"What are you staring at? Run!" Varian yelled as he rose into the air and started to fade.
"N-No wait, B-Baldu, B-big bro, take me with you!" Maria shamelessly clung onto his leg like a puppy.
Varian was bewildered by her actions.
So were the three underlings of Hollow. Especially Reaper who fought the woman previously and the pride in her bones.
With his experience, he concluded that she was a born warrior, a keen and preserving woman who, if left alive, would rise to at least rank 9, becoming an unwanted obstruction for their plans.
"His teleport is faster than even mine! Come on, hop up!" Maria wasn't satisfied with taking the ride. She invited others to tag along.
Reaper slapped his skull with his palm bone and muttered in a voice that bordered on confusion and fear. "H-Have I gone mad?"
There's no way this shameless woman clinging onto someone's leg was going to be a rank 9. And what's that pitiful smile on her face? Was she trying to appeal to the man's sympathy?
Huh! She's more suitable for a dog instead!
'No, she's alright. The problem is that man.' The fires burning in Reaper's eyesockets reflected Varian who seemed to panic.
It seemed like the perfect moment to sneak attack and kill him. But Reaper was smarter than to fall for that.
"Hey! Don't pull my pants down so hard!" Varian screamed as Prince Sohan latched onto his other leg.
"S-Sorry…" Princess Bella couldn't even apologize properly as she raised her arms towards his neck.
"Hands off." An invisible force pushed her down and she clung onto Maria's waist.
Varian nodded in satisfaction while keeping an eye on the Reaper's trio. They stood still, waiting for him to finally teleport like he was supposed to three seconds ago.
'They didn't take the bait, huh.' He put away the maiden's tears, and toy sun and teleported away with the three puppies.
Reaper's gaze remained on the spot where Varian stood. He couldn't forget the eyes of this man.
The eyes of a predator.
Reaper deemed him as someone who must be killed. So, he planned to end the trio first and then team up with his colleagues against Varian, ensuring Varian would die for certain.
Even if he escaped now, with three against one, he'd be having little chance of survival.
In fact, Reaper hoped Varian to escape. That way, his job would be much easier.
But Varian was clever. That made him even more dangerous.
— — — — —
The four crashed onto a cliff built of a gleaming white crystal. Varian caught the edge of the cliff and pulled himself up while the three royalty fell off the cliff with a shocked expression.
Varian rubbed the area between his eyebrows and tapped the crystal ground with his index finger.
They'll lose.
There's no way they could win this fight.
Varian thought of giving the toy sun to Maria and let her use it to kill the trio. But these treasures had rigid sense of ownership and had a steep fall in performance when used by non-owners.
'Status'
[Adept Rank 4: 500/1000
Assimilator Rank 4: 400/1000
Binder Rank 4: 300/1000
Matter Rank 4: 300/1000
Energy Rank 4: 250/1000
Space Rank 4: 350/1000
Time Rank 4: 250/1000]
'Without artifacts, I can fight one peak rank 5. With artifacts, I can kill a bunch of them and be able to fight off a weak rank 6 for some time. But…'
There's no way he could win a rank 6. And definitely not a rank 6 as strong as Reaper.
Varian's thoughts halted as he sensed the tremors from the ground. Maria told him long ago that there was no running from the elves. Teleportation or not, they'd always sense you and always hunt you.
They were lucky last time to hide in a mountain range where the elves couldn't sense much but they weren't so lucky this time.
The place they were at—endless purple plains in front with white crystalline mountains in the back under the dark night—offered no hiding.
"We need to go! Quick!" Varian clenched his fists and his knuckles turned white.
The prince and princesses stopped recuperating at the bottom of the cliff and jumped up.
A second later, the horde of elves broke through the ground and started climbing the cliff.
From the sky, it looked like an endless sea of ants climbing up a hill to devour it whole.
"We can't keep running away like this. Do you know an exit route?" Varian asked.
Maria shook her head with a despairing expression and Princess Bella's smile once again went stiff.
Prince Sohan looked down for a moment before nodding. "It's dangerous, but it's the only option we got."
In fact, if they ran away from Varian—who's the target of the elf hordes—they could've been safe. But then they'd been targetted by those three powerhouses.
It's certain-death either way.
Ironically, staying with Varian might be the only way they could survive.
"Where?" Varian grabbed the three of them and tapped on his space ring—just for the show that he's not a space awakener.
— — — —
The World Tree was vast. It spanned such a length and breadth that humans couldn't even imagine a thousandth of it.
Due to its sheer size, the tree had all the landscapes a planet would have. And it had the ones that a planet didn't have.
After escaping from the unending pursuits of the ocean of elves, Varian and the trio appeared at the edge of a plan.
In front of them was a deep darkness that stretched out for tens of millions of miles.
Sohan pointed to the darkness and said. "There's an exit out of the world tree there. But if you go in, you'll be back to the safe zone."
"Then wouldn't everything go to waste!" Princess Bella bit her lip. "Those spies were already waiting for us. That means they started their plan already. If we leave now, it'd take days to reach them. By then, their mission would be over!"
"There's no choice." Maria sighed and looked back at the blue plains with a complicated expression.
The ground began to shake and the elves started to rise.
If it was just the elves, they'd have hidden in secretive spots, used some treasures to get mask their auras and proceed.
But the Jai spies would never allow that plan to succeed. Fighting with them would always break their disguise and once the elves realize they'd been disguising themselves, their pursuit would only grow stronger, putting them at a greater risk.
"I don't know what the mission is, but you can't do it while you're dead. Let's go." Varian urged.
The three of them paused for a moment and hesitation came across their faces. They're okay with sacrificing their lives for a cause but they didn't want to die a meaningless death.
Sighing softly, they turned to the small white vortex in the center of darkness.
"I'll go first." Varian jumped.
And a red shockwave swept him, blasting him out of the darkness and crashing him back into the blue plains.
Reaper, Tri-hound, and Numan encircled him.
"The three of you can go," Reaper didn't even gaze up and stared down at Varian. "But you, you're staying and dying."
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