Chapter 4: Broken Seal
Cold sweat was flowing down the face of the Siren Queen. She was busy doing her best to heal Calix and Ren's injuries at incredible speed. Despite all the screams of the old Emperor, she prioritized curing the Spirit King first. She somewhat believed that the old man would hold until Calix could return to fight.
The continuous healing was taking a heavy toll on her mind and body. She couldn't use her Legacy like she did moments ago to heal her companions, and her ability alone wasn't enough to treat Calix. Ren was almost recovered, but he remained unconscious until now. While Calix was in a terrible condition, his body was covered with burn marks and slashes, and she was wondering how the Spirit King was still alive.
"A full-blown confrontation with the Demon King will make you like this," Kizhaia said with a trembling voice. She was thinking what would happen if Cinhard chose to go all out from the start—would they manage to defeat him or even escape if things went wrong?
The burns made by the blue flames were not easy to heal; Calix's soft tissues and muscles were damaged to the point that some of his bones were fully exposed. She was concentrating when she heard the emperor cry out in pain, and then she looked in the direction where the shout came from, but all she saw was the sea of flames. She ignored the screams and did her best to focus again to heal the two men when the young man began to open his eyes.
"Finally, you're awake," Kizhaia said with a cheerful voice.
Then, the bubble that was healing Ren burst all of a sudden. His eyes were open, but he still looked like he was in a deep sleep. He was looking at the sea of flames and started to walk there slowly. His right hand was still holding his sword. Despite all the events that happened, he never let go of it.
"Hey, where are you going? Come back here, you're not fully healed yet," Kizhaia shouted to Ren; she couldn't afford to stop what she was doing just to drag Ren to her side. All she did was look at Ren entering the sea of flames, but the next scenario made her drop her jaw.
"How, the flame… Is it making way for him?" Kizhaia asked with astonishment and curiosity.
. . . . .
The half-asleep Ren walked slowly inside the blazing field, and his body emitted a golden light that paved his way through the sea of flames. Then his brown hair and eyes turned gold due to the particles of light that wrapped around him.
He continuously walked in the direction of the Demon King and Human Emperor. He was moving closer, but Cinhard didn't feel his presence at all, and a concentrated energy was building on the tip of his sword. He pierced Cinhard's back.
The attack was not a simple stab. The ball of light that Ren's sword produced left a huge hole in Cinhard's chest, and his heart was nowhere to be seen. Thus, the Demon King halted his attack on the old Emperor and turned at his back to identify the owner of the sword that impaled him.
Ren pulled back his sword while Cinhard was staring at him with clouded thoughts. The surrounding area was still covered with darkness, yet he couldn't feel any presence from the person behind him. Even his flames looked as if they were avoiding the man.
The Demon King turned around to face the young man before him. He didn't even bother himself to take a look in the hole in his chest; instead, he flicked his index finger in his front, and a small amount of fire was tossed, but a meter away before it reached Ren. The remnant of flame hovered in the air then dropped on the ground.
"Hmnn," Cinhard confirmed his suspicion. His flames were avoiding Ren, and he didn't know why.
Ren took a stance by holding his sword in front of him. The next moment, Cinhard disappeared and reappeared at his back; his sword was aiming for the young man's head, but Ren spun around and fended off the attack. Cinhard crouched to pull off a sweep kick, but Ren jumped in the air while kicking his opponent's head.
The Demon King didn't manage to evade the attack and was hurled into the air, where several beams of light penetrated his body. The chain of attacks was so fast that Cinhard couldn't even react. Before slamming into a huge tree trunk, he vanished and appeared in midair. His stomach and other limbs were bleeding, but he ignored all of it. Then, he retracted the darkness, and the next second, he set his whole body ablaze.
His skin and hair started to burn. All of his flesh had burned until there were only bones left. Then again, flesh began to materialize under his blue flames. Even his white hair grew at a rapid speed until it reached his waist. Ren, who saw this, jumped in the air and attacked Cinhard, but a white furry tail stopped his sword and he was pushed backwards.
The Demon King showed his true form at last. His arms were covered with white fur to his bare chest, and his nails were longer. He now had sharp fangs, and the pointy ears at the top of his head gave him a demon-beast resemblance. His vertical slit eyes gazed at Ren like a predator hunting its prey, and twelve long tails floated around his back. His lower clothing was replaced by armored pants made of blue flames. A Demon Fox-Human Hybrid then had a regalia appear as a black tattoo on his forehead. It was a crescent moon with a key penetrating from its side.
. . . . .
The all-out battle was concluded a few moments ago when the demon troops slowly fled from the battlefield. The allied force was now busy searching every crook and cranny to look for demons that were hiding when the light from the sun returned. They rejoiced upon seeing the darkness recede. However, in just a second, fear enveloped their hearts upon sensing an ominous presence deep inside the woods.
"This—what is this?" Salamander soared above the sky to find out where it was coming from.
In a faraway distance, he couldn't believe what he had seen: a twelve-tailed demon fox with a human figure. This was the very first time that he saw a demon creature like that. And due to the blue flames that were covering half of its body, he was sure that the human fox was Cinhard. Then he averted his gaze to where the human fox was looking, and overwhelming triumph started to bloom on his face.
"No, even a creature like you won't stand a chance against that child if he was in that state," Salamander said before flapping his wings to go into the woods.
. . . . .
Calix regained consciousness when the surroundings lighted up, and upon opening his eyes, the first thing he saw was Kizhaia. He looked at his body to check his condition, but almost everything was still burned flesh. If not for his outstanding physique, he wouldn't survive these grave injuries.
"What happened?" He asked the worn-out siren.
"I don't know; all I heard were Augustus' screams, then it stopped as soon as Ren entered the sea of flames," Kizhaia explained the situation to Calix when they felt a heavy pressure not far from them. They looked in mid-air and saw Cinhard's new form.
"That blue flame, is that Cinhard?" Kizhaia questioned Calix without averting her gaze from the Demon Fox. Astonishment was written on her face.
Calix nodded before he answered Kizhaia's curiosity: "Hmnn, the last time I had seen him in that form, he only had five tails."
"To think that he's toying with us without bringing his full potential, the difference in our power is immeasurable," Calix sighed with disappointment. He took a glance at Ren, but like Cinhard, he couldn't feel his presence.
. . . . .
Ren and Cinhard looked at each other. They were gauging their strength. One was a raging volcano that was ready to erupt at any moment, while the other was a bottomless lake with a calm surface.
The first one to break the balance was Ren. He dashed forward and swung his sword at the Demon King while Cinhard blocked each attack with his tail. At the same moment, he was trying to attack Ren with his sword, but Ren was maintaining a good distance from him with the help of his enhanced weapon. Golden particles of light were covering Ren's sword, and this made it much bigger. The light tripled its length.
Cinhard conjured a ball of blue flame with his right hand and sent it to Ren. The young man fended off the projectile, which exploded at a distance. The nearby swamp evaporated, and a huge crater appeared. Extreme vibrations were felt from the attack.
Cadaver, who was busy building his army in the swamp, tumbled upon the explosion. He suffered serious burns from the shockwave released by Cinhard's ball of flame.
A few moments ago, he had finally managed to summon a hundred ghouls, but all of them vanished together with the swamp. He looked at the two beings that were fighting in the sky, within his six hundred years of service to the demon army. This was the first time that he witnessed Cinhard's true form.
'What do I need to do to obtain such powers?' He was dismayed by the sudden thoughts, but an evil grin crept out on his face.
. . . . .
Ren continued to harass Cinhard without giving him some space to breathe; however, the same went for him; to dodge attacks from twelve different directions and retaliate at the same time was not an easy feat.
"Damn it," Cinhard cursed after getting pushed backwards by Ren's continuous strikes.
He was starting to get frustrated as the fight went on; his flames couldn't touch his opponent, and Ren's speed and intuition were so great that all the attacks he made were parried and blocked.
"Your defense is so good, I'll give you that," Cinhard praised Ren before jumping at him once again.
They were in a stalemate until the Demon King made one wrong judgment. Ren spun around before slashing his sword, but got blocked by two of Cinhard's tails; however, the attack still pushed the Demon King into the distance. Then, Ren manifested several swords made of golden light, and they hovered in the air. He aimed it at Cinhard, and the swords shot all at once.
The Demon King drew a curtain of flames to protect him from Ren's attack, but the swords of light passed through his shield with ease. He was caught off-guard by the sudden occurrence and was a second late to block the attack that pierced several parts of his body.
Cinhard gritted his teeth due to pain.
'It's not him that my flames are avoiding; it's the golden light particles,' he concluded from his thoughts, and when he was supposed to pull out the swords, that struck him. It's exploded like a bomb. He managed to pull out one that pierced his torso and throw it away, but his right arm and three of his tails that he used as a shield were blown into pieces.
The Demon King turned into a bloody mess, and Ren didn't waste a second. He dashed to Cinhard as soon as he saw that his previous attack was successful. He struck his sword at the injured Demon King with all the power he had left. This was the opening that he was waiting for, but his attack was stopped by a young maiden that appeared between the two of them.
Cinhard felt fear for his life when he saw Ren dashing forward, and so he tried to manifest his Legacy once again to flee from the situation when a frail hand of a woman suddenly patted him on the head while blocking Ren's attack with an umbrella. Its frame and shaft were made of black wood, its canopy was maroon in color, and it had three white lotus flower designs on its one sector.
"Oops, I'm so sorry for the sudden intrusion, but," the young maiden chimed in with a lovable smile while her peach-colored eyes were looking at Ren. She was dressed in a black cocktail dress with a lace cloth that covered her arms. Her long, ash-colored hair with red highlights was braided like a waterfall, and this greatly contributed to her dazzling appearance.
Then she turned her gaze to Cinhard's eyes, before her hand moved to his face, and the next second, she plucked out the Demon King's eye.
"Ahhhhh, what did you do!" Cinhard cried in horror when his left eye was removed all of a sudden; he couldn't explain what had happened. His mind went blank the moment the woman touched him, and in the next seconds, he experienced extreme pain. He covered his bleeding eye socket with his remaining hand and attacked the woman in front of him. But the umbrella moved as if it were alive, and then it blocked Cinhard's tail. Then, it was grabbed by the maiden, and it closed as soon as she placed it at the top of her head. Upon closing the umbrella, the woman vanished, leaving Cinhard and Ren with questions on their minds.
Darkness enveloped the area once again, but only for a second. Then the Demon King was nowhere to be seen, and Ren was left there standing in mid-air before he fell while coughing up a lot of blood. But a red dragon flew under and rescued him from the sudden fall.
"Thank you," Ren murmured before his eyes closed and his hair returned to its original color.
. . . . .
At the Demon King's Palace, a white-haired man was holding a cane while doing his best to walk straight past a bed with a woman lying inside. He looked like he would die at any moment. His right arm was missing, and his appearance was full of blood and gore, especially on his face. He sat beside the bed, and tears began to flow from his right eye while blood was flowing from the empty socket of his left eye.
"I'm sorry, I failed to avenge you," he apologized with a quivering voice before he set the whole palace on fire.
. . . . .
In the deepest part of the Forest of Nightmares, there was a seal that was not visible to the naked eye; it was covered with chains and shrouded in darkness.
Then a crackling sound echoed through the place, and the chains that had been locked away for eternity shattered into pieces.
. . . . .
Gifts
-- Gift
received Weekly Power Status
-- Power
Ranking 
-- Power
stone