The Ancient Evil and the Storm Titan continued to remain inside the lightning field that was cast around them. Valerian was exerting both of his strength and power to keep his enemy from moving from there. He was doing this in order to buy time for the Phoenix Titan to recuperate and arrive at the battlefield to fight this dangerous enemy. Yet, several minutes went by, and Valerian continued to remain hovering there and using his magic to keep the Ancient Evil from escaping and reeking more havoc on the semi-destroyed Mardana Kingdom’s capital.

“What’s the matter?” The Ancient Evil asked the Storm Titan while still in a state of being unable to move his body. “You’ve been rather quiet for some time now.”

Valerian merrily looked at him and did not say anything in return. He was simply letting his expression do the talking, which his enemy understood and let out loud laughter as if he found it very funny.

“It’s hilarious to think that the one that gave me so much challenge… is you of all people!” His enemy complemented him with a smooth smile. “I really mean it! You were by far the toughest opponent I had come across that gave me this much trouble! You should feel proud.”

Once again, Valerian remained silent as he glared at him with great anger but kept his mind cool and relaxed. He knew that unnecessarily feeling emotions and exerting upon them could distract his concentration from his magic to keep his enemy from moving.

“And yet,” continued the Ancient Evil, and his smile became twisted as he went on saying, “but you wasted your last chance at life to try and stop me.” As Valerian did not change his expression, his enemy chuckled and said, “Alright then. I think I’ve entertained you long enough. Let’s get serious, shall we?”

With that, he suddenly began to exert an immeasurable amount of power and caused a wild blowing wind to blow in all directions even inside the lightning sphere that was being cast to stop his movement. The Storm Titan began to feel an unbelievable amount of pressure on him to keep his enemy from moving, causing him to tighten his arm muscles and grit his teeth tightly as he desperately kept his magic up.

This struggle lasted for a few seconds and as he began to sweat from the desperate struggle, he heard his enemy ask, “What’s the matter? I can feel you weakening! Come on! Put up more fight! Don’t disappoint me now after coming so far!”

“D-Damn!”

Valerian finally broke his silence as it became an upheaval struggle to keep his enemy from breaking free. His arms were going numb from how tight he was clenching his muscles and felt he might lose his teeth from how hard he was gritting them together. The air around him was shaking violently as the enemy’s power was beginning to overwhelm him despite his valiant struggle.

“Why are you fighting me so desperately?” The Ancient Evil asked curiously. “I mean, your hero is dead! The Phoenix Titan is no more, and your allies are wasted… leaving only you to fight me… all… alone… and yet you keep up the fight! Why? Why go so far? Why not surrender and make it easer on yourself? I promise I’ll make your death as least painful as possible if it’s the pain you’re worried about.”

Valerian glared fiercely at him and spoke in a determined voice, “You… have no idea… what kind of hope… I have! I… am not… a dreamer…! I… am the Storm Titan, part of the Nine Pillars of Powers bestowed upon me by the great Phoenix Titan, and I’m not about to disappoint him! Never!”

As he finished his statement, the two warriors suddenly sensed the activation of a magic from somewhere nearby and a few seconds later, they sensed something else that caused a change in each of their expressions that reflect on how they were feeling. Valerian began to smile with happiness while the Ancient Evil suddenly looked like he was scared.

“He came…! He finally came!” Valerian shouted triumphantly and grinned at his scared enemy.

Several meters away from where they were, a portal opened and the person that came out of it was none other than the Phoenix Titan, Lakshman Chand. He stepped onto the broken ground and as the portal closed behind him, he began to glance around at the destruction caused to the Mardana Kingdom’s Capital.

“What a mess this is,” he remarked unhappily.

At that moment, he began to sense the power levels of the people around him and sensed that many of them were in danger and needed to be evacuated. So, he activated his Thousand Army spell and sent his multiple copies to rescue each of them from their whatever predicament they were facing. At the same time, he also started sensing the current condition of his friends and possible enemies.

“On no!” He exclaimed, suddenly sensing the weakening levels of Lagron and Dominic. “Lagron and Dom are in trouble! Hang on guys!”

Without further ado, he surged with power and flew off to where his friends were at. While flying, he also sensed that Nara was badly injured while Valerian was putting up a desperate struggle against the Ancient Evil. He gritted his teeth and powered up even more to increase his speed dramatically.

At the same time, the Ancient Evil forcefully turned to the side and sensed a great power level was heading towards them and knew instantly whom it belonged to. He turned towards Valerian and looked extremely angry.

“You…! All of you tricked me!” He snarled with the utmost fury emitting in his voice.

The Storm Titan let out a cold laughter and replied, “Serves you right!”

“Dammit! I’m not ready!” The Ancient Evil complained. He immediately turned to where the monster girl was standing motionless and shouted, “Servant! Break this field!”

With his orders given, the monster girl surged with power before kicking off the ground and flew straight towards them. Upon arriving, she let out a loud roar and punched the field with all her might. In an instant, the two warriors shook from the impact of her attack before the field was destroyed into pieces from being weakened from the Ancient Evil’s pressure, which freed both warriors simultaneously.

“Damn!” Valerian shouted at the sudden destruction of his lightning field.

He aimed both of his to attack him when his enemy shouted, “Not a chance!”

The Ancient Evil raised one hand and swept it in an arc in his direction, unleashing a dark slighting wave that smashed into the Storm Titan and blasted him straight to the ground. As he crashed, the Ancient Evil turned back to his servant, who was looking at him with eyes void of life and smiled.

“You’ve served me well, servant, but I must get back what is mine.”

With that, he placed a hand on the monster girl’s forehead and said, “Return.”

In an instant, a great dark energy began to radiate from the servant, and she began to let out a gut-wrenching scream as the dark energy began to flow out of her and into his arm as he absorbed it. This lasted for a few seconds before the dark energy stopped flowing out, and the girl hung limply where he held her with his hand. At the same time, Lakshman arrived at the scene and wore a look of disgust on his face by what he saw.

“Damn you!” The Phoenix Titan cursed at him angrily. “What have you done?!”

“Oh. Nothing. Just taking back what’s mine,” replied his enemy pleasantly and tossed the limp girl aside.

Initially shocked, Lakshman quickly dived after her and caught her in his arms before gently landing on the ground. He was saddened to see that all form of energy had left the girl except for the life she was desperately clinging onto. Feeling saddened, he used Restoration spell on her and returned her to a normal condition. However, he was momentarily perplexed when he thought he found her face to be somewhat familiar.

“Where have I seen her before?” He momentarily wondered.

Getting no answers and there being no time, he laid her gently on the ground and soared back up to face his greatest enemy. From the ground, the innocent people, Mardana Kingdom’s King, and the few members of the Nine Pillars of Power saw them and felt a mix of emotions consisting of fear and hope.

Lagron, upon seeing his rival and friend arrive, coughed and complained, “Damn…! Took him long enough…!”

“He made it…! Phew…!” Dominic breathed a sigh of relief when he saw his friend hovering there facing their enemy.

“Man, am I glad to see him!” Nara remarked happily at the relief of seeing their strongest ally arrive at the scene.

Valerian looked at them and smiled, but he still looked troubled as he muttered, “I wish… I could’ve done more…!”

From aside, Athurus, the Mardana Kingdom’s King was looking up at the Phoenix Titan with an alarmed look on his face.

“He’s… alive…!” Athurus said, staring up at the Phoenix Titan with a scared look. “How…? How in the… world?! He… should’ve died from that attack!”

“Huh?” Dominic asked, turning to him as he overheard what the king was saying. “What’re you saying, Athurus? Don’t tell me… you were a part of this!”

As Athurus looked at him with a scared look, someone else approached from behind with a sinister smile on their face.

At that time, Lakshman and the Ancient Evil continued to stare at each other with total silence surrounding them. Lakshman was looking serious while his enemy was looking smug and confident, a stark contrast to the sudden fear he displayed not too long ago when the Phoenix Titan stepped through the portal in the capital.

“It’s been a very long time, hasn’t it?” The Ancient Evil asked him calmly.

“It certainly has,” replied Lakshman coldly. He looked at his enemy up and down and remarked, “Seems like you’re back to your old habits of stealing bodies.”

This made his enemy to chuckle and respond with, “I was a just a mass of energy that never possessed an actual body, which was part of the reason why I was defeated. If I had a body to call my own, I know I can deal with, and you wouldn’t be able to defeat me like last time.”

Lakshman glared at him and asked, “What about the ones you possessed in the past? That Angel King for instance?”

“Oh. Those were simply because ones that I possessed out of boredom while I waited for my body to be readied,” replied the Ancient Evil with a smirk and as the Phoenix Titan looked surprised, his enemy elaborated.

“You see, I woke up a long time ago, around the time when the Phoenix Titan disappeared after bringing whatever peace it was to this wretched world. But I was not satisfied by just waking up; I swore that I will not be defeated by you a second time! So, I did whatever I could to obtain a body and gather likeminded allies that had a grudge against you!”

“The demons?”

“Ha! The demons?! You’ve got to be kidding me! They are an inferior race with less than acceptable intellect to the humans. They would’ve been useless to make me stronger against you, and I knew your reincarnation would be so much greater of a challenge than you were the last time we fought.

No. My allies were humans. More specifically, they were the ones that you had destroyed in the past. A clan that threatened the balance of the world that you were conquering all because they possessed technology that way ahead of their time.”

Then the Ancient Evil looked sinisterly at him and asked, “Now then, can you take a guess to whom I’m referring to?”

As the ancient enemy finished with an ominous question, Lakshman’s eyes slowly widened in horror as he put the pieces together of who the clan was. At the same time, Asura also realised who the enemy was, and two of them simultaneously uttered, in a quiet voice, the name of the clan that the Phoenix Titan destroyed in the ancient times.

“The Workshop Clan…!”

“The Workshop Clan…!”