Episode 487
Yellin’s cold gaze pierced through Peter and Howard, whose bodies were paralyzed by poison.
The bloodline users and Draker’s knights behind them were desperately searching for an opening to move, but the sharp blades of the sorcerers at their throats kept them at bay.
Yellin turned to Howard and spoke.
“There’s always a rat like you wherever you go. Himmel, tell him how we deal with traitors in Ishtar.”
Himmel looked at Howard with disdain, as if he were a mere insect.
“We cut off their arms and legs, smear their bodies with honey, and throw them to the fire ants under the scorching sun.”
The fire ants had a mild venom, causing excruciating pain without delivering death. Ishtar never allowed traitors an easy end.
Yellin approached Howard, pressing Anexi’s dagger to his throat.
“I’m curious how Draker deals with traitors.”
Howard, trembling with fear, couldn’t even appreciate Yellin’s beauty as he frantically tried to think.
‘Who could have done this… Could it be Kali? Did she betray me?’
But he couldn’t reach a conclusion. Even for Kali, who had helped him defeat Zeke, his support was crucial to gain the council’s backing. There was no reason for her to use Ishtar against him.
Boom!
Another explosion echoed from outside.
Yellin gestured to Himmel, who pulled a small vial from her pocket and smashed it on the ground.
Hiss—
Purple smoke billowed out, and the bloodline users and Draker’s knights, already subdued, had no choice but to inhale it.
“Ugh!”
They staggered back, disoriented.
And then, from within the purple haze, something emerged.
A monstrous creature, unlike anything seen before, charged at them.
The bloodline users and knights, startled, swung their swords and unleashed their powers at the beast.
Boom—
A powerful aura blade flew towards the creature, severing its head and causing it to collapse in a pool of blood.
But soon, another monster appeared from behind.
The room was quickly filling with creatures.
“Die! Die!”
Draker’s knights and bloodline users swung their swords at the monsters surrounding them.
The room was a scene of utter chaos.
Under the influence of Ishtar’s hallucinogenic magic, the knights and bloodline users saw each other as monsters and fought with deadly intent.
“Aaargh!”
“Die! Die!”
Himmel quietly opened the door, allowing them to flee outside.
The knights and bloodline users, driven by the illusion of being chased by monsters, would undoubtedly throw the underground base into further disarray.
Peter and Howard, having been preemptively injected with an antidote, could only watch the carnage unfold, trembling in their paralysis.
Once the room was cleared of knights and bloodline users, Ishtar’s sorcerers moved to take the two men outside.
“Over there!”
At that moment, combat operatives from the Nostra family, tasked with guarding the underground base, rushed in to rescue their leader, Peter.
Boom!
They used their bloodline powers to crush Ishtar’s sorcerers and released fierce chimeras from their cages.
Roar!
The chimeras, grotesque creatures stitched together from various monster parts, charged at the sorcerers.
Yellin stepped forward, leaping into the air with Anexi’s dagger in hand.
Whoosh!
Riding the wind conjured by a spirit, Yellin infused her dagger with chakra and swiftly sliced through a chimera.
Slash—
The chimera split cleanly from head to toe, collapsing to the ground.
The Raven Squad members, moving with agility, scaled the walls and subdued the bloodline-powered combat operatives.
Just as Ishtar’s side seemed to gain the upper hand, the entire corridor was engulfed in flames.
Yellin shouted as the flames rushed towards them.
“Get down!”
She summoned an earth spirit, quickly erecting a wall of earth to shield them.
The sturdy wall blocked the flames, sparing Ishtar’s sorcerers, but the bloodline users and chimeras outside were reduced to ashes.
Rumble!
Yellin peered through the crumbling wall at the source of the flames.
‘That…’
The creature, wreathed in fire, had two horns and red skin. Yellin realized it was a demon, not human.
‘Has the Nostra family summoned demons too?’
She recalled Zeke mentioning that a group of dark sorcerers called Narak was summoning demons.
But now, facing the Nostra family, it was clear the creature before her was indeed a demon.
The fire-clad demon opened its mouth wide.
“Rrrr.”
Flames flickered within its maw once more.
Yellin steadied herself to raise another earth wall, but she wasn’t sure it could withstand the more intense flames.
She shouted to Himmel.
“Get them out of here while I hold it off!”
In Ishtar, a superior’s command was absolute.
Himmel gritted her teeth but nodded, quickly leading her subordinates towards the exit.
The demon unleashed another torrent of flames.
Boom!
Yellin erected an earth wall to block the fire.
Rumble!
The demon’s flames pushed hard against Yellin’s wall.
“Ugh!”
Yellin summoned a wind spirit to create a vacuum barrier.
But the demon’s fire ignored such defenses, bearing down on Yellin with fierce intensity.
She was on the verge of being engulfed by the flames.
Seeing Himmel’s squad disappear from view, Yellin clenched her teeth.
‘I have to retreat in one move.’
She needed to withdraw to a safe distance beyond the flames’ reach.
Yellin took a deep breath.
In an instant, the flames breached the wall, rushing towards her.
Whoosh—
Yellin quickly retreated, trying to escape the fire’s range.
But then, something unexpected happened.
The flames, having seeped into the ground, erupted behind her, closing in from both front and back.
The fiery maw gaped wide, ready to swallow Yellin whole.
“Ugh!”
Yellin twisted her body to evade, but the flames moved faster.
The inferno wrapped around Yellin.
Fwoosh!
Yellin shut her eyes tight, bracing for the demon’s fire to consume her. Yet, as moments passed, she felt nothing.
She opened her eyes to see a black-clad figure standing before her.
Zeke, wielding the holy sword Ascalon, was shielding her from the flames.
‘Lord Zeke?’
Whoosh!
Zeke manipulated the flames with his power, ensuring they didn’t touch Yellin.
Though the fire was potent enough to melt stone walls, it was ineffective against Zeke.
He gestured, bending the flames away, and spoke to Yellin.
“Rest for a moment, Lady Yellin. I’ll handle this.”
Leaving Yellin behind, Zeke advanced.
The demon unleashed another fierce blaze at Zeke.
Boom!
But Zeke raised his left hand, effortlessly blocking the demon’s fire once more.
It seemed as if the flames were being drawn into his hand.
Watching this, Zeke addressed the demon.
“You seem confident in your fire.”
Rumble!
Zeke’s hand unleashed a field of elemental sword fire.
A brilliant blue flame erupted from his body.
“Then let’s see how you handle this.”
Boom!
The blue flame surged from Zeke, devouring the demon’s fire as it raced forward.
Screech!
The demon roared, spewing fire, but it couldn’t stop the blue flame.
Soon, the demon’s limbs were engulfed in the azure blaze.
Sizzle—
The fire-resistant demon was burning.
Screams of agony and terror filled the air as the demon experienced the sensation of burning for the first time.
It struggled to escape, but it was futile.
Slash—
Zeke’s strike with Ascalon severed the demon’s legs.
Thud!
The demon fell, writhing in pain as the blue flames consumed it.
Zeke approached, pressing his foot on the demon’s neck, gazing down with icy eyes.
“Even the Nostra family is summoning demons now. Seems like everyone’s using them.”
He shone the light of the holy weapon on the demon.
Sizzle—
The demon’s skin bubbled under the holy light.
Then, something astonishing happened.
Crack!
The red demon’s skin began to crack and shatter.
‘What is this?’
Zeke felt something was off as he looked down at the writhing demon at his feet.
Real demons, when faced with the holy sword Ascalon or sacred relics, would suffer immense pain and then disintegrate into ash. But this demon was reacting differently.
Puzzled by the unfamiliar situation, Zeke turned to Arataso for answers.
“Is this thing really a demon?”
Arataso’s voice echoed in response.
“That is not a demon.”
“What? Not a demon?”
“Yes, it’s a human. It’s just possessed by a demon’s spirit.”
“A demon’s spirit possessing a human? Not summoned?”
Hearing this, Zeke was reminded once again that they were in the Nostra Family’s laboratory.
“Could they really have…?”
Zeke quickly tapped into the wisdom of the dragon to read the demon’s information.
In an instant, the relevant details flooded into his mind.
With this newfound knowledge, Zeke realized the true nature of the demon.
“These maniacs. They’re summoning mid-level demons using flame-blooded humans as vessels?”
It was a summoning method he’d never heard of before.
Typically, summoning demons involved drawing a summoning circle, offering a price, and allowing the demon’s spirit to materialize in the physical realm.
Thus, demons appearing in the physical realm were usually in a fixed spiritual form.
But the Nostra Family had devised a different method.
They injected a corrupted holy blood serum into humans with abilities similar to the demons they wanted to summon, enhancing their physical and bloodline powers, and then possessed them with a demon’s spirit.
This way, the spirit was demonic, but the body was human, bypassing karmic restrictions and allowing mid-level demons to manifest in the physical realm.
Demons possessing human bodies in the physical realm could absorb souls directly, growing stronger without karmic limitations, which was a significant advantage.
“Creating such abominations…”
The demon, engulfed in Zeke’s blue flames, soon turned to ash and scattered.
However, as the current situation showed, the downside of this summoning method was that the human vessel and the demon’s spirit became intertwined, meaning any attack on the vessel also severely impacted the demon’s core.
The demon struck by Zeke’s blue flames likely suffered near-total spiritual annihilation.
Zeke imagined the consequences if the Nostra Family’s research fell into the hands of Narak.
“Narak might use this method to summon high-level demons.”
Narak had already summoned the supreme demon Anastasia.
While Narak’s method required a hefty price for summoning powerful demons, the Nostra Family’s approach significantly reduced the cost.
“If they create an army of fully empowered mid-level demons…”
The central continent would surely crumble.
Feeling a chill run down his spine, Zeke resolved to destroy the laboratory completely.
He approached the fallen Yellin.
“Are you alright, Yellin?”
Yellin, who had watched Zeke effortlessly subdue the powerful demon, felt herself shrinking in comparison.
“If I want to stand beside Sir Zeke… I need to become stronger.”
In Ishtar, no one her age could match her.
Yellin had never known her limits.
But seeing Zeke in the world outside, she realized her arrogance.
“I’ll train harder so that next time, I can stand alongside Sir Zeke.”
Determined to grow stronger, Yellin nodded silently.
“Please, leave first, Yellin. I’ll bring this place down and follow.”
Yellin couldn’t bring herself to insist on staying.
With her current skills, she’d only be a hindrance to Zeke.
Reluctantly, she nodded.
“Be careful, Sir Zeke.”
Just as Yellin turned to leave, a thunderous crash echoed.
The corridor she was about to pass through collapsed, and something massive crashed into it.
Zeke was startled to see that it was a giant beast shaped like a turtle.
“Dol?”
Dol, one of the four mythical beasts and the pinnacle of magical creatures, lay defeated and barely alive.