Tales of Dark El
As the final battle begins, Soyul poses with her balisong, before saying to her allies "Are you guys ready?", to which they were all ready. Demetria summons her dual shuriken, and said "Bring it on, Soyul!", before attempting to manipulate Aisha, only for her to get hit by Elsword, who told her to stop.Suddenly, to his and Aisha's surprise, Demetria removes her own costume, revealing her other costume, which turned out to be none other than a clone of Elsword's own dark version, this time with the dark red hair and black eyes.Ain said "No way! Who the hell are you?!", to which Demetria, now as "Dark Elsword", replied to him "I'm Elsword, but darker." Crescentia slapped her in the face, telling her "You're not Elsword, Demetria!"This caused Demetria to get angry towards Ain and Crescentia that she ended up removing her disguise, revealing yet, an suspicious-looking man, calling himself Ephraim, to Elsword and Aisha's shock. Raven got shocked and said "Wait, who's she? Is she some dude or something?" Ephraim pulls a card from a magician hat he summoned before telling him and the others "Ha! You just activated my trap card!"Eve retaliated by pulling an Uno reverse card and tells him "Nice try Demetria, but you activated my trap card as well!", resulting in Ephraim getting angry to the point he tried to attack Laby, but Nisha came to her defense, hitting him back. Not long after, this enraged him to the point he resorted into shooting lasers out of his eyes, targeting Ain, trapping him inside a dark crystal, making him unable to move, to the point he slowly disappeared, with Elsword attempting to summon him multiple times by calling his name multiple times, but to no avail.On the other hand, Ain wakes up in an different dimension, where he found himself in the body of a young boy, and walks up to an large replica of the Primal El. As soon as he touches the El, his body turned back to normal and he soon teleports back to Elrios. Back to the island in the Crescent Sea, the rest of his allies were devastated to see him gone, with some of the fragments of the El in his place. Suddenly, one of Elsword's tears fell into the fragment, causing Ain to return, to his allies' shock, albeit with diamond pupils.After Ain returned, Hayat walked up to Ephraim, and says to him "Your life ends right there, Demetria." while aiming his spear at him. Suddenly, Ephraim transformed back to Demetria, and finds a knife, in which she tries to stab Elsword from behind, only for him to throw the knife away from her, but suddenly, he located a bracelet on her left arm.As soon as he found the bracelet, he destroyed it using some of his fire abilities, weakening her. After Demetria was weakened by him, Crescentia showed up, facing her, in which she tells her "It's too late now, Demetria." before continuing with "You're been hurting everyone but yourself so much that he had to burn your bracelet containing that Dark El."While listening to Crescentia, Demetria saw the destroyed bracelet and she started to cry to the point she stopped crying and saw Ain, to which she told him and his allies "The next time I see you guys, I'll make sure to destroy your heartless souls!" before disappearing from the island.After Demetria disappeared from the island, Eve said to herself "Wow, what a childish person she is..." Ara walked in, and she saw Noah replying to Eve, saying "Yeah. I never thought that she'd throw a fit over Elsword breaking her bracelet." before minding her own thing, only to bump into Elesis in which the two fell to the ground and she helped her get up on her own.Soon, the rest of the group moved on from Demetria, as they left the island in the Crescent Sea and returned to Velder, where Noah was looking at the moon on his own, in the rooftop of the house the group were staying at, before he went to sleep.Later that night, Elsword came to the rooftop, only to saw Ara eating one of the tanghulu, in which he sat next to her and thus, the two ate the tanghulu while watching the fireworks display together. Suddenly, the fireworks stopped, and the two went to sleep in separate bedrooms. The next day, Ain showed up and tells Elsword, Aisha and Rena about a summer festival, which turned out to be a black market, in the Velder Central Square, and so, the four of them heads over to the summer festival.As soon as they arrived to the festival, Rumo came running to Rena, telling her, Aisha, Ain and Elsword that this place isn't safe and that they should come to his place. By the time the four arrived to his place, he starts grilling goat meat with his half-brother Lunal in the backyard, with him seasoning it with salt and sesame seeds and Lunal putting cooking oil on the meat.After the goat meat was done, Elsword, Aisha, Rena and Ain were to taste it. All four of them ate a piece of the meat, and they gave it a thumbs up, with Aisha saying to the three of them "Wow, that reminds me of the meat we've eaten before in Elyria, right guys?", in which Elsword and Rena nodded except for Ain, who never went to Elyria before.Suddenly, Ara walked in, and asked Lunal if she could eat the goat meat, to which he agreed to let her eat the meat. Not long after, Fabian, Frostine and Fawn came along, and together, everybody ate the goat meat. After they were done eating the goat meat, it was time for Elsword and Fabian's group to part ways with Rumo and Lunal, this time to revisit the village of Elyria.As soon as they arrived in Elyria by hiking, the villagers welcomed them before they went to the same mountain hut near Mount Elyria. Inside the hut, they saw a man playing the piano, who waved at them before saying "Oh hey, nice to meet you guys. I'm Kuro, and you?" and getting up from his chair to greet Elsword by bowing down to him before shaking hands with him. "So, you're Elsword, right?" Kuro said to him, who nodded back.Aisha summons the broken bracelet, and said to Kuro "Actually, I have this bracelet containing the Dark El my husband actually broke, which caused Demetria to throw a fit over it." Kuro replied "Demetria? I've never seen that name before, but I think I've seen her as Ephraim before. I'm glad that your husband got rid of the Dark El from her and she left Elrios for good, even though you guys need to watch out for her, as she's recovering in an isolated location in the very south of the Daystar Purgatory that you should never visit in any way."After their conversation, it was time for the rest of the group to leave the hut, with Kuro following them, walking down to the village of Elyria, where Elsword and Aisha told the mayor about the information about Demetria, to which the mayor nodded and agreed to launch an manhunt for Demetria, before they, Rena, Ain and the rest of the group parted ways with the mayor before returning to Elrios. Back in Velder, just as they were about to head to their house, an concerned villager told Soyul that the guild of assassins had taken over their house and had kicked her group out of the house with no warning, with most of their belongings outside of the house, to her anger that she saw Laby telling Noah and Lithia "These creepy people... How dare they kick us out of our house like this?! How are we supposed to live next?!"Lithia responded with "That's horrible, but you can't help that. Besides, we're all mad here, Laby." Suddenly, Elsword ran towards the three of them and said to them "Don't worry about this house. We have no choice but to move into an another house.", to which everybody in his group agreed to move with him to an another house, which turned out to be the house where Soyul infiltrated to use as the location of her dance party and met him, Aisha and Rena for the first time.Later that night, Ain and Lithia were sitting in the rooftop, eating ice cream, when suddenly, one of the assassins tried to target her, only for him to grab the shuriken, in which he threw it back at him, stabbing him. Just as rest of the assassins were about to go after him, he ran out of the rooftop with her and they both ran downstairs, tricking them into believing that he was dead and soon the assassins left.While Ain and Lithia were running downstairs, Ara was walking upstairs to the rooftop, in which she said to herself "Well, that's crazy... I never thought that they would go after him like that." Just as she stepped foot into the rooftop, the assassins tried to attack her, only for her to use martial arts on one of them, with Eun coming to her defense, to their horror that they all surrendered to her, and she told them never to mess with her ever again.Afterwards, she saw the assassins grabbing all of their rations and belongings, while running away from the stolen house, and they looked at each other, to which she thanked Eun for saving her from the assassins. Suddenly, the rest of the allies but her came rushing to the rooftop, with Elsword clapping and saying to her "Ara, thank you for clearing our house from those assassins. Without you, our house wouldn't be saved from them." She replied "No worries, I did this so that we can live happily together." Rena responded with "However, that doesn't mean that Demetria has an ongoing vendetta against us."Aisha replied "That's right, Rena. Let's go back into our house and defend it from future intruders." Soon, the rest of the group followed her, and together, they returned to their original house and spent the next few days into fortifying their original house to prevent further incidents from taking place within said house.A few days later, after the house was fortified, Elsword received a mysterious letter from Delphia, inviting him and his group to a private meeting in the Al-Qasr al-Aswad in the Aswad Kingdom. And so, he gathers the rest of his group to come with him to the Aswad Kingdom, where they were accompanied by multiple security guards all the way to the entrance of the Al-Qasr al-Aswad.Eventually, they encounter the ancient time goddess Ardith's grandson Kairos, who was more than happy to welcome them to the grand hall, where they all met Delphia, who was waiting for them. While sitting in the dining table, Delphia put out the maps of the Aswad Kingdom and Abyad Kingdom, along with that of the Nether Valley, Daystar Purgatory and Acheron."Listen, since we're in the Aswad Kingdom, which neighbors the Abyad Kingdom to the east, we have the maps of the other lands in this dimension." She said, before continuing with "From what I've heard from the people living in the Daystar Purgatory, Demetria is nowhere to be found in the Purgatory."Kairos replied to Delphia, saying "Additionally, she had fled to the Arcane Tower in the Arcane Realm, where she's hiding in a treasure chest in its summit, which can only be accessed via the Temple of El, which requires the 6 different elemental El shards, including Fire, Earth, Water, Wind, Sun and Moon."As soon as Kairos and Delphia talked to each other about the Elemental El, Saros and Rosana showed up, telling them about Demetria's whereabouts. Turns out, she wasn't in Elrios and in the Daystar Purgatory, but rather, in a treasure chest located within the Arcane Tower. To no one's surprise, Elsword places two different maps of the Arcane Realm and the Arcane Tower. Delphia says to him "Thank you for the maps. Alright then, let's see..." before pointing her finger towards the cross symbol put on the summit of the Arcane Tower, indicating the treasure chest Demetria's been hiding inside the whole time.She said to Saros, Rosana and Elsword "Thanks for letting me know about her whereabouts. You may now take a seat.", before the trio sat in three different chairs throughout the large dining table, while the maids offered them as well as Aisha, Rena, Raven, Ain, Eve, Soyul, Hayat, Crescentia, Laby, Noah, Lithia and Ara some tea.And soon, the private meeting ended, with the people involved, most of whom were Elsword's group, now called the "Arcane Search Party", along with Saros and Rosana, parting ways with Kairos and Delphia while taking the maps with them and leaving the Al-Qasr al-Aswad for Elrios in search of the El Shards.Eventually, the elemental El shards were found in no time. Now it was time for the Arcane Search Party to go to the Arcane Realm, where they were stopped by its ruling monarch Froid, who tells them "What brings you guys here to my realm?", to which Aisha replied "We're here to have a great time, especially that we have our final battle against Demetria in the Arcane Tower." He responded "So, you mean that girl who hid inside the treasure chest in the tower?" Aisha nodded and said "Yes. That's exactly what we're looking for."Not long after, Froid takes them to the Arcane Palace, where they met his younger sister Frostine, who was more than happy to meet her friends from an another world, to the point she invited them to an inn to stay in for the whole night, as tomorrow would be the day of the Arcane Search Party's planned raid party, this time on the Arcane Tower and their final battle against Demetria.