105 Star of Hope

As Erza's words fell, everyone felt their strength left them as all of their energies rushed toward the sky, creating a huge green vortex. The vortex then rapidly condensed into a star which was shining so bright in the middle of this dark night.

A girl whose whole body was covered in green light suddenly flew toward the star and merged with it.

*Boom!*

Shockwave after shockwave rolled through the air as the girl's aura kept climbing…

Mid King…

Late King…

Peak King… After reaching the peak stage of King Realm, the girl's aura finally started to slow down but it was still climbing…

Erza thought she would be pushed through the peak stage of King Realm into the Emperor Realm. However, her body suddenly experiencing a sharp feeling of pain which Erza had never experienced before.

Even though this was the first time she experienced this kind of pain, she intuitively knew that it was due to her current body was unable to hold her sudden increase in power. If she truly entered the Emperor Realm with her current body, there was no a shadow of doubt that she would explode and cease to exist in both body and soul.

Erza gritted her teeth as she quickly pushed the remaining energy out from her body and formed a sword. The sword was therefore made from the accumulated energy essences and it would dissipate after this fight.

This was Erza's current strongest skill besides the last move of Heavenly Flame Sword which would result in her dying after executing the skill. According to the inherited memory she received from Chasiel, 'Star of Hope' was a skill which would collect and transform the feeling of hope and the strengths of the 'believers' in the caster's surroundings into a source of power. The stronger the believers' hope, the higher the portion of their strength would be taken.

Of course, the accumulated power was not permanent. In her current level of power, Erza could only maintain this level of strength for less than twenty minutes.

In addition, 'Star of Hope' was not without a risk and serious negative after-effect. Other than the risk of exploding, Erza would probably spend her following two months being in a weakened state. At worst, she could fall to coma just like when she used 'Purgatory'.

Nevertheless, Erza was willing to take the risks in order to help defend Mirage City from the beasts and to protect all the things she had built there in these last few days.

After stabilizing her new-founded strength, Erza turned to look at the three Peak Level Beast Kings.

"Let me handle the Golden Fur Lion King." Erza exclaimed as she flew toward the three Peak Level Beast Kings with no hesitation.

*Boom!*

Erza was like an unstoppable sword that was capable of destroying any defence and killing anything. Her terrifying aura caused all of the lower levelled beasts to tremble and fear started to grow in their hearts, surpassing those dread feelings they had toward the tree Peak Level Beast Kings. None of them dared to move or make a sound in her presence.

At this moment, Leo and his brother had already engaged with the Peak Level Beast Kings. With each strike they made, the three Peak Level Beast Kings retaliated, their battles had already deformed the area around them beyond recognition.

Their fighting sent ripples of energy that flew everywhere and shook the earth. With each attack, the shockwaves grew bigger and bigger in intensity.

"Hou!" The Green Scaled King Kong roared angrily as a human's chest sized fist coming down onto Leo with a terrifying amount of force.

Leo threw himself out of the way in order to dodge the fist. With a loud bang, the fist landed on the ground where Leo had just been. A large amount of energy rippled across the ground, and when the fist was lifted, there was a three meter deep and five meter long crater below.

On one side, the Bladed Crocodile King spat out a grey coloured ball of energy toward Leon while simultaneously readying its bladed spine. Levelling it horizontally to the ground, the spine suddenly flew at Leon with blinding speed.

A glimpse of golden fur could be seen as the Golden Fur Lion King let out an ear piercing roar. Its claws which were strong enough to shatter rock and split metal flashed dangerously as they swiped at Leon while a foul smell of blood could be smelled as it also tried to bite him.

Leon and Leo did not dare to defend head on with any of the strikes from the three Peak Level Beast Kings. Both of them knew that they were definitely not an opponent for any of the three beast kings, and so it was not possible for them to win at all if they tried to go head to head. It would also consume their energy rapidly and make escaping difficult. All they wanted to do was stall for time and gather the attention of the beasts.

It was at this moment that Erza had finally arrived with her eyes burning with a strong fighting intent. Staring at the golden mane of the Golden Fur Lion King, her sword began to shine with green light before it moved toward the beast.

Standing further away near the city gates, everyone hold their breathes as they were witnessing this peak level fight. Their fates would be practically decided by the result of this fight.

Sensing the incoming attack, the Lion King quickly flick its tail from behind to strike Erza with a speed that whistled through the air.

The power in the tail was incredibly large as even a King Grade Treasure would surely break apart if it was hit by this tail. However, when the tail of the Golden Fur Lion King made contact with the green sword, it was effortlessly cut in two.

Surprisingly, the part that had been cut off resumed its trajectory path due to the great force behind it and hit Erza in the arm, which consequently pushed Erza's sword arm away and cancelled her attack.

"Rrrraawwwrr~~~"

As the feeling of its tail got cut in two spread around its body, the Golden Fur Lion King let out an ear splitting shriek of pain to the point where both the envoys and Erza thought their eardrums would shatter.

'Rewind!'

'Time Stop!'

Erza's eyes flashed dangerously as she tried to heal her broken arm while launching another attack straight into the lion's neck. She needed to end this fight as soon as possible given the time limitation of the 'Star of Hope'.

With her back facing the two envoys, Melforce slashed toward the Golden Fur Lion King's neck. Normally, the lion king would try to block or dodge the attack. However, under the effect of 'Time Stop', the lion king was no different from a meat on a chopping board.

Immediately, the head of the Lion King spun through the air leaking blood. At the same time, a fountain of blood spurted out from its beheaded corpse two meters high into the air before falling back down to the earth.

Erza just killed a Peak Level Beast King!

Leo and Leon stared at the spinning head of the lion dumbfounded. They had even forgotten that they were in the midst of a battle. Disbelief was clearly written on their faces.

The Golden Fur Lion King was something that neither of the two brothers would be able to kill by themselves. To think that Erza had managed to cut off its head, this was too much of a shock for their hearts to handle.

The Green Scaled King Kong and the Bladed Crocodile King also stopped their actions and turned to look at the severed head of the Golden Fur Lion King. They could not believe that their comrade was killed that quickly.

Everyone thought that Erza would go after the other two Peak Level Beast Kings after finishing off the Lion King. However, she surprisingly just stood there unmoving.

"I know both of you could understand human languages. So let me be honest with you, I could kill you two just like how I was able to kill the lion king. However, it will come at a great cost to me which I would like to avoid."

"Therefore, I'm offering you two a truce. Let's stop this war and sit back to discuss what we could do to benefit both sides…. What do you think?"

Erza unexpectedly offered them a truce! Without anyone realizing it, she was actually in great dilemma. Thanks to the fact that she had used her 'Time Stop' to swiftly deal with the lion king, her Eyes of Chronos was currently visible to the outside, and there was no way for her to hide them anytime soon. If she continued to fight, then her cover would surely be blown!