Leo's silver eyes tracked the invisible currents in the air long before anyone else could sense them.
Staring up at the sky, Leo muttered, "It's finally here, took it long enough."
The others gathered around him—Ryder with his newly forged alliance with Dwang Sung, Brok with his long frown of concern, and Mara standing scarily near Ryder.
"What's here?" Mara inquired.
Leo extended a slender finger toward the seemingly empty sky. "The thick gamma energy I spoke about, spreading out from a distance. It's here."
To Leo alone, the air rippled with waves of purple energy, silent in its approach—a flow of power invisible to regular eyes.
The gamma energy expanded in waves that should have raced across the sky like wildfire, yet it moved with an unnatural sluggishness that made Leo's skin crawl.
Brok stepped forward, squinting upward. "I don't see anything."
"You will," Leo assured him. "Soon enough."
Being the possessor of the silver gaze, one who could see beyond the ordinary human senses, only he understood the true implication of the impending disaster.
The gamma energy was too thick to travel as quick ripples, and that was right, but again, what the hell was going on?
As the others continued to stare at the clear blue sky, Leo's mind raced through possibilities. Such dense gamma energy could manifest only under a few circumstances: either the summoning of an extraordinarily powerful familiar that is stronger than even Luxy—or the simultaneous summoning of a horde of red-marked beasts.
Neither option sounded good for the village.
"Care to explain what we're looking at?" Dwang Sung asked, his voice carrying the practiced authority of the guild master he was.
Leo drew a deep breath, organizing his thoughts before exhaling.
"Think of it as the atmospheric pressure before a storm only I can see, except this storm cos from another realm entirely," he explained.
"Normal summonings create ripples of gamma energy—small disturbances in the balance of gamma energy in our world.
You know how our world and the astral shadow plane cannot co together? Well guess what, they can link up if there is enough gamma energy to make this world habitable for creatures from the astral shadow plane.
The greater the intensity of gamma energy here, the stronger the beast that erges, or in so cases, the higher the number of beasts that can erge.
What's happening now..." He paused, searching for the right word. "It's more like soone summoned enough energy for disaster. I just can't find any clue of what we should expect."
Before anything, Leo was deeply relieved that Ryder had made the right decision, because all these would have been much harder and beyond their capability to handle alone, but with Dwang Sung here, that wasn't the case anymore.
Now, given that Dwang Sung was on their side, they would have extra hands in handling the breach that was about to occur.
"That's a clearer explanation," Ryder admitted. "You should have explained it just like that to ."
Before Leo could answer, the soft guttural sound of approaching engines drew their attention. A convoy of three black SUVs with tinted windows approached.
The vehicles moved in synchronized formation, blowing up clouds of dust behind their tires.
Ryder narrowed his eyes, recognizing the lead vehicle's driver. "Aren't those—"
"The workers from the noodle shop at Ludlow," Dwang Sung confird with a curt nod. "My guild mbers."
As the vehicles screeched to a halt beside them, the doors flew open almost simultaneously.
Various n erged alongside a very few number of ladies, each of them in their combat uniform of the Red-Eastern Guild Fan's hierarchy.
The vehicles pulled up beside them and all the summoners rushed out with craze in their eyes. Tʜe source of this ᴄontent ɪs novèlfire
Their expressions carried no mixture; it was all rage, readying to exterminate and kill as they approached Dwang Sung, scanning the area with predatory glares.
"Master," they said at the sa ti, bowing deeply despite the urgency radiating from their postures. "Where is he, master? The one that deserves to be executed?"
Dwang Sung smiled enigmatically, then pulled Ryder closer by the shoulder in a gesture that shocked everyone.
"Here is the man we would have executed if he hadn't complied." His smile widened. "Guess what now... He is on our side."
All the Red-Eastern mbers gasped collectively.
Their expressions shifted from bloodthirsty to confusion, then outrage. One burly man with a light scar running across one of his cheeks stepped forward, his voice sharp with frustration.
"How can you take sides with him, master? He hurt our pride and the dignity of our guild. I thought you called us in to take care of him once and for all."
Dwang Sung's expression hardened, a silent warning to his subordinate about questioning his authority. They all seed to understand the change in deanor because no one uttered any word after.
Dzzzzzz
A spark ignited in the empty air above them—a brief flash of purple lightning that crackled into existence then vanished just as quickly.
Unlike the waves of energy that only Leo could perceive, this spark was visible to everyone present.
"You saw that, didn't you?" Leo asked.
All eyes were now fixed on the sky with unwavering stares; it had felt previously empty to them but now that feeling was gone.
Brok swallowed hard before replying, "Yeah, we sure did."
Dzzzzzzz
Another spark, more intense than the first, crackled across the sky. Then another. And another. The frequency increased with each passing second until the air itself seed to be altered abnormally.
What began as re sparks of energy at the center of the village rapidly expanded outward as constant energy.
The swirling circle of purple energy grew from the size of a coin to that of a house in re seconds and continued expanding with no sign of slowing down anyti soon.
Its edges crackled with unstable power, distorting the very air around it while the center remained constant and unwavering.
Leo had expected a large breach, but what materialized before them exceeded even his worst expectations. The portal wasn't rely large—it was colossal, expanding until it covered the entire sky above the entire village like an ominous purple ceiling.
"Holy shit," Brok whispered; he appeared traumatized.
The portal still hadn't taken its color, as so it wouldn't stop expanding. This is how portal breaches form—it starts as purely gamma energy portal and later randomly picks its color, which marks the end of the breach expansion.
The portal remained in the sky, crackling with purple lightning for a long while, seemingly to have its color undecided, but then...
"Brown," Leo sighed, his shoulders sagging with unexpected relief. "I can't believe it, we will be able to handle this just fine."
The others looked at him questioningly, not understanding the significance of the color.
"In the classification of portal breaches," Leo explained quickly, "the color indicates the general threat level of what's coming through. If it was Red, the beasts erging from the portal would have been familiars worthy of red marks, sa applies to all other colors of the portal.
The color works like the marking summoners receive.
It was a brown portal which ans the beasts that will erge from it would be weak, but given the size and the quantity of beasts that could potentially erge from the portal breach... Dwang Sung, Leo, Ryder, Brok and the Red-Eastern would be able to handle themselves fine, but extending it to the villagers, the sa can't be said.
There were no guarantees that the villagers would be fine, and if they were to consider evacuation, it still wouldn't be possible because it is already too late.
"Is this what you were referring to when you said it is here?" Dwang Sung asked, a bit curious. "Aren't you guys the ones responsible?
I could have sworn the report given to about you proved clear evidence that you guys were performing a strange ritual that linked the astral shadow plane to this world."
"Not really," Leo replied. "It occurred on its own, it wasn't our will."
Dwang Sung nodded then turned to his guild mbers. "I believe this should be a fine task for you, don't you think so?" It was a command disguised as a question and they all were aware.
"Protect everyone in this village at all cost and help them evacuate."
The Red-Eastern mbers stiffened to attention, their previous animosity toward Ryder temporarily forgotten in the face of the more imdiate threat.
"Yes, Master Sung," they bowed their heads respectfully before dispersing throughout the village, summoning out their familiars on their way.
For so strange reason, the portal was taking quite long to allow beasts to erge from the other side which raised the question.
"Why is it taking so long?" Mara whispered, her eyes never leaving the swirling breach above. "Shouldn't they be coming through already?"
She had never seen such nace before, but she could guess how it should work with re reasoning. The portal had stopped expanding which ant it had completely ford, so creatures should have been descending out from it.
"The barrier between realms is thicker than you can ever imagine, thick enough to have prevented a breach for all these years," Leo explained, his silver eyes tracking invisible currents. "I can't tell for sure, but I can guess... Sothing's... reinforcing it from the other side, trying to protect us."
"Is that good news?" Brok asked hopefully.
"Kinda," Leo's expression remained grim. "It's just delaying the inevitable. But it's buying ti for us as well to brace ourselves and prepare."
Just in ti after all the Red Eastern guild mbers had spread out throughout the village, they finally erged.
From the center of the portal, small dark shapes began to rain down—first a trickle, then dozens, then hundreds. They fell from the sky like black massive raindrops, their forms contorting as they fell toward the earth.
"Here they co," Master Sung smiled and turned towards the trio. "Hope you guys are ready for this," he inquired, directing the question towards Leo, Brok, Ryder, and Mara particularly.
"Ready or not, we have to do it anyway," Ryder replied. "I just hope this doesn't bore ."
Ryder stared at the ground briefly, wondering just where his mind and reasoning were suddenly different, but then again the conclusion that Luxy must be behind it flashed to his mind.
With a resigning sigh, he just couldn't bla Luxy for making the wrong decision. At this mont, he would have made a silly mistake, so without much thought, he finally chanted:
"*Familiar retreat*"
****
anwhile at Leo's apartnt that had been cleared into a wasteland by the crimson monarch Daoka.
How it all happened still remained like a mystery to Lucian, reason being that he was not capable of seeing through their movents; they were simply too fast for him.
But there was a clear winning familiar in this battle, and it surprisingly turned out to be Mara's.
Luxy, who had been acting cocky all this while, had received a deep wound on his forehead which Daoka's claws had penetrated through in a fatal strike.
Beasts from the Astral shadow plane are all clearly abnormal and could heal various wounds, but so especially those delivered at vital areas could pose a threat to their life.
This was clear at the wound on Luxy's forehead because unlike the previous slashes that he healed within an instant, this particular strike was taking quite long to close up.
Pulling his claw out of Luxy's forehead, Daoka was in no haste, not anymore, but still he wouldn't make any stupid decision like delaying Luxy's execution.
With shadows wrapping around his claws and wavering nacingly, he aid his last strike for Luxy's neck. This is the weak point of all familiars: severing their neck is equivalent to their death.
Slash.
Just as Daoka swung his claws, Luxy's body burst into black mist and flowed through the air.
"What the hell, it is getting away!" Lucian panicked. "Let's go after him now."
"Right," Mia agreed. "But try to catch up, it is moving too fast and I don't think you will be able to catch up."
With that, both Mia and Daoka chased after the black fog weaving through the air and heading for a particular location.
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