" Just to double confirm, Joey has already left the are with Little One, right?"
Philomel turned to Darzirak as she hid herself on top of the catacombs entrance.
"Yup, I can feel that they are a short walk from the inn."
Darzirak nodded with his ears perked up.
" Alright, proceed with phase 1 of the plan."
Philomel nodded then signal for Darzirak to go. Darzirak leaped from the catacombs, diving into the shadows. The shadow world accepted him like an ocean accepts a raindrop. Taking in a deep breath, he could feel, hear, see Lenny's carriage in mind's eye. Being one within the ocean of darkness, Darzirak flowed, he was water and water was him. Popping up from the shadow of a tree, right in front of Lenny's carriage. Darzirak's appearance scared the horses pulling the carriage, both steeds lurched away from the demon, screaming as they stood on their hind legs, ready to stomp on Darzirak if he came any closer. Darzirak quickly assessed the situation.
There were 10 knights upon their steeds, 2 in the front, 2 on each side and 4 at the back. From the differences of their armours, only one bore the colours of Luxtorious.
" Demon attack!"
The knight sitting in the driver box of the carriage alerted. Instantly there was chaos and much panic. The knights in the front turned their horses around to face Darzirak. The knight wearing the crest of Luxtorious didn't even hesitate, while all the other knights were stunned, he charged at Darzirak.
" No doubt, that's Lenny. "
Darzirak muttered under his breath as he leaped onto the driver box, landed on the driver's head before jumping onto the roof of the carriage. Knights were yelling orders over each other as they all turned their horses to face the demon. Darzirak watched them carefully, there were two sets of orders being given. The ones riding on the horse backs had 3 different units of knights, 4 from Lunaris, 5 from Alryne and Lenny from Luxtorious. There were zero unity between the 3 units.
Knights of Alryne were in the formation to push Darzirak back and drive him to and open area, so that there was enough room to surround the demon and engage in battle. Knights of Lunaris were more interested on attacking Darzirak where he stood in a well coordinated attack combination. While Lenny... well... only the gods would know what he was doing since Darzirak had already lost sight of him within all the knight chaos.
Darzirak stood there and allow the knights to strike him with their weapons. Since the demon was one with water, there was no damage and their blade felt like it was cutting through jelly. The moment the weapons touched the demon, Darzirak absorbed them all into his body. The knights struggled to pull their blades back.
" Let go of the weapon or become apart of me. You all know your strength is nothing compared to me."
Darzirak mocked a warning with a laughing smile. No knight let go and so Darzirak pulled the blade within himself, lifting some knights from their feet. 3 knights as soon as they were dangling from Darzirak they let go but one knight was especially stubborn. Darzirak recognise him as one of the knights barking orders earlier.
" A captain, eh? If you don't let go boy, then be mine."
Darzirak growled out as he showed off all his sharp teeth. Instantly a shiver ran through the captain and he let go of his blade.
" Enough messing around, demon."
Lenny ordered Darzirak as the Holy Knight stood on the branch of a nearby tree. Having a clear view of the demon, Lenny snapped his fingers and a purple barrier started to materialised around Darzirak.
Darzirak spat out all the swords that he had previously absorbed into his body.
" Shadow teleport."
Darzirak casted. The spell was successful but the barrier cut the demon from the shadows outside of the barrier which meant Darzirak could only teleport from one corner to another corner within the barrier. Having nowhere to go, Darzirak sat hidden within the shadows of the barrier.
" Everyone stay on guard that demon teleported!"
Lunaris's captain ordered and instantly all his men stood with their backs to the carriage, pulling out their daggers, watching their surroundings carefully.
The knights of Alryne form another circle around the carriage but remember to keep some distance between themselves and the knights of Lunaris.
" How can this be? This is a holy barrier, no demon should have been able to escape it."
Lenny gasped as he stare at the empty purple barrier.
" This could be a high rank demon, stay alert. If worse come to worse we will hold the demon back while you and Estella make your escape with the Messiah."
Alryne's captain ordered and instantly all knights circling the carriage, agreed.
" But if the demon was that powerful the barrier would have broke."
Lenny muttered to himself as he studied the purple barrier.
" Can we get our swords back? I don't feel like we would be more useful equipped with swords rather than daggers."
One of the Lunaris's knights pointed out.
" Lenny can you undo your barrier?"
Lunaris's captain asked as he pressed his back against the carriage and grab hold of the roof of the carriage. Lenny contemplated the options along with it's benifits and weaknesses. He couldn't sense Darzirak's demonic presences at all since technically Darzirak was in a different world.
" Ah,sure."
Lenny nodded and dispelled his barrier causing the shadows within the barrier to mix back with the rest of the shadows. Lunaris's captain climbed up onto the carriage and started handing the swords back to his team. Darzirak move through the shadow's and hid within Estrella's robe, finding her book of spells while having an extreme close up look at the baby she was protecting.
"Ah ... if only I could do shadow teleport without having to stick parts of myself out to adsorb the book. "
Darzirak grumbled to himself as he asked himself if he was feeling lucky. Since using shadow teleport with something other than himself has no guarantee it would work on the first try, not to mention each time he fails to cast the spell, his body would shrink. Darzirak estimated that it would be an 85 percentage of success for a book as big as Estrella's but it takes time to absorb the book within himself. As soon as he sticks his paw out Estrella and Lenny would instantly sense his presence.
" I don't even know how fast she is... and I'm right within her robe."
Darzirak sighed wondering how he was going to pull this off. He then noticed two knights seated across from her and a mage next to her.
" Including the carriage driver there's at least 13 knights and two mages here... Not to mention holy magic would have long term damage for me. I don't like where this is going."
Darzirak huffed and shivered. Not wanting his body to be burnt by Holy magic and lose much mass of his body. Mass that would be harder to recover. Holy magic not only shrinken his body also his envy conversion. For example Darzirak has body mass of 30, he collects 10 envy points then convers it into 5 body mass, giving him a total of 35 body mass. But if he is hit by Holy magic his body mass from 35 becomes 20 and he would suffer Holy burns. Holy burn causes his envy conversion to need double the amount which means he would need 20 envy points to convert into 5 body mass.
With Amon and Joey nowhere near Darzirak. It would be impossible for him to regain body mass unless by some miracle he someone nearby agree to sign a tenancy agreement, manages to look through their memories fast enough to figure out what makes them envious and then come up with some form of conversation to plant that seed of envy. Even then it would take some time for envy points to generate from the person and that's depending how well Darzirak plant the seed of envy.
" Pretty sure today is the day this dream ends."
Darzirak concluded with a huge sigh as he shook his head and crossed his paws.
" This is a dream worth dreaming but I cannot disappoint Amon right after he has returned to me my freedom to feel. I would feel bad and it would be a waste of good blood. Therefore to dream is the only way."
Darzirak concluded as he decided to use the dreamer's power, knowing that his brothers would feel his existence in this world and that could lead to complications.
"Ensnare dreamscape."
Morpheus ordered as his breath swept through the wind. Instantly Lenny, Estrella and the mage sitting next to Estrella, all fell into a deep slumber.
While all world guardians felt the alteration since the alteration was only to three beings, it felt nothing more than a tingle. To the world guardians it felt like an ant or small insect crawl on their arms for 9 seconds before the feeling disappears.
__________________________________________