The boy squeezed out whatever courage he had left to barely stop himself from crying in fear.

“I-I won't tell you a-anything...” The tone failed to convey any of his resolutions.

“Hm, see this first.”

Jor approached Church Boy A and released him from the breathless prison.

“Bwuah! Uhuk… Uhuk… GWAHH!!”

While he relished the sensation of sweet oxygen entering his lungs, Jor stabbed his thigh with a fiery knife.

“This is how it goes down: either you hold this person dear enough so you tell me what I want to know before I gravely mutilated his body and soul… Or you don't care much about this guy and let him suffer until he felt death is a much more preferable fate.”

Jor turned his head to Church Boy D while A was wailing. The sound and smell of human flesh barbeque was in the air

“The former option means everybody is happy, I’ll leave and you both will… do whatever you do. The latter option means you’ll be the subject of the same torture he undergoes before the Goddess saw fit to snuff his life out as an act of mercy. I admit I’ve never tortured someone before but I’m confident I can find ways to inflict extreme pain to fragile human flesh and bones.”

D listened with horror, looking at the melting flesh of A’s thigh. His eyes were wide and his head was blanked, Jor pulled him back to reality by a crisp sound of a hand clap.

“So! What’ll it be? Chop chop, I’m on a tight schedule.”

***

“Blood Whip!”

From Scarlett’s wand, a strip of blood red cord appeared. As she swung her weapon, the blood knights charged to their opponent.

Ativan blocked the whip’s lash with his forearm.

“Mu!?”

Despite being covered by a top notch defensive Arte, he still felt pain after being struck. A red mark appeared on his metal arm.

Scarlett skillfully unleashed a flurry of whip strikes, Ativan pressed forward. He parried what he could and let the rest fall on his body. He ate some damage but it wasn't severe, the tradeoff was he managed to close the distance to the blood user.

“Predictable, Blood Repel!”

A deep red magic circle appeared in front of Scarlett before Ativan could launch his attack, it emitted a mysterious pressure that hurled him back. The closer they were to Blood Repel’s user, the stronger the knockback effect.

“Stalwart Poise!”

Normally, Blood Repel would’ve hurled him back like a person hit by a speeding truck. But Ativan stopped after a mere six meters and made a martial art’s stance. Stalwart Poise Arte also increased his offensive power.

“Void Punch!”

From afar, Ativan punched at nothing but air. But Scarlett's face changed and hastily erected a shield of blood. The shield broke apart like glass after being shot with a bullet but she was unharmed. The Arte was a shockwave kind of attack.

Both level 2s continued their exchange of offense and defense. They were earnestly trying to bring each other down but refrained from using any form of AOE attacks. They were in a closed space and each side had friendlies, none were eager to involve the level 1s in their fight.

The two blood knights were doing well fighting their opponents and keep them occupied. However, they couldn’t kill them. Blood Knights Arte was a defensive Arte in nature; it supposed to be tanking damage for the caster and harassing enemies, attacking was not their strong suit.

***

“Wind Drill!”

A swirling wind was aimed at one of his opponents but cleanly defended. Soris’ opponents were slowly putting him on the back foot. He was a mage-type, his opponents fought in a way that gave him no opening to unleash his more powerful or complex Arte. Soris coped by having superior speed and mobility courtesy of his wind affinity but as time goes on, he was slowly losing.

Fuck! Fucking-Fat-Prick! If that bastard didn’t run away, I wouldn’t be in this pathetic situation. He may be a level 0 but at least he could serve as a meat shield! What do I do? If this goes on…

Soris grimaced behind his mask and racked his brains out to resolve his predicament.

“Wind Blade! Wind Spear!”

With their harassment, Soris couldn’t cast complex Arte so he was forced to compensate by peppering them with low-level Artes.

“Brother, don’t let your guard down.”

“I know, there’s no telling what foul tricks he has in his sleeves.”

Soris’ opponents were vigilant and didn’t take any risk. They didn’t give him any opening to overturn his disadvantageous state.

***

“Yaah!” Azure made one of her opponents lost an eye with a sweep of her spear.

“Gaaah!!” The now one-eyed man put his left hand on his wounded face.

“Arec! You brat! Hmph!” The other one was agitated and unleashed an overhead chop with his broadsword but Azure easily sidestepped.

“Angelo, don’t! Haah… haah… I’m fine. Don’t lose your cool, this one… is strong.”

“Yes… we have no data on her. She must be a new recruit. First, the white mask that killed our promising seed then her… The Cult of Dumuzin has recruited strong kids this time.”

“Grh, we can’t underestimate her because of her age either. Her spearmanship is quite polished, very impressive for one so young.”

“Aw, that’s it? You both are at least a decade older than me and this is all you got?” Azure playfully spoke to them both, she tapped the shaft of her spear on her shoulder.

At first, she engaged them in hand to hand combat. In a crucial moment she took out her baton on her waist, it elongated and turned into a spear. The series of attacks following that resulted in Arec lost an eye.

“Floating Bubbles.”

With her thumb and index finger, Azure made a ring. As she blew through it bubbles started to come out. Tens of bubbles of various sizes were floating around Azure’s body. At first glance, the bubbles only looked pretty and harmless.

“Let’s kick things up a notch, Spear Flow Dance!”

Azure dashed to the injured one, the bubbles followed.

“Khh, Rock Defense! Ground Pierce!”

Arec built his defenses while Angelo attacked from her flank.

“Blazing Slice!”

His broadsword was wreathed in flames, but before he could get too close the bubbles swarmed towards him. After they got close enough, they burst apart releasing bombs of sound.

Angelo was stunned by a chain of sound explosions. He dropped to one knee because his sense of balance was off and the world is spinning in his eyes.

With Angelo temporarily incapacitated, Azure could focus on her wounded opponent. His second Arte created jutted, sharp rocks from the ground; Azure leaped above it and releasing a flurry of spear stabs towards Arec before landing on the ground.

“Akkh!” Arec painfully grunted.

He crossed his arms in front of his face to minimize the damage. Arec’s skin of rock reduced the damage but not completely. Sweep, slash, pierce, Azure danced like a ballerina as she picked apart her opponent’s defense with her slender spear.

“Ah!? Water Barrier!”

Before she could deal a fatal blow, she gasped and hastily protect herself with her spear shaft. Not willing to simply watch one of his men die, Ativan released a Void Punch at Azure. The attack in the form of an air pressure landed above her guard but she still got thrown to the wall. The stone wall cracked as she crashed.

“You dare to hurt my sister while fighting me? Blood Death Grasp!”

By helping Arec, there exist a hole in Ativan’s defenses. Scarlett pounced towards it like a lioness to its prey jugular. A skeletal phantom hand seemingly made of blood mist choked Ativan in the neck. Not even a second later, his metal skin cracked.

“Hrgh!”

His bracelet shined with white light then the blood hand faded like sands in the wind. With much difficulty, Ativan released himself from the fatal strangle; the odds were stacked against him now.

“Oww… that hurt. Old man, you shouldn’t be too rough on a lady. Didn’t your parents teach you that? “Azure rose up to her feet, injured but not fatal. She resumed fighting Arec and Angelo, she still retained her superiority.

“Brother, go! I’ll hold him back.”

Urged by his brother, one of Soris’ opponent nodded then charged at Azure, wanting to deal a killing blow.

With three people as her opponent, Azure was forced to take more defensive actions.

“You think I’m that weak? How much more are you going to insult me? DIE, motherfucker! Tempest Wolf!!”

Soris exploded with fury and conjured a tiger-sized wolf made of green wind. It moved like a real wolf but vastly faster, it savagely mauled his opponent with its fangs and claws.

“AAAhh!”

Soris swiftly killed his opponent, the wind wolf reduced the man to a mangled sack of flesh and blood.

“Hahah! That’s what you get!” He immediately reinforced Azure that was besieged by three opponents.

“Brother! No!” Seeing his brother's lifeless body, he regretted his action.

Looking at how the battles went, it was clear the cultists’ individual strengths were higher than the church’s Path-seekers. Scarlett alone took on Ativan and two other level 1s. Azure could overpower two of her opponents and would’ve killed Arec if Ativan didn’t intervene. Now that Soris killed one of them, the church’s defeat was only a matter of time.

The Est Church’s might as a whole certainly dwarfed any cult of the seven devils but in Luxore town, the branch of the Church and the Cult of Dumuzin was almost equal. The Church outnumbered the cultists by seven to three but still failed to achieve superiority, this was caused by two reasons.

Firstly, because the Church’s combatants were spread out to other places.

Secondly, because the cultists were elites. Scarlett and Azure were the higher-ups of the cult, they had the best training since they were young and abundant resources to improve their strength. Therefore it wasn’t unnatural that their power towered over enemies on the same level. Soris also wasn’t bad by any means but his power didn’t reach Azure’s.

But the Church wasn’t filled with fools. This was their stronghold and they were prepared for an assault.

Seeing their unfavorable situation, Ativan decisively act.

“Activate the barrier’s secondary effect!” the head priest said out loud.

Suddenly, chains of light appeared on the three cultists’ body.

“!”

They found themselves unable to move and unable to use Arte, even Scarlett.