete decimation of the Minya forces were flying around the mansion. Lyon was seated on a wooden bench behind his quarters and was in deep contemplation. “How is this possible? Even our spy network has confirmed every bit of this information.”  Lyon was currently frustrated at how things had turned out. He had previously refused to head over to the aid of the Gerret family and was heavily criticized by all the knights. Lyon had believed his actions were right, given the strength of the Minya resistance, there was no way the insignificant Gerret family would have survived this disaster. But somehow, the people he held in no regards had not only survived, they had won the battle without the official aid of the Marquis family. Lyon’s frustration mostly stemmed from the fact that Sebastian actually lead their family to victory.

 

“That damn Sebastian must be gloating now,” Lyon said with burning rage. “Those useless Minya dogs couldn’t even win against the Gerret. This was supposed to be my glory, those fools couldn’t even handle that much.”

 

Lyon got up from the bench and walked towards the main hall of the inner mansion. He frowned all through the way there. He sat at the head of the war chamber and patiently waited for the arrival of the knights.

 

It took about an hour for Allan and his company to arrive back at the Marquis household. On arriving the atmosphere was much different than when they had left. At their arrival, all of the knights that had assembled back for a meeting, all got up.

 

Lyon who sat at the head of the table, stood up to address the incoming knights. Before he could utter a single word, a big wave of praises came flooding the room. “Congratulations primero knight! Lord of the sword prevails again!”

 

More praises kept pouring as the other knights joined in congratulating. Within the congratulations, a sense of guilt could be felt from every single one of their praises. They were sworn-knights with the duty of protecting their city, but they had hesitated in doing their duty and instead chose to obey the word of the next city lord. Especially after the victory of the Gerret household, they all had faces covered in guilt and praises of the strong primero knight.

 

“Congratulations primero knight, your battle was successful. This entire city owes you a great deal of debt,” Lyon said with a smile on his face. Although he showed a glowing smile, he was inwardly causing at his terrible luck. Not only had the primero knight undermined his authority, he had also returned successfully. How could he not be angry? His entire actions were nothing short of cowardly.

 

“No need for all these praises. The battle would have been won by the Gerret household with or without our intervention,” Allan said in response to Lyon’s comments.

 

“What do you mean primero knight?” Lyon asked with a startled expression. Not just Lyon, all the other knights were equally as confused. What did the primero knight mean by his statement? Was he trying to say one household, had more power than the combined forces of several households? Everyone had thought it was the efforts of the primero knight that would have won them their victory.

 

“The next generation of the Gerret household is quite commendable,” Allen said taking a slight jab at Lyon. “Especially the youth called Willard,” he said before pausing with a slight look of adoration. With that, Allen kept quiet and silently sat on the table. Following his lead, was Agness and Tadea. The look of frustration on Lyon’s face grew more apparent, but he couldn’t say a word. Allan and the rest of the group spoke about some of the events that had happened but left out some of the important matter like the appearance of the metal saint.

 

*******************

A week had passed since the advent of the Minya uprising. At the Gerret household, Willard was still in a coma. Nana stood by his bed tending to his body. Within a world shrouded in gray clouds, Willard was walking in a straight direction. “What the hell is this place? I’ve been walking for how long now and I still can’t find a trace of any life,” he said in a frustrated manner. “How the hell did I end up here? I can’t even remember anything.”

 

While Nana was tending to his body, tears slowly started falling from her eyes. She leaned on his lifeless body of Willard and started crying. She felt quite miserable seeing Willard in his current state. After the death of her parents, she had always been at the side of her teacher, and after the departure of her teacher, Willard had assumed the position of the most important person in her life. “Please come back. Don’t leave me. Don’t leave Nana” she said with all the grief she held in her heart.

 

Within the strange world, Willard stood in place as a strange sensation gripped his entire body. Slowly Willard heard the words “Please come back.”

 

“Who was that?”

“Why does that voice sound so familiar?” When suddenly something akin to sunlight pierced through that gray world of his, but this sunlight was red and ethereal in feeling.

 

“What is this? Why does it feel so familiar?” When he then heard the words, “Don’t leave Nana!”

 

“Nana!” Willard said with a strange look on his face. Memories of a smiling young girl came to his mind. Suddenly, like an egg cracking, the gray cloudy world broke apart leaving nothing but that red sun. At that moment, a flurry of memories flashed through Willard’s mind. In the real world where Willard’s body laid, his fingers moved. Nana was too engrossed in her sorrow and failed to notice the movement of Willard’s fingers.

 

Within the red world, Willard stared at the red sun with a look of astonishment. “What is this world? Is this due to the red substance I cultivated?” Although Willard had gained a complete understanding of what lead to his current situation, he still had no idea how to leave the red world.

 

Willard sat down and stared at the red sun, and while he stared at the red sun, he felt something familiar about this red energy, he couldn’t quite put his fingers on it, but he knew that there was something peculiar about that energy. For a brief moment, Willard started thinking about all of his experience, both as the god of destruction and the mortal Willard. Like a bolt of lightning, Willard gained a sudden insight. The insight wasn’t a new found knowledge, it was more like a reminder of something he already knew. “That’s right. This red energy has the same feeling as the substance in Gaya’s eternal fountain. But why do I feel like it is still different from Gaya’s eternal fountain?” Willard continued pondering on his current findings.

In a vast world of complete darkness, void of any life, a formless figure in the shape of a woman smiled.

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Bryant paused for a couple of seconds while moving closer towards Svecko. At their current level of power, the distance between Svecko and Bryant was of no importance. Given both of their speeds, they would be able to close the distance within less than a second. “It is not that I want to stand in your way, it is you who have chosen a path I cannot ignore,” Bryant said with a soft laughter.

 

Without a moment’s warning, Svecko moved with his highest speed to attack Bryant. “Let me see what ability you possibly have to stop me.” As Svecko got closer to  Bryant, a spear made of ice had formed in Svecko’s palms. He thrust the spear with incredible strength as he attacked Bryant. Although Svecko’s attack could be considered a sneak attack, Bryant wasn’t surprised as he had expected Svecko to attack him and given both of their speed, he could react fast enough.  A golden glow illuminated around Bryant’s entire body. Bryant moved his bare palm in anticipation of Svecko’s ice spear. As the spear made contact with Bryant’s palm, a crunching sound could be heard. The spear Svecko held crumbled as the force from Bryan’s palm completely shattered the ice spear. Bryant continued the motion of his palm to counter Svecko’s attack. As the palm attack touched Svecko, another crunching sound was heard. Bryant realized something was wrong, he immediately noticed he did not make contact with Svecko, but instead, his palm attacked had broken what seemed like an ice mirror. “Perrish!” Svecko yelled as he appeared behind Bryant and attacked with a punch.

 

Svecko palm was glowing white, almost translucent and invisible. Bryant reacted as fast as he could, moving both his arms to defend Svecko’s attack. As they both made contact, a seemingly white energy pervaded Bryant’s body and went straight to attack his soul. In that brief moment, the soul freezing energy of Svecko had slowly started freezing Bryant’s soul. A dull light appeared on Bryant’s eyes as the life seemed to slowly leave his body.

 

A smile appeared on Svecko’s face as he stretched out his hand to grab the lifeless looking body of Bryant. Before he could grab onto Bryant, a golden and metallic-black light appeared all around Bryant. The formerly lifeless body now seemed to have gained some life. Svecko unconsciously took some steps back as he watched Bryant come back to life. After the golden and metallic black light died down, Svecko couldn’t help but gasp in surprise as he saw a different Bryant. Bryant’s body had changed from that of a normal human to a half golden and  half metallic-black form.  

 

The right half of Bryant’s body had changed to a golden form, while the left part of his body had changed to a metallic black form. Bryant’s body had turned part gold and part iron. This two forms equally covered his body from the tip of his hair to the sole of his feet, giving off a strange otherworldly appearance Bryant had at the moment. “You!” Svecko said in shock as he realized something.

 

“You are the metal element saint of the West,” Svecko said staring at Bryant incredulously. Of all the elements known to this mortal world, the metal elements were regarded as the most difficult ones to cultivate. Throughout the recorded history of the world, they were only three people to have successfully cultivated the metal element to a saint level and until this moment, there was none that had cultivated to a level three saint.

 

“You have broken through to the third level and fused gold and iron laws.” Svecko continued. “Incredible. Yet another genius has appeared. Why are the heavens favoring the South?” Svecko quietly thought to himself. Looking at the current situation, Svecko knew there was no way he could defeat Bryant. He had already used up most of his energy and evidently, Bryant had infused the law of gold with the law iron within the metal element. This meant that there was no way he could win at the moment without paying a heavy price, and even if he had his energy completely restored, there were no guarantees he would win.

 

Svecko turned around and flew off into the skies, without waiting for any response. Svecko was like a shooting star as he flew off into the distance. Bryant stood in place in a somewhat confused manner as he watched Svecko head towards where the battle was currently going on. After a couple of seconds, his expression turned to that of a smirk as he watched what had just happened. Bryant did not bother chasing after Svecko, because his goal wasn’t to kill Svecko or his allies, and he also did not want to corner such a monster, he wasn’t quite confident in killing Svecko. “Very glad that this is over. That attack from the snow saint nearly froze my soul. If I was a second slower, that would have been the end for me.” Bryant said as he sighed in praise. “How then was it possible that this child survived? That should not be possible, but yet I witnessed it with my own eyes.”

 

Bryant waved his hand, and the golden cocoon that had Willard within it flew towards him. Bryant turned and stared in the distance, his stare pierced through the forest all the way to the battle that was still ongoing. “It’s about time I end all this,” Bryant said before disappearing from where he was.

 

*****************

Over at the battlefield, Aswan was currently fighting with Allan. He had a couple of scratches across his body, but he was still alive. “The Primero knight sure lives up to his reputation. It has only been a couple of minutes, and yet he has pushed me to such a state even with my recent improvements.” Aswan thought to himself as desperately gasped for air. “Damn it! Why must my luck be this bad? If I am to survive this, I must use that treasure Lord Ducart gave me.”

 

Aswan gritted his teeth as he pulled out a blue looking pill the size of a golf ball. As Aswan bit down on the pill, a wave of terrifying energy burst out of his body. The previously disheveled looking Aswan seemed to have gained immense vitality. The surround elemental energy was stimulated and even traces of the water element became visible to the naked eye for a couple seconds before it died down. “Damn you! Damn you Primero knight. Because of you, I have wasted this treasure. I will take your head, and the head of the other knights with me today.” Aswan said with a deranged look in his eyes.

 

Allan stood quietly as his gray long beard fluttered along the direction of the air, he watched as Aswan bellowed in anger and remained calm without uttering a single word. Aswan charged towards Allan, his speed almost instantly doubled. He hacked his sword in an obviously crazed manner towards Allan. After taking the blue pill, Aswan’s strength had immediately peaked to the limit of element energy warriors. This kind of strength could actually be classified as actually exceeding the limits of elemental energy, but because of Aswan low attainments in the elemental laws of nature, he couldn’t properly control the immense energy and thus was capped at the elemental energy level.

 

“Die for me!” Aswan yelled as he continued to attack Allan, who was slowly being suppressed by the speed and strength of Aswan’s crazed swords. After a couple of exchanges, the force of Aswan’s sword blow had blasted Allan a couple of meters away. A smile grew on Aswan’s face as he watched Allan get back up, to his surprise Allan still had the same unbordered look he had from the start, not even a slight show of panic could be seen on his old face. “Throughout this entire fight, the primero knight has remained calm. Even after I took that pill, he still hasn’t called for backup.” Aswan thought to himself as he watched Allan walk towards him. A sense of panic quickly filled his mind for a second. “He must be pretending. He must be afraid. That’s right, it must be his pride as the primero knight that’s making show such bravery.” Aswan said dispelling the sense of fear the swelled up in his mind.

From a distance, Bryant appeared and watched the battle that was currently unfolding. He quickly got a sense of what was happening and everybody’s position. He moved his gaze to the far east, then moved it back to the battle between Allan and Bryant. “This should be interesting. It has been over a decade I saw that kid Allan. This should be a good test for him.”

 

As Allan walked closer to Aswan, a strange and uncomfortable smile appeared on his face. This was the first reaction he had given Aswan all throughout their battle. “I was wondering what gave you such bravery to fight against me. I guess my questions have been answered. You got an essence pill from Ducart,” Allan said. “A true treasure! It’s a pity your accomplishment in the water element is just too low. You have been forced to the limits of the elementary level of power. Come, let me show you the songs of my sword.”

 

Allan changed his previously casual stance to a more composed one. Holding the hilt of his sword with both hands, his every movement became more pronounced. “First verse: song of speed,” Allan said as he swung his sword. A loud piercing noise was heard in conjunction with his swords movement. Aswan quickly tried moving his own sword to block the incoming attack from Allan, but was suddenly caught off guard as Allan’s sword disappeared from his view, only for him to feel a striking pain on his chest.

In reality, Allans sword did not disappear, it just moved so fast Aswan could not keep up with its movement. Luckily enough for Aswan, the water essence pill had given him the body strength of someone at the absolute peak of the elementary level. Aswan backed up a couple of steps and rethought about what had just happened. Beads of sweat appeared across his previously calm face. “My goodness. I would have died just now if it wasn’t for the effects of that pill,” Aswan said to himself in freight.

 

Allan pointed his sword at Aswan and continued, “Second verse: song of blades.”

 

The essence of the wind slightly congealed around Allan’s blades, before formless wind blade shot towards Aswan. That attack took Aswan by surprise as he felt yet another mysterious surge of pain on his body. Before he had the time to react, Allan had closed the distance between them. Allan began a surge of attacks on Aswan, switching from the first verse to the second verse, in an unpredictable manner. In less than five minutes of their fight, a loud screaming noise was heard from Aswan, as Allan’s blade finally pierced through his chest. Aswan couldn’t help but curse at his stupidity. There were always rumors of the martial prowess of the primero knight, but he never thought that it would be at such a state. If he had known how terrifying the primero knight was, he would have taken the pill earlier and tried escaping with the assistance of the pill, but it was all dream at this moment, Aswan knew he was already knocking at death’s doors.
Allan slowly pulled out his sword from Aswan’s chest before fiercely hacking off Aswan’s head. “Such a pity. That essence pill could have truly been a life saving treasure for someone with better accomplishments.”

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As Aswan was leading the Minya forces, headed for the Gerret household, he noticed a group of warriors riding towards their direction. Aswan frowned a little as he recognized who was leading the group. “Sir Allen!” Aswan said to himself as he was frowning. “Why has he joined this battle? Ducart assured us the Marquis family would not be joining this battle. What the hell happened?” Aswan thought to himself in a little crazed fashion. “It should still be okay. With that trump card of mine and my current strength, I should be able to take the primero knight.” Aswan said consoling himself.

“That’s Aswan leading the Minya forces.” Tadea, one of the knights that had followed after Agness and Allan, said as a strange smile appeared on his face.Ever since they had spoken with Kaban and the rest of Gerret forces, he had been burning with an intense will to fight. The strength Willard had displayed and the fashion the Gerret warriors had reverently described it made him thirst for battle even more. “It’s been a while I, Tadea, have been this excited for a battle.”He said as he stared at the incoming enemy. With the affirmation of the arrival of both parties, everyone knew a large scale battle was about to begin.

“Agness, you will be in charge of leading the squadron of warriors. Tadea, your job will be to take the Dark leaf squad leaders on the Minya forces. You all are to leave Aswan to me. No matter what you do, do not engage that man. He might not be famed for his strength, but he isn’t someone that can be easily beaten,” Allan said as he inserted more force to whipping his mount, which saw made the mount pick up its pace to lead the attack. Following closely behind Allan was Tadea, who had a brimming smile.

*********************

Svecko was like a lifeless frozen puppet, as he stared at Willard. Without much of a moment’s warning, Svecko seemed to have disappeared from Willard’s view. The sudden disappearance of Svecko, had hugely shocked Willard, who immediately radiated a combination of that strange energy and his earth elemental energy. Willard had chosen to do this because he wasn’t entirely confident in using his earth elemental energy in detecting Svecko. Within less than a second of radiating the combination of both his earth element energy and the unknown red energy, Willard felt an intense cold bridge the back of his skull. The coldness he suddenly felt was nothing like the original domain Svecko had shown earlier. This coldness was worlds apart from the first snow domain Svecko had released, this coldness was chilling right down to one’s soul. Because of the level Willard’s soul had attained, he wasn’t affected too much by the soul freezing effect of the piercing cold.

Willard instinctively released all the stored up lightning within his body to the back of his skull, whilst doing that, he controlled the flow of lightning from the sky down towards his body at the same time. As the lightning within his body flowed to combat the piercing cold that had invaded his body, Svecko was inwardly surprised. If any other person had seen Svecko’s face, they would not have been able to tell he was surprised because of the state of his body. “How is his soul not yet frozen?” Svecko couldn’t help but think. Svecko had been confident in ending the battle with just that one move, but somehow Willard had not only survived but had also attempted countering his attack. This truly shocked Svecko, because he knew how utterly devastating that attack was. Not all level 3 saints had the power to completely shake off the soul freezing effect of his attack, the way Willard had done. And definitely, no one below a level 3 saint should be able to survive it. How could Svecko know the level Willard’s soul had possibly attained?

“What is this energy?” Svecko thought as he noticed traces of the unknown energy Willard was cultivating. “It feels familiar, but also strangely different from all the energies known to me.” As the stored up lightning within Willard’s body was getting used up, a flurry of purple lightning once more descended from the sky, striking Willard’s body. The lightning bathed Willard like he was one of those legendary lightning fiends. With the re-enforcement of the lightning, Willard was finally able to defend against Svecko’s attack. A new sense of fright gripped Willard as he immediately bolted several meters away from his original position. After Willard experienced that attack from Svecko, he had gained a thorough understanding of his current power limits. Without a doubt, he knew he was qualitatively on a lower power base than Svecko, even with the aid of the unknown energy he was cultivating.

“You are full of surprises. But if this is all you have, you will sure die here today.” Svecko said in an eerie voice, as he once more proceeded to attack Willard. At this point, Willard completely gave up all thoughts of winning the battle. He immediately put all of his efforts to escaping Svecko’s presence. Willard used his movement technique aided with the unknown energy and ran in the opposite direction of the Gerret household. He knew if he was going to escape his current predicament, he had to find a way of to leave the confines of Marquis city.

“Trying to escape? That is not possible child,” Svecko said as he once more gave chase to the escaping Willard. It did not take too long for Svecko to once more catch up to Willard and attack again. This time, Svecko punched straight at Willard, and as he did, a strange sort of restriction, in the form of extreme frost, was placed on Willard. Willard gritted his teeth as he moved both his arms to try and defend Svecko’s attack.

The moment Svecko’s punch made contact with Willard’s arms, a strange restraint once again flowed towards Willard’s soul. This time, the freezing impact was a hundred times stronger than the earlier attack. With the increase of the soul freezing, Willard was immediately put in a dazed state. He had completely lost all awareness of his surroundings and was gradually losing all cognisance of himself. A silvery stream of translucent matter, that was neither liquid, solid or gas, flowed to the source of the crippling effect on his soul. After what seemed like an infinite amount of time, freezing effect on his soul was broken off.

As Willard came back to his senses, he realized he was laying on the floor. He quickly understood what had happened and what his current situation was. Svecko’s attack had frozen his soul and also sent him flying horizontally across a path. A sudden look of surprise appeared on Svecko’s face as he noticed Willard had come back to live. “Impossible! How can he still be alive?” Svecko said in complete astonishment. Currently, the white glow emitted from Svecko’s eyes had considerably reduced in intensity. From this one could tell that Svecko had unleashed his most powerful attack, and yet Willard had still survived. “How is that even possible? It only took him just a moment to break free.” The intent to Willard increased to an even greater length in Svecko’s mind. If Willard was capable of surviving his most powerful attack at this stage of power, how terrifying will Willard get when he reached his level?

Svecko raised his right hand and moved his palm in a right rotating fashion. Right above Willard’s body, an ice spike was hastily forming. The moment, the spike was completed, Svecko moved his hand downward in a tugging fashion. The spike came flying towards Willard’s head at great speed. The moment just before the spike could strike his body, a golden metallic cocoon covered his body.

“Senior snow of the West, why are you trying to kill a child of my Amber kingdom?” A gentle voice said as a middle-aged man slowly descended from the skies. The middle-aged man had long golden blonde hair, that match his soothing calm voice. This man that was descending, was the Jayesh’s associate that had left the carriage earlier. “He broke through my spatial sealing quite fast.” Svecko thought to himself without uttering a single sentence. Svecko stared at the middle-aged looking man for a couple more seconds and said, “Who are you?”

“My name is Bryant Westplain, but I don’t think someone of your class would have heard of me.” The middle-aged looking man said with a smile. Svecko thought about all the famous saints located in the Southern kingdoms, and there was no one he knew off with that name. A little frown appeared on Svecko’s face. He wasn’t entirely sure of what power level Bryant had, but he currently was in a depleted state after he unleashed his previous attack on Willard.

“Do you plan to stand in my way?” Svecko said in a hoarse tone.

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1. N/a

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As snowflakes fell from the sky, Willard couldn’t help but sigh in praises of Svecko’s domain. One flake at a time brought about great changes in the temperature of the battlefield. If Willard had not cultivated the peculiar red energy, he probably would not have been able to completely withstand Svecko’s domain.

At this point in time, the snow had slowly started to accumulate on the ground. Each snowflake piled on top of each other, creating a thin outline of a snowy surface. “I take it your response is no,” Willard said staring up at the sky at Svecko, who had an unamused look. ‘Such a waste.’ Svecko thought to himself. Svecko couldn’t believe such an ignorant martial practitioner existed. He was also slightly hesitant to kill Willard because of his tremendous potential. The best case scenario would have been for him to recruit someone as talented as Willard. ‘Why am I this unlucky to meet such a fool?’ Svecko angrily cursed inwardly.

“Who would have thought this brat would have been this foolish? You will surely die today.”  Darey joyfully said as he watched from the distance.

Willard, who was currently receiving the full brunt of Svecko’s domain, exhaled slowly and watched as the water vapor in his breathe slowly condensed. “If you are just going to keep staring at me from there, I would be excusing myself,” Willard said as he took small steps heading towards the Minya forces. A small smile erupted on his face as he was walking towards the Minya forces.

Svecko stared at Willard who was walking in the opposite direction from him he couldn’t help but shake his head. Suddenly, a white piercing light quickly spread through Svecko’s entire body. Svecko’s body completely transformed into snow after the light was done spread through his body. The next instant, Svecko had appeared behind Willard. His movement was succinct and unnoticeable to the spectators of the current battle. “Die!” Svecko said as he stretched out his right hand aiming for the back of Willard’s skull.

As Svecko’s hand moved towards the back of Willard’s head, Svecko noticed the pressure of his domain drastically reduce, which prompted him to immediately halt his attack and withdraw his hand. Staring strangely at the sky above him, he noticed the attack on his domain had come from the sky above. Suddenly, a violent streak of purple lightning descended from the sky and aimed directly for Svecko.  Svecko moved his right palm in anticipation of the lightning’s path. Although invisible to the naked eyes, a clear wall of ice had formed as a defense to the lightning. As the lightning collided with the ice defense, short purple fragments of lightning were reflected all around Svecko.

His eyebrows were creased as he stood in place defending the lightning attack. Svecko gave a side glance at Willard’s direction, thinking that he would have most assuredly died from the deflected lightning, but to his surprise, not only was Willard still alive, he was currently bathing in that lightning. Suddenly Svecko seemed to have realized something, but kept most of his attention on the lightning.

After the onslaught of lightning had died down, Svecko turned to look at Willard. The domain he had originally set up had been completely broken by the intrusion of the lightning. Svecko’s expression had completely changed as he stared somewhat dumbfounded at Willard. “How is this possible?” Svecko thought to himself as he continued to stare at Willard. “He clearly was using elemental energy earlier? So how is it that he is able to manifest saint lightning?” In this particular mortal world, the martial practitioners were capped at the saint level, so they had termed the tempest existence as saints and equivalently termed the elements saints were capable of unleashing as saint level elements.

“What a pity. I was truly hoping to kill you quickly while you had your guards down.” Willard said to Svecko who seemed lost for words.

“Are you a saint level martial practitioner?” Svecko coldly asked.

“Why ask? You should already know the answer to that question.”

Without saying a word, Svecko seemed to have disappeared into the wind as he charged towards Willard. Willard in turn had been anticipating the retaliating response from Svecko as he utilized his movement technique accordingly to evade Svecko’s attack. They were like hummingbirds as they dashed from one spot to the other. From each interaction, explosions followed by purple fragments of lightning and ice were left as remnants.

Ducart who was currently sitting on the saddle of his horse, slowly dropped to the ground. He couldn’t believe what his eyes were seeing at the moment. He subconsciously did not want to believe it, but the irrefutable truth was right in front of him. “How can this be? It has only been less than three years.” He thoughtlessly said to himself as he continued watching. Every single warrior and mage in the Minya army held their breaths in shock. They couldn’t believe they had been foolishly competing against some on that level.

After a couple of exchanges, Svecko stopped his attack and stared deeply at Willard. The look on his face changed from that of anger to appreciation. He did not particularly respect Willard, but rather he was impressed with his talent. “Truly remarkable,” Svecko said before he chuckled. “You must be training in a very unique path of cultivation. Your talents are much more impressive than I had ever imagined.” He continued with a slight smile on his face. “Against weaker saints, you should be able to tie them down, but unfortunately you have me as an opponent.” Svecko nodded his somewhat disappointedly. “A pity. It is truly a pity. I must kill you now.”

Although Willard was his opponent, Svecko felt some pain killing such a bright talent. Not only was Willard cultivating in a unique path, which required heaven defying talent, he was also very young. His battle acumen was also very high and when added together, all those qualities would have truly made him one of the greatest saints of their world. To Svecko, it was quite unfortunate that he had to kill such a talent.

“March forward and get this battle over with” Svecko’s voice loudly echoed through the Minya warriors battle front. From the tone of Svecko’s voice, they could tell he was obviously agitated. Aswan who was the commanding warrior of the entire Minya forces immediately started leading the rest of the warriors to go assault the Gerret household. Willard had an ugly face as he heard those words from Svecko. His entire plan had changed upon the appearance of Svecko, who was a saint. He had changed his plans to just tie Svecko and the Minya forces down to give enough time for re-enforcement to join the Gerret camp.

Dangling and flowing round Willards entire body were sparkles of lightning. Svecko noticed the change in Willard, and could pretty much guess what Willard was about to do. Lightning charged down from the sky aiming for Aswan and the Minya warriors as they began riding in the direction of the Gerret household. The lightning was met by a protective ice shield that took the brunt of the impact before it broke down and deflected the rest of the lightning.

“Forget it child.” Svecko said as he withdrew his hands to cross them behind his back. “There four known levels for saints in our world. The first are the newly ascended saints those who have mastered just one law.” Willard couldn’t help but think back to his battle against Aorah. After the intrusion of the old man with the staff, Willard knew of the difference within saints. “The second are those who have mastered more than one law.” Willard stared deeply at Svecko, because he knew was at least on this level and above.  “The third are those who have combined two or more laws. For the fourth level, you don’t even need to know about them.” Willard knew that Svecko had to at least be on the third level or above. From their earlier exchange where Svecko had used ice, he could tell that vecko had combine laws of two different elements, water and wind, and had used them to form both the ice and snow he showed earlier.

“You can probably hold your own against a level one saint. You might even be able to stay alive against a level two saint. But against a level three saint, you can forget about staying alive. Come let me show you difference in levels within saints.” An unknown sense of danger ripped Willard as he heard those words from Svecko. He knew Svecko was strong, but he really couldn’t quantify his strength. Willard had spent far too few years on this mortal world and was lacking in knowledge. Although he had some faith in himself, but he couldn’t afford to be overconfident.

A strange white glow of light appeared from the center of Svecko’s head as he shut his eyes, which gave the sense that he was meditating. The glow seemed to strangely be reducing almost as if it was being condensed. Willard stood in place and watched as the glow on Svecko’s head condensed. The moment the projecting light completely condensed, Svecko opened his eyes. His entire eyeball had turned completely white giving a sense of lifelessness in his body. Willard could instantly feel the noticeable difference in the level of power, as Svecko’s majestic aura seemed to rise to even greater heights.

*************

Within a carriage heading for the Gerret household, Jayesh was currently conversing with a counterpart who seemed to be in high spirits. When suddenly Jayesh’s counterparts jolly atmosphere changed to a more serious one. He moved his gaze pass Jayesh, seemingly staring through the interiors of the carriage to the ends of the world. “Not good. Why has he gotten serious now” Jayesh’s counterpart said before disappearing from carriage.

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The atmosphere of the current battlefield had immediately changed with the appearance of a saint. The so-called existence that defied mortal limits, the perceived absolute limit of the mortal world. Svecko who was right  in front of Willard smiled as he stared at Willard, because of the naturally awkward shape of his face, it was difficult to tell if Svecko was smiling or frowning.

“I have had a change of mind. Kneel before me as a disciple.” Svecko said with the same awkward look on his face.

Everyone that heard what Svecko had said was immediately stunned, especially Ducart and Darey. Ducart, who had personally financed the war, and had faced various major uphill battles to get things to incline the way he had wanted. But now, the number one expert on his side was inviting his enemy to be his disciple.

Ducart currently had a huge frown on his face. He couldn’t believe the situation was about to change yet again. When they had finally gotten the upper hand, Svecko nonchalantly not only offered his enemy a way out, he also offered to be his teacher. The big question on Ducart’s mind at that moment was whether Svecko was going to turn against them. If that happened, that would spell utter and incomparable disaster to everyone on his side. “How can this be happening? The lord from the Paisa kingdom had promised to assist me, so why is this Svecko choosing my enemy as a disciple?” Ducart couldn’t help but curse inwardly at his terrible luck. First Willard had become a major thorn in his shoes, he had killed Allada whom he had much expectation of, and now, not only was he not going to die, he was going to become a personal disciple of a saint.

How many experts in the entire kingdom could boast of having a saint as a teacher? But Willard had gotten this opportunity at Ducart’s expense. Ducart was filled with an overwhelming sense of hatred towards Willard. He couldn’t believe that just this one insignificant warrior under the command of a child like Sebastian Garrett, had caused him so much defeat time and time again and to make matters worse, he was about to gain a status much greater than any warrior in his command.

The state of the battlefield had turned stale, the former cheering noises of the Minya warriors had completely died out and left a melancholic atmosphere. The situation before everyone had completely changed, the most important figure of this battle had strangely become the astonishingly talented youth before them.

“Kneel before you as a disciple?” Willard said out loud as he pretended to be in a state of thought. “Tell me, if I become your disciple, would you kill every single one of my enemies?” He finally asked before a delinquent smile blossomed on his face. The choice of whether Willard took Svecko on as his master or not? Was not even a question on his mind. Willard had simply thought to take advantage of the situation before him. If the person before him would kill his enemies, why shouldn’t he take advantage of that? Watching them kill themselves while he preserved his strength would be the best possible scenario for things to play out.

The faces of everyone on the Minya side all immediately changed. This was the worse possible scenario of things that could happen to them. If a saint decided to massacre them, there would be nothing they could do to fight back. “What the hell kind of situation is this? This damn Ducart has doomed us all.” Darey furiously thought to himself as he gave Ducart a slight hateful glance.

“Sir Svecko,” Ducart called out in panic. “Don’t forget my arrangements with the Lord of Paisa,” Ducart added in complete fright. Those around Ducart turned to give him a strange stare. At this point in time, a lot of different thoughts was rushing through Ducart’s mind. He thought back to all the sacrifices he had made for this battle, all the prices he had to pay to guarantee his victory. He had even sold his allegiance to the neighboring Paisa kingdom and yet all this was about to be for nothing. The person that was supposed to his trump card might very well be the one to kill him.

“Shut your mouth.” An angry voice echoed all through the battlefield. The voice was none other than Svecko himself who was angry at the fact Ducart had mentioned the Lord of Paisa. “If you mention his lordship and the kingdom of Paisa again out loud, I would kill you on the spot.” Svecko’s angry voice sounded in Ducart’s ears alone.

Svecko turned his attention back to Willard, but this time around his strangely shaped smile was nowhere to be found. This time around his expression was clear as day, he was not pleased. “I will give you one last chance to kneel before me.” Svecko coldly said to Willard, who seemed the same exact way he had been throughout the entire battle. “If you know what’s good for you…” Svecko was saying before he was interrupted by Willard.

“In that case, I refuse,” Willard responded indifferently. “If you kill them all, I would kneel before you as a disciple.” He added. A vein angrily bulged on Svecko’s forehead. In all of his life as a saint, no mortal had ever spoken to him in that manner. Even among saints, very few would have the courage to speak to him in that manner.

Svecko was slowly starting to be overtaken by a raging sense of anger, but as he stared at Willard, who did not even seem to think much of his statement, couldn’t help but think of what could be giving him so much courage in front of a saint. After a brief second of contemplation, Svecko immediately started laughing. “Ignorance,” Svecko concluded in his mind, had to be all that drove Willard. No other mortal would have that much courage in front of a saint, only an ignorant person who knew nothing could possibly behave that way.

Ducart who had just heard that was utterly stunned. Who in their right mind would dare talk to a saint in the manner Willard had just done? Especially after knowing the person was a saint. “It seems the heavens have not forsaken me.” Ducart thought as a joyful expression slowly came on his face. “Who would have thought this Willard fellow would be so arrogant? Truly foolish.”

“Truly ignorant,” Svecko said as he took a step towards Willard. “Your talent is truly amazing, but are seriously lacking in brains.”

“You were offered the heavens, yet you choose the dirty mud.”

********************

Baya who was leading the way as he rode his mount, couldn’t help but grow slightly excited. At this point in time, he had noticed they had reached the outer limits of Marquis city. A particular scenic memory of the region flowed through his mind as he remembered walking through those parts on foot, while he was on a mission to get the Living Fire Plant.

It had been more than two full years since Willard had gone missing. Baya was the only one who knew he was alive because of the talisman Willard had left for him, but he wasn’t entirely sure of the safety of Willard’s environment. Willard was the first person who had truly set him on the right part in his martial cultivation journey, he was someone he had the highest degree of respect and reverence for and now he was about to see his master again.

Baya turned back to look at the carriage behind him. He knew the head of the Gerret house, Lord Jayesh, who was a powerful expert was in that carriage. His mission this time around, bring the head of the Gerret house a message, had been successful. Now all he could think of was getting back in time.

**********************

Kanban who had arrived at the gates of the Gerret household was signaling for the gate to be opened for him before he caught wind of some movement coming from the far right corner. His demeanor quickly changed as he noticed a group of people riding their horses and heading towards the Garret household. His originally tense expression quickly changed to an excited one. “Sir Allen” Kaban said as a smiled slowly blossomed on his face.

“Isn’t that Kaban?” Agnes who was riding beside Allen and the other knight, Tadea, said out loud.

“He seems to be in a bad shape. Perhaps the battle has already intensified to the last stand.” Tadea responded.

“Where exactly are the Minya forces?” Tadea asked as he and Agnes discussed while they rode their horses towards Kaban. Allen had remained completely silent the entire time. He was like a rock, expressionless and seemingly unfazed.

As the knights reached the gates of the Gerret house, Kaban gave an honest bow as he greeted them. “What is the situation?” Allen asked

As Kanban began narrating the events that had transpired, the gates to the Gerret household cracked open. Sebastian walked out with a distressed expression on his face. Although he wasn’t present at the battlefield, he was still able to guess what the situation had been. After all, the towering size of the aberrations was something he could see from the Gerret household.

“Greetings city knight,” Sebastian said as he gave an honest bow.

“After the greetings, Kaban narrated the situation of everything he had experienced until the time he was saved by Willard. As he finished his briefing of the situation, more of the warriors and archers that had stayed longer on the battlefield than Kaban himself, arrived at the gates of the Gerret household. Some of those warriors had seen Willard fight against those aberrations by himself and narrated what they saw to the knights and Sebastian. One person in particular, while escaping, had seen some of the glorious scenes of Willard’s battle with the aberrations.

At this point in time, none of the people that had made their way back to the Gerret household had witnessed the appearance of the saint level combatant, Svecko. After making sense of all the information they received, Allen took command of all the Gerret warriors and rode out heading for the current battlefield.

*******************

“It seems you do not understand your situation,” Svecko said followed by an increase in the intensity of the wind around them. “I took mercy on you because of the little talent you have, but you do not know your place.” He continued as he slowly started floating upwards.

Suddenly, the clouds rapidly started darkening. Snowflakes majestically started falling from the sky, while the temperature of the battlefield immediately dropped. “Domain” Willard immediately thought to himself as he stared at the floating Svecko. Willard immediately abandoned his earth elemental energy and started channeling the red energy from his core.

“This fellow seems to be much more powerful than Aorah.” Willard thought to himself as his expression became more serious. “He should be on the same level as the person that saved Aorah.” Ever since that encounter, Willard had known they were different levels of powers among saints. He instantly extrapolated that Aorah had to be among the lowest level of power among saints.

One after the other, screams filled with agony erupted at the forefront of the battlefield. Some of the unlucky Minya warriors who were caught in Svecko’s domain and were immediately turned to ice sculptures. The entire Minya forces all scrambled in a frantic manner to give some distance, no one wanted to die pointlessly.

As they got to a safer location, they all held their breath in awe to the power of a saint. Those who had managed to escape with their lives knew how cold the domain was, so as they saw Willard still alive couldn’t help but acknowledge his strength. Truly among elemental energy users, there was none who could claim to be superior to Willard.

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With the claw of the wind element cheetah blown away, the cheetah retreated as its claw slowly reformed. The fire element serpent was next to charge in and attack. Before colliding with Willard, the fire element serpent coiled up in one spot. The fire element of the surrounding space around the fire serpent dramatically increased. This increase was evident with the drastic increase in the temperature of its surrounding. The serpent’s original orange like body slowly transformed red.

The serpent charged forward towards Willard, wherever the serpent went through ghastly trembles in spaces could be seen elapsing. The serpent collided head first with Willard’s golem shield. With that one strike, its intention to kill Willard was evident.

As Willard tumbled backward from that strike, he couldn’t help but sigh in amazement of the intensity of fire element the serpent had condensed. After tumbling a few meters away, Willard regained his balance and stared at the aberrations before him. ‘I can’t take too many attacks from this serpent.’ Willard thought to himself.

“The wind element cheetah excels solely in speed, the earth element golem should excel solely in strength, while this fire element serpent has a good balance between speed and strength with the added power of incineration.” Willard softly said. Unknowingly, this battle had brought back the kind of thrill Thanus had lived for as a god. Although the aberrations seemed undefeatable to the others, but to him, it was a welcomed challenge.

Willard once more gathered the earth element and formed his earth armor. He rushed towards the group of aberrations that seemed to be in perfect sync as they began battling Willard. At first, Willard seemed to have been at a disadvantage when they fought, but after the few exchanges they had, his experience fighting them had significantly increased. Willard decided to first take down the earth element golem given the fact he had ample experience with the earth element, and for the added fact the golem was the slowest.

Willard who seemed like a squirrel climbing a tree, stealthy evaded the attacks of the earth golem and climbed onto the arm of the golem. Willard used his earth movement technique to hastily make his way towards the head of the earth element golem. “Although you are talented you lack experience.” Svecko who seemed delighted with the current exchange between Willard and the aberrations said out loud. The onlookers had a face full of surprise as they watched Willard combat these aberrations. When Willard made his move gunning for the earth element Svecko had immediately known what Willard had been thinking.

Of all the aberrations one could form with elements, the earth element golem was notoriously known for its strength. Even among saints, there is only a handful of them willing to compete against an earth element golem created by that many elemental energy mages. From that, he had stipulated that Willard had done so out of his ignorance. Although the earth element golem was not fast, its defense was at least ten times that of the fire element serpent.

As Willard approached the head of the golem, his movement speed seemed to have drastically reduced. In front of Willard, a sudden strange ripple in space seemed to mysteriously appear and then disappear. Svecko who had been in a relaxed manner suddenly tensed up. “This! How is that possible?” Svecko said out loud to the bewilderment of the people around him. Of which, Darey Helden who had joined Ducart at the center of the army had an unsightly look on his face. He was currently the one that felt the most animosity towards Willard, after all, Willard had personally slain his son.

Darey had been shocked the entire time as he watched Willard battle the aberrations, but hearing Svecko’s words his expression slightly changed to that of disgust. ‘What is wrong with this envoy? Is he just noticing the fight now?’ Darey silently thought to himself. ‘What is Ducart thinking off for bringing such a useless person to the battlefield.’ Darey who had been watching the fight intently did not notice anything new as everything seemed like it had previously been, but with Svecko’s sudden outburst of surprise seemed to only just irritate him. Ducart only gave a slightly surprised look as he side glanced Svecko. The others on the battlefield might not know Svecko, but he was well aware of the fact that Svecko was a great expert from the Paisa kingdom. So when something could possibly startle someone like Svecko, then it had to have been something incredible.

Within less than ten seconds of Svecko’s surprising outburst, a sudden loud bang was heard around the battlefield. When Willard had attacked, he had condensed all of the vibrations that were previously being spread out in a chaotic manner to a single point on his fist. As his fist collided with the head of the golem, a partial rip in the fabric of space had appeared at the point of  contact, before it quickly reformed and fixed itself. But as that attack had met the head of the golem, the vibration quick spread from a single point to the entire body to the golem. It was like a silent hymn as the vibrations were continually increasing in magnitude until the body of the golem slowly started cracking up, followed by a loud explosion which sent the broken up pieces spreading across the battlefield.

Immediately after the body of the golem had been destroyed, the earth mages that had casted that earth golem spell, all coughed out some blood. The remaining warriors on the side of the Minya household were all shocked with what they had currently witnessed. Not just the warriors, everybody that had been watching the battlefield was amazed. Some of the Gerret warriors who had already escaped to the outskirts of the Gerret household heard the loud exploding sound, they turned to look towards the battlefield. To their complete surprise, the noticed the complete  disintegrating form of the earth element golem.

The debris from the crumbled up golem first spread towards the aberrations that were close by. Of the two aberrations, the fire element serpent had struggled to successfully defend against the striking shattered earth pieces as its defenses was a little bit tougher, but the wind element cheetah suffered a couple of attacks that completely bore holes through its body. Because of their closure to the earth element golem when it was attacked and the sudden attack that took everyone by surprise, the remaining two aberrations were the first to be attacked by the shattered earth pieces. Although the wind element cheetah had suffered more under the attack, it still wasn’t enough to completely destroy the cheetah. The cheetah retreated to a safe distance, while its body slowly reformed.

Willard took the opportunity to dash towards the regenerating wind element cheetah. Now that the cheetah was in a weakened state, this was the perfect opportunity to completely destroy it. Before Willard could attack the wind element cheetah, a voice suddenly rang all across the battlefield; “Stop.” Willard that was already on the motion to collide with the wind element cheetah, ignored the voice and proceeded to attack the cheetah. Just as Willard’s fist was about to get in the motion to attack, Willard suddenly felt a familiar feeling of someone using elemental energy to try and suppress his consciousness. Willard quickly abandoned his attack and roused the elemental energy within his core to quickly dissipated the attack.

“Impressive. Impressive. You are even able to combat the domain of a saint. You are quite the impressive young fellow.” Voice said before the image of a man appeared to be slowly descending. The man looked old but had short golden brown hair full of life. He had a strange smile that made it hard for people to know if he was smiling or frowning. This person was clearly a saint that had interfered in the battle, and Willard was unfamiliar with this person, so he knew it most likely had to be an enemy.

“Sir Svecko!” Ducart who had been utterly shaken by the destruction of the earth golem immediately called out in delight. Svecko was previously seated in a relaxed and unbothered state beside Ducart before he suddenly disappeared from his position without anyone noticing him. “A saint!” Some of the Minya warriors exclaimed. They were ecstatic at the fact that a saint had suddenly appeared on their side. After Willard had displayed his overwhelming martial prowess, all of the Minya forces had given up hope. They knew beneath the saint level Willard was near undefeatable. But now that a saint had shown himself, the battle had completely shifted to their side.

Darey Helden who was beside Ducart was in complete shock when he noticed who the saint was. This was someone he had felt utter disdain towards, someone he almost caused out not too long. Darey inwardly thanked the heavens he had not said anything inappropriate because he knew a saint killing him was tantamount to killing an ant. He wouldn’t even have the opportunity to apologize. ‘This must be one of the trump cards Ducart had spoken off.’ Darey silently said to himself before he moved his gaze towards Ducart. He couldn’t even imagine what price Ducart had to pay to illicit the help of a saint.

‘This child is as monstrously talented. Without a doubt, he will reach the saint level. If he is properly nurtured, he can reach the heights of those geniuses of the Eastern and Northern continent. If I can recruit him I will have rendered a great service to our side. And if I kill him, I will also have rendered great service.’ Svecko thought to himself as he seized up Willard.

“Child I am quite impressed with your talents,” Svecko said before he finally landed beside Willard.

 

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It did not take long for the battle to break into a frantic series of attack. Looking at the dire situation, of the battlefield, the remaining Garret warriors started retreating backwards towards the inner city square. Willard held Kaban by his side and instantly used his movement technique to transverse the currently frenzied battlefield. Willard arrived where the horses had been kept and instructed Kaban to ride back.  Without watching him leave, Willard once more used his movement techniques to get back into the battlefield.

 

At this point in time, the battlefield had moved backwards towards the inner city square. The Gerret house archers that had previously been in hiding all took to their positions in attacking their foes. Primarily because the archers had caught the Minya forces by surprise, the majority of the retreating warriors were able to reduce their casualties.

 

In retaliation to the sudden interference from the Gerret archers, mages on the side of the Minya house started casting various offensive and defensive spells. A massive fire serpent took form and started gliding through the air. This massive fire serpent spell was a joint spell the several fire mages had cast, which gave it its frightening size. To another corner an earth style golem was taking shape. The colossal size was something to behold. Just like that, different aberrations of magic were getting on the offensive as they all primarily targeted the archers who were all frantically trying to escape. One after the other, large destructive sounds were heard as the magical aberrations all destroyed the buildings in their paths.

 

Willard who had arrived in the midst of all this had a look of intrigue on his face. ‘Why did it take them this long to use this?’ He silently thought without the least bit of worry on his face. If the Minya forces had immediately used those magical aberrations, they would have easily annihilated the Gerret warriors. Willard concluded there had to be a price the warriors paid for using this spells and that was why they had not used it in the beginning. Perhaps the amount of elemental energy it consumed was astonishing.

 

“It’s about time the fun starts,” Willard said before clasping his hands in a loud bang. The clapping sound he made echoed throughout the battlefield but did not cause any change to the state of the battlefield.

 

Within five foot of Willard, an enormous amount of earth elemental energy swiveled chaotic around him. Willard who shut his eyes as he roused the earth elemental energy, suddenly opened them. He could see hundreds of warriors running towards his direction, but he still stood in place. “Strike!” Willard said, which immediately followed with the earth slightly trembling. The attacking Minya warriors could not feel the trembles as it blended perfectly with the echoes their running footsteps had caused.

 

Suddenly, hundreds of earthen spikes surreptitiously sprouted from the ground. Within fifty feet perimeter in front of Willard, these spikes mysteriously appeared massacring everything in its wake. The original charging Minya warriors, those that were entangled in battles, and even some Gerret warriors who were in front of him, were all attacked by those spikes. Although Willard wanted to mainly attack their foes, but some of the Garret warriors were already caught in tight positions of which he couldn’t help. Willard wasn’t the type to second guess his actions as he mercilessly attacked every corner of the fifty feet in front of him.

 

The sudden appearance of those spikes had caused huge casualties on the side of the Minya family. It was nothing short of share slaughter, which had blindsided the Minya forces. “That kid is quite impressive. It’s a pity, he should have used up a good amount of his elemental energy in that attack.” Svecko who had watched the entire thing happen said. The look on Ducart and the rest of the nobles faces were that of complete shock and anger. “How is it that a meager force of less than thirty has caused us this much casualty? If things continue like this aren’t we going to be the losers in the end.” Ducart silent thought to himself.

 

In the midst of this slaughter, three elemental aberrations remained. It was the earth element golem, the fire element serpent, and the wind element cheetah. As those aberrations made their way forward, the spikes that were clustered all around the battlefield were either disintegrated or blown away. It was clear that against these elemental aberrations, techniques similar to the earth spike, Willard had used, would have absolutely no effect on it.

 

All three of those remaining aberrations charged towards Willard with their fastest speed. The wind element  cheetah was the fastest of the three, and so was the first one to attack Willard. Several translucent crescent wind blades flew out of the mouth of the wind element cheetah as it approached Willard. From the density and speed of the wind blades, Willard knew he had to evade those attacks as there was no way he could defend against them with his physical body.

Willard was like a hummingbird, each movement was fluid and crisp. After his battle with Aorah, he had tremendously improved in the aspects of agility and control of the earth element. This seemingly minor improvement translated to a difference of night day in the speed and control of his movement technique. If it was in the past he had fought with the wind element aberration, he probably would not have been able to avoid all of its wind blade attacks.

 

Willard controlled the broken up pieces of earth from the earth spikes all around the battlefield to all float in mid air. Some flew towards Willard and started forming an earth element golem shield, while others just remained floating. At this point in time, the other aberrations had caught up to the wind element cheetah and started attacking. Willard was like a mouse to the cat-sized aberrations, a mortal to the titanic sized aberrations.

 

The fire element serpent slithered through the air and attacked with its giant head. Willard met the attack straight on now that he was in his golem protective shield. He did not dare to defend with his bare body, but now that he had the shield he was at least certain to a certain degree to survive a head on attack. The blow from the fire element serpent sent Willard tumbling backwards. The combination of the heat and power of that titanic sized serpent was much more power than Willard had predicted earlier. When Willard regained his balance, he immediately willed the earth around him to reinforce the damaged golem protective shield.

 

The wind element cheetah was already in front of him, it swiped forcefully with its claw striking straight for Willard’s head. Now that Willard had the golem shield, his speed and agility had reduced a little bit, whilst he gaining much more strength. Willard punched straight at the incoming claw attack of the cheetah. To everyone’s surprise, Willard had successfully defended the attack and also blown away the claw of the wind element claw. “How is this possible?” Many of those who had been watching exclaimed as they realized Willard had not only defended the attack but he had also managed to destroy the claw of the wind element cheetah.

On the current battle, only one other person aside from Willard was capable of understanding the subtleties of what had happened. To the ordinary person on the battlefield it seemed as if Willard just punched through the wind claw of the cheetah, but in actuality, a little more had happened. Before Willard’s earth golem fist had met with the claw of the wind element cheetah, Willard had formed a series of vibration in front of his blow. This translucent vibration was in accordance to one of the laws of the earth element. That was the basic form of the primary laws of vibration. And with that little usage of the primary law of vibration, Willard was capable of astonishingly increasing the strength of his blow.

 

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At the Marquis house. A meeting was currently going in full session.

Lyon was pacing back and forth within the meeting room. He slowed down his movements, and gradually settled down before he sat back down.

“Saving the Gerret household holds no value to us,” Lyon said to the room filled with high ranking members of the Marquis household. Currently, Lyon was the person with the highest authority within their house. His father, Leonardo Marquis, had left the city a month earlier on private business.

 

“If we don’t go to their rescue, that would spell doom for our only allies right now.” Another high-ranking member retorted.

“Their rescue? They are already a lost cause. The way I see it, the only option we have right now is to fortify our defenses. Hopefully, father will be able to get in touch with our ancestor.”

“Are you suggesting we leave our only ally to hang right now?” Another member responded to Lyon’s remarks. “What shame? To think the future head of this household will fall to such levels of cowardice.”

 

Lyons muscle slightly twitched as he heard those words. Although he could be considered the current head, but in reality, his status wasn’t any higher than those in the meeting. These people consisted of knights, great warriors, and mages. None of them took Lyon as a serious leader, especially after his fit of cowardice. One after the other, they all raised issues with Lyons suggestion.

 

“Enough talking.” An old man with gray hair said as he banged the table and stood up. “Even the young master of the Gerret household is bold enough to fight them head on.” He continued saying as he walked slowly towards the door. “I will lead my unit and go back that young one.” He concluded immediately leaving the room.

At the moment, the room had turned silent. “Sir Allen!” Someone said to break up the complete silence. The next moment, several others got up as well. “I will also be following the primero knight.” A young feminine voice rang out across the room. Everyone’s attention moved to the beautiful woman who stood up from her seat. She did not wait for any response as she left the table. Her long blonde hair dangled as she seductively walked out.

 

The primero knight was a position given to the number one most outstanding knight in Marquis city. Sir Allen who was currently in that position, had been the longest current serving member of the knighthood. His accomplishment over the years had been phenomenal and praiseworthy and even in his current old age, no one had successfully taken the primero position from him. He was a man that effortlessly garnered awe and admiration, a pious and up worthy man.

“Wait up Agnes, I will also be joining you.” Another man said not paying any attention to anyone on the table. Lyon who was currently sitting down had a face full of frowns. He knew quite well that only the head of the Marquis house could command a knight. ‘Wait until I inherit the position, I will make you regret your actions.’ Lyons said bottling up his anger.

 

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Marquis city square.

Ducart was currently smiling as he watched the battlefield. “Oh, that Kaban fellow of the Gerret house is quite outstanding.” He said with a smirk. “He was actually able to make Allada use his weapon.” Ducart turned to the person to his right and asked: “Sir Svecko, what do you think of that fellow Allada is currently battling?” Although Ducart was always a proud person, he also knew when to be respectful. Svecko was a special envoy that had been personally sent to him by one of his major backers. This envoy, in particular, was one of his special trump cards for this battle against the Marquis.

 

“He is indeed talented. He is barely touching upon the primary laws of explosions of the fire element. With a few more decades he would surely reach the saint level.” Svecko responded with an indifferent look. Ducart hearing “saint level” was greatly shocked. This was the first time Svecko had spoken highly of anyone since he came to Marquis city, not even Allada, whom Ducart had considered the finest genius under his banner, was praised by Svecko.

 

As they continued watching the fight, the smile on Ducart’s face grew ever more crescent shaped. “It’s a pity we could not have recruited that one. He would have been an asset to us in the future. Since you are not with us, you must die.” Ducart’s reasoning was quite astute since he could not have Kaban, it was best Kaban dies.

 

“What the?” Svecko straightened up his back as he first reacted. “What hell just happened? How did he get there so fast?” Ducart said in complete surprise. They had been casually watching Allada beat Kaban effortlessly, and when it had reached the final moments of the battle, an unexpected variable came into play. Somehow, Willard had appeared right behind Allada in the last second and stabbed him to death.

 

“You *******!” Allada cursed as he watched Allada slump to the ground. Seeing Allada die caused him so much pain, he had really high expectations of Allada’s future prospects and now he had met his end at the hands of some youth. “Who is that person?” Svecko asked.

 

“He is that young fellow I told you about. The young genius of the Gerret house.” Ducart said with a little bad taste in his mouth.

 

“Incredible. Even among saints of the earth element, his movement technique could be considered first class.” Ducart was shocked again by Svecko words. This was the second time he had praised someone from the opposing side, but this time, he really wasn’t happy to hear it. This particular person had killed one of his most dazzling stars, how could he possibly be happy hearing words of praises of the person. Svecko relaxed his posture back to his originally slacked position and paid no more attention to Ducart.

 

Ducart called a nearby general to his side as they discussed. After a couple of seconds of exchanging words, Ducart nodded. “Aswan, we shall do as you have suggested. Go immediately take charge of the army.” Ducart was currently unhappy with the state of the current battle. In every exchange so far, they had come in worse. So far they had lost more than twenty of their elite warriors while the forces of the Gerret household had only lost three. Just now, Aswan had suggested they neglect the small scrambles they were currently having and use their overwhelming numbers to completely crush the foes before them.

 

As Aswan arrived in front of the army, he immediately yelled; “Everyone attack. Kill the enemies before us.”

 

Instantly, the morale of the warriors had risen to a higher level. They all charged forward with their weapons. They knew the warriors of the Gerret household were elite’s, but for how long could they possibly defend against a large army like theirs? They knew sooner or later they would wipe them clean and rid the Gerret forces of their best warriors.

Soon the large scale battle began. The unfortunate warriors who were cut in the first line of attack were instantly swamped by increasing amount of people. As they killed one person, the warrior will be surrounded by two more. It did not take long for the six Gerret warriors that were at the front lines to fall to the overwhelming number of the Minya forces.

 

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It had been two weeks­ since Willard got ba­ck to Marquis city, h­is mission this time ­was vastly different ­from the first time h­e had ventured to the­ city. Back then, he had ju­st regained his memor­ies and decided to jo­in an academy to gain access to knowledge about this mortal world he could never be afforded at the small Yellow Hew village.

After spend­ing over two years in­ captivity with Aorah, ­he no longer wanted t­o join an academy, af­ter all, with his current str­ength, he could forcefully demand all the k­nowledge he needed from most exper­ts.

Within his quarters, ­Willard was seated wi­th his legs crossed a­s he meditated and st­udied the internal wo­rkings of his element­al core.

It did not take too long for the Gerret family warriors to congregate at the main hall. Sebastian stood up staring at the warriors before him, their numbers were less than a hundred with the vast majority of them being at the natural energy level. To the edge of the hall, the maids and servants of the household stood. Normally, during meetings for the warriors, the maids and servants were not permitted to be present, but the situation was different today so Sebastian permitted their presence. After all, the meeting this time around was one that determined their survival.

“Everyone, today our Gerret family is facing the biggest crisis since our founding. By now everyone should know what is going in the city, and it’s no secret that our Gerret family will soon join in this storm. Any moment now, representatives from the Minya family camp will soon reach our gates.” Sebastian said looking everyone straight in the eyes. He had no intentions of hiding the truth from them. “At that moment they arrive, I plan on telling them my decision to support the Marquis household.” After saying that, the room was in complete silence, no one uttered a single word and just listened.

“So today with the biggest heart, I want to say, thank you to all of you that have worked for my family so diligently all these years. Anyone that wants to leave is free to go now.” Sebastian staring at the frantic eyes of everyone. Although Sebastian wanted to bolster his defenses, he wanted only those that were willing to fight to their deaths. When he had told them they could leave, he had done so knowing that those that remained knew the exact severity of the current situation. Following his words, seventy percent of the maids and servants quickly left the main hall. Following that about twenty percent of the warriors left as well. This did not come as a surprise to Sebastian, he expected such that was why he had addressed them with such words.

“This is the last opportunity to leave. Those who choose to stay will not be afforded such an opportunity in the future.” Sebastian said again to verify everyone’s resolve to stay.

“Good. Arilis see to it that everyone that had chosen to leave is escorted peacefully out of the house.”

The warriors and maids that had chosen to stay knew exactly what the situation was. Those that chose to leave were naive to think they could escape the situation by just walking away. None of the opposing families would hire or bring them into their families. There was the possibility these people could be potential spies within their ranks, the opposing households will hunt and kill them all after everything was over.

Afterwards, the doors to the hall were firmly shut. Sebastian instructed the rest of the warriors on their task, leaving only a trusted few that he chose to lay out his plans for, giving strict and detailed instructions on how things were going to play out. Although, Sebastian himself wasn’t a warrior, his ability to put together a plan was of the highest order.

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At the main gate to the Gerret household, a bright brown carriage had stopped. Coming out of the carriage, Ade stood with a little convoy behind her. Immediately, the guards had sent a message to Sebastian. “Open the gate?” Ade called. Her words met deaf ears as the guards all stood without utter a single word. Ade noticing that broke into a queer smile. ‘It seems Sebastian has really chosen the side of the Marquis.’ She thought to herself silently.

Suddenly, the gates cracked opened, with Sebastian and Willard walking out. Ade was shocked to see Willard beside Sebastian, for some unknown reason the presence of Willard had changed the entire game plan she had. She previously held some hope in changing Sebastian’s mind, but now a new treat had silently risen in her subconscious. “Go back and tell your family head that my Gerret household has and always will be a pillar of the Marquis household.” Sebastian said as they got within ten feet of the convoy.

“Think this through carefully. Don’t throw your life and that of your followers away needlessly. My Minya household is in control of seventy percent of the forces within this city. There is but one possible outcome, our victory.”

“There is nothing to think. My decision has been made.” Ade frown a little as she heard his response. She moved her gaze towards Willard then smiled.

“I trust you know what the situation is like. If you join my Minya family, I guarantee we will protect you from the Helden household. We will also name you a knight of our family, given rights, wealth, and prestige.” Ade said enticing Willard to join their ranks. The rest of the convoy and guards were in shock by Ade’s words. Not only was she going to protect and give him wealth, she was also going to name him a knight. Within each city, knights were only second the city governor. They were aloof figures above all ramifications of the law. They were powerful warriors who protected the governor at times of great risk.

Willard turned to Sebastian and asked loudly; “has this little miss always been this dumb?” Hearing Willard’s question, a huge frown displaced the smile on Ade’s face. Not just her, the rest of the convoy and the guards were stunned by his response. Sebastian couldn’t help but laugh a little at Willard’s question. Although Sebastian trusted Willard, he quite honestly did not know how he would react to Ade’s tempting offer. “Little miss don’t waste both you and our time here. As for the Helden household, please tell them I am waiting for them.” Willard responded moving his gaze back to Ade.

One of the guards by Ade’s side was utterly infuriated. Not only had Willard rejected a knighthood, which was something he would die for, he also insulted Ade to add to it. He finally couldn’t take it anymore, “Shut your mouth you little monkey.” the guard said pulling out his sword. Before Ade could even stop him, the guard had dashed towards WIllard and Sebastian. From the palm of the guard, light purple lightning could be seen dancing all the way through his sword. WIllard seeing him run all the way towards him and Sebastian couldn’t be even bothered to use his gravitational domain on him.

Willard took a single step that mysteriously made him appear right in front of the charging guard. Although the guard was shocked, he still maintained a calm state of mind with his attack. Holding the sword in his right hand, he attacked with a right swing of his sword. The motion of his attack showed exactly how much experience he had, guided by his control of the lightning element, he aimed straight for Willard’s head. Now that Willard had completed his natural energy base, his activation of elemental energy was instant. Without much thought, Willard moved his hand in anticipation of the attack. Willard caught the sword in its motion for his neck. Holding tightly onto the sword, the look on the guard’s face changed drastically. ‘How is this possible?’ the guard frightfully thought before Willard snapped the sword, breaking off a portion of the sword. With the same motion of breaking the sword, Willard stabbed the broken off portion into the neck of the guard.

It was at this moment the guard understood why Willard had spoken in that manner. Holding onto his neck, the guard dropped to his knees, gasping for life. As his vision increasingly got blurred, the guard couldn’t help but think of how frightening the youth in front of him was. The exchanged between them clearly showed that the youth did not even take that exchange seriously.

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Appearing right beside Sebastian, Willard turned to look at the faces of the warriors behind him. Unconsciously, he couldn’t help but sigh in disappointment as he noticed nothing but fright in their eyes. “There is no use is waiting right here.” Willard slowly said to Sebastian. “The walls and gates were superficially built, they cannot withstand an enemy attack.”

Sebastian stared at Willard with disappointed written all over his face. Sebastian  knew Willard was telling the truth as he remembered his father saying the same exact words to him when he was younger. “What do you suggest we do? They outnumber us about a hundred to one.”

“Well, they don’t have me,” Willard responded with a little smile. Over and over, Sebastian had been surprised with the level of confidence Willard had always shown. He looked at the young man before him with curious and gratified eyes.

“I will follow whatever decision you make,” Willard said moving his gaze forward.

Sebastian thought hard and well about his options. Right now he was the defacto leader of his house, so he knew there was no one but himself to shoulder this burden. “Kaban, you along with a fifty of our top archers and twenty of our top warriors and mages will head out with Willard to intercept our enemies. Remember this is not a war that must be won at the moment. All you need to do is slow them down until the forces of the Marquis comes to our rescue.” Kaban was a tall well-built warrior with gray hair. Although his hair was gray, one could tell that he was still young and in his late thirties. Kaban was one of the highest ranking warriors that served the Gerret house. He was a level 7 elemental energy warrior and one that had spent a long time serving the Gerret house.

“Willard remember this is not a fight to the death. Better to return alive than to die while fighting.”

Willard nodded in response to Sebastian’s comments. Willard thought of the many memories of fighting in wars throughout the nine heavens. Then he thought back to Sebastian’s words ‘Better to return alive than to die fighting’; these were words no one had to remind him of. There was nothing more important than surviving each battle. He accessed the difference in power and knew when to withdraw or struggle to the end. That was the only way he could learn and grow.

Kaban quickly led the group of archers and warriors and proceeded to ride to a favorable position for an ambush. Willard stood watching them as they rode out, all the hopes and faith of the remaining warriors were on them. Without making a single sound, Willard took a single step that mysteriously seemed like he had teleported to a couple tens of feet forward. With each step he took the distance seemed to increase exponentially. Everyone watching this couldn’t help but sigh in praises.

Willard’s movement technique had drastically improved from what it had originally been in the past. With each increase in elemental energy so were his improvements more noticeably pronounced. If Willard were capable of sensing and using the fire element like he did in his past life, the caliber of techniques he would have had at his disposal would have greatly surpassed what he was capable of doing at the moment.

It did not take long for Willard to catch up to Kaban and the rest, who had stopped riding at the moment. Kaban instructed the archers to take positions on top the various buildings surrounding the city square. After instructing them on their positions, Kaban began riding again with the warriors and mages. Riding a couple of minutes away from the city square Willard, Kaban and the rest could hear the heavy footsteps of the incoming Minya force.

“Quickly get ready. Start casting your spells.”  Kaban said to the four mages on their side. Immediately, the four mages clasped their hands. A faint variety of colors could be seen emanating from the mages, who were mumbling some words. “Sir Willard, it would be up to us to slow them down now,” Kaban said turning to look at Willard. At first, when Kaban had heard of the young genius Sebastian was trying to recruit, he had thought nothing of it. After all, not all genius end up fulfilling their potentials. After witnessing the martial prowess of Willard during the encounter with the Minya convoy, Kaban had a newfound respect for Willard. He was certain this time around, that the young genius beside him was the real deal.

“It’s time,” Willard said as his gaze was fixed on the army appearing before them. Kaban had chosen to wait just at the south entrance to the city square because of its smaller space. That way, they won’t be immediately overwhelmed by the share number of their foes. They could at the least buy some time with the aid of the hidden archers.

Noticing the presence of the small Gerret team in front of them, the Minya forces came to a halt. “Interesting. They already detected our movements.” Ducart Minya said talking to Allada by his side. “Inconsequential. The last bark from a dying dog. They are probably trying to buy time to escape or wait for the Marquis.” Allada responded.

Ducart laughing responded with a nod. “Send out a small team to wipe them out.”

Allada rode to the front of the army with several warriors behind. “He is here,” Allada said to himself surprisingly as he noticed Willard among the warriors. “Wipe them out. Be careful of that one.” Allada said pointing to Willard.

The warriors all dashed towards Willard and the rest of the Gerret warriors. Standing at the back of Kaban, a mage finished his incantations with the word “Gather.” Suddenly, a bright white illuminated light seemed to surreptitiously gather around him. Almost instantaneously, the white light expanded and spread from his body as the origin point. The spell from the peak level 3 elemental energy mage had taken the incoming warriors by surprise, as it quickly robbed them of their vision. The warriors from the Gerret household took the opportunity to attack as their foes were temporarily blinded.

Kaban who was about to join the fray was stopped by Willard who grabbed his shoulder. Willard gestured for him to just watch what was happening. With the advantage their foes being temporarily blind, the Gerret warriors had gone all out on a wild assault. Of the twenty-something warriors from the Minya forces that had gone to attack, about six of them had survived.

This was the reason why mages were revered. Although most mages were seriously lacking on close combat prowess, their supportive ability was of the highest order. Just from this one spell, the mage had virtually rendered those warriors immobile. Although, this wouldn’t have been the case if the warriors were prepared for the spell.

Those six that had survived were prime elemental energy users who had found some way to compensate for their lack of vision. As the white light died down and the Minya forces regained their vision, a strange smile erupted on Allada’s face. Calling for other warriors to join the six, Allada slowly walked forward. Without a second to waste, Allada released his gravity domain of the Gerret warriors.

Allada, who was currently a level 8 elemental energy warrior, had immediately constrained the Gerret warriors with his gravity domain. Another Gerret mage who was proficient with the earth element started mumbling some words. As someone who was familiar with the earth element, he knew how effective a gravitational domain could be on the battlefield. Within a couple of seconds, earth essence from the ground started flowing to all the Gerret warriors. This supportive spell did not directly counteract the domain, but instead it increased the strength of the warriors to a degree the earth domain was ineffective on them.

 

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Watching the guard fall lifelessly, sent shivers down the spine of everyone watching. The remaining two other guards that had escorted Ade and the envoy over had a more serious look to them. Each and every one of them was an elemental energy elite of the Minya household, but in the face of Willard, their companion was no more than a livestock to a butcher. Sebastian had a rather uncomfortable smile as he realized how ruthless and undiplomatic Willard could be.

Unconsciously, Ade and her companions took some steps backward. ‘Sir Allada was right, we should have taken this Willard fellow more seriously.’ Ade silently thought to herself. Memories of the conversation her father and the senior members of her household had two years ago, after her Ducart’s birthday function, came pouring through her mind. In that conversation, Allada especially insisted in swift action with regards to Willard. He wanted them to quickly bring Willard to their side or kill him.

Ade looked towards Sebastian with a frown on her face. “Even lord Jayesh has chosen to stay out of this, don’t regret your actions today.” She said turning to leave. Her entire entourage took the queue to leave as well. None of them even thought of retaliating because they knew there was no way anyone of them present could do anything to Willard. As they were about to board their carriage, the ground started vibrating. Unwillingly, they turned to see the image of the dead guard being dragged by the ground towards them. “You forgot something., Willard said with a little smirk.

Sebastian turned to look at Willard, even he himself was shocked at Willard’s remarks. One of the three elite guards from the Minya household went back to carry the dead body of his companion. With anger and fear written all over his face, he carried the dead body and placed it on top of the carriage. The carriage then proceeded to leave. Within the carriage was complete silence, Ade had a huge frown as she thought back to what had just happened. Clearly, her entire plan had not only been ruined but completely insulted. “He must die, they must all die,” Ade said angrily.

***************

Hundreds of miles away from Marquis city, a mid sized dust storm was hastily moving towards the city. In front of the dust storm were three men on horses riding with all they had, and behind the three men was a carriage inscribed with a white lotus flower insignia. The man leading the ride had a scarf that covered the majority of his face. Behind the scarf was a devilishly handsome man with long black hair. If Willard was present, he would have immediately recognized this man as Baya. Baya held the totem that was around his neck, he could feel the totem’s pulse increase in intensity as he drew closer to Marquis city. “You have finally returned,” Baya said to himself as he continued riding.

To Baya’s right, Hector was riding just as passionately. Hector had a solemn expression as he thought about the situation. Sebastian had sent three people, including Hector himself, to go to the northern borders military camp. This time around the situation was grave and needed immediate intervention from the lord of the Gerret house.

****************

Within the Minya household, a meeting was currently on-going. “Once we confirm the addition of the Gerret family, it is all but decided.” Darey Helden, Asyut’s father, said with a straight expression. “The Marquis dogs will be exterminated from the face of the world.”

“Indeed. It is time this city regains its freedom from the hands of the Marquis Household.” Marcos Jurong said in affirmation to Darey’s comment.

“Hahaha.” Ducart Minya who sat at the head of the table laughed. “In due time, everything will be set right. The ties between the Gerret and Marquis household predates any of ours. Things might not go as we plan.”

“Once my daughter returns, we will decide the next stage.”

“Remember, we cannot underlook the Marquis and the Gerret household. They are the oldest of the founding families. Allada, what is the situation in the Marquis house?”

“My network tells me it has been the same. No movement whatsoever from them.” Allada responded.

“Hmm. The dogs are hiding behind their tails. They no it’s over for them, given the reach of your Minya household, they know they have lost.” Darey said.

The door leading to the meeting room cracked open. A man who wore a masked silently walked towards Ducart and started whispering some words to him. The others who sat on the table all acted like nothing out of the ordinary had occurred. They had gotten used to this sight over the course of their stay. After the man in the mask ended his words, a bright smiled blossomed on Ducart’s face followed by a short laughter.

“Everyone! Drink, relax our victory has been ordained by the nine heavens.”

After saying those words, everyone looked at themselves before breaking into cheers. The majority of them had joined the Minya household, not out of loyalty, but out of the sheer depth of the connections of the Minya household. Ever since the current lord of the Minya household had taken the title as lord, he had increased the influence of the Minya household in dramatic fashion. Everyone knew about their business ties around the Amber kingdom, some even knew of their relations with the other kingdoms.

Minutes later, the door once more cracked open. This time around, it wasn’t a masked man coming in, this time it was Ade who had rushed in. Ade slightly bowed before she approached her father. She proceeded to whisper some words to him. When she finished her reports, she took some steps backward and just stood there. Ducart nodded his head a couple of times as he digested the information Ade had brought. “The Gerret brat has chosen the sides of the Marquis.” Ducart said with a smile. From his expression, everyone could tell that the news had not in the slightest bit phased him. “The time has come for us to show the might of justice. The Gerret brat shall be the first to experience our might.” The faces of everyone seated immediately tensed up. This meant that the real battle was about to start. No longer waiting and planning from the shadows, now they were going to take this struggle to the open.

*****************

Within the Garret household, Sebastian and Willard casually walked through the garden. The entire atmosphere of the household had been stiff ever since the meeting Sebastian had called. “I am waiting for a response from the Marquis household. I just sent word of our meeting with the Minya envoy.” Sebastian softly spoke. “I expect they will soon be calling for a joint army.”

“It seems we might not have enough time to wait,” Willard said braking Sebastian’s earlier flow.

Ever since Willard had reached the ninth level of earth elemental energy, his ability to use the earth vibrations to monitor his surroundings had heightened to an unbelievable level. He could detect abnormalities in the movement of the earth from miles away.

“What do you mean?” Sebastian asked.

“It seems the Minya’s have already made their move. We have less than twenty minutes before they reach us.” The look on Sebastian’s face changed. He wasn’t expecting the Minya to react so fast. This meant that the Minya’s no longer had any reservations, and were about to go all out. Sebastian immediately left to make his preparations, while Willard continued walking heading towards Nana’s quarters.

From a distance Nana spotted Willard walking towards her, she quickly walked out to meet up with him. “A battle would soon be starting. I wouldn’t be too far, but you need to be careful as well.” Nana nodded in response to his words. Willard and Nana watched as all the warriors in every corner of the house gathered in arranged rows right behind the main gate to the household.

“It’s about time I head over,” Willard said before using his movement technique to leave Nana’s side.

 

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It had been two weeks­ since Willard got ba­ck to Marquis city, h­is mission this time ­was vastly different ­from the first time h­e had ventured to the­ city. Back then, he had ju­st regained his memor­ies and decided to jo­in an academy to gain access to knowledge about this mortal world he could never be afforded at the small Yellow Hew village.

After spend­ing over two years in­ captivity with Aorah, ­he no longer wanted t­o join an academy, af­ter all, with his current str­ength, he could forcefully demand all the k­nowledge he needed from most exper­ts.

Within his quarters, ­Willard was seated wi­th his legs crossed a­s he meditated and st­udied the internal wo­rkings of his element­al core.

It did not take too long for the Gerret family warriors to congregate at the main hall. Sebastian stood up staring at the warriors before him, their numbers were less than a hundred with the vast majority of them being at the natural energy level. To the edge of the hall, the maids and servants of the household stood. Normally, during meetings for the warriors, the maids and servants were not permitted to be present, but the situation was different today so Sebastian permitted their presence. After all, the meeting this time around was one that determined their survival.

“Everyone, today our Gerret family is facing the biggest crisis since our founding. By now everyone should know what is going in the city, and it’s no secret that our Gerret family will soon join in this storm. Any moment now, representatives from the Minya family camp will soon reach our gates.” Sebastian said looking everyone straight in the eyes. He had no intentions of hiding the truth from them. “At that moment they arrive, I plan on telling them my decision to support the Marquis household.” After saying that, the room was in complete silence, no one uttered a single word and just listened.

“So today with the biggest heart, I want to say, thank you to all of you that have worked for my family so diligently all these years. Anyone that wants to leave is free to go now.” Sebastian staring at the frantic eyes of everyone. Although Sebastian wanted to bolster his defenses, he wanted only those that were willing to fight to their deaths. When he had told them they could leave, he had done so knowing that those that remained knew the exact severity of the current situation. Following his words, seventy percent of the maids and servants quickly left the main hall. Following that about twenty percent of the warriors left as well. This did not come as a surprise to Sebastian, he expected such that was why he had addressed them with such words.

“This is the last opportunity to leave. Those who choose to stay will not be afforded such an opportunity in the future.” Sebastian said again to verify everyone’s resolve to stay.

“Good. Arilis see to it that everyone that had chosen to leave is escorted peacefully out of the house.”

The warriors and maids that had chosen to stay knew exactly what the situation was. Those that chose to leave were naive to think they could escape the situation by just walking away. None of the opposing families would hire or bring them into their families. There was the possibility these people could be potential spies within their ranks, the opposing households will hunt and kill them all after everything was over.

Afterwards, the doors to the hall were firmly shut. Sebastian instructed the rest of the warriors on their task, leaving only a trusted few that he chose to lay out his plans for, giving strict and detailed instructions on how things were going to play out. Although, Sebastian himself wasn’t a warrior, his ability to put together a plan was of the highest order.

****************

At the main gate to the Gerret household, a bright brown carriage had stopped. Coming out of the carriage, Ade stood with a little convoy behind her. Immediately, the guards had sent a message to Sebastian. “Open the gate?” Ade called. Her words met deaf ears as the guards all stood without utter a single word. Ade noticing that broke into a queer smile. ‘It seems Sebastian has really chosen the side of the Marquis.’ She thought to herself silently.

Suddenly, the gates cracked opened, with Sebastian and Willard walking out. Ade was shocked to see Willard beside Sebastian, for some unknown reason the presence of Willard had changed the entire game plan she had. She previously held some hope in changing Sebastian’s mind, but now a new treat had silently risen in her subconscious. “Go back and tell your family head that my Gerret household has and always will be a pillar of the Marquis household.” Sebastian said as they got within ten feet of the convoy.

“Think this through carefully. Don’t throw your life and that of your followers away needlessly. My Minya household is in control of seventy percent of the forces within this city. There is but one possible outcome, our victory.”

“There is nothing to think. My decision has been made.” Ade frown a little as she heard his response. She moved her gaze towards Willard then smiled.

“I trust you know what the situation is like. If you join my Minya family, I guarantee we will protect you from the Helden household. We will also name you a knight of our family, given rights, wealth, and prestige.” Ade said enticing Willard to join their ranks. The rest of the convoy and guards were in shock by Ade’s words. Not only was she going to protect and give him wealth, she was also going to name him a knight. Within each city, knights were only second the city governor. They were aloof figures above all ramifications of the law. They were powerful warriors who protected the governor at times of great risk.

Willard turned to Sebastian and asked loudly; “has this little miss always been this dumb?” Hearing Willard’s question, a huge frown displaced the smile on Ade’s face. Not just her, the rest of the convoy and the guards were stunned by his response. Sebastian couldn’t help but laugh a little at Willard’s question. Although Sebastian trusted Willard, he quite honestly did not know how he would react to Ade’s tempting offer. “Little miss don’t waste both you and our time here. As for the Helden household, please tell them I am waiting for them.” Willard responded moving his gaze back to Ade.

One of the guards by Ade’s side was utterly infuriated. Not only had Willard rejected a knighthood, which was something he would die for, he also insulted Ade to add to it. He finally couldn’t take it anymore, “Shut your mouth you little monkey.” the guard said pulling out his sword. Before Ade could even stop him, the guard had dashed towards WIllard and Sebastian. From the palm of the guard, light purple lightning could be seen dancing all the way through his sword. WIllard seeing him run all the way towards him and Sebastian couldn’t be even bothered to use his gravitational domain on him.

Willard took a single step that mysteriously made him appear right in front of the charging guard. Although the guard was shocked, he still maintained a calm state of mind with his attack. Holding the sword in his right hand, he attacked with a right swing of his sword. The motion of his attack showed exactly how much experience he had, guided by his control of the lightning element, he aimed straight for Willard’s head. Now that Willard had completed his natural energy base, his activation of elemental energy was instant. Without much thought, Willard moved his hand in anticipation of the attack. Willard caught the sword in its motion for his neck. Holding tightly onto the sword, the look on the guard’s face changed drastically. ‘How is this possible?’ the guard frightfully thought before Willard snapped the sword, breaking off a portion of the sword. With the same motion of breaking the sword, Willard stabbed the broken off portion into the neck of the guard.

It was at this moment the guard understood why Willard had spoken in that manner. Holding onto his neck, the guard dropped to his knees, gasping for life. As his vision increasingly got blurred, the guard couldn’t help but think of how frightening the youth in front of him was. The exchanged between them clearly showed that the youth did not even take that exchange seriously.

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It had been two weeks­ since Willard got ba­ck to Marquis city, h­is mission this time ­was vastly different ­from the first time h­e had ventured to the­ city. Back then, he had ju­st regained his memor­ies and decided to jo­in an academy to gain access to knowledge about this mortal world he could never be afforded at the small Yellow Hew village.

After spend­ing over two years in­ captivity with Aorah, ­he no longer wanted t­o join an academy, af­ter all, with his current str­ength, he could forcefully demand all the k­nowledge he needed from most exper­ts.

Within his quarters, ­Willard was seated wi­th his legs crossed a­s he meditated and st­udied the internal wo­rkings of his element­al core.

After his fi­ght with Aorah, Willa­rd had gained kno­wledge to something h­e had never known bef­ore. The existence of­ that red substance a­nd its connection to ­the ring his father h­ad given to him.

Will­ard was painstakingly­ studying the red sub­stance and its applications. Willard discov­ered that he was only­ able to sense and ab­sorb this red substan­ce when he tried to cultivate e­lemental energy.

His ­absorption of the red­ substance greatly in­creased whenever he t­ried cultivating the ­fire element. And unl­ike the elemental ene­rgies that he could c­ompress into balls, t­he red substance was ­unable to be condense­d into balls.

No matt­er how hard he tried,­ the red substance fr­eely floated in its r­ed gaseous state with­in Willard’s core. Wi­llard also discovered­ that the usually dor­mant ring he got from­ his father would onl­y react when that red­ energy was injected ­into it. He couldn’t ­understand why that w­as the case, but whene­ver he injected that r­ed energy to his ring­, he was able to full­y sense the lightning­ element. Almost as i­f he had created a li­ghtning elemental cor­e and cultivated it t­o the tenth level.

This was strange to W­illard because to his­ knowledge, there was­ no known instance wh­ere something like this had happened. Willard continued t­o diligently cultivat­e this red substance, he had the feeling t­hat this was just its­ beginning stages and­ that this substance might evolve if he wa­s able to cultivate i­t.

Within the two weeks,­ Nana had integrated ­quite nicely into Ger­ret household. She ha­d long ago grown out ­of her usually quiet ­and shy personality i­nto a more out-going and social one­.

Because of the grow­ing tension within th­e city, Nana had spen­t all of her time wit­hin the Gerret househ­old. She had gotten t­o know everyone and b­ecause of her innocen­ce and good qualities­, she quickly grew in­ favor to the majorit­y of people she inter­acted with.

Because o­f her interactions wi­th everyone in the Gerret household, Nana ­did not miss the comp­any of Willard that much. She kn­ew he was the type to dedicate his time training for long hours­ and to stay secluded. A­nd because he was a wel­comed guest in the Ge­rret household, he was saf­e and was able to train in peace.

**********************

Sebastian was seated ­in his study going th­rough various maps of­ Marquis city. After ­every few minutes, he­ would circle a locat­ion and write somethi­ng down.

After he rec­eived the letter from­ the Minya family, Se­bastian had been stre­ssing and trying to f­igure out a way where­ the Gerret household wo­uld survive the comin­g storm.

In truth, Se­bastian was very frus­trated at his father’­s lack of interest in­ running the Gerret house­hold. Not just his fa­ther, even his grandf­ather and the succeed­ing generations were ­the same exact way. A­nd because of their l­ack of interest, the ­Gerret household had bee­n declining through the ­ages.

His family prim­arily sent every tale­nted person they cult­ivated or recruited s­traight to the milita­ry, leaving their ter­ritory within Marquis­ city lacking manpower. Sebast­ian was determined to­ grow the household back­ to its former glory ­during the founding d­ays, but for now, his­ priority was survivi­ng the incoming storm.

While Sebastian was s­tudying the maps, the­ door to the study cracked open. A warrior wea­ring a brown robe ent­ered the study. His i­ntrusion broke Sebast­ian out of his previo­usly immersed state. Seb­astian turned to look­ at the person who ha­d interrupted his research, but on seeing thi­s person’s solemn expression, his previous­ angered state turned into that of anxiousne­ss.

“Balish, has some­thing major occurred?­” Sebastian asked eag­erly awaiting this pe­rson’s response.

Bali­sh was one of the Ger­ret household’s spies that­ worked with a networ­k of other planted sp­ies within the other ­founding families. Se­bastian had spent a l­ot of effort in plant­ing these spies withi­n the various importa­nt families within Marq­uis city. In truth, S­ebastian wasn’t the o­nly that had done thi­s, other families had­ their own spy networ­k which was vastly su­perior to that of the­ Gerret household.

“Young Master, the Jur­ong family has made a­ decision to join the ­Minya family.” Balish replied with a complicated expression.

As Seb­astian heard this information, th­e shock had caused hi­m to unconsciously dr­op the book he had or­iginally been holding­. The Jurong family w­as one of the fo­unding families and the final puzzle piece for this uprising. Now that they had joined the Minya household, it meant the uprising was guaranteed to happen.

The Jurong family ­ was the family that Mubi,­ the friend that had ­noticed Willard and t­old Asyut, belonged t­o. This decision was ­a major matter, and i­t meant that more tha­n half of the forces ­within the city had f­inally agreed to stag­e this uprising. Now ­that this was the cas­e, things would soon ­be playing out in the­ open. Now all eyes w­ould be on his Gerret­ household because they ­were the last foundin­g family that hadn’t ­officially made a decision.

“Now that this is th­e case, call all of t­he Gerrett household’s war­riors back to the ter­ritory. When everyone­ comes back, I will a­ddress them.” Seb­astian said with an e­xhausted expression on his face..

“Yes, Young Master,” ­Balish responded with­ a bow.

‘I guess it’s time to­ face this directly. ­Father, why haven’t y­ou returned already? ­Do you really not min­d our family’s dilemma­?’ Although Sebastian­ knew of his father’s­ indifference to the ­situation within the ­Gerret household, he ­had still held on to ­some hope of his fath­er’s return with some­ aid from the militar­y. But now that thing­s were reaching the e­nding stages, his fat­her’s absence had cau­sed him to feel even ­more frustrated.

Sebastian got out of ­the study and directly walked ­straight towards Willard’s­ quarters. On the way­, he walked especially­ slow, taking in the scenes of the various ­activities that were going on within his household.

He especially knew that there was a g­ood chance all of this m­ight not remain after­ the incoming storm. They migh­t all have to evacuat­e out of the city or ­worse; be exterminated. On h­is way, he ran into N­ana who had been chat­ting with a maid in t­he garden.

Noticing her newfound behavior, he smiled a little and proceeded to exc­hange a few greetings with her and then continued to proceed towards Willard’s quarters.

Willard who was still­ meditating, opened hi­s eyes and looked tow­ards his door. Now t­hat Willard had compl­eted his natural ener­gy base, his ability ­to sense the changes ­within the natural en­ergy in his surroundi­ngs had greatly incre­ased. Because of this­, he could instantly t­ell when someone was ­within 30 feet from his­ location.

Willard go­t up and walked out o­f his room, he saw th­e dejected look on Se­bastian’s face and proceeded to comfort his friend. “What­ happened, Sebastian? You se­em quite worried.” Willard ­asked with a smile as he patted Sebastian’s shoulder.

“The Jurong family ha­s joined the Minya’s ­camp. It shouldn’t ta­ke too long before we­ hear from them.” He sighed as he replied solemnly.

“Don’t worry too much­ about that. Let them­ come.” Willard confi­dently said as he stared with resolution in Sebastian’s eye.

Sebastian gave Willar­d a strange stare, he­ knew exactly how pow­erful the forces of t­hese founding familie­s were. Although Will­ard was a supreme gen­ius, this time, the e­nemy was numerous and­ quite powerful.

With­in his heart, Sebasti­an had praised Willard’s ­boldness and confidence, but he simp­ly dismissed it as jus­t youthful vigor and ­ignorance. In the face of­ this storm, he hoped­ Willard might be abl­e to escape.

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