4 When Light meets Darkness

The rubbles of stones piled quietly as fresh smoke billowed unto the air, the men pushed through it, emerging from the rubbles. They were lucky earlier to leap back before the rocks fell over them.

The first thing the men saw was Celina who bled out on the rough dirt. And close to her was Gamiz who held a blood stained knife.

"Gamiz you traitor!" They said.

Gamiz turned his attention to them, he snorted in displeasure. "Me traitor? You people abandoned our kingdom, you hypocrites. If only you have trusted King Dersim's plan."

The men pulled themselves up as they, crawled through the pile of rocks. "Shut up Gamiz, when a King betrays his people he's no longer a King." One clapped back.

"If his highness didn't summon the demons, the kingdom could have already fell on the hands of the empire." Gamiz spoke strongly.

"Gamiz you're an idiot for having a faith to that kind of ruler, our kingdom has fallen anyway." Another blurted out.

"If you people never left Thesur it wouldn't have happened, see, I want the Ragnez Empire to fall. My family and I was enslaved by that horrible country and luckily I was bought by the King. I owe him my life thus my loyalty will never waver." Gamiz lent out his arm upon the other men. "So what do you say? Don't worry our plan will ensure the fall of the Ragnez."

The men furrowed their eyebrows, they were obviously not sold. "Gamiz! No matter the reasons you're still a swine, just what did you do to Miss Celina?!" One said.

Gamiz grunted and crossed his arms. "Simply put if the Light Mage is dead, then nothing in the future can impede our goals. True she's weak now but her light magic would be dangerous at some point. I can't let her live."

The mages readied the aim of their palms and performed their encantations. They shot out fire balls into Gamiz' direction. "Die! Along with that snake you call king!"

Gamiz simply blocked the attack with a flick of his arm. "What did you say?!." He got enraged, he huffed some air, and with some encantations, balls of flames emerged upon his palms, he threw his arm and it spew out streams of fire.

The flames was big enough to swallow their bodies, it passed through the men and they wallowed upon the flames, screaming.

"No, stop!" Celina said as she gazed tightly upon her men crying in anguish

When she gazed at her arm there were runes crawling on her skin. Upon a glance on her chest there one as well, it started to even wrap his face. "Gamiz what did you do?"

Gamiz gave her a glare of pity. "Lucky for you I can't deliver the final blow since I still have some good memories with you. So I sealed your magic." He said coldly.

"It can't be... " Her strength faded, she coughed and her eyes gradually blurred, the borders of her vision slightly darkened.

After the flames subsided, burnt corpses were left on the scene and it oozed out a horrible stench. The ground below the corpses were smoldered into soot.

After a faint roar reached Gamiz's ears, he got frightened, he quickly scampered and mounted upon a horse. He freed the other horses letting them scatter and disappear into the fog. Without wasting much time he left as well.

"I need a magic potion." She said in her mind.

She remembered they brought one and it was kept by one of her men.

However she no longer had the strength to lift a finger, she panted as she just stared into the plain grey sky, accepting her death. "Sorry Sir Herdis, I failed you."

She was about to close her eyelids, but didn't continue to do so, she felt a glassy bottle between her fingers. When she turned her head to stare at her arm, there was a man with burnt cloth beside her, who had severe burns upon his body and he was on the brink of death, However it seemed he managed to crawl from the cave in such state.

While there was no hope for the others, since their skin were smoldered and turned a dark ash. He was still able to release a weakened voice.

"Miss Celina, you can't fail now, you're our only hope." The man said as he lent a potion on her fingers. The man then slumped into the ground, which she presumed was now lifeless.

Tears started to flow from her eyes, she gathered all of her energy to lift her arm and then placed the bottle unto her lips, she hastily gulped it down as her nose bathed upon the liquid.

When it was empty, she dropped it and coughed heavy. The stinging pain on her waist gradually subsided, she then pulled her body up and sneered. "I'm supposed to be a Pillar but I couldn't even protect my men, they were right I was useless."

The pile of stones on the cave entrance were shoved outwards, the beast appeared, it halted and inspected its surroundings, its head shaking too and fro. It mustered a wide smile. "Hahaha, when was the last time I had a sniff of the outside world."

The beast's stare then turned into Celina, however even after noticing the beast she refused to move as she sagged her glum face to the ground.

"That's too bad for you light mage, it seems you are the last one. Well then, time to put you out of your misery." The beast slowly scampered into her direction.

Celina didn't move an inch as she was busy sniffling after she checked the man beside her bit the dust, her mind was empty for the moment, no thoughts of escape even crossed her mind.

"Hey, ugly bald monster, you can't touch that woman." A haughty voice reached the beast's ear.

The beast halted as it was annoyed, it spun around and saw a pale man with long black hair. "You bastard, how are you still alive?" The beast said confused.

Blue sighed as he scratched his head. "That's the question I wanna ask myself." He then stared intently at the beast, "Hey, anyway where am I?"

Without warning the beast leaped upon Blue and crushed him with its giant leg, buckets of blood got splashed upon the ground. And Blue's severed arm got flung and were sent rolling. The beast then cackled. "There's no way you're still alive after that."

When the beast removed its leg, it got taken aback when blue flames emerged from Blue's flattened body. In a flash, he was being reverted to his usual look, the flames regenerated his severed arm and then his body turned to normal, even his clothes were intact.

Blue stood still, he frowned heavily and glared angrily upon the beast. "You bastard, even though I'm immortal, I can still feel pain!" He exclaimed.

"You're immortal? That's absurd." The beast 's confidence slowly wavered as it moved several steps backwards.

"Whatever, you die now." Blue aimed his palms upon the beast, then raging bluish flames gushed out from his arm. The flames swallowed the beast's body severely, the beast roared in anguish until it was completely vaporized into nothingness.

His flames were fierce enough to push the fog away from their vicinity, Celina gulped upon seeing the difference between flames of Gamiz and the new man. It was the level between the size of a village and a kingdom.

As the fog slowly dispersed the blue sky finally emerged, the wet and muddy terrain of the dark green swamp came into view. Celina got hushed upon the events that unfurled before her eyes.

"Woman, are you the one who fired that white ball at me?" Blue pointed his sharp nail upon her.

Celina gave a weak nod.

Blue's emotionless face gave a cold smirk. "So there was still a hope, huh?" He then approached her.

"Hey woman, kill me." Blue said with a voice filled with excitement.

Celina's eyebrow rose in confusion. "I don't understand."

Blue snickered. "I said it clearly, shoot your white magic on me. Your magic seemed to have a different effect on my body, usually I heal instantly but it took me more than a minute to recover my wounds when I got struck by that thing. Only few more of those and I could have been a goner. Now shoot me." He spread out his arms into crucifix, infront of her.

Celina strayed her eyes, she was deeply perplexed about the situation that she didn't knew where to start. "Look, even if I wanted to, I can't, since my magic was sealed."

Blue's eyes turned sharp and cold, he displayed his sharp gleaming nails and slowly approached her. "Is that so? Then I have no need for you, I'll just find another mage like yourself. Now settle down and let me feed upon you."

Celina got startled, her face got painted with fright seeing the man's eyes were cold as ice. "Please spare me, I'm the only light mage left and there is no one like myself." She said.

Blue halted for a second, assessing the words she just released. "You're not lying?"

Celina nodded hastily.

Blue narrowed his dubious eyes. "Then, how do we unseal your power?"

Celina sighed in relief when the oozing bloodlust released by Blue's body subsided, she was deeply frightened that she couldn't move her lips. She was in a state of trance.

"Hey!" Blue demanded. "Are you listening?"

Celina got startled and then she came into her senses. "Uhh, the guy who sealed my ability has fleed."

"Okay where is he now?" Blue said.

Celina sighed, she loosened up a bit. "I'm not very sure but I'm guessing he's heading to the city of Lanzud."

Blue gave a smile, he unfurled his wings then soared into the sky. Celina got surprised upon seeing his bat like wings, "Y-- you- a vampire?" She said with a trembling voice.

"Yeah I am, now tell me where this city is." Blue said in mid air.

Celina nodded. "It's in the north west."

"Woman come with me, we'll unseal your powers together." Blue said.

Celina shook her head. "I'm not in a hurry, I still have somewhere I have to go and it will be difficult to track him now since he could have gone in any directions."

Blue made his slow descent, he then landed infront of her. "Listen woman I'm not asking you to come with me, I'm threatening you. "

Celina held a scowl. "Kill me if you want, but I have somewhere I should go."

Blue and Celina exchanged a long stare that seemed to have taken forever.

Blue ended up snorting. "Fine, but let me tell you this woman, you better take me seriously. Because if you can't kill me, I'll start killing you, then everyone else on this land."

Celina sneered and stomped her foot. "Why do you have to do that?"

Blue sat on a rock and crossed his arms. "It's obvious, so that they would take me seriously and start killing me. Right now, it seems you're the only one who's ability can harm my body differently, so I'll hold my plans and join you for now."

Celina snorted in disgust. She walked away irked while she held a frown. "What join? I'll leave you when I have a chance." She said to herself, then her face drooped. "But then what if he is serious? Its not unlikely because he seems completely evil."

She scratched her head as she vent out her frustration. "I don't know what to do."

She then heard a sharp, menacing cackle. Several demons stepped forward they held an iron spears enshrouded with dark lightning. They were almost human, but they had a dry, dark violet skin, tall sharp teeth that protrude over their lips, their bodies were clad with enchanted, glossy black armor. They had rough surfaced horns protruding over their hairs.

Celina recognized they were the elite demonic warriors that pursued them earlier, she sneered as she aimed her arm upon them. It gave her blunder when she realized she can no longer muster her mana. "Damn it." She cursed.