[Before the attack on Fort Caca]

"My bishop. The remnants of Deco Parade decided to take refuge at Fort Caca," said a woman in white cleric clothing.

"Hah! How ironic." Bishop Kelen licked her lips.

"My bishop. Is it wise to not inform the other high-ranking members? Additional assistant wouldn't-"

Before the female cleric can finish, she was slapped across the face!

"This is once of a chance in a lifetime!" The bishop yelled at the cleric.

The holy pope was on his last leg, age was consuming him. There will be a lot of individuals seeking to be the next pope, only the current one had the ability to bestow the title to another. Everyone in the the upper echelon competed, they tried to contribute as much as possible to shine in their pope's eyes. Even if everyone was a loyal follower to the same diety, authority had its perks.

Then Deco Parade became this world's threat. Destroying them and better yet, capturing or killing the summoner of these creatures, will be the greatest achievement.

Bishop Kelen got her hands dirty and does grunt work to stay ahead of the pack. Others had their minions and apprentices do all the hard work. Living in the holy city was a life of comfort and ease that many people became complacent. But not her.

Through her thorough investigation of the origins of Deco Parade. Deco Parade made its first huge wave at Fort Caca, then follow their trails back to Asul. After detaining and interrogating refugees of the capture of Asul, there was one demon with distinctive features that leads to the the capital of Chesire Kingdom. Then the fall of the captial came afterwards, how can it not be a coincidence?

Kelen pleaded her case to the pope that she had a lead on the person who created Deco Parade. After much convincing, the pope granted her the authority to command the Holy Knights. The Holy Knights were powerful creations gifted by their Life Goddess, except the knights' strength correlates with the amount of mana stones they absorbed. They needed to consume mana stones continously to be functionally.

Kelen's next course of action was to head to Eluvia with her knights while fighting Deco Parade as she goes along. Nation after nation was falling, Eluvia became a crucial ally.

Kelen had met the missing Princess Elen and Princess Kirin and Deco Parade happened to be on the scene. After questioning the both of them, the pieces were falling into place. The king gifted mana stones for her knights, which allowed to eliminate the threat on the southern fort swiftly.

Mana stones were an expensive resource that the Life Church were willing to pay for their Holy Knights. Unfortunately, the knights caused a halt in operation and closure of the mines because they attacked the demon slaves. The attack caused cave-ins, destruction of equipments, and lost of labor force.

Currently, Bishop Kelen was biting her nails on the low supply of mana stones right now. The enemy was right in front of her! She brought her own personal followers, hired mercenaries and adventurers, and the Empire's soldiers. She spared no expense and used her connections to obtained outside help. She will not involved other members of the church into this!

"Have the strongest Holy Knights to attack the fort! The weaker knights surround the fort! Celine, when will the new supply of mana stones will be coming!" Kelen yelled out orders to everyone.

The cleric, Celine, replied: " We had our men to search through the ruins of the cpaital of Runis State. We had found a hidden vault of mana stones. They should be arriving today!"

"Get someone to tell them to hurry up! We can't lose them!"

The battle at Fort Caca was chaotic.

The knights surrounded Fort Caca and some of them were already inside. Kei's minions were being defeated by the knights with little effort.

Kipa used his golden ax and swung down on a knight.

The knight blocked it with his two-handed sword. Kipa kept swinging the ax down on that one knight that it was being pressed into the ground.

"Why. You. No. DIE!" Yelled Kipa. Kipa continued to swing and the knight's arms was starting to crack because the enormous strength from Kipa was giving. Once he saw those cracks, he kept slamming with his ax! The crack became bigger and bigger until the knight's arms crumbled! Once the arms are gone, Kipa's last swing smashed the knight's head.

Kipa was huffing and puffing like he was just finished at the gym. "See. Me can... *panting* ... do it."

Kipa's back was exposed and another knight tried to slash Kipa's back, but Talwar blocked it.

"Never leave your back expose!" Talwar yelled.

Johanna sat on her magic staff, floating in the air watching Kipa's battle below. She levitated the knight that Talwar was fighting into the sky and shot a ball of purple energy at the knight and a loud explosion happened!

Johanna then shouted at Kipa: "You big buffon! Never fight alone!"

Another knight super jumped high in sky and swung his sword at Johanna. She grasped and watched as the knight was slowing swinging his sword and Johanna tried to point her wooden wand at the leaping knight.

Before the knight can hit Johanna, a shining arrow striked at the knight and knocked it to the ground.

Johanna turned her head to see when that arrow came from, it was from Bow. Bow gave a thumbs up and quickly fired other arrows at other knights.

Johanna flew down next to Bow and commented: "Hey, do you think these knights are a little... I don't know, weaker than before?"

Bow nodded his head. "Easier to penetrate through. But our numbers are still dwindling."

Then in the midst of battle, something came from the sky and landed outside of the fort. They were stone golems!They were at least 10 of them in various colors and they began smashing the knights.

After the stone golems descended, women in silver armour with wings and wings on their helmets, came out of no where began attacking the other knights in the fort.

Talwar screamed out, "Valkyrie!"

"Reinforcement! But... Ah." Johanna was surprised by the new helping hands but she clearly knew who can summoned these beings out of thin air.

There was one person still in the air, standing still. Johanna flew towards this person and lowered her head and said: "My Lordship. Thank you for your assistant."

Bishop Kelen was screaming at the top of her lungs. The summoner had showed up, BUT the Holy Knights were being demolished. One of the golem looked like it was made of diamonds.

The men she hired and brought along were shaking. Before anyone had second thoughts of turning and running, the cleric girl ran towards Kelen. "The mana stones have arrived!"

"Good, get one knight and let it absorbed all of it!"

"Why one? There are a few hundreds that needed the most!"

Kelen took hold of both of the cleric's shoulders and shouted at her: "They will not be strong to face that summoner!" Kelen pointed at Kei in the sky. "Make one knight to kill him! Once he's gone, Deco Parade will be gone as well!"

One of the knights came in front of carts upon carts of mana stones. This knight absorbed every single one of them, the more it took, the shinier its armours became. Afterward, white wings grew from its back and grew taller by a few feet!

Then it froze on the spot.

The cleric became very nervous and said: "Is it... broken?"

The knight suddenly flapped its wings and caused a huge burst of wind. It flew towards Kei's direction!

Kei was staring down at the fort. The battle was in Deco Parade's favor. He didn't understand why they were weaker now than the ones he faced before.

Kei raised his voice to let all his subordinates to hear. "Once you're done with the knights!" Kei pointed at a group of people in the distance. It was Bishop Kelen's mashup army. "Go and kill them!" All of his subordinated gave a war cry and the fighting intensified.

After that, Kei decided to laid back. But suddenly, he was tackled straight towards the ground, away from the fort!

A crater was formed upon impact! Kei laid on the ground and saw it was knight, except it had wings, bigger, and brighter. The knight still held Kei unto the ground and lifted its sword, ready to strike!

Before it swung down its sword, Kei turned into a shadow and escaped the knight's grip. He turned back to his usual self next to the knight and punched the knight's head. With a 'boom,' the knight flew before using its wings to get back on its feet.

The knight once again flew towards Kei. There were no words to say, one of them was gonna die. Kei cast all sorts of buffs onto himself. The knights nullified any debuffs and relied on its strength, defense, and magic resistance.

Kei cast two swords, one of blue fire and the other ice. Both Kei and the knight swung at each other. Kei was nimble to dodged the knight's attacks but the Knight's defense and magic resistance were high. Only marks and small dents appeared on the knight's armour.

Kei cast another spell to bind the knight with vines from the ground and it dropped its sword. Since his elemental swords had no effects, he just straight up used his bare fists and pummeled the knight. "Kakakakakakakkakakaka!" The ground shook with every strike.

The dents on the armour were getting deeper, but the knights slipped its hand through the vines and punched the side Kei's head! Kei flew several meters away!

The knight struggled and finally broken free from the vines. Kei was abled to regain his focus and saw the knight was again flying towards him.

Kei took to the sky and was readied for another collision. Clouds started to appear and swirled above Kei. Kei raised both of his hands towards the clouds and purple lightning striked his hands. But it didn't injured him! No, he was forming and playing the lightning in his hands.

"Okay motherfucker!"

As the knight grew closer, Kei moved his arms towards the knight and purple lightning shot out from his hands. As the lightning was about to hit, the knight raised its sword, and the lightning striked the sword. Once the sword was struck, the knight tossed the sword away. The sword was used as a conduit and attracted the lightning instead of the knight.

"Fuck!" Lightning failed and the clouds slowly dispersed. The knight and Kei began exchanging fists. Bruises were appearing on his body with each exchanged. Kei quickly flew behind the knight and grabbed one of its wings, and began twisting and pulling it.

The knight was losing control and began falling. Kei used all of his strength to tore its wing apart from its body!

The knight and Kei crashed into the ground! The knight may not be abled to fly but it didn't stop moving! The knight quickly got up and grabbed both of Kei's horns! It was pulling both of Kei's horns apart, it felt like it was splitting his skull!

"Ahhhh!!!"

Kei blasted the knight with various magic that was more destructive than the last. The knight couldn't handle the barraged of magic, so it loosen its gripped on Kei's horns. Kei kicked the knight away and began flying higher in the sky.

Then suddenly, Kei started to feel pain in his chest and coughing out blood! This led him to fell into the ground!

Damn it! I used too much different elements on the knight!

Kei was on the ground on his hands and knees. He stared at the knight as it was dragging itself closer. The knight didn't look better than he was and began to slowly looked like a regular knight. He then stared at the fort, the fighting stopped. But he saw the valkyries and witches flying around at another battle further away.

Kei was tired and there was ringing in his ears. He drained a lot of mana from using his spells and cast a minor healing spell. Not saving mana for a good healing spell wasn't thought through. He didn't want to uncall his summoned beings in their own midst of battle to return his mana. He can just used his brute strength to finished this. A few feet away, he saw a sword sticking out.

Kei began crawling his way towards the sword. The knight was getting closer to him.

Once Kei reached the sword, he pulled himself up and his legs were unsteady. He gripped the handle and pulled the sword out of the ground. He turned towards the knight and it was only a few feet away.

Kei used all his strength to lift the sword over his head. The knight only had one thing in its mind, kill the demon. Once the knight was close, Kei swung down the sword onto its head! The impact was loud caused a huge dent.

Kei let go of the sword and went down on his knees. The knight stood still. Then it slowly fell to one side and dropped to the ground.

Kei let out a soft chuckle before coughing more blood. His vision was blurred and began having a migraine.

He felt his limbs were getting weaker and suddenly felt colder.

Kei's eyelids grew heavy. Sleep. I love sleep.

Then Kei also fell on the ground.