Liara's eyes went from one emaciated face to the other, silently counting. If she didn't make a mistake, they were half a hundred prisoners chained down the Pit by the Thorn's Church. Nelg changed back to his human form after slicing through the last slave collar.

  "Cough...T- Thank you," said the first prisoner to recover his voice. He was a red-haired human with a tattoo of a weighing scale on his chest.

  "Don't mention it," grumbled Nelg. "As far as I'm aware, everyone down this hole is in the same boat sailing to take revenge on the Thorn's Church. Am I right?"

  The redhead's eyes darkened and he clenched his fists tightly. A blue Aura exploded around him, finally freed after a long time of being sealed. That same scene repeated with many mages, warriors, and even priests of other religions finally recovering their powers. Liara's eyes widened at the sight.

  'They're all...so strong. How did so many people become captured by the Thorn's Church?'

  "Wow! That's a lot of Sahro's in one place," cursed Nelg as he took a frightened step back. He scratched the back of his head before raising his voice. "Does someone here know how to escape from this hole?"

  An old orc approached Nelg, dragging his feet. His muscles, pride of that green-skinned race, had withered away, leaving his limbs gaunt and frail. Still, despite that meager appearance, the senior orc had a bestial feeling to himself, even more as red Aura pulsed out of him with every step he took.

  "Cough, cough..." He cleared his throat before pointing his finger at the darkness. "It not eaten yet."

  Nelg raised a pleasantly surprised eyebrow. 'An orc that speaks the Common Tongue? He could translate between orcish —or whatever is called the orcs' language— and Common Tongue if we ever meet that Decimius back from the Ink Dunes. That'd be fun.'

  He shook away these thoughts and focused on the old orc's words. "It? What are you talking about?"

  The redhead from earlier gulped heavily as he glanced back to the shadows. "H- He's right. I don't know when, but soon it will eat again. Only the fast runners could escape it before, but now that we have our powers again..." His eyes widened in realization. "Could we try and kill it from the inside?"

  The old orc grounded his fangs as he rubbed his chin. "Too big. We only bugs."

  Liara watched silently, thankful to not be leading the discussion. 'I don't know how I would have survived if I didn't have Nelg around...I'll have to ask Glenn to reward him for his hard work.'

  Nelg took a deep breath, his eyes widening in horror. "Again, what the hell are you talking about? What's too big? What is supposed to eat us?"

  The old orc sighed, struggling to find his words. "Do you see...flowers that eat meat?"

  Nelg nodded, the colors draining out of his face in realization. The orc continued, unfazed.

  "We in the stomach. Waiting to be...eat."

  Liara's mouth opened up in horror. The ball of light above her head flickered, threatening to go out. 'We're inside a living being? That means...the enchanted, poisoned vine walls...They're also part of that massive living being!'

  The Black Heiress spun on her feet, her Mana Sight activating to search through the darkness. With her timely ascension to the fifth rank, she could now perceive everything in a much sharper, intricate way. Orcs, humans, and Black Heirs all shone in different, recognizable colors that she couldn't name. She squinted, her eyes stopping on a point in the distance.

  'Is that...?'

  Gong!

  Before she could understand what she was seeing, the sound of a bell rang through the darkness. The red head, the old orc and all of the other prisoners' expressions hardened. Aura, Mana and Divinity flared up in a grandiose show of power. Liara instinctively followed the lead of the group, standing her ground alongside them.

  Whatever was coming, she would be fighting against it.

  "That's during these occasions that I wish I knew how to fight or something. Why can't I just use spells like Glenn does? I'd love a Sun for myself, honestly..." Nelg's grumbles were left unheard as Liara conjured a sword and spear out of physicalized light.

  Gong!

  The bell rang again, and the ground shook with it. Nelg cursed and got closer to Liara, just in case, while the latter stabbed her sword on the floor to ensure a stable foothold.

  "What's happening?!" Nelg screamed at the old orc. The green geezer had his arms crossed and looked ready to rip through anything that would come his way.

  "Not know. Bell only rings once for feed." His red Aura covered his fists, burning with fiery lust for battle. He rose them to the sky, roaring like a lion. "Non timebo!" He turned to the other orc prisoners, who raised their fists in a brotherly manner, similarly pumped up. "Ad gloriam!"

  The humans roared with the orcs, even though they couldn't understand their words. The Black Heirs' powers also exploded as they stood beside Liara, their eyes burning with desire for revenge and battle. The corner of Nelg's lips rose nervously.

  'This is strangely exciting. A last stand of some sort, huh? What are we even fighting that they're so stimulated?'

  His answer came flying in a distorted mess of bones, flesh, and skin. Vaguely humanoid monsters ran out of the darkness, shrieking in highly pitched screams. Vines were connected to their backs, running back to the unknown darkness. Not a single one of the prisoners hesitated as they threw themselves forward, pummeling the creatures, and destroying them with incredibly powerful attacks.

  Nelg didn't know where to gaze as massive fireballs and gigantic ice balls crossed each other to destroy the weird vine and flesh beasts. The orcs were rampaging with Aura-covered fists at the vanguard, supported by human and Black Heirs melee fighters. A few mages also stood at the rear, their faces taut with anger and hatred as they reduced the creatures to ashes.

  "I'm kind of glad we didn't stick around to find out what's making those guys so angry about all this..." Nelg muttered as he kept Liara in his line of sight. "I mean, if I get thrown into a prison, I'd be more eager to escape from it than to beat up my jailers. Just my opinion, though..."

  Only the sound of battle replied to his gibbers, bones, vines and flesh shredded all alike. The monster's side was getting destroyed by the incongruous prisoner alliance. Liara suddenly flashed back to Nelg's side, grabbing him by the hand and throwing him on her spear to ride.

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  "Hey, what the—" Nelg only had the time to grab Liara's waist as her sword shot forward into the darkness, through the increasingly large monsters. Nelg's eyes widened as Liara's light magic showed countless monsters creeping into the darkness, waiting for their turn to be slaughtered at the prisoners' hands.

  "Liara, where are we going? Are we fleeing—?" Nelg gritted his teeth as Liara made her sword accelerate suddenly. Thorny vines crashed where they were flying the second before chasing them through the air. The light coming off Liara's lux ball was losing efficiency the deeper they dove into the darkness.

  Nelg's eyes widened as Liara's sword finally stopped. Her ball of light was barely enough to distinguish an opening in the ground leading even deeper. The walls were fleshy, green meat that oozed with red blood. Liara drew a short breath before jumping down straight into the hole. Nelg only had time to blink before her hand pulled him down with her straight into the maw of the beast.

  "AHH!!! WHY ARE YOU TAKING ME WITH YOU???"

  Unfortunately, Liara still couldn't bring herself to break the tradition for Nelg.

  ***

  Lucian coughed a mouthful of blood as he flew through the air, his royal attire shredded by the Count's attack. He slowed down as he controlled his flight, his crown of orange and magenta light shining brightly with power. He stabilized himself in the sky before spitting to the side in a less than majestic manner.

  "Is Munirp truly rotten of a nation to be riddled with so many traitors...?" He pondered aloud as he kept his eyes on the Count's manor. Soon enough, an abomination of thorny vines and countless eyes broke through its ceiling, its bloodthirsty branches reaching for Lucian.

  There was nothing human anymore about the Count. Lucian tried to execute the damned traitor in the middle of his transformation but barely managed to damage him. A massive vine was the culprit for sending him out of the mansion and into the air, where he currently was.

  Lucian looked down at the empty streets and similarly unoccupied houses. 'Seems like I don't need to worry about the citizens getting hurt. I'll take care of that vine mess and rejoin with the rest of the group.'

  The Vine Count roared as he grew to become a massive, walking tree with countless snake-like vines hanging from its branches. The vines kept on snapping in Lucian's direction like whips, but the Prince deflected each of them with his spells. Orange and purple bursts of light swallowed the vines, reducing them to nothingness.

  Lucian carefully retreated, observing his opponent. He hadn't interacted in person with this sort of energy, but he had heard about it. A vicious, painful thing, hellbent on inflicting the most pain of everything that existed in this world.

  The Thorn's Church. A religion that was barely tolerated when practiced under the rug and without making a noise about it. Officially, the religion wasn't accepted inside King's Rise, hence why their churches once dwelled outside each of the four gates. That is until the Black Heirs destroyed them all for one reason or another.

  Lucian had vaguely listened to reports of that situation, but he hadn't paid too much attention to it. There was already a lot to deal with inside King's Rise's walls and with the constant threat of the Celestial Gods and the other bastards living beyond the Dark Wall back then.

  Today, he was finally confronted with it. A mundane human who once believed in the Gold Church had now turned into an abominable creature serving the God of Pain and Redemption, Epinos.

  'I'll have to give it a closer look after this whole mess. If the Thorn's Church has abilities to transform people into monsters powerful enough to resist even the might of an Archmagi, that means a royal crusade might be of order. I'll ask Glenn about it after we find him. I'm sure he knows one thing or two about them.' Lucian reined in his thoughts and concentrated fully on the monster. The living, walking tree had grown taller and larger than the Count's mansion and was currently destroying the city.

  Roots covered in thorns ripped through houses and streets as the monstrous tree tried moving closer to Lucian. The latter simply flew a little higher, trying to keep a big picture of the situation.

  "I still need to do one last check for citizens... Let me see. Quaerite Vita Ostendere!" He guided his Mana through the spell, sending a large wave of magic over the entire city. One of the advantages of being an Archmagi was being able to cast city-wide magics without too much of a struggle. Lucian's eyebrows rose in confusion as the spell only found a few isolated life forces in a few corners of the town. Even if he hadn't noticed any citizens previously, at least a few merchants were manning the stalls. Where were they all gone?

  The spell suddenly found a massive amount of lifeforce besides the one coming off the mutated Count. There were thousands of people hidden beneath the city, dozens of meters under the ground. They were but a fraction of Satidipug's original population, which was in the hundreds of thousands. Lucian clenched his fists tightly as he thought back to the battlefield on Retni's Plains.

  "You traitorous fiend..." His crown gleamed with strengthened power as his rage grew. "How dare you collude with the Thorn's Church, and give up your citizens' lives for them?" The Prince opened his right hand, aiming it at the giant tree wriggling below.

  "I, Lucian Magnus, strip you and your descendants of their titles! Your lands shall be given to the most suitable lord, and your name buried into the mud! Count Satidipug..." Lucian's eyes turned completely purple. "I hereby sentence you to death."

  His crown turned completely purple as all the Mana in the area was sucked into his hand, channeled into the spell. A massive sword of purple light appeared in the sky, even larger and bigger than the mutated Count himself. Lucian emotionlessly lowered his hand, and with it, ordered the sword to fall.

  "Final Twilight."

  The blade made a roaring sound as it fell onto the tree monster. The latter tried to defend itself by sending vines and branches in the sword's path, but nothing would stop the Final Twilight from executing its duty. It fell slowly, but the tree monster couldn't avoid it. Even if it could move around, it was nowhere fast enough to dodge the massive spell.

  The sword impaled it from head to toe, exploding in a massive blast that destroyed a good chunk of the city. A large cloud of dust rose from the shockwave as Lucian looked down at the devastation he created. There was nothing left from the Count, his house, or his pregnant wives. Lucian coldly shook his head.

  "If he truly believed I would allow his lineage to be continued after this...then he was truly a fool. A desperate, idiotic fool..."

  A truly powerful Archmagi could destroy cities if he so wished. The only reason they didn't do so was because other Archmagis would always stand in the way. As much as they can destroy a city, they can also protect it.

  And today, there was no one strong enough to stop Lucian from ridding the world of another traitor to the nation.

  'It'll be expensive to rebuild. I'm not even sure it would be worth it. It will probably be better to relocate the survivors to King's Rise and draw the curtain on this shameful thing.'

  A bolt of red lightning suddenly shot through the air and stopped in front of him, crackling with violent power. Sahro grabbed Lucian's shoulders angrily.

  "You bastard! Why didn't you call me for that? I barely had the time to notice the thing that you already took it down! Don't you noble bastards learn how to share?"

  Lucian scratched the back of his head. "Well, uhm, I'll leave the next one to you, Sahro, alright?"

  The Black Heir grumbled as he glanced to the side. Milena and Tuleam flew up to them, one standing on a sword in Liara-style, and the other simply with a personal flight spell.

  "What the hell was that thing?" Milena exclaimed as she looked down at the damage. "You destroyed an entire district, Lucian!"

  The Prince cleared his throat. "No, no, Count Satidipug destroyed everything, and I only put an end to his folly. All of the destruction was his fault and certainly not mine."

  Tuleam brushed his seaweed-like hair back. "That retches of Thorn's Church antics. Seems like you were right, Milena."

  Lucian raised an eyebrow in Milena's direction. "What did you find?"

  Milena opened her mouth to reply but a bestial roar interrupted her, shaking the earth and threatening their eardrums. It was a hundred times more powerful than the Count, strong enough to make everyone there shiver in dread. They looked toward the source of the noise.

  Milena and Lucian's faces turned white as they understood where it came from.

  The Retni's Plains.

  Where hundreds of thousands of corpses were lying around.