Demons, a race Keilan was unfamiliar with, yet at the same time very intimately familiar with.

  He knew there were various species of demons, the Mind clan being one of them. He'd had his fair share of encounters and he wouldn't deny that they were powerful.

  Tales of demons were rampant everywhere, otherworldly beings that granted wishes in exchange for the souls of their beseecher to, or worse, their kin. Damien had even been rumored at one time to deal with them, however much false it was.

  There were tales abundant about demons, many of them untrue and some of them true. But one thing was certain, a rumor everyone knew was a fact; a demon never encroached on a place without invitation.

  “Shit, what variant is it?” Huiron asked.

  “A blood demon, I believe,” Lady Filenus replied. “Progenitors of the vampiric race.”

  “Okayyy, yeah we need to run.”

  “Indeed.”

  “Wait!” Keilan hissed and staggered forward. Damn, his entire body hurt. He didn't know how he was even functioning. “What about the civilians? We can't just leave them. We even have some with us right here.” Keilan turned around and stopped, eyes widening.

  A hand rested on his shoulder. “Some casualties you learn to swallow, even if bitter.”

  “This is our fault,” he whispered as tears dropped from his eyes. He didn't even know why he was crying. This wasn't a new experience. “They were unawakened and we fought right next to them.”

  “Yes.”

  Keilan stared up at the woman, who stood over ten feet tall above him. She gazed down at him and her expression was unchanged. He realized she wasn't moved at all by the tragedy right in front of them.

  “Did you expect me to cradle your guilt, child? You all made a grievous mistake and it cost you the lives of your charges. There's no escaping that. The fault lies with you, all of you.”

  “I take full responsibility,” Vanis stepped forward. “Whatever punishment will be doled out, let it fall on me. I led this mission, I should take full responsibility.”

  Lady Kuno turned to him. “Unfortunately for you, Young Verrille, the justice system doesn't work that way. You began this mission as a team, remember? A team of equals. Whatever punishment is given, you all will bear it, together.” She turned her face into the distance. “Enough talk. Leave whatever you are doing and depart this planet immediately. I am about to do battle, and unless you intend to end up like these poor souls over there, then I suggest you flee.”

  “The commanders—”

  “Are already made aware. Every shuttle on this planet is already up in the air. DarkMoon should be done by now.”

  “DarkMoon?”

  Just then a crescent moon appeared in the sky, a bright blue arc in contrast to the shining white light of Lady Filenus’s conjuration.

  It fell to the planet.

  A scream echoed across the world as the arc dug deep into it, creating a chasm so vast and deep that Keilan couldn't even make sense of where it began and where it ended. Shadows were all he could make of it from where he stood, until red started pouring out.

  The metallic taste of blood reached his nose as oceans of blood poured out of the deep opening, flowing over the earth like a bleeding wound.

  Lady Filenus drifted upwards back into the sky, her form glowing as her voice thundered forth.

  "Reveal Yourself!”

  A white pulse erupted from her body, now a figure of pure light. The pulse spread outward, ripping apart every form of darkness, including the cage Nalon and Kiki had been entrapped within.

  They were just the side effects. Keilan's vision wobbled as countless eyes snapped open within the sea of blood. A mouth formed, filled with four unimaginably long fangs, and then a whispering, inhuman voice crept forth.

  “A Divine King Not. Food.”

  “I Do Not Need The Power Of A Divine King To End You, Creature.” the lady replied just as stars began forming in the sky, an incalculable number of them.

  “Vanis, we need to go!” Huiron shouted. “Nalon, take us out of here!”

  Crimson energy wrapped around them and they rose into the sky. The Spirit King was in his human form, which made the many scratches and tears across his skin all the more apparent. What form of creature had they fought?

  Unfortunately, Keilan wasn't given time to contemplate. Lady Kuno gestured downwards and the countless number of stars in the sky descended onto the earth, and everything turned blinding white.

  The orb of energy Nalon surrounded them with cracked, but fortunately, that was all that happened to it. When the light finally died down, it was to the sight of a cracked and dismembered earth.

  The continent, the only whole one of the lot, was cracked and shattered, parts of it drifting off. And instead of ocean water pouring out, it was blood that came forth.

  Within, Keilan could make out the drops of blood that spilled back into the sea. A dome hovered above the newly formed sea, with holes marred its surface. Those holes closed back a second later, and a mocking laughter slithered forth.

  Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

  “A Divine King,” Nalon said thickly.

  Keilan grimaced. That was not good.

  They were far above the land that he could easily make out the ocean beyond, and all he could see was red. The pure blue water of this world had been turned to blood.

  “Look,” someone gasped.

  Crawling on the earth were countless shapes. A little bit of narrowed vision and Keilan made out the figures of humans, Aveaniis, other races, and even animals. They all crawled, like possessed beings being pulled by strings, towards the crack in the earth.

  One of those eyes swiveled to their location, and a voice sounded in Keilan's mind.

  “Flee? Why flee? Come.”

  It was like reality itself rushed to obey the command of the Divine King. A heavy weight pressed upon the orb and Keilan felt as they were pushed downwards, slowly reversing their path back to the earth.

  Darkness flowed across the land just another ocean, this one made of shadows crashed against the ocean of Blood.

  Countless tentacled hands erupted from it and they began tearing into the sea of blood. The demon fought back, summoning teeth and claws that tore back at the sea of shadows.

  Lady Filenus rained countless stars down into the sea of red, causing domes of explosions that vaporized everything in its path.

  Together, their battle tore apart the earth, turning what was left to rubble that sank into the newly formed Red Sea.

  “Depart from thee!”

  An explosion of blood erupted, and both Lese Kings were sent reeling backwards. DarkMoon gestured forwards and blades of shadows scraped across the borders of the blood domain, cutting off a huge chunk out of it and diminishing its greater mass.

  A giant moth made of light dived down, its bladed appendages piercing into the sea of blood, which caused the demon to scream.

  A blood whip slammed into the moth and Lady Kuno was sent careening to the side. She oriented herself quickly and dived back towards her opponent.

  Blood shot towards DarkMoon, and the man created a hole of swirling darkness that sucked in the attack. Lady Kuno deflected hers by conjuring a shield of refracted light that sent the beam scraping against the surface of a distant landmass. It exploded.

  The earth shook as those titans battled, their energies reverberating outwards like an endless heatwave. Keilan felt fractures spread across his bones as the distant shockwaves of their attacks slammed into him. Even through the orb of energy Nalon had conjured, they were still powerful enough to leave fractures on his bones. What more would they do should he be left out in the open?

  “Nalon, get us out of here.”

  “I'm trying,” the warder gritted out. “The Will of the creature bars me.”

  Above the sky, moon crescents formed, hundreds of them, each brimming with catastrophic power.

  They tore into the earth like a pack of hungry wolves, shredding through the ocean of blood with such gusto that cracks began running across the air like spider webs.

  The demon screeched, a sound that sent everyone down on their knees. Nalon’s orb shattered and Keilan immediately felt the full brunt of the shockwaves slam into him.

  Something burst within him and he spat out blood. He screamed as his vision darkened again just as multiple bones broke, shattering and leaving his limbs hanging limp.

  Before the damage could exacerbate further, a golden flower bloomed from beneath them, its giant petals flowing up to wrap around them in a dome of fiery energy.

  A woman with golden flames for hair and a flowing robe made of fire stepped forward and took the position Nalon previously occupied.

  Keilan had known Kiki could walk in human form, but he'd never seen her before in any. Her right hand was outstretched outwards while the other cradled an unconscious Sareina.

  Time stretched as the tension grew. The battle between the Spirit Kings grew more devastating as more of their domains were unleashed, each border growing more and more until each was the size of a continent. They pushed against each other, summoning everything from humanoid figures to nightmarish appendages that sought and tore against each other, pushing their way into the other domain.

  Lady Filenus flapped her wings and a bright ray of luminous energy gushed down into the sea of red, vaporizing a huge chunk of its mass.

  The demon retaliated by extending huge appendages that caught and ripped off one of the Moth’s wings, causing an explosion of light so devastating that it sent the protective dome around them rolling through the skies.

  Unable to fly up, the firebird had instead elected to push their protective orb horizontally, far away from the area of battle. But Keilan knew that was just a stalling measure. The effects of the battle had already covered the entire globe; soon, its shockwaves were going to devastate everything within the surface of the world.

  As the distance between them and the fighting behemoths stretched, the figures got smaller, until even the oceans of sea and shadows were but lines on the horizon.

  “You go? Why go? Me said come!”

  The world thickened, turning a deeper shade of red. The atmosphere turned humid, blood practically dripping from the sky. The temperature soared and Keilan felt an icy grip wrap around his throat.

  One moment they were thousands of miles away from the central continent, the next they hovered back in their former position, dragged through space with such vehement force that it sent Kiki staggering and almost dropping Sareina.

  They arrived just in time to watch a sea of blood, separate from the demon’s domain. This one was made up of all the dead victims of this world, the countless numbers that had died to the Aveanii wave of attacks, and the countless more who'd been unable to flee the Demon's emergence.

  A titanic figure rose out of the mountain of blood. It sprouted two arms and two legs, each tipped with four rows of long, curved, claws. That was where its vague resemblance to a human ended.

  From its torso emerged two huge white eyes, no pupils, a contrast to its blood red form. A mouth formed beneath those eyes, stretching into a morbid facsimile of a normal smile, and four great white fangs sprouted from within.

  Two bat-like wings opened behind it, dripping blood as they blotted out the horizon.

  The creature stretched forth one of its arms into the sky and then spoke.

  —Blood Invocation—

  Keilan sagged forward as his exhaustion doubled. It felt like the lifeforce within his body was leaking out. He wasn't the only one.

  Countless of the remaining stringed puppets on the ground burst and the orb containing them slowed to a halt. Kiki sagged forward.

  “Me want you, you come!”

  Slowly, Keilan felt the orb draw downwards. For the dozen'th time that day, he felt his vision wobble.

  “Uhh, I don't know about any of you, but I don't want to be anywhere near that thing. Ideas anyone? Anything? Somebody do something!”

  Keilan doubted they'd even need to be near the creature for it to do whatever it is it wanted. As it was right now, their blood, their lifeforce, was being sucked away from them, flowing out in visible streams towards the demon.

  All of them had lost a lot of blood over countless battles, which meant they didn't have as much time as they would have had against something like this. If a solution wasn't found soon, there was more likely a chance that they'd be bloodless husks by the time they reached the creature.

  An idea crossed his mind and he didn't give himself much time to think about it.

  “Open a path for me,” he whispered through blurry eyes.

  “What?!”

  “Open the orb, let me through!”

  “Are you dense in the head?! You can't—”

  Keilan was done listening. He gathered the last of his strength—how little it was—and punched. He fell outward. Guess the orb hadn't been designed to keep things in.

  The heat slammed into him like a speeding cart and he choked out blood.

  He didn't have much time left so he acted, moving on instinct. Keilan gathered the last of his will, and spoke into the world.

  —Wind Arts: Rage—

  The world screamed as an otherworldly storm was born. The power born from his ascended technique was such that he felt the mental hold on them slacken and then loose.

  And darkness took him.