Shin couldn’t see anything and he could sense his whole body being under pain, almost like thousands of knives are cutting him up. But, even so, Shin closed his eyes calmly and tried to breathe evenly.

The painful yells and roars which he heard at the beginning were slowly fading away in the wind.

Subconsciously Shin let out a faint smile.

A minute back in time

Kali was still keeping tabs on Laria and the other seven, while Aria, Azane and Laura & Peutoa holding back one person each.

Aria rapidly slashed her katana against a green-haired man wielding a shield and a hammer. Most of her attacks were repelled, but she still smiled as she was doing her part, not allowing the enemy to do as they please.

She sent a swift glance towards the others, finding them doing their part fine as well.

Aria had already felt a slight leakage of an aura which she was familiar with. Aria knew it was Shin’s aura, but she just knew that he was going to fight with them, but not how.

Let’s see what he will do.

No matter what, I trust him.

Hehe... If he gets in trouble, I’ll save him no matter what.

Aria squinted her eyes slightly as a smirk appeared on her face.

But that smirk didn’t last for long…

An aura which suppressed everyone’s whole being suddenly appeared like an active volcano!

Kali and Aria hurriedly glanced towards where Shin was, only to find his body slightly shining in twelve different colours.

But the next second Shin’s body disappeared…

Everyone was confused and didn’t know what to think about the oppressive aura Shin let out.

Laria had a frown on her face and her face distorted because of what she sensed from Shin’s body. But she could only barely move her own body, trying to defend against Kali’s rushing attacks.

Even while being surprised, Kali knew that this wasn’t the time to stop attacking. Her hands didn’t stop at all and she continued to fight against Laria and the others, Kali could barely hold on to her scythe because of all the sweat and blood dripping out of every small wound on her body.

“Humph!”

But even so, she forced herself to continue attacking the green-haired enemy, her golden eyes had a tinge of redness which looked like a mark, but it was slowly shining brighter and becoming more livid.

Laura and Peutoa had it slightly tougher, they might be both ‘strong’ in the sense of humanity on this continent, but they couldn’t match up against Gods that easily.

Laura’s hands were equipped with her gloves, her hands were slightly trembling because of the force she was hitting with and the force she had to block.

Their enemy was a lady wearing dark green metal gloves. The Lady’s name was; Jessica, Jessica was the youngest of the siblings, but she was also the most arrogant of them all.

She only glared at Laura and Peutoa in disdain as she was fighting, even when she got injured by Peutoa and blocked by Laura, she never thought highly of the two.

Peutoa’s hands were shivering, but she did her best to hold her curved daggers as tightly as she could and continue fighting. Her eyes were slightly narrowed as she tried her best to focus on Jessica’s movements, trying to read her every move and attack her whenever there was a slight gap in her defence.

Peutoa could only muster enough strength to injure her slightly, all of her cuts were shallow, but they rapidly stacked up.

The only one which was heartily laughing and smiling was; Azane.

She used brute force to swing her halberd around at her enemy which was brandishing a long green spear.

“Hahahaha.”

Her laughter sounded out throughout the whole battlefield as she clashed her halberd against the green spear.

Azane’s halberd clashed against the spear around three times a second with a colossal strength which made the air tremble and the surrounding in devastation.

“Come!”

Azane’s loud voice was filled with eagerness and thrill.

Hm… What will the kid do this time?

Even if Azane was a battle-freak, she knew that her priority was to defeat the enemy in time and to protect Shin. As she was shouting and laughing, she glanced everywhere for Shin, but not finding anything at all, even so, she continued to glance in the middle of her fight.

As everyone was fighting with everything they got, a soft voice which could have faded away in the wind, entered their ears.

“Move…”

As they heard Shin’s voice, everyone swiftly turned around and fled.

The only reason the enemy wasn’t able to attack their fleeing backs, was because an oppressive aura surrounded the whole area, locking the green-haired people in their place, not being able to move a single muscle.

With a couple of steps, they all arrived over ten kilometres away from the battlefield, when they turned around, their mouths were wide open.

A bright light which was shining in twelve different colours soared down from the heavens like a lightning!

Without being prepared at all, all they saw was Shin punching the air in the middle of the eleven green-haired people.

With a moment silent, they thought that something was wrong, only to be surprised once again.

A dark vortex appeared where Shin punched and engulfed everything…

Before they could even think about what happened, they managed to hear yells and roars which they thought came straight from hell!

Aria worriedly stared at the dark vortex, squinting her eyes, trying to get a glimpse of Shin. But to no avail…

As Aria wanted to get closer to the dark vortex, Kali’s hand was on top of Aria’s shoulder.

“Don’t…”

“We won’t be able to survive that. Believe in Shin…”

Kali’s voice was trembling and she barely managed to speak, her golden pupils which held a tinge of redness was slowly turning redder by the seconds.

Peutoa clenched her fists tightly, she closed her eyelids and tried to listen to the voices. Peutoa was able to hear the screams of eleven people, but none of them was from a child…

At the moment, Azane was holding on Eline. When she was rushing back, she swiftly passed by Anaj and grabbed Eline from him as she was a lot faster than Anaj.

Don’t let him get injured, please…

As she was begging in her thoughts, her heartbeat was becoming faster and faster.

Eline in her hands was trembling, she could clearly fear the pressure of the dark vortex which almost made her unconscious. But, Eline squinted her eyes and tried to find something in the dark vortex. That was because Eline was sensing something different than the others…

Slowly it turned silent, no sounds could be heard.

Only the eerie dark vortex was visible.

Kali held her breathe as she was staring at the vortex, just waiting for it to vanish.

As she wished for, only a couple of seconds later, the dark vortex slowly shrank.

As the dark vortex shrank, a couple of bodies could be seen.

Several green-haired people laid on the ground with torn off limbs and blood everywhere around their bodies.

A couple of meters above the ground stood Shin. His silver hair waved in the wind and his night like eyes shined even when his eyelids were half-closed.

Shin’s robe was tattered, his pale white skin could clearly be seen. Shin’s skin wasn’t drenched in blood nor sweat, that was because of the red flame which covered his body. But, his old scars could clearly be seen.

Shin could see a light, but not what it was through his hazy eyes. A faint smile appeared on his face because he knew that it was finally over…

I won…!

Kali sensed that something was wrong, her smile which appeared when she saw Shin froze and she rushed towards Shin with all her might.

Shin wasn’t able to see what was happening, but the calm atmosphere turned cold.

Even while knowing that, Shin was not able to do anything, he was exhausted beyond what he was capable of, he could only muster enough force to stand still in the air.

On the ground, Laria’s body suddenly dashed up towards Shin, her fierce gaze hatefully gazed at Shin, she wanted to use him before, but not any longer. All she wished for was to rip Shin apart in thousands of pieces!

He deserves to die!!!

Within a moment, Laria stood right behind Shin. She raised her hand up high, she coldly gazed at Shin and all she could feel was hatred!

Shin clearly sensed the deadly bloodlust right behind him, but he still continued to have a faint smile on his face.

That was because when Laria was about to attack Shin, her body was cut into two.

What swept through her body was a scythe!

Kali stood right behind Laria’s falling body which was cut in two and coldly gazed at her. Fury and rage were clearly shown in her expression, but she sighed in relief when she saw that Shin stood still without any additional injuries.

The scythe vanished and Kali drew closer towards Shin, she passed his body and stood in front of him.

Kali could see that Shin was trying his best to stay conscious and that little smile on his face like a mischievous child.

“Shin…”

Kali softly hugged Shin, trying her best not to put any force on his body. When she held Shin for a moment, she could feel his entire weight on her body. As Kali glanced at Shin’s face, she could see his eyes closed and his calm breathing.

“Rest well Shin, don’t worry…”

Her soft voice entered Shin’s ears and Kali just softly embraced Shin, savouring the chance to feel his body.

Not long after, the wind split apart and several people appeared right behind Kali.

Aria worriedly stared at Shin, she thought that the world was about to break when she saw Laria behind Shin. Aria sent a complex filled glance towards Kali which was hugging Shin, she really wanted to push Kali away, but she stayed motionless and only watched the two.

The others standing near Aria were also silent. Laura and Anaj just watched without a lot of expressions, while Peutoa’s eyes only stared at Shin’s face which rested on Kali’s shoulder.

Azane on the other hand just smiled faintly when she saw that Shin was alright. Eline which was in Azane’s arms stared only at Shin, feeling complicated.

“Can you let him go…?”

The one who broke the silence was Eline. She mustered her courage and asked Kali, even when she was nervous, her eyes firmly stared at Shin.

“Hihi.”

Kali laughed softly and glanced behind her at Eline, Kali then turned around, facing Eline and the others.

Azane wrinkled her nose and raised her eyebrows slightly when she saw Shin’s back.

Laura, on the other hand, has seen Shin’s body before, even when she has seen them before, her heart pained when seeing the scars on his body.

“What do you want, ‘little princess’?”

Kali snickered softly as she watched Eline’s reactions, the main reason Kali didn’t want to turn around at first was because she knew that they would be able to see his scars.

Well, another reason was that she didn’t want others to bother her time embracing Shin, but she would never say that out loud.

Eline tried to calm her breathe and seriously gazed at Shin’s body before asking Kali.

“How is his body doing? Is he unscathed after being in that vortex?”

Eline’s voice was soft and held traces of worry and expectation.

Aria smiled faintly as she could clearly see that Eline was deeply worried about Shin and steeled herself into knowing about his condition than to be anxious about the whole ordeal.

Kali’s eyebrows slightly twitched, her pupils were still golden with redness, she had seen the red flame covering Shin the moment the vortex vanished, but Kali smelled the blood covering Shin’s whole body.

“He, Shin…”

Kali reorganized her thoughts for a second before answering Eline seriously.

“Shin was injured by the vortex, but it seems like it was minimized by the help of his Guardian. If I’m correct, his body was covered in red flames while staying in the vortex, that should have protected him enough to let him come out without any serious injuries.”

Aria nodded, she also saw the red flames covering Shin’s body when the vortex vanished.

She knew how powerful the red flame was in its defence and healing power.

“Still, how was he able to create a vortex that strong?”

Being slightly confused, Azane asked in deep thought.

As Eline was barely able to follow through what Kali said she heard Azane’s murmur.

Even if Shin is able to ‘borrow’ strength from his ‘Guardians’, how did he defeat someone who’s at the same strength as the Purple Witch Kali and the Empress Aria? And that weird woman with that overly enormous halberd isn’t that much weaker than the Empress either…

“I am also slightly confused about that too…”

Kali furrowed her eyebrows, the calm atmosphere around her froze for a second before she laughed out loud.

“Hihihi, that doesn’t matter at all for me!”

She burrowed Shin’s face towards her chest and cuddled him. As she was doing this, her smile grew into a smirk.

“Stop!”

Eline shouted loudly as her cheeks turned red, she pushed herself away from Azane and leapt towards Shin.

As Eline dragged Shin from Kali’s embrace, she thought that the two would fall to the ground, but she noticed that Aria held the two of them up with her aura.

“You have to be careful with him!”

Eline threw a glance at Kali before holding Shin’s body softly, she stared mesmerized at his face.

Kali’s mouth slightly opened as she watched Eline grabbing Shin away from her.

She thought she heard a snicker and glanced at Aria, only to find her smiling evilly.

“Hehe, did you just lose to a little girl? Hehe…”

Aria said in a low voice and tried her best to not laugh out loud.

Kali rolled her eyes and watched how sincerely Eline treated Shin by holding him softly and how she was staring deeply at Shin’s face.

Hihi…

Kali also stared at Shin’s peaceful resting face as she let out a faint smile.

Even when you’re asleep you’re a player who can attract everyone.