Void passage. Sophia appeared once again.
"My dear Orion, you've got quite an impressive group of subordinates," she said in a soft, motherly tone.
Orion's answer was a swirl of lightning flashing around the void passage. This ti, he was fully confident that if Sophia tried to cross over, his powerful lightning could blast her to pieces.
"Hee hee hee…"
Sophia couldn't hold back a mischievous laugh at Orion's sowhat dramatic response.
"Orion, are you scared of ?"
Orion kept his eyes shut and said nothing. Deep down, there was indeed a flicker of fear—but not because he was afraid of Sophia herself. He was worried about her using that particular thod to have sex with him again.
Although Sophia had never once hard him during sex—if anything, she was extra gentle—he still felt uneasy.
"It looks like I'm going to suffer a big loss from this invasion," Sophia sighed, her voice sweet and tinged with sorrow, enough to stir anyone's sympathy.
"Orion, aren't you curious whether I'll be the one leading an invasion against your territory again when the dark beast tides co next year?"
The question made Orion lift his head, but he still didn't open his eyes.
"Alas... it won't be ," Sophia went on. "Otherwise, I wouldn't be so eager to have a child with you… hee hee!"
Her first few words sounded regretful, but the teasing tone at the end was clear. She wore a mix of shyness, excitent, wistfulness, and disappointnt on her face, creating a magnetism that was hard to resist. Unfortunately, with Orion's eyes closed, he didn't see a thing.
He frowned, sensing hidden aning in her words, as if she were both warning and tempting him.
"What is she really getting at? Does it an that next year, the dark creatures who invade my territory won't be her troops anymore?"
Orion mulled over the implications. After a mont, he looked up, finally opening his eyes toward the void passage. Yet on the other side, Sophia was already gone.
"If her troops aren't the ones invading next year, then whose are they? Maybe this ans sothing else—that the void passage opened by the Erald Dream Realm doesn't appear in a fixed location."
"But why would the gods prevent the void passage from being fixed in one place? Are they protecting themselves from sothing? What could it be…?"
A sudden thought made Orion's pupils tighten for a second before returning to normal.
"Looks like I've got a long way to go before I can beco a god. Becoming a Titan is a distant goal."
After a while, Orion understood that the shifting location of the void passage was ant to stop private deals between the lords and arch lords of the two worlds—specifically the smuggling of each world's essence.
Put simply, the gods of both worlds wouldn't tolerate traitors or black-market deals. If anyone turned traitor, they would be hunted down to the very end.
"Why would Sophia tip off like this? If no one's allowed to make secret trades, why did she use that as bait to tempt before?"
Orion stared into the void passage, growing more serious by the second. Ever since he beca a lord, he'd realized that his path was riddled with obstacles.
More importantly, he had noticed a sort of boundary set by the gods—their collective decree. In many ways, this boundary held back the growth of lords and arch lords. If he couldn't break through it, becoming a true Titan would be nearly impossible.
…
Blackstone City, western wall.
While Orion's thoughts ran deep, blood and fire were already colliding on the western ramparts.
All of a sudden, Lysinthia raised her slender sword and aid it straight at a dark corner on the wall. At the sa ti, her aura swept across the area. But the darkness in that corner remained still, with no sign of the butterfly-assassin.
"Is that butterfly-assassin lurking nearby?" Slagor asked at once, quick to guess the truth since his own life was at stake.
"Yes."
"In the shadows?" he whispered. Lysinthia shook her head but kept her sword leveled.
"It's there, and yet not quite there."
Rembering Delilah's earlier report, Slagor imdiately understood: the butterfly-assassin was hiding in the shadowed void.
"I'll keep an eye on him. You handle the bigger picture."
"All right."
Encouraged by Lysinthia's calm confidence, Slagor turned to watch the other elders, ready to send help if they needed it.
---
"Break for !"
Onyx's furious roars thundered across the battlefield. Wielding his stone axe, he made sweeping attacks, clearly relishing his fight like never before since reaching Alpha-level.
He and his Dark Armored Beetle tag-tead the tentacle monster from front and back, pressing their advantage until each strike flowed more easily than the last. The tentacle monster, anwhile, was at a clear disadvantage: most of its tentacles had already been cut off. Judging by the state of things, Onyx would soon finish it off.
Elsewhere, Rendall and Earthshaker were pushing the eight-ard Night Stalkers to the brink of defeat. Rendall stood forward, bearing his blood shield under the creature's unrelenting assault, while Earthshaker seized gaps from the side and rear. It was a fierce and chaotic fight.
Clang! Clang! Clang!
The Night Stalkers' weapons slamd repeatedly against Rendall's blood shield, each impact strong enough to make him stagger.
But Earthshaker used the opening to slice off several of the creature's extra arms. As long as Rendall held out, victory was practically guaranteed.
A short distance above ground, Lilith was still locked in a struggle with the Enchanted Butterfly, blinking in and out of the fray so quickly that Slagor couldn't help feeling envious. He envyed their ability to fly, even if it was only low-altitude flight—sothing he himself couldn't achieve.
Looking higher up, Slagor noticed the fight between Thunderhawk Rayden and the Four-Winged Blood Bat was nearing its end.
Delilah, riding on Rayden, had steered the thunderhawk into lee so that the Bat's fury would stay fixed on Rayden. Once that happened, Delilah's left hand could slip the taming collar onto the Bat without being repelled.
Thunderhawk Rayden unleashed lightning as it pressed in. The Four-Winged Blood Bat, cornered by its pursuer, gave a savage roar and lunged at the thunderhawk head-on.
Squish! Squish! Squish!
That was the sound of claws plunging into flesh, as Thunderhawk Rayden and the Four-Winged Blood Bat tore into each other with lethal intent.
Seizing that mont, Delilah spread the fleshy wings on her back, swooped onto the Bat from behind, and pressed the taming collar against its body. It was not thrown off. The device fused into the Four-Winged Blood Bat with no resistance.
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