Second World

Chapter 1853. The Heavenly Beasts

Penny roared as she flapped her wings. Her elevated power improved all her abilities. Her roar caused the demon bats in her vicinity to stop in their tracks and lose their flying ability. They dropped like flies. She then shot up into the sky. Several seconds after she vanished into the clouds, she shot back down with incredible speed. The air around her burned, causing her to look like a falling meteor.

She was using her Diving Lava Beam. She had been fighting far ahead at the front line, so the area directly under her was filled with enemies. The demon bats who had lost their flying abilities earlier fell among these enemies. She let out her lava beam in their midst.

Under her elevated eternal condition, her Diving Lava Beam caused an explosion wider than when she was a mythical grade. The hit area was doubled to a diameter of three hundred meters. This attack halted a portion of the demon's advance.

After carrying out her attack, she left the wounded demons and rushed to where the demon commanders were. However, something beat her to it.

Ladohn had a faster flying speed. Under the elevated effect, he was even faster. A crescent blade followed his flight. He swerved away when he was close. The crescent blade continued onward while maintaining its trajectory. It was heading toward the three demon commanders.

The three demon commanders were surprised the enemies dared to attack them directly. Ladohn was so fast that his crescent blade was already upon them by the time they noticed. Xarod moved forward and put his hand out to accept the incoming crescent blade. A ki shield appeared before that hand.

Ladohn's crescent blade crackled with electricity as it neared its target. It easily sliced through Xarod's ki shield. Considering the attack came from someone of the same grade but ten levels higher, this outcome was expected. It was a shock to Xarod, though. He had seen this stormbird in action. From what he saw, he estimated the stormbird to be a mythical grade. He had no time to use Inspect when Ladohn suddenly ambushed them.

The crescent blade continued onward, but Xarod managed to activate another skill in time despite his shock. A layer of hardened rocks covered his body. The crescent blade hit him, but the earth suit reduced the damage. It also prevented him from getting paralyzed.

"Watch out!" Maliarki cast a spell. A large blue sphere encapsulated the three of them.

Ladohn didn't stop after sending his crescent blade. He flew up and gathered the lightning elements in the environment. After gathering enough, he unleashed the energy upon the three commanders. Lightning sparks raged in the area where the three commanders were. Multiple lightning explosions occurred incessantly in the area. If Maliarki hadn't erected the protective sphere in time, the three would have drowned in the lightning turbulence.

Ladohn pressed on the attack after using his Storm Blast. His wings flapped rapidly. Each beat of his wings produced lightning blades larger than his standard attacks. The barrage of lightning blades battered the protective blue sphere until it broke.

A streak of fire rushed out as the blue sphere shattered. It was lightning fast. It stabbed into Ladohn before he could fly away.

"Loathsome bird! How dare you attack us?" The streak of fire was Ririth. Her body was coated in flames. Her flaming rapier was deep inside Ladohn. The rapier continued to discharge flames and cause fire damage to Ladohn.

Ladohn shrieked. Dense lightning burst out of his body. This lightning washed over Ririth. Her flame suit was not enough to protect her. The dense lightning assailed her, and she was blasted away.

Maliarki used the window created by Ririth to cast another spell. Large gravity balls spread all around Ladohn and exploded. They caused dark damage and generated a force field that prevented Ladohn from moving.

When the three demon commanders prepared to dish out another attack on Ladohn, they sensed pressure from below. They turned and saw a huge hurricane headed toward them. They hurriedly used whatever protective measures they could. The hurricane swept and tossed them around, dealing wind damage every second.

They only regained their balance after the wind died down. The hurricane shrunk and revealed Czar, Everlasting Heavenly Legends' third guild guardian. The wings on his back had winds constantly swirling around them, making it seem as if he had two tornados for wings. Czar was level 83. The three commanders were now facing two eternal-grade opponents higher in level than them.

Not long after, Penny also joined the fray.

Against three eternal-grade opponents with higher levels than them, the three demon commanders had difficulties fighting back. They hurriedly transferred mental commands for the other demons to come to their aid. Soon, a horde of demons came to fight Penny, Czar, and Ladohn, relieving the pressure from the demon commanders.

When more demons were flying up from below, a massive sphere of water appeared out of thin air. This water sphere encapsulated the demons and drowned them. It prevented them from going to the demon commanders.

"What is that?!" Xarod asked in surprise. He then saw within the water sphere a giant dragon turtle swimming around, attacking the demons whose movements were now impaired by the water.

The dragon turtle was Gumeru. He was also an eternal grade due to the Oriental Guardian Beasts' enchantment. His level was 75. Despite having the lowest level among the guild guardians, he was not to be underestimated.

Under eternal-grade effect, his Dual-world domain had become mobile. In the past, it was static. It stayed at the same place where the skill was used. Gumeru could swim to the edge of his domain. Now, the domain always placed him at the center. This meant he could continue to swim up to the sky if he wished. The water sphere followed his movements. This effectively gave him a flying ability when he didn't possess one.

Aside from becoming mobile, there were two other differences to his eternal-version Dual-world Domain.

The first was the water inside his water sphere was denser. This put extra pressure on the enemies inside the water, limiting their movements further.

The second was that Gumeru could manipulate the water inside his domain at will. He could make it so the water split apart for his allies, so his allies could move normally without being hindered by the water.

With these upgrades, Gumeru continued swimming up until his water sphere enveloped the three commanders and his three guardian comrades. The three commanders had been trying to move away when they saw the massive water sphere approaching, but the other three guild guardians stopped their paths. Even with the aid of their demon subordinates, it was difficult to move freely against the three guild guardians.

As the water drowned everything around the three commanders, it split apart for the three guild guardians.

"Damn turtle!" Maliarki cursed. He cast a spell that erected a gravity shield around him. The gravity pushed the water from touching him. Even so, he could still feel the pressure. He couldn't move freely.

Ririth slashed her rapier, which had now turned into a fiery whip. The flames of her whip were greatly dimmed when they were inside Gumeru's water.

More and more demons entered Gumeru's water bubble to save their commanders. The demons were creatures of strict hierarchy. The lower-ranked demons were not hesitant to throw their lives for those higher in rank. That's why they dove into Gumeru's water world without second thoughts even if they knew they would be greatly hampered inside.

Before long, Gumeru's water sphere was as if an ant's nest. It was filled with demons.

This caused the four guardians difficulty in defeating the three commanders. But in turn, this greatly alleviated the pressure on the defenders' side. Not only did the defenders manage to maintain their defensive line, they could even slowly push back the demon horde.

The battle continued. Linda used the respite to rearrange the army's formation so the soldiers could fight efficiently as a coherent whole. He also sent some soldiers with mechanic skills to repair the siege weapons not yet destroyed.

The defenders' morale had been in continuous decline ever since the battle started. But now, their morale increased when the situation became better. They had the hope that they could beat this demon horde back.

"Keep at it, everyone!" Linda told the guild members who were controlling the guild armies.

"I would love to, but you should know. The enchantment is at its last hour," Tip said to Linda. He was referring to the Oriental Guardian Beasts.

"Can they defeat those eternal-grade commanders?" Linda asked. Taking out the enemy's commanders should throw the enemies into temporary confusion. Not to mention, those commanders were also powerful combatants.

Tip shook his head. "I think it is unlikely. The other demons are adamant about protecting those three, even at the cost of their lives. I've been sending commands to our guild guardians to put those three as priorities, but they still couldn't carry out the task."

"Then be ready to use the final attack when it is near the last minute," Linda said. "Keep them close to each other when the time comes."

Tip nodded. The active effect of the Oriental Guardian Beasts had one last feature aside from elevating the guild guardians by one grade. That feature was a combination attack between the four guardians. The drawback of using this combination attack was the active effect would end even if the natural duration had not yet ended. So, this combination attack could also be considered a final attack.

Another requirement was the four guardians had to be close to one another to execute the combination attack. Tip paid attention to the time. At the corner of the guild army platform was an indication of how much time was left for the enchantment's active effect.

Tip waited until almost the last minute, so the demons continued to be occupied up there. This gave them more time to decrease the number of demons down here.

When it was three minutes left, Tip had the four guardians gathered. With Gumeru's Dual-world Domain, this was easy to do even when there were so many demons around the four.

When only one minute left, Tip sent the command to execute the combination attack.

The four guild guardians uttered thundering cries at the same time. These cries stunned the demons in a large area. Their bodies then shone. The image of a large circle divided into four sections encompassed the guardians. Each section was represented with different colors. The four colors were: Blue, red, white, and black. At the center was a smaller circle with a golden color.

Out of the four colored sections, four beasts emerged. However, they were not the guild guardians. They were larger and they were different. The four beasts were the azure dragon, vermillion bird, white tiger, and black tortoise.