The darkness imbued within the Harvester hurt the undead, but wasn't enough to kill him before he could call for reinforcements.

"Are you insane?" Senton retrieved Leria while Rena covered herself and picked the triplets between her arms. "Why did you let him do that? My mother and my father live here as well whereas there's only one of you!

"How do you plan to protect all of us?"

"All part of the plan." Reaper guffawed as he retrieved Abominus with Spirit Magic and healed his wounds. "What's a King without his court?"

He tapped the ground with the Harvester, opening several Warp Steps that let the Shyfs of his pack enter the house and hide in strategical spots.

"This is no longer their trap, but our own. Yet there is no safe place on the battlefield so we'll move your family to the woods." Another dimensional corridor opened, bringing the humans to the safety of Lifebringer's tribe that was waiting for them.

Reaper silently looked at the undead bursting from the windows and the doors of the house, uncaring to hide their presence anymore. The mission was all that mattered to them.

The king of the woods couldn't agree more with them. As long as he kept the undead unaware of Rena's escape, the enemy would split their forces and waste manpower in a fool's errand.

Only once everyone was in their place did the slaughter begin.

***

Lith sighed in relief seeing Rena's rune become available again, yet his good mood didn't last long. His last Warp Steps had failed and so did that he had attempted to open a bit farther from his home, forcing Lith to fly to his destination to not waste more mana.

'Those bastards sure did a thorough job. Even Dad's fields are covered by an array.' The realization made him turn into his hybrid form so that when air magic failed him, his wings kept him from crashing on the ground.

'Thank the gods you're here. I need you to pick me up!' Solus said through their mind link from the ground.

Lith swooped down and collected the inconspicuous stone that was Solus's disguise. Without air magic, she couldn't either use the amulet to communicate or fly to reach him.

The moment she slipped on his finger, Solus used their mind fusion to share with him all that she had learned from the tower's Mirror Hall while waiting for his arrival. The scenario she showed him went beyond his worst expectations.

He had thought that the assault had been Deirus's way to get even with Lith for ruining his plans in the Feymar mines, but a human Archmage had no way to recruit so many undead troops.

In the images Solus had collected before perceiving Lith's arrival, Zinya's home had crumbled and Selia's was seconds away from being razed. Only Lith's house was still standing, yet Yurial's Hexagram had already absorbed four powerful tier five spells, so its protection was as good as gone.

'Your family is safe thanks to the men of the Queen's corps taking refuge inside your house and keeping the undead from messing with its defensive arrays, but until we don't get rid of the air sealing formation, they can't call for reinforcements.' Solus said.

Lith nodded and took the black eye of Trouble the Balor out of his pocket dimension in a blaze of emerald flames. Unlike normal dimensional items, an omni pocket could ignore the effects of a dimensional sealing array, if its master knew how.

Lith started to weave a spell that he had hoped to never use while using Invigoration to recover the strength that he had lost after opening so many Warp Steps.

When he reached Lutia's outskirts, an appalling scene appeared in front of his eyes. Only a crater was left where once Zinya's house was and no life force could be perceived.

Selia's house was standing only thanks to Nalrond's Light Mastery, but judging from the enemies swarming around the place and the Rezar's dwindling strength, he didn't have much time left.

To make matters worse, a figure donned in black prevented him to move any further.

"This isn't how I pictured our first meeting, but it will have to do." Night said while flying thanks to the wings of her black crystal armor resembling her lost adamant equipment.

She had taken the body of a young girl barely past fifteen, about 1.65 meters (5'5") tall, with blonde hair and brown eyes. There was nothing remarkable in Night's host except the madness in her eyes and her feverish voice.

Lith ignored her ramblings and unleashed one of the Final Sunsets stored inside his tier five magic holding ring against the unknown madwoman. Night didn't even attempt to dodge the black flames that hit her with their full force and yet didn't left so much as a scratch on her body.

'Was that Domination?' Lith asked, realizing that he couldn't afford to underestimate his enemy, no matter how dire his family's situation was.

'No. She simply used her darkness magic to stop yours and resisted the flames. Beware, though, she used no spell, just Fusion Magic.' Solus had a hard time believing her own words and estimating the enemy's strength.

'Are you kidding me? This woman is weak ass!' Lith could see with Life Vision that his opponent had barely a yellow core and the prowess of a woman who had barely started training for a few months.

'Mana sense agrees with your estimates, but that's what happened nonetheless.' Solus said.

Lith tried to kill the woman with War, but she dodged his attacks with the minimum necessary movement. Night had the highest host turnover rate among her siblings, so she was used to fight using a weakling.

"I wanted you to see a bloodbath, maybe even a few heads on a pike. Yet this should work as well." Night giggled like a little girl talking to her first crush while she danced around the angry blade.

"After all, you can't get past me, and even if you somehow managed to do it, you would have me at your back and my army in front of you. Many have already died and more will fall if you keep struggling.

"Surrender and accept to become my host. If you do, I promise that your family will be saved and that I'll not hurt you during our first night. Much." Night's words and her black crystal armor allowed Lith to figure her identity.

"Are you the Black Night?" Lith stopped fighting only to give Solus the time to verify his suspicions.

"Nailed it in one, my dear husband." Night shapeshifted into her real body, discarding her host's appearance.

She now looked like a young woman in her mid-twenties, about 1.70 meters (5'7") tall, with ebony skin that seemed to devour all light and full lips that highlighted her sensual smile.

She had silver waist-long hair and round eyes without pupils that shone like moons. Her body was covered by a skin-tight black suit of crystal armor that left only her head exposed, yet she was no less charming than if she was wearing a cocktail dress.

'I have bad news and I have worse news.' Solus said. 'The bad news is that you were right. We're against Dawn's little sister and we both failed to sense her real powers because her host hid her.

'The worse news is that despite her host is way weaker than Acala, for some reason Night is even stronger than Dawn.'