All the miasma vibrated, and a feeling of deadly danger ran through Darian. At that moment, he was completely vulnerable and could die from a single move from that enemy.

Time wasn't on his side, so Darian had to take a lot of risks. If that figure was truly evil in its essence, it would attack immediately upon finding intruders. But if it was like Howlyn — who always acted at the bare minimum of what he was forced to do — then it would try to control its aggression as much as possible, giving Darian some chance of winning.

"Oh? You came pretty fast." a light, dry voice echoed.

Darian snorted, "Why wait if we can settle this now?"

"Quite confident, that's great. I hope it's not baseless, because now that you came, I can't let you leave." he replied calmly, then his red eyes pulsed with a terrifying ferocity.

Darian took a deep breath, understanding. The Celestial Shadow's orders were now dominating him, forcing him to kill. But... he hadn't moved yet, and that was enough.

"ATTACK!"

A shout and a wave of golden power flooded that small world. Enfield turned toward the entrance, where he saw a hundred thousand Spiritual Guardians with nine rings charging at full force.

They all arrived, and their senses locked onto the pair of red eyes in the middle of the miasma. All the mages' blessings were activated at the same time, creating a storm of aggressive energies that exploded forward.

**BOOOM!**

It was a truly apocalyptic attack. Even Darian, if he were the target, would suffer injuries that would force him to heal.

But... it only scattered the miasma in all directions, revealing a figure standing completely unharmed before them.

Rising dozens of meters into the sky, the Risen displayed a muscular, imposing body covered in golden and light-gray fur that seemed to shimmer with ethereal energy.

Its head, paws, and body were a disturbing fusion of a canine and a feline, creating a hybrid with a wild, majestic appearance. A pair of short, dense, feathered wings opened from its back, complemented by another pair connected directly to its front legs.

Aside from the red eyes radiating corruption, its body looked strangely pure; likely because corruption didn't have the power to taint the immortal body of a Primordial Beast.

All the Mannaz with Enfield's Bloodline felt their bodies tremble.

The blood in their veins seemed to resonate before that imposing, unsettling figure in the skies. Not even in their wildest dreams could they imagine they would one day be forced to fight the divinity they had worshiped since the moment they were born.

*Divine Dragon Possession*

In that second, a wave of draconic power erupted like a tsunami. In the skies, a radiant Dragoness roared, her shine eclipsing the world.

It was at that moment that Enfield's eyes changed. He turned toward Niara in the skies, staring at her, and a strange light appeared in his eyes — as if he had just encountered something he never expected to see in his entire life.

Darian instinctively felt something wrong. It was like that figure was noticing something he still didn't understand. But... just like everything he didn't know and still took the risk for, he couldn't waste time and had to push forward.

"GO!"

Niara attacked, her fists shooting like a meteor. At the same time, all the Tanks with nine rings moved, surrounding the Risen.

It was like watching an army of ants trying to fight a cat. Enfield's gaze shifted again, now taken over by violence and destruction.

His sharp claws moved like blades, and the simple gesture made space-time itself shatter as if it were fragile and without resistance.

That single move, if it hit them directly, could kill them all at once with no chance of escape.

But... Niara jumped in front of the strike without any fear.

A strange distortion appeared around her, and all the energies of the enemy's attack were pulled into her body as if it were inevitable. When the strike hit her...

...everyone expected a violent explosion, but the only thing they heard was a muffled sound and strange energy fluctuations.

Enfield's eyes widened, now in genuine surprise.

*Woooosh!*

At the same time, taking advantage of that instant, a wave of piercing winds swept through the battlefield at terrifying speed.

Darian smiled slightly as he saw Awel, Tir, and Eleri bringing his body safely to him.

Up to that point, the plan had flowed perfectly. It was completely impossible for that beast to guess that Niara had a blessing capable of fully absorbing his strike.

And it was in that critical moment of surprise that the three had to run, carrying the completely vulnerable body to Darian.

In a second, the eyes of his real body opened.

Darian snorted... and then the world lit up as if a multicolored star had appeared in the middle of the darkness.

"GWAAAAAAAA!"

A hoarse, frantic roar echoed. Niara, in berserker mode, shot forward without any rationality toward the still-surprised Enfield.

Those around her tensed. They already knew Niara could only block one strike and then would fight without that Cheat.

Enfield snapped out of the stupor; his wings beat, and countless spatial blades shot out like a rain of knives.

*CRACK! CRACK! CRACK!*

This time, terrifying cracking sounds echoed along with the smell of blood. Niara's scales were being completely destroyed as she was struck — but she roared like a mad beast, still trying to push forward toward him.

"STOP!"

In that instant, all the Tanks managed to get within a few meters of the target and pushed their blessings to the limit.

Enfield felt his body grow heavy and let out a snort. It was like he was wrapped in countless different chains: some simple, made of natural elements; others, strange energies; and others were like restrictions from the laws of the universe, forcing him to turn toward the Spiritual Guardian.

Blessings were pretty peculiar things, and even he was forced to pay attention to those Tanks. But… when he was forced to do that—

**BANG!!!**

A violent sound echoed as Niara struck him head-on. Enfield was caught off guard and thrown toward the ground.

"NOW!"

All the mages fired their attacks again with everything they had, creating a show of lights like missiles.

After intense, explosive sounds, the Fighters attacked with everything from all sides, like bolts of lightning.

It was an endless tide of offensive moves unleashed by people with nine rings, extremely experienced in battle.

Everyone who managed to reach this level had already participated in countless group fights in this universe or missions in other universes where they had to act as a single unit. Some might not be that impressive individually, but all were useful when focused on a single goal.

But...

Right after everyone attacked with everything they had, a wave of astral winds erupted, pushing them several steps back. Then, a beastly and imposing figure rose into the skies again, completely untouched.

Wounding an immortal Primordial Beast? That had to be a joke. What had just happened could only be counted as him slightly slipping and getting a bit of mud on himself.

"AAAAARH!"

Niara charged forward without a single thought besides attacking.

But this time, that Risen wasn't going to play around. His body pulsed, and an extreme corrupt power began to flow. Then—

"!"

A "ghost" appeared behind him. He turned abruptly, seeing Darian staring at him from less than five meters away, his body completely taken over by a white light.

"Take it easy."

He muttered and waved. His white power had already moved, making all of Enfield's corruption reverberate and recoil against his will.

**BANG!**

Niara attacked again at full force, with even more violence than before, slamming Enfield back into the ground.

"AGAIN!"

Camille roared, commanding.

All the mages and Fighters already had pills in their mouths, recovering their energies as fast as possible. But there was no time, and they attacked again in sequence with everything they had, even with only 70% of their strength left.

Darian quickly retreated using Chaos Blink.

Then he saw Niara standing still in the air, covered in blood, instinctively waiting for the allies' power fluctuations to stop so she could attack again.

'Those three flames she absorbed, along with the other benefits, boosted her a lot.' Darian thought, satisfied.

He had seen Niara use Berserker mode before, and for sure, if nothing had changed, she wouldn't even be able to cause a third of the damage she was doing now.

Sure, she absorbed the attack of a Primordial Beast, so now she had a lot more power to release; but before, it was like she was a small faucet releasing this power, and now she could pour it out ten times faster and explosively.

Darian took a deep breath as he watched the figure rise again, without a single injury.

With a step, he moved through space once more.

In that closed environment inside the inscription, and still covered in Miasma, it was much easier for Darian to use Chaos Blink at full power, without needing to put much effort into manipulating space.

When Enfield roared and tried to use his full power again… Darian used all his white power first, stopping the corruption from flowing outward.

Darian couldn't purify his corruption easily, but his white power was still its nemesis. He was basically burning everything he had stored to pull this off.

The idea came from Niara, when she remembered the first time she used Darian's White power to fight. Back then, the White Dragon Armor affected all the Risen's corruption, stopping them from releasing their powers outside their bodies.

Now that Darian was infinitely stronger and more experienced using it, he easily replicated the effect, burning through a lot of this power.

He had to get very close for it to work, and the creature could counterattack fiercely in response. But…

Niara didn't allow that and attacked with everything at the exact same moment.

**BOOOM!**

From afar, Camille felt her heart pounding out of rhythm. It wasn't just her; everyone participating in that fight felt their blood boiling. They were… actually beating down that Primordial Beast, not letting it retaliate.

Basically, after turning into a Risen, the Primordial Beast's raw power dropped almost 90%, replaced by corruption. But Darian was stopping him from using this corruption, forcing him to rely only on his natural body and power, which had been heavily weakened after being corrupted.

Even with that, he was still probably strong enough to kill a Spiritual Sovereign if they slipped even a little. But the synchronization and teamwork of everyone kept him from doing anything.

The nine-ring Tanks could keep his attention diverted; the Fighters and Mages were incredibly aggressive and didn't stop swallowing pills to recover and attack.

And Niara and Darian worked in perfect sync; even with her having no rationality, the two of them together became a Risen's worst nightmare.

The whole fight unfolded very fast, in just a few minutes. When the timer reached ten minutes…

'Master! They're ready!'

Tir's voice echoed in Darian's mind.

Off to the side, those three were positioned to protect the Heavenly Elemental Spirits. All 600 thousand were together, forming a single formation. Their eyes were closed, doing what they had learned their whole lives: praying to Heaven's Will.

Darian snorted and nodded. From his inventory, hundreds of power crystals came out. This was part of the stuff Tir found buried in the ground and collected. Darian had saved them for emergencies, since the power inside was very pure and could be useful.

But basically, they had only one use; if he failed, everything would be over.

Without time to hesitate, with a thought, the crystals shattered together, releasing pure elemental energy in all directions.

Darian controlled and concentrated all of it, at the same time sending a message to Camille so everyone could retreat in time.

Right then, Enfield rose from the crater in the ground, completely overtaken by fury. Until now, he hadn't suffered a single injury; he just couldn't fight back, constantly being slammed down.

But… this time… he felt a premonition chill and turned.

There, he saw a blade pulse and shoot toward him, as if it were capable of splitting gods and immortals in half like insects.

*Blinding Break*

Enfield roared. His whole body trembled, focusing entirely on defending against that thing in front of him, or he might actually get injured.

At the same time… all the Heavenly Elemental Spirits opened their eyes.

A power coming directly from the laws of the world appeared from the void, concentrating on that single figure.

**RUMBLE!!**

A terrifying sound, along with overwhelming distortions, spread in all directions.

Darian appeared at the edge of the place, holding Niara in his arms, completely drained of energy.

He stared at the center of the distortion, tense, as everything slowly stabilized.

After a few minutes…

"!"

He saw a beastly figure flap its wings slowly, then its gaze turned to Darian.

They were still red…

'Did we fail?'