Chapter 195 - A Different Colored Guard
The Purple Palace had a different aura than the Crimson Palace. It was then that Elliot knew that there are something unique to the place.
It would start with the entrance alone, or the border between them green grass and the dark purple barren grounds. In the Crimson Palace, you would see dark red soil, as if the ground was stained with blood. But in here, the ground wasn't the only problem.
It was commonly known as the Purge of the Weaks, a unique ability of the Purple King. Everyone who wasn't sacred would be cursed, taking half of their HP the instance they step inside the border.
"How come I just knew of this?" Elliot asked. "There's a different, like theme in every palace, right? I don't know what's unique with the Crimson Palace yet."
"The strength of the Phantoms and Guards in that Palace has almost twice the beasts in other Palaces, the Knights, Mages, Archers, and the King though, has almost the same ones," Lance replied. "There had been countless of Scouting and explorations, but no one has yet to seen the King of this Palace and the Sun Palace."
"Why?" Elliot asked. "Is there like, a forcefield or something?"
"Nope," Lance shook his head and flattened his lips. "The two Kings has what's known as area of effect, but you probably know that. A magic that can affect a certain area. The Purple King has denser mist in his chamber and the Sun King, well, no one has actually passed through the Sun Palace Knights."
Elliot's eyes met, his lips pursed in confusion, "And why is that?"
"The Sun Palace has barriers within the area where you could locate the beasts," Lance replied. "The deeper you go, the tougher the barrier is."
"And no one has penetrated the barrier?" Elliot asked, to which Lance shrugged.
"No one tried to. You needed at least 5 Guardian-level Adventurers to even dent that barrier, how much would it take to actually break it?" Lance chuckled. "Well, many had tried before but after the Conquest of the Azure Palace, everyone just stopped."
"Because it's not worth it," Ed interrupted. "Why would go there if it's just going to kill everyone anyway, right? Just better leave it be. It will pass. Besides, the beasts don't leave their Palaces. Just let them stay there and let's all live happily."
"But that's really sad," Hope suddenly said. "What if the Sun King just wants friends. And he cannot see them because he's trapped in his own room. That's so sad."
"What in the hell happened to this guy?" Ed whispered to Connor that made the latter snort. "It's like he's so emotional. Has he been watching those tragic plays again?"
"What if I am?" Hope said, his eyes welling with tears and his lips curled into a frown. "Are you gonna do something about– ow!"
"How come it's been months and you still think your child puppy eyes would work on us?" Ed narrowed his eyes. "You're a grown up, now and you only look like a sick bastard."
"Shh," Lance said and raised his arm to the side. "It's the Phantoms."
They all got serious and formed a circle, facing back on each other. Their hands grazed on the handle of their swords, slowly gripping it and pulling it from their scabbard.
"These Phantoms have Curse abilities, do be careful," Lance said. "Though they have to touch you to do it. Elliot, eliminate the one on your left. Connor, shoot the other one. I'll take care of the rest."
"Hasty Aspire!" Elliot blasted himself to a phantom, running in front of it and letting his sword glow with a light pink light. "Lotus Blast!"
After three slashes, the Phantom had fallen. Elliot had slashes to spare so he ran over to Lance's target and finished two more.
"Greedy," Lance chuckled, slashing the remaining two with his swords.
"I thought they could only be slain when using elemental attacks?" Elliot asked. "You just clearly swung your swords and they're dead."
"That's because I used an elemental attack," Lance said. "I covered my swords with their respective magic, creating an elemental coating."
Lance raised his swords for Elliot to see clearly. The younger boy was in awe, seeing how the black and white sword were glowing like when he would start activating his skill
"Can I do this too?" Elliot asked. "Or is it like the moment just before I activate my skill? Are they the same?"
"Not quite," Lance said. "The light a weapon use before a skill is a pre-burst. Only Adventurers with highet levels can do it, it's like edging a skill, will I activate it or not? Activate it or not? But this light only has a fraction of the elemental attacks, it's not enough to kill Phantoms."
"That's very informative," Elliot snorted and raised his thumb. "Thank you, good sir."
"Whatever, Elliot," Lance chuckled, turning to see that the final Phantom had been burned to ashes by Connor.
"I could've used some parts of it you know," Elliot clicked his tongue and playfully shook his head. "So greedy."
"W-What the– did he just…" Connor scoffed and rolled his eyes. "He just did that with me instead of Lance who did it to him. I smell a thick layer of favoritism."
Elliot collected the corpses with The Creator's Sloth skill. After he was done, they went on inside the Purple Palace walls. The dark purple bricks were as dull and as lifeless as the Crimson Palace.
Only this time, the air was filled with a mist of miasma as well. Good thing they all have reached Legendary tier at this point. They shouldn't be affected by any of the mists.
"I have a question," Connor suddenly found himself asking. "Have you ever taken another beast from one palace into another Palace?"
"What do you mean?" Lance asked. "Like as an experiment?"
"Yeah," Connor said. "Like, what would their reaction be? Would they all be friendly with each other? Or will they all tear each other's guts out?"
"The latter," Lance answered. "I've seen it done before and it seemed like one Palace's beasts doesn't appreciate the existence of another Palace's beasts."
"Oh," Connor scrunched his forehead. "Then what is that Sun Palace Guard doing over there?"
They all turned to where Connor pointed and saw the guard with yellow armor. It was standing with other Purple Palace Guards but they don't seem to kill each other. It even looked like the Sun Palace Guard was the leader of them.
"What in the hell is going on?" Lance gulped, taking out his sword once again.. "But I saw them kill each other before. What is this?!"