The light slowly faded and brought everything back to normal for them to see. Lakshman removed his hand covering his eyes and looked up at the floating demon warriors once again. He was astonished when he saw strange radiating aura emanating from within the opened box.

Floating in mid-air with the box in his hand was the leader of the enemy warriors. He had just broken the seal and opened the box to reveal the contents within. Upon the opening of the box, he and his men eagerly looked inside it only to change their expressions to disappointment. Inside the box was a nicely shaped orb that lay there between what appeared to be cushions.

“Um…” the enemy leader began hesitantly.

He actually was lost for words and so were the rest of his men as they stared at the orb lying motionless inside. They were all lead to be believe a monster lay in the inside, a monster that was newly engineered by the demon scientists. This was achieved after experimenting on many other monsters and collecting the data from those results, they came to make this. Unfortunately, it did not like anything like a monster to them and they even doubted that it was a monster.

The enemy leader picked the orb up with his hand and lifted it out of the box. He looked at it with a frown on his face while his men stared at it with puzzled expressions on their faces.

“Is this even a monster?”

“Doesn’t look anything like a monster to me.”

“Maybe, it’s asleep?”

“How can you tell? I don’t see any eyes on it!”

“I mean, I can’t feel its life force… So, maybe it’s dead for staying too long in there?”

“Or, maybe it’s just a regular orb.”

“What?”

“Come on! Look at it! Its design is completely the shape of an orb!”

“Oh…”

“Maybe, they mistakenly given us an orb instead of the actual monster?”

“Stop it!” the enemy leader said curtly and they stopped discussing it. “This was given to me by the assistant of the Demon Lord, Delon. There is no way he would mistakenly swap boxes and give us a regular thing.”

“Ah.”

“You’re right.”

“Still, it’s not doing anything.”

“I don’t feel its energy either.”

The enemy leader looked at the orb lying still and silent in his hand with narrowed eyes. A moment later, he began speaking to it in a loud commanding voice.

“Hey! Orb! As your master, I command you to wake up this instance and kill that guy over there!”

As he shouted, he pointed at Lakshman who hovered there with an eyebrow raised. Using Zooming Force, he was able to see the shape of the orb and it did not impress him one bit. It still left him feeling cautious about it due to the strange purple aura radiating from it that the enemy warriors clearly missed.

When the Orb still lying there motionless, the enemy leader got very angry and shouted, “Wake up this instance! I command you!”

Once again, nothing seemed to be happening from him frantically trying all means of waking the thing up. Lakshman, for the first time, felt pity for the enemy leader with his inability to wake whatever that orb was.

“What…?” Lakshman suddenly exclaimed in a low voice as he saw something.

He still had Elemental Sight active, which allowed him to see something that totally missed the naked eye. The orb in the enemy leader’s hands began top glow strangely with different colours like a rotational variation of colours. First it let off red aura, but switched to purple, then blue and finally pink. These were slow changes radiating from within the orb as it slowly turned purple on the inside.

Fearing what it might do, he raised his voice and shouted, “Hey! You lot! Put it back inside the box and seal it! Do it now…!”

The enemy warriors turned in mid-air and looked down at him with puzzled expressions on their faces. They did not quite understand why he was suddenly shouting him or why there was a fearful expression on his face.

“Huh?”

“What’s his problem?”

The enemy leader grinned broadly when he saw Lakshman’s fearful face and said, “Haha! Look at that! That warrior’s become afraid now that he knows I’m awakening Orb to attack him!”

“I don’t know… He is telling us to put the orb back inside the box or something.”

“Huh? You’re going to listen to the advice of your enemy?” the enemy leader asked through angry eyes and his subordinates faltered. “Fear not, because this monster will defeat—!”

“Sir! That thing’s turning purple!”

“Huh?”

He looked down at the orb and it was indeed turning purple on the inside. At the very same time, they felt the energy beginning to rise from within it, which surprised them. For a moment, the enemy leader was taken aback by surprise, but he quickly recovered and began laughing proudly.

“Yes! It’s awakening because of my command!” he boasted proudly. “Now, go and attack that spiky blonde haired warrior over there!”

Orb did not listen as it completely got covered in purple light and radiated in purple energy. For a moment, he and his men watched it with puzzled expressions on their faces. The next moment, it expanded to great length and began covering the enemy leader as it began to absorb him.

“Gah! Get off me! Get off!” he shouted desperately.

He attempted to get rid of Orb that was clearly surrounding his entire body to absorb it. His men quickly came to his rescue and tried to pull him free, but it was too late. In a matter of seconds, his entire body got covered in gooey purple substance and they had to pull back. They could no longer sense the energy signature of their leader as the absorption was complete.

For a moment, there was only the purple gooey substance moving around before it solidified. It slowly solidified into the form of the enemy leader, but its body had become grey with sinister looking white eyes. The henchmen looked at the changed appearance of their leader cautiously.

“Um… Sir…?”

“Is that… you, sir…?”

They were cautiously asking the figure of their leader, but it did not respond. It simply turned its head towards each of them before extending its arms out. More purple gooey substance flew out of its outstretched and flew towards the demon warriors. It did this several times by aiming its arm at them in a quick succession. The demon warriors were shocked as it quickly flew towards them and splattered onto some part of their body before beginning to absorb them.

Lakshman, who was hovering at a low altitude than them, watched in horror as the demon warriors got slowly absorbed. The process of absorption shocked him and although he wanted to free them, he decided against it. Watching the absorption, he quickly realised he would get pulled in during the absorption process. However, what concerned him the most was this strange feeling that is neither good nor evil.

“It’s not pure evil, but it’s not good either… I don’t understand this feeling…!” he muttered in a shocked voice.

In a few seconds, all the remaining warriors had been nearly surrounded by the purple gooey substance. It was then Lakshman remembered about his wives and he turned to see them facing this way with a confused expressions on their faces.

“Damn…! What are you doing?” he muttered before flying towards them at high speed.

He soared through the air at high speed and descended to land in front of them. Immediately, the girls rushed forward while crying out his name before giving him a hug. Within seconds, all seven of his wives were hugging him tightly and left him no room to move or breathe.

“C-Come on… I’m having trouble breathing…!” he stuttered and the girls finally let go.

“I’m glad you’re safe!” Emilia said in a relieved voice.

“You’re got a nice look now! I’m impressed!” Ondine said and she gave him a thumps up with Cantia growling in approval.

“What’s with the long hair? It doesn’t suit you!” Venezuela and Erza complained at the same time.

Lakshman waved his hand and said, “Forget about my appearance! Right now, you girls need to go to where Sumara is and put up the strongest barriers you can right now.”

“What? Why?”

“I don’t have time to explain right now, so hurry up and go!” he told them in a firm serious voice.

They all raised their eyes in surprise when they saw the fearful look on his face and realised this was more dangerous than they thought. They quickly looked at each other and nodded once in understanding before hurrying to where Sumara and her people were.

Lakshman turned to the Sacred Spirit cradling Amaranda Lefrity in his arms and said, “Hey, staff boy! Quickly take your master and follow after my wives!”

“S-Staff boy…?” the Sacred Spirit asked indignantly. “I’m sorry, but I’m not a staff boy! My name is Temidan and I’m a proud Sacred Spirit of my mistress, the Magic Titan!”

“Yeah, yeah. Whatever, staff boy! Just hurry up and take your master to where my wives are headed!” Lakshman said, totally ignoring the Temidan’s introduction.

Temidan glared at him furiously and began saying, “What makes you think—?”

“I’m the Phoenix Titan and as such, I have the authority to order you around! Now, hurry up and take your master, the Magic Titan, to safety!”

Lakshman almost shouted at him and possibly due to this, Temidan realised the situation they were in. He looked up at the monster that was absorbing the demon warriors with its purple gooey substances and looked back at Lakshman, who was wearing a serious expression on his face. With a single nod of the head, Temidan rose to his feet while clutching Amaranda and quickly followed after his wives.

Seeing him go, Lakshman turned his attention to the giant turtle below him and said, “Eternal Turtle! I know I’m not your master, but please listen to me for now! I want you to raise the output of your barrier to maximum and protect yourself and everyone riding on you! Do you understand?”

“GGGOOOOOAAAAAAA!!!!”

Lakshman smiled and said, “That’s it! Go for it!”

He flew high into the air and let the Eternal Turtle activated its barrier. Soon, its large body was surrounded by a strange looking barrier that appeared to be shimmering in the sunlight like water. Lakshman realised this was a powerful water barrier and it was strong enough to protect them if he was their enemy.

“Right! Now, to focus on that whatever thing is!” he said while turning to face in its direction.

By then, the purple body of the monster was going through a change as it completed absorbing the demon warriors. Lakshman quickly gathered the energy and flew towards it, but soon stopped to keep his distance from it. He narrowed his eyes and stared at the changing shape of the monster as he felt its energy. Compared to earlier, its power had rocketed skyward by a great amount, but it did not compare to his.

“I’m going to have to be careful with that thing since I can’t use the Spirit Burst Cannon because I don’t sense any evil intent coming from it. That leaves me with only one option of trying to find a way of killing that thing before it does too much damage to me and to the surroundings!” he thought firmly.

The monster finally solidified and took the form of the enemy leader, but with a purple body. It was also several centimetres taller than Lakshman, which gave him a towering look. Even so, Lakshman was not fearing it, but remained cautious regardless as he saw what happened moments earlier. As he watched, the monster raised both of its arms up in the air and began dancing while shouts its name.

“OOOORRRBBB!! OOOORRRRBBBB!! OOOORRRRRRBBBB!! OOOORRRRBBBBBB!!”

“What the hell…?” Lakshman exclaimed in shock as he saw the monster dancing while shouting its name. “So… Its name is Orb and it’s announcing this by dancing in mid-air?”

He could not believe the actions of this monster, which had fearsomely absorbed the demon warriors and was now playing around. Even the name sounds funny from the way it keeps yelling it out loud while dancing around like crazy.

At that moment, Orb stopped dancing and looked at him curiously. Lakshman looked at it in surprise as it tilted its head this way and that way as if it was wondering about him.

It extending its hand out and pointed at him before saying, “Orb. Eat you. Orb. Hungry. Orb. Eat more.”

“Huh?!” Lakshman exclaimed in shock after hearing what it had to say to him. He quickly realised that it wanted to absorb him like what it did earlier. He sighed and said, “Eat me…? No… Eat my attack!”

He brought the palms of his hands together and quickly gathered energy into it before shouting the technique name as he launched it.

“Positron Burst Cannon!”

With the charged energy ready, he brought his hands forward and unleashed a mighty blue wave of destruction. It rocketed towards the monster and it stared at it with wide round eyes before screaming as the wave pierced straight its body and continued onwards before resulting in an explosion. The monster made a pitiful cry as it floated around in the air helplessly.

“What…?” Lakshman asked in a surprised voice as he lowered his hands. He saw the gaping hole in the monster’s chest and said, “Um… Taken down by one shot? Them, what was all that power that I sensed? What’s going on…?”

He was confused that his one single powerful shot had taken the monster down. However, he quickly noticed that its energy was not depleting and instead, seemed to be getting stronger. A few seconds later, the monster pulled itself together and straightened up with the gaping hole in its chest.

“Ugh… That looks bad…” Lakshman muttered as he watched the monster touched itself.

Orb suddenly took a deep breath and screamed, “OOOORRRRRRBBBBB!!! PPPOOOOOO!!!”

In an instant, the gaping hole in its chest magically got restored along with the destroyed clothing it wore. This amazed Lakshman at how quickly Orb was able to regenerate itself destroyed part of the body. It quickly made him realise how dangerous the situation had become.

“It’s got both this weird power and the regeneration ability? Damn…! I have to take it down quickly before it’s too late!” he thought firmly.

He began surging with power before charging at Orb, who was dancing once again gleefully as the battle it and Lakshman was about to begin.

Author's Note

I'm sorry that I didn't post a chapter yesterday, but I was feeling down. Anyway, I'm back to full power today and written the chapter down!