Valerius closed his eyes for a moment, floating cross-legged on his elastic Cushion.

  Eight hours, huh? If I grab those relics now, I’ll just be painting a target on my back. Probably smarter to wait until the last thirty minutes…

  Then his grin widened.

  “But where’s the fun in that?”

  He cracked his neck. “I need to get my blood pumping.”

  In the next instant, Valerius shot off the Cushion like a bullet, hurtling toward the Blood Chalice at sonic speeds.

  He flipped forward several times in midair, then brought down his palm in a powerful blow, laughing manically. “HAAAAHAHAHA!”

  BOOM.

  Using his Cushion technique, Valerius expanded its range outward at the moment of impact. The force slammed into the earth like a divine hammer.

  A crater in the shape of his hand nearly a kilometer across and twelve kilometers deep yawned open beneath him.

  He dove straight down through the chasm and reached for the glowing relic. The Blood Chalice pulsed as he grabbed it, and a brilliant yellow light shot from his head into the sky.

  Valerius stared upward at the beacon that now marked him as prey. He smirked. “Guess I’m the target now.”

  ---

  Elsewhere, Kaelan sprinted beside Elsa, panting, their feet pounding the scarred earth.

  “Damn it,” Kaelan growled. “We can’t keep up with these people. We were way over our heads. It’ll be a miracle if we don’t die here as collateral damage. I’ve never regretted leaving our village as much as I do now.”

  Before Elsa could respond, a hurricane-force wind slammed into them, hurling them across the battlefield like ragdolls.

  ---

  Nearby, Juvian and Isabela were fleeing desperately as augmenters pursued them, their attacks leaving craters with every strike.

  “Drop it!” Juvian shouted, barely dodging a blade of Bravo that ripped past his face. “Drop Isabela! It’s not worth dying over — we’ll find another one!”

  Isabela’s teeth clenched. “Damn it!” She hurled the Mirror Blade behind her.

  The chasing challengers swarmed it instantly, tearing into each other with a frenzy that shook the earth.

  ---

  Far away, Eliana and Maloi entered a stone house, its interior cold and echoing like a temple.

  At the far end sat a female Spirit on a stone chair, her presence suffocating. She was fifteen feet tall, her skin glowing like molten sapphire, her eyes two pits of endless black. Her naked, flawless form gave off an alien, unnatural grace.

  In her hand, she held the Wailing Crown — its many whispering voices filling the room with madness.

  “So,” the Spirit purred, her voice like velvet dripping with venom, “how will you take this from me, darlings?”

  Eliana’s gaze narrowed.

  She leaned toward Maloi, whispering, “How do you think we should do this? We can’t take it by force — she’s a Spirit.”

  Maloi straightened, facing the Spirit. “Can we negotiate?”

  The Spirit’s lips curled into something that wasn’t quite a smile. “Oh? How bold. What do you propose?”

  She paused, then tilted her head as if struck by inspiration.

  “Wait. I have a better idea. For the Crown… one of you will lend me your body. For a single day.”

  Eliana froze. “What?”

  The Spirit rose from her chair and glided forward, her height dwarfing them both.

  “I am a Spirit,” she said smoothly, “and though I can be summoned, I cannot walk freely in your world. But with a contract… I can take over your body for some time. And when I leave… you will retain a fragment of my power.”

  In a blur of motion, she bent forward until her faceless head was inches from Eliana’s, her voice echoing directly into her mind.

  “And if I know you, little one… you crave power.”

  “No!” Maloi barked, stepping between them. “We’re not giving our bodies to you.”

  The Spirit chuckled and sauntered back to her chair, crossing her long legs. “Just for a day, darlings. Nothing more.”

  She tapped the Crown with one glowing finger. “But decide quickly. Others are coming. And I know for certain you cannot beat them.”

  Eliana frowned. “I don’t sense anyone nearby…”

  “That’s because,” the Spirit whispered, “they are Bravo users.”

  Eliana’s stomach sank. She read my mind…

  The Spirit tilted her head as if amused. “Tik tok, darling. And because I enjoy our little chat, I’ll sweeten the deal: I’ll give you a portion of my power now, to help you win this game. All I require in return is one day in your body.”

  Did you know this text is from a different site? Read the official version to support the creator.

  Maloi spun toward Eliana, her voice breaking. “No. Eliana, don’t even think about it.”

  Eliana’s voice was calm. “What will you do with my body during that day?”

  The Spirit’s tone sharpened. “That… is none of your concern.”

  “Eliana, look at me!” Maloi’s voice was almost pleading now. “Don’t do this.”

  The Spirit’s voice boomed, reverberating through the chamber like a drum.

  “The clock is ticking. Once they arrive, you will surely die. Even if you manage to escape, it is only a matter of time before someone rips your head off and takes the Crown. The way I see it, from the moment you stepped onto this island, you had two choices: win… or die.”

  Her faceless head tilted, black eyes gleaming like bottomless wells.

  “Or did you truly think this was a friendly competition?”

  Eliana’s breath hitched. She could feel Maloi’s stare burning into her, begging her to refuse.

  But her voice was steady. “I told my father I would make a name for myself.” She raised her chin, staring into those abyssal black eyes. “I can’t die here. …Fine. I’ll do it.”

  The Spirit — Selestine — tilted her head, and for the first time, Eliana could feel a sense of delight emanating from that faceless visage.

  “Good girl.”

  A contract of glowing script and a quill materialized before Eliana. The parchment pulsed with faint blue light, whispering like it was alive.

  This is a binding agreement between — there was a blank space.

  — and Selestine. In return for twenty-four hours of… another blank space —’s body, Selestine will grant… blank space — her power.

  “Write your full name in the blanks,” Selestine purred. “And sign with your thumb… in blood.”

  Eliana’s heart pounded, but her hand didn’t tremble. She filled in the spaces:

  Eliana Anastasia Ignir.

  Then, without hesitation, she bit her thumb, letting a drop of blood stain the parchment before pressing it against her name.

  The contract glowed like a newborn star, then disintegrated into sparks that sank into Eliana’s skin.

  A burning symbol flared on her forehead — intricate, alien — then vanished.

  Selestine tossed the Wailing Crown to her. The moment Eliana’s fingers touched it, a violent surge of Vitalis coursed through her, searing through her veins like liquid fire. Her body instinctively began refining it into mana, her core expanding, reshaping, growing.

  Maloi’s voice shook. “What will I tell the king?”

  Eliana’s gaze hardened. “Nothing.”

  With a deafening bang and an ear-splitting ring, a portal ripped open behind Selestine. The Spirit strode through it, her towering form vanishing into another realm.

  “Thanks, little elf,” her voice echoed in Eliana’s mind, smooth as velvet. “You’ve done me more good than you know.”

  Eliana gasped as her senses exploded outward — she could feel them: dozens of Bravo users approaching from all directions.

  Where did they all come from?

  Selestine’s voice purred inside her thoughts. “Spirits sense Vitalis, darling — not mana. And both Bravo and mana… are but crude derivatives of it.”

  Eliana gritted her teeth. How are you speaking to me?

  “We’re connected now,” Selestine whispered. “A contract binds more than body and soul. It binds thought.”

  The roof above them groaned. Bravo users — dozens — hovered overhead, glowing like angry stars, ready to unleash hell.

  Eliana grabbed Maloi, wrapping her arm around her waist. “Hold on.”

  Then she exploded through the ceiling, blasting into the open sky at sonic speed.

  Maloi’s stomach lurched as Eliana rocketed them forward, the Float spell anchoring Maloi’s weightless body to her side.

  But the challengers were faster than expected. They were on her.

  ---

  Suddenly, a green blur cut through the air, slamming into them like a battering ram.

  Pain exploded across Eliana and Maloi’s faces as two massive hands grabbed their heads and slammed them into the ground.

  BOOM.

  The impact carved two 500-meter-deep craters, throwing up walls of dust and shattered stone.

  Groaning, Eliana looked up through the haze.

  A Fishal stood there, towering at sixteen feet. His muscular frame dripped with ocean water, green skin glistening under the sun. Tentacles writhed from his scalp like hair, webbed digits flexed on his massive hands, and fins sliced along his forearms. His shark-like teeth gleamed in a wide, predatory grin.

  He stepped forward with a bone-shaking thud, cracking his knuckles.

  “Two little elves just for me,” he hissed, his voice like a tide dragging corpses out to sea. “Don’t worry… I won’t hurt you too much.”

  Eliana’s vision blurred. Maloi coughed blood.

  And then —

  The temperature plummeted.

  Breath frosted in the air.

  Snow began to fall.

  A blizzard erupted around them, howling winds slicing through the battlefield.

  Mist rolled in, thick and impenetrable, swallowing everything.

  One by one, the approaching challengers dove into the storm — and screams echoed in the white void as they were dragged out of the air, ripped apart by something unseen.

  The Fishal froze, his grin faltering.

  “W-what the—?”

  He looked around — but saw nothing.

  The blizzard roared louder.

  He couldn’t even see his own hand.

  The Fishal stood still, listening.

  Screams echoed through the blizzard — short, sharp, and wet. The sound of flesh being torn apart.

  His eyes were useless in the whiteout. So he closed them and stretched out his senses, feeling for the faintest shift in the storm.

  There…

  A sudden flare of energy.

  WHOOSH.

  A giant sword of light came crashing down from above.

  The Fishal jerked sideways — the blade cleaved the air just inches from his face and split the ground for two kilometers, leaving a glowing canyon of molten rock.

  Before he could strike back, the sword — and whoever wielded it — vanished.

  More screams.

  A warm spray hit his face. Blood.

  The Fishal wiped it off, baring his teeth.

  “Playing games with me, are you?” he snarled. “You underestimate my Sentinel.”

  WHOOSH.

  The light sword came again — this time in a horizontal slash.

  The Fishal ducked. The blade carved a mountain in half, the top sliding cleanly off before exploding in a cascade of stone and fire.

  Again, the sword vanished.

  The Fishal’s grin widened. “I’ve found you.”

  The next strike came in an inclined slash, blinding in its speed.

  The Fishal didn’t dodge. He spun, punching behind him with everything he had.

  BOOOOM.

  The blow obliterated Eliana’s Tree Guardian in a single hit and blasted away the storm.

  The blizzard evaporated. The mist cleared.

  And then he saw them.

  ---

  Six Guardians.

  Each stood one hundred feet tall, arranged in a circle around him, heads bowed so low their foreheads touched, enclosing him in a cage of living light.

  Their faces glowed — holy, radiant, merciless.

  The Fishal froze.

  And it was in that moment he knew —

  He was fucked.

  ---

  KRAAAAAA-BOOOOM.

  All six Guardians fired at once.

  Beams of annihilating light converged on the Fishal, pinning him in place. His scream echoed across the island as the assault blasted him downward, tearing through bedrock like paper.

  The bombardment lasted fifteen full seconds.

  By the time it ended, the Fishal had been driven clean through the island, his body flung into the open ocean below.

  ---

  At the bottom of the sea, nearly a thousand kilometers beneath the surface, he finally stopped.

  The ocean floor had been hollowed into a crater a full kilometer deep.

  The Fishal twitched. His arms and legs were gone. His eyes had been burned away. He floated there, barely alive, a ruined husk.

  ---

  On the surface, the battlefield was silent.

  Maloi stood atop the crushed head of a Pesterio, one foot pressing it into the dirt. In her hand gleamed a Wailing Crown, its whispers now harmonizing with Eliana’s.

  Eliana walked up beside her, calm as if they hadn’t just annihilated a Fishal.

  “That plan was brilliant, Maloi,” she said.

  Maloi turned, still breathing hard. “I don’t remember your Guardians being that powerful.”

  They both looked up at the six towering constructs now standing in formation, encircling them like an unbreakable wall. Their glowing faces turned outward, watching for the next threat.

  “Was it the Spirit?” Maloi asked.

  Eliana nodded. “Yes. This was the power she promised me.”

  Maloi exhaled, finally smiling. “So do you still think we can’t win this?”

  Eliana smirked. “You might have just changed my mind.”

  Both women now held a Wailing Crown.

  Eliana adjusted hers, her new strength humming beneath her skin. “Let’s go get the others.”

  ---

  To Be Continued...