The capital of the sorcerer's dynasty Sarion was built around a giant tree whose branches stretched all over the sky of the capital and its leaves blocked the light of the sun, and it would have cast a huge shadow if it weren't for the elves ingenious use of magic to illuminate the capital.

At the top of this tree, the royal palace was located where the current empress Elmesia resided along with her royal family. The other 12 royal families also resided at the top of this tree, but In different directions.

On this particular day, Elmesia was enjoying her evening tea while complaining to her servants "Damn it, that bastard actually became a demon lord, now it's going to become even harder to get back at him"

As she said this, the light suddenly dimmed, and it was very noticeable which made her squint her eyes and raise her head to the sky and she ended up seeing a terrifying scene.

A huge black cloud kept spreading over the capital and threatening to swallow it, and for some reason, it avoided the detection of their magic arrays and quickly spread before anyone could detect it…

"What's going on?" exclaimed Elmesia with a serious look on her face… However, no one could answer her.

This was the effect of Kayle's unique skill: engulf. It granted him the ability to engulf anything, including immaterial things such as his presence or his magic's presence which prevented it from getting detected…

And currently, he was reluctantly following Yuki's orders and he couldn't help but remember what Yuki told him before he sent him here and he shook his head helplessly 'Oy Kayle, Change your appearance and go kidnap Elmesia and grab me a few gifts along the way'

"My old bones can't handle this" muttered Kayle while walking among the guards that were rushing around in the royal palace startled by the dark smoke appearing in the sky yet no one seemed to notice his presence even when he reached Elmesia's royal chamber.

'This is quite easy' Thought Kayle before he stepped through the chamber but just as he did, one of the tiles on the floor sank in and many holes appeared on the walls and they started shooting all kinds of magic and weapons at him.

'This is? When did the elves start to use mechanical traps? This should have been the dwarf's specialty… and they are even using both physical and magical attacks for some reason' Kayle's eyes narrowed slightly and he felt like Elmesia seemed to be prepared for such an occasion, and he was correct.

This was actually a new room design which she spent a lot on by hiring the best craftsmen that Dwargon had to offer, all because of the recent auction house robbery...

They learned their lesson after Yurei robbed them dry, and after confirming that Yuki has an ability that allowed him to turn immaterial and phase through things, they finally put an end to their inflated egos that made them trust blindly in their magic mastery and decided to rely on other methods for detection, and sometimes, simple is better, just like in this case.

…

Kayle of course didn't mind this at all since he had many plans prepared just in case for this kind of situation, or any kind of situation literally as his centuries of experience as an assassin never went away despite him forgoing that ruthless lifestyle.

So, he calmly used his unique skill and engulfed every single attack aimed his way before he sent them back into all the formations and traps he detected in the room causing a huge mess around him…

Elmesia noticing this immediately used her unique skill instant cast and teleported her weaker servants away while she herself started attacking Kayle. However, not even one of her attacks was able to reach him

"Who are you?" She questioned with a frown while staring at the black fog that swallowed her magic greedily and the black silhouette hiding behind it.

However, she suddenly felt a chill coming from her back and a huge impact soon sent her flying across the room and smashing into many walls…

"Ohh, not bad, that's quite the clever way of using magic, I didn't expect you to cover your body in an invisible magic barrier and hide it by emitting your own magic recklessly as a distraction" Muttered Kayle while looking at his hand covered in darkness and an eerie aura that almost made it appear cursed…

Elmesia stood up from the rubble and the barrier surrounding her body slowly shattered as her frown deepened 'How did he appear behind me? I'm sure I've seen him behind that black fog just now'

'It seems like these old tricks still work' thought Kayle with a smile, he used a shadow clone to pretend that he was still hiding behind the black fog when in fact he engulfed his own presence and sneaked behind her to deliver a devasting attack of his called death touch…

"You will soon find yourself surrounded with nowhere to escape" Spoke Elmesia haughtily and created many defensive measures around her body as she thought 'I can't attack him, I don't know the capacity of that weird ability of his, but seeing how he can unleash the accumulated attacks against him, it can be terrifying'

"It seems like you are not as stupid as I was told" Spoke Kayle with his usual elegant smile, but it almost made Elmesia lose control of her magic as she yelled back at him "You are the stupid one"

Kayle shook his head at her and said "Do you really think my previous attack was just meant to destroy your magic barrier?"

The moment Kayle said this, Elmesia's expression shifted and she noticed a small dark spot that was slowly expanding on her back and it gave her an ominous feeling.

"This is… don't tell me… Are you the famous Black death!" Yelled Elmesia with a startled look on her face and Kayle felt his ego going off the roof as people still recognized him after all this time... although he ignored the fact that Elmesia was older than him..." Hohoho, I'm glad my name hasn't been forgotten yet"

Hearing Kayle not denying it, Elmesia quickly started casting all kinds of purification magic on her body to remove the dark spot in her back which after expanding for some time, it would explode along with its host…

At this point, many powerful figures rushed to the royal palace, most of them were at the calamity grade while some actually reached the disaster level! This was the power of the elves Dynasty…

"Save her highness!" yelled Erald and just as he did, countless magical projectiles including high-level magic such as nuclear magic rained on Kayle's body, but despite all of this, his elegant smile never faded, in fact, it widened even further as Elmesia yelled

"NOOO, Don't attack him" But the elves stopped too late as Kayle suddenly said "Thank you for making my job easier" Then, he raised his hand and a small vortex appeared on top of it, and the high-ranking elves present could feel the terrifying aura coming from it.

Elmesia quickly yelled at them "Use every possible barrier you can to defend!" She herself couldn't do anything as she was occupied by the dark spot on her back… However, Kayle wasn't nice enough to give them time to prepare and cruelly said "Goodbye, elf empress"

A terrifying destructive light came out of the dark vortex, it brought an ominous feel with it and it even distorted the very air it passed through. This was the accumulation of countless magic attacks concentrated all in a single beam, and Elmesia as well as everyone present instinctively realized that there was no chance she would survive this attack.

Some elves were quick enough to react, mainly those that were at disaster level and they created a barrier or two to protect Elmesia, but these hastily cast barriers weren't enough to block Kayle's destructive beam and it went through them like a hot knife going through butter.

'Is this the end?' Wondered Elmesia as the heat of the death ray reached her before the attack and she felt a sense of loss.

"YOUR HIGHNESS!" Yelled the elves, but no one could stop the outcome anymore… No one except a white-haired man that suddenly appeared in front of her, his green eyes stared directly at the death ray and the slight frown on his face added a charm to his appearance showing his seriousness in dealing with this situation.

'What is he going to do!' Was the thought on everyone's mind while Elmesia had a surprised look on her face as she thought 'What's this guy doing here? He's going to die if he doesn't dodge!', but the death ray kept getting closer to his body and he showed no reaction at all, but if someone was perceptive enough, they would have noticed the slight sweat falling down the side of his face as well as the weird grin on Kayle's face…

'That bastard, is he trying to kill me? Did I misspeak and said I want to be a dead hero instead of just a hero?' Wondered Yuki, but the grin on Kayle's face removed any of his doubts…

'Enjoy my little gift, Yuki-sama' Thought Kayle sadistically.

Meanwhile, seeing Yuki not reacting at all, some of the elves closed their eyes thinking that the outcome would be Yuki and Elmesia being removed from existence, and indeed, after opening their eyes, neither Yuki nor Elmesia were there and their worst fears had happened, or at least they thought…

….

Somewhere 10 kilometers away from the royal palace, a man with all of his clothes torn apart can be seen flying in the air and smashing through many hills and trees while covering a woman in his embrace.

That woman was also covered in a dark barrier that seemed to be on the verge of breaking but it apparently served its purpose as the woman inside it was completely unharmed….

After smashing into one final mountain and creating a 10 meters deep hole inside of it, the effect of Kayle's attack finally subsided. All of this took less than a second showing just how terrifying fast it was.

Meanwhile, Elmesia suddenly realized that she was still breathing and felt the warm embrace that she was laying in and her face instantly turned red like a tomato before she jumped away from Yuki only to end up hitting her head on the roof of the cave which made her wince in pain…

"Hey, can't you be at least a little bit gentle?" Said Yuki while standing up and holding his chest which had a red mark on it as if someone had just slapped him on it…

Elmesia was shocked 'He's actually still alive?' but then her eyes drifted downward and saw the mighty beast crouching silently in wait for its opportunity to rise and her head ended up overheating…