The lightning left barak’s eyes, yet he still wore that evil grin on his face as he approached Aster and Levant, who stood there in shock, Polaris got up off of the ground, brushing the dust from the impact off of him, yumi was now sitting on a branch in a nearby tree,

“A whole three months and y’all still ain’t caught up to me, then again i was always the strongest, ain’t that right aster”, barak proclaimed, as he now stood directly in front of aster,

Aster caught his breath, composing himself, he stood up straight, folding his hands into fists, taking a step forward, coming face to face with barak,

“we don’t have time for this we got a prepare to leave now that all of us are here”, Aster said calmly, after that aster walked back into the house, without saying a word,

yumi jumped out of the tree, landing next to barak,

“well its great to see after so long, barak”, yumi said,

barak looked at her, smiled and walked towards the house,

as he walked away yumi stood there observing him, he was wearing a black t-shirt, that seemed to fit very close to his body and green cargo pants that were tucked into his boots at the bottom, but what she found interesting is that he looked more muscular since the last time she saw him, and his divine energy seemed more refined, she also noticed that the end of the locs of his hair were starting to turn a very light blue, almost white, she smiled to herself, realizing that he was even stronger than she anticipated,

she sighed to herself,’ he’s not wrong, but those three aren’t as far off as he thinks, especially Aster and Levant’, she had thought to herself,

in the house

barak stood in front of the fridge with the door open rummaging through it looking for something to eat, yumi sat on the counter swinging her feet back and forth slightly humming at the thought of getting something to eat, Polaris and Levant sat on the bar stools that were placed at the counter, Polaris had his head on the counter, he wore a defeated expression on his face because of his training from earlier,

“For fucks sake pol, how long are you gonna look sad because you couldn’t beat her”, Levant complained as he looked at Polaris very annoyed,

“and what are so happy about half pint”, Levant shouted at yumi,

“well for the whole time we been at the hideout training you been saying how delicious barak’s cooking is and i love food so I’m excited to finally try it out”, yumi answered with a very hyper tone,

“by the way”, yumi said, her tone switching to a more serious one,

“do not, I repeat do not, use that technique I taught you guys that reckless ever again, I’ve told you all this already, but that could end up crippling you or worse, killing you”, yumi said,

“well how else are we suppose to beat you, three months down the drain and we couldn’t even properly defeat, and that smug asshole is stronger than you”, Levant said,

“ohh, lev have some faith in yourself, plus with barak back, the overall fire power of the four of you is way above what it was three months ago”, yumi said,

barak was now standing at the stove with a variety of ingredients on the counter top next to it along with some knives and a cutting board,

As barak prepared food, yumi started to explain how things would progress from here on out,

“ A few days ago, I left the island for a bit, and went out to meet one of the rebell soldiers that specialize in communications, I managed to get through to the base and get the location for the new base, not only that, it seems aluric has been busy, and has become a bit stronger since last time, from what I heard he….”, yumi stopped,

“wait shouldnt aster be here to hear this also”, levant pointed out,

“nah I’ll tell him later, let him mope in peace”, she said casually brushing it off,

“anyways, the day after tomorrow we’ll be heading to the shadow continent, and first order of business when we get there is to get to the main rebel army”, yumi said,

“okay, but how do we get to the shadow continent in the first place”, polaris asked yumi,

“let me finish explaining, we’ll have to get there by boat, luckily i was able to get one”, yumi said jumping off of the counter,

she took out a piece of folded paper from in her pocket, she unfolded the paper which turned out to be a map of the shadow continent,

“this is where we will enter the continent from”, she said as she pointed to a place on the map, which was labelled as Mars village,

“its a small village that’s allied with us, we’ll get any other supplies we need from there and then head to the main army yumi explained on,

“That’s all fine and good but how long will that take”, levant asked,

“hmm...at a normal pace should take us about three days to get there, two if we don’t rest as long” yumi answered,

“Anyways the main army is at an abandoned military stronghold just on the outskirts of the Dracht kingdom, unfortunately for us the guild”s headquarters are in Dracht kingdom and the kingdom and the guild are allies, actually many of the citizens in the kingdom are part of the guild, and its through the financial backing of the current king that the guild was able to takeover parts of the continent”, yumi told the boys,

Barak turned around and put three plates of food on the counter,

“hmm....how many other kingdoms are there besides the one thats backing the guild ?”, barak asked,

yumi quickly gulped her first set of food from her fork,” two others, Bolterra, the biggest kingdom on the continent, which has been partially taken over and Argon it’s about the same size as Dracht but less, powerful and it was completely taken over by the guild, well that’s the case when i left we have no idea what we are walking into when we get there”, yumi quickly turned her attention back to her food,

“well if that’s how it is I’m guessing the kingdom is trying to take over the others by means of the guild, so as to keep their name out of it”, barak guessed,

“this is bound to become a clusterfuck sooner or later”, Polaris stated,

“it’s already one” yumi said,

“that’s what I was trying to say earlier, Aluric was reported to wipe out an entire battalion of bolterra troops by himself, leaving countless dead, we had a rebel commander, Keagan wiv, going to assist them, since he is also bolterran, and last they heard, aluric was advancing on the castle by the time Keagan got there”, yumi said,

“so by the time we get there, both kingdoms may have already fallen”, barak said,

“yup”, yumi said,

“wait so if both kingdoms have fallen by the time we get there, if shit hits the wall”, levant said,

“we have no where to run”, yumi said,

While the others were inside talking Aster was outside on the deck at the back of the house,

Aster leaned back on the wooden railing that surrounded the deck, he looked up at the starry sky, the stars were scattered across the sky as if someone had thrown glitter on the sky and it stuck perfectly,

he was deep in thought, he raised his hand in front of his face and stared at it,

‘why’, he thought, ‘why was barak so much stronger than before’, Aster had felt himself grow stronger, he could feel that his power had increased, so why did it seem as though barak had widened the gap in their power even more,

“it’s because you admire him”, a voice said,

Aster jumped out of his thoughts, looking around, there next to him sat a man, he wore a black eyepatch with a golden symbol for the goddess junorra on it, he wore no shirt and a brown baggy pants decorated with red symbols on it that stopped below his knee and white bandages running down to his ankles, his skin was dark bearing a striking resemblance to mud, and his hair was dreadlocked and stopped at his shoulders, his eyes were yellow,

aster stood there lost as to why this strange man appeared next to him,

“so who or what are you ?”, aster asked,

‘well i won’t tell you that now but you can call me ash”, he answered,

Aster’s eyes opened, it felt as though he was awash in divine energy, but it felt strangely familiar, as if he were being gently hugged by the earth itself, Aster could tell whatever stood before wasn’t human, and was extremely powerful, this worried him so he began to summon his war hammer,

“you don’t need to worry I’m certainly not your enemy, in fact me and a couple others have been keeping a close eye on you and your friends”, ash told aster,

“i only showed myself on a whim, but think on what i said, he only seems so monstrously strong because you admire him and devalue yourself”, ash explained to aster,

“anyways I’m leaving now” ash said, as he disappeared in a soft golden light,

aster stood there confused as the whole experience felt as though it were something he was daydreaming,

“what the hell are you standing there spaced out for the food is finished”, barak shouted at aster, as aster snapped out of it, he walked off inside, thinking on what just happened

The Bolterra capitol, Blackdawn Palace

Aluric looked on in front of him, night had fallen, the flames raged all around him, as he walked through the blood soaked city that was now up in flames, he paused looking on at the person that stood infront of him, his arms out stretched, as he placed his body in between, aluric, and the six children who stood behind him,

His body, was beaten, his ribs were broken, along with his left arm, his left eye was basically gone at this point, as he had lost vision in it hours ago, not to mention, the gaping hole in his right leg,

“Keagan, Keagan, Keagan, look around you, your beloved home, is in flames, protecting those six children is a futile waste of your life”, Aluric said,

“just give up, run back to the rebel headquarters, rest up, and surrender with the rest of them, while your life is intact, not that you have much of it left anyways”, aluric said,

“like hell I will”, Keagan shouted, he looked back at the kids behind,

“run while you can, my friends are soon here, when they get here everything will be better”, Keagan said, rustling his bloody hand through on the kids hair, as he pushed them off in the opposite direction,

“sigh, so you’ve choosen death”, aluric said,

“if I’m dying here I might as well take you out with me”, Keagan said, mashing his two Iron guantlets together, a loud humming sound could be heard, as a light purple energy built up around him,

“ eat this, PSIONIC PULSE”, Keagan shouted, punching forward, as a large beam of purple energy shot out directly towards Aluric,

A quick shadowy figure, landed in front of aluric, cutting the attack in half,

“thanks pix, but I had it taken care of”, Aluric said,

“regardless, I have my job to do”, Pix said,

“true, but don’t interfere anymore than you have to”, aluric said,

“aluric you coward, unable to face me head on so you called for one of your lackeys, I always knew you were spinele…..”

Keagan found himself flying through the air, he felt the last bit of energy leave his body, as he began to fall to the ground, aluric jumped into the air over keagan’s body, riding it to the ground with his foot on keagan’s face, and with a loud thunderous crash, they plummeted, landing next to the group of fleeing children Keagan was protecting before,

Aluric emerged, his face, covered in streaks of blood, and around him bathed in fire, as he looked on at the children, he took off one of keagan’s guantlets,

“trust me children, I bear no satisfaction in doing this”, aluric said,

A light glistened off in the distance, as a spear came flying towards aluric landing at his feet, soon after pix came running up to aluric,

“their reinforcements have arrived, and are pushing back our men, lets retreat for now, we’ve already taken out one of their commanders, we can’t take anymore losses”, pix said,

Aluric let out a small sigh,”I guess you’re right, sound the retreat, let’s go home”, aluric said,