Affinity: Chaos

Chapter 2150: Night Purge II

Grey felt a quiet wave of relief when he confirmed there were only two Peak Sovereigns present. With the Mayor and Elder Harrington holding those two in check, he, Reynolds, Void, and Elder Voss would be more than enough to deal with everyone at the Ninth stage and below. He also had the bunny leader’s army available, which could overwhelm the Necromancers through pure numbers if necessary, but he preferred to avoid widespread destruction inside the city.

The Mayor’s gaze locked onto the mid-thirties woman standing among the enemy ranks.

"Liora," he said, voice heavy with restrained anger and disappointment, "how could you do something like this?"

Liora scoffed, her expression twisted with long-held bitterness. "You left my husband to rot and still expected kindness from me?"

"I spared both his life and yours," the Mayor answered evenly. "Your husband broke the rules and was punished accordingly."

He had known she harbored resentment over the matter, but he had never imagined she would wait decades to exact revenge in this manner.

Liora snorted coldly, then turned an icy glare on Grey. "If not for this boy’s sudden arrival, I would have taken my revenge during the next siege. Since all of you are already here, then this will be your burial ground."

Grey did not spare her a glance. His attention remained on the two Gnomes standing near the center of the group. Both radiated only the aura of Seventh-stage Sovereigns. It made sense, stronger Gnomes would have found it far more difficult to sneak into the city undetected and remain hidden for so long.

Elder Voss’s eyes never left Liora’s face. A complicated mixture of disbelief and fury twisted her features. She could not accept that the person they had come to eliminate was someone she had once known and even trusted.

"Liora, you are a disgrace," Voss said, her voice trembling with sorrowful rage. "It seems you and your husband are cut from the same cloth. I will strip you of your cultivation and send you to spend the rest of your life in that pit alongside him."

Liora did not even flinch. The pain in Voss’s voice meant nothing to her. Any attachment she once felt toward the elder had died the day her husband was locked away fifty years ago. Her eyes remained cold and empty of regret.

Seeing that complete lack of reaction, Elder Voss’s body trembled. Her killing intent surged outward in a visible wave of heat. A sword of pure flame materialized in her hand, the air around it shimmering and distorting from the intense temperature. Sparks drifted from the blade and vanished before they touched the floor.

The Mayor sent a calm voice transmission to the group.

’I have already evacuated the surrounding area. You have no reason to hold back.’

When Grey first proposed the night attack, the Mayor had quietly ordered the nearby streets cleared while they waited for the two elders. The western district was one of the less populated parts of the city, and on the way here they had seen citizens and refugees being moved farther away under the cover of darkness.

Hearing that they no longer needed to restrain themselves, Elder Voss released a long breath that came out as a plume of steam. She locked eyes with Liora, the flames around her intensifying.

"You’re dead."

Her figure erupted into a brilliant column of red-orange flame and shot forward like a meteor, the heat of her passage causing the air itself to ripple.

Liora instinctively stepped back, eyes widening slightly. As an Eighth-stage Sovereign who was also very familiar with Elder Voss, she knew exactly how strong Elder Voss was when she fought seriously. She would not last more than a few exchanges in a direct confrontation.

One of the four Ninth-stage Necromancers moved to intercept without hesitation. He stepped in front of Liora, one palm placed behind his back and the other extended forward. A thick, reinforced earth wall surged up from the stone floor with a deep rumble, sealing off the incoming attack.

The collision shook the entire hall. A deafening boom echoed off the walls. Debris and fine dust rained from the ceiling as the impact reverberated through the ancient structure. Several of the weaker Necromancers staggered from the force.

The earth wall cracked in multiple places but held.

Elder Voss stood before it, her flaming sword buried only a few inches into the barrier. The heat pouring from the blade caused the surface of the wall to glow dull red. She stomped her foot hard against the floor. The flames surrounding her body roared higher, turning from red to a fierce, almost white-hot intensity. The sword in her hand suddenly expanded with a burst of blinding light, the blade thickening and lengthening as more fire poured into it. With a sharp, explosive sound the wall shattered outward in a spray of molten rock and dust.

The elongated flaming sword continued forward without pause, cleaving down toward both Liora and the Ninth-stage Necromancer in a single, overwhelming arc.

The Necromancer reacted instantly. Two massive hands of condensed earth formed in the air and clamped together around the descending sword like a vice. A violent shockwave exploded outward with the pair at its center, sending a wave of scorching heat and force across the hall. The temperature in the immediate area spiked sharply. The Necromancer coated himself in a thick layer of darkness essence to resist the burn, black energy writhing across his skin like living armor. Liora wrapped herself in a spiraling layer of wind that deflected the worst of the heat.

The earthen hands cracked under the relentless pressure of the flaming sword, fractures spreading rapidly across their surface. Moments later they crumbled completely, but the brief delay had been enough. Both Liora and the Necromancer managed to throw themselves clear of the sword’s path. The flaming blade slammed into the floor where they had stood, carving a deep, glowing furrow into the stone and sending another spray of molten fragments into the air.

While Elder Voss pressed the attack on Liora and her protector without giving them a moment to recover, the Mayor turned his head slightly toward Grey and Reynolds. His expression remained calm despite the chaos unfolding only meters away.

"You’re certain the two of you can handle the rest?"

"Yes," Grey answered with quiet, absolute confidence. "Just keep the Peak Sovereigns occupied. I’ll clear everyone below the Ninth stage shortly."

Elder Harrington studied Grey with open disapproval, arms folded across his chest. He had spent most of the recent years in deep seclusion under the lake, attempting to break through to the Half-God Plane, and had only recently heard scattered rumors of a Ninth-stage youth who had supposedly killed a Peak Sovereign. When the Mayor first contacted him about Necromancers inside the city and the involvement of this same young man, Harrington had half-suspected an attention-seeker looking to make a name for himself.

Now, standing inside the enemy headquarters and watching the young man’s calm demeanor amid the rising violence, he revised that opinion only slightly.

The young man was not an attention-seeker.

He was simply extremely arrogant.