Aryssa Holyworth wasn’t back at 100%. No one could after being lambasted with enchanted fire, but she was back on her feet and thirsting for vengeance. The priestess in torn and dirtied robe rose to the occasion and checked her equally battered colleagues. Artos finally done healing the bruised company. Sorin was still out cold. Amitate was back on his feet, unlike Magnolia and Emily who simply collapses after finishing the wall of ice, isolating them and the survivors from further attack. The barricade of solid ice rose from floor to ceiling like a curtain to a stage of devastation. It was a decent effort from both ends to create solid 800 tons of ice barricade.

“What are you doing? We need to kill the vampire.”

“Which?” Emily Aztellic asked.

“Both! Are you an idiot? We need to wipe every single vampire from this place.”

“Aryssa, enough,” Artos warned.

“Hate to agree with the holier-than-thou idiot, but he is right,” Amitate agreed with his archenemy. “We don’t know who sent the robot and you are suggesting we should execute a potential ally. What type of drug are you on, dimwit?”

Aryssa scrunched into a bundle of outrage. But it was the traitor himself who scored the finishing blow.

“She isn’t on drug, Amitate,” said Sun Senwei who remained in his crater. “The Holy Church fed their propaganda onto her for breakfast, lunch and dinner. I need to give the Church credit on their indoctrination programms. All its members, from top to bottom, believe their side of the story is correct, even when the evidence point to the contrary. Be glad we kinda outnumber her, so she can’t beat us into accepting her reality.”

Aryssa trudged toward Senwei, intending to commit murder.

It was then that the true test of character arrived, the ice barricade, thickness in the meters, crumpled like thin foil as the beast returned. A battered vampire skidded from amidst the flying frozen chunk. Icy mist and ice brick flew as she bounced across the floor, landing in a crumpled heap. Serina tried to rise, but fell back down. Even vampire-grade regeneration won’t fix the brutal beating she just received.

“Commander,” Joshua yelled worriedly as he witnessed the monster slowly marched to finish Serina once and for all. “Come on! You guys need to help.”

“Oh,” Aryssa smiled sweetly. “I will help alright.”

…

Serina’s vision was a blur.

Her body usually regenerated by now, but the electricity she ate was doing a number on her body. Oh, she doubted her healing factor got removed. No, the likeliest explanation for her lagging recovery was the unholy minefield of damages she suffered combined with the depleted Mana. Even vampire got limited in their healing. Serina never heard of a healing factor that wouldn’t correlate with Mana supplied. Imagine being able to heal despite running empty. Yeah, that would be totally unfair.

The monster picked up the vampires by the throat and squeezed. Serina resisted to her best ability, slapping that armored with ineffectual punch lacking any power.

That was the moment Aryssa dropped her attack.

[Holy Scripture: Sanctification Spire]

A monument of holy might appeared above the two and bathed them in a ray of light. Chain of sacred energy rose from the blessed ground and restrained both Luxinna and Serina. Serina’s blood froze she heard about this spell. It was a wide area of effect spell that restrained, weakened and roasted its victim to death with holy light emanating from the spire. The power packed behind this attack was at least low level of S-rank.

Sickness slowly washed over Serina. Her skin smoked. The light was slowly disabling the blood inside her body, hampering their circulation into a snail's pace. Sweat rolled from skin and evaporated into vapor from the scalding heat. Crimson glows surfaced on her skin and feebly blocked the light, but this was only delaying the inevitable.

Serina glared at Aryssa in the distance. That bitch launched the attack to take out both her and the monster. It was a smart move. She would have done the same, but that knowledge didn’t aid in stopping the well of bitterness rising from her heart. She couldn’t blame anyone but bad luck for this hopeless position. Reflection won’t matter. Even knowing the result, she would still leap in to defend her subordinates.

Guess she and her mother weren’t much different.

However, the light of destiny had a different opinion. Serina was meant for much more than dying in a sneak attack. In a surprising twist of fate, it was her tormentor that came to the rescue.

Indeed, the holy spire was strong. Its strength was enough to imprison Luxinna who was also being weakened by the light, albeit to a much lesser extent compared to Serina due to benefit of not being a vampire. The crutch which spelled the Sanctification’s inevitable failure was Aryssa Holyworth’s lack of understanding in the elf’s 2nd Legend. If Aryssa fully understood Luxinna’s arsenal, she would have grabbed all 33 Stars, ran to the nearest bunker and prepared several magical nuke and few S-rank.

But she didn’t and now she would experience the True Magic which fated to grow so powerful it put fear and awe into the heart of the gods.

…

“Stop!” Joshua rushed toward Aryssa who fell to her knees after launching her most powerful attack. “You are killing the Commander!”

“That is a bonus!” Aryssa replied was maniacal. Her eyes were widened with ecstasy. “We get both the monster and the vampire.”

Joshua, knowing that force was a must, drew a knife, but was stopped by a figure.

“I know how you feel,” Artos grabbed his hand and squeezed, forcing Joshua to drop his weapon. “But this is a best shot at stopping that thing.”

“Heh,” Joshua fearlessly stared into the elf’s eyes. “So, this is the true face of the Lightwell. You gladly toss aside the woman who saved you from Salazar at the moment it suits you. You know I don’t really feel that guilty about being a criminal anymore, because at least I still got more honor than you lot.”

“Shut up.” Magnolia Drakokia glared at the boy. “A few must be sacrificed for the greater of many. Those sacrifice is what keep the world going around. That is reality.”

Joshua responded with a spit, but Artos gently stepped aside. Not even bother to retaliate.

Sadly, the 33 Stars seemed to forget the mystique of magic was the defiance against reality. A spell wich wrought miracles and salvation on a hopeless impossibility. Throwing the permanence of humanity and self-respect for the brief tenure of group satisfaction was the last offering Mana would accept.

True Magic represented this unbending rebellion against the physics of certainty more than anything. Life was a battle and, as the power truest to life, the miracles of soul burned unreasonably bright against the oppressiveness of reality.

Under the monument of disingenuous purity, True Magics buckled in rebellion.

A brief second later, a golden light brighter than a star shone, then the forest of glass erupted. Golden glass grew from the steel floor like lush flowers and ferns, a beautiful ever-expanding formation of glittering crystal grew from the construct like the rising amalgamation born from the reaction of mercury and aluminum. It was akin to watching the video of planted grow at a fast forward.

“What?” Aryssa, exhausted after putting she got into that spell, gaped at the miracles.

Like a reverse water fall, golden glass grew like mosses on the massive spire of light. It shouldn’t be possible for anything to find purchase on the mirage composing of spell formula and holy light converted from Mana, but the glass did it. Leaf and petal of gold sprouted from the light spires, and the spread wouldn’t stop. Like black oily ink spreading in a water, the golden fern grew at an accelerated pace, covering the spires of light from top to bottom, blocking its blinding light with the golden shade.

The spectators witness the weakening light of Holy Church utterly vanished behind the veil of golden glass. The monument was no longer the shining white beacon, but softly glowing lamp of gold and petal.

Beast Luxinna turned toward the culprit behind the spell. Without the Spire weakening her, she easily snapped the of glowing energy immobilizing her. The girl took a step forward. Behind her, the collective garden of glass shimmered, releasing fireflies-like dandelion from those golden flowers. The golden seed shone, charging the elf with more power.

…

The 33 Stars watch wide-eye.

“Impossible…” Aryssa was more than wide-eye. Her brain simply switched into the deep pool of denial. The priestess’ mind refused to witness the reality that her entire Mana pool accomplished nothing against this threat. “No way… This can’t be…”

“Did she just... absorb Sanctification? How?” Magnolia Drakokia barely comprehended the tearing of law of magic theory and spell crafting.

[Holy Scripture: Sanctification Spire] were composed of paranormal photon created by Mana but at the frequency of radiation found in Heaven Realm. Not even the angel or light attribute magic beast could assimilate the energy because of the unique frequency the light possessed. This radiation also weakened almost every biological and pseudo-soul like existence. Yes, this spell had been blocked, interrupted and even destroyed in the Church's long history, but never absorbed. No one ever plucked one of Holy Church’s best attack and digested it like candy.

Until now.

Luxinna turned toward the recovering stooges. Meanwhile, the Serina fell to the floor gasping for breath, the chain of light around her shattered to shards. The development was transparent, they just wagged their finger at the tiger.

“Serve you right,” Joshua sneered at Artos and Magnolia. “Guess your sacrifice for greater good doesn’t accomplish the damn thing.”

“Shut up,” Aryssa yelled. “We must--”

Beast Luxinna appeared at the speed of the flash, picked Aryssa with one hand and smacked her to the floor. Joshua and the girl nearby him, Yurica, prepared to run, but someone pushed them down.

“Sssh,” Sun Senwei leaned over the two. “There is nothing a predator loves more than a chase, and speaking of the chase, Amitate about to show us the result first-hand.”

In the background Amitate tried to leap away in black fire, but the beast was faster. She flashed above him and nailed the demon to the floor with a heel drop. Not wasting a moment, she picked the winded demon with her clawed foot and threw him toward the downed priestess in a flip.

Amitate slammed into the injured Aryssa head-first like a missile. Artos Sevar attempted to counterattack by unleashing his strongest moves. He combined the spirit of light, Hermione, and water, Penelope, into a cohesive torrent of compress holy water jet. It was attack guaranteed to carve the man in half.

[Harmonic: River Breath]

The attack carved toward Luxinna at the speed of a fighter jet, but it was too telegraphed to defeat the instinct and speed of a monster. Luxinna easily ran past the attack and brought Sevar to a close-quarter combat. Credit to Artos, his sword was fast, landing a slash against the elf, but Luxinna’s exoskeleton easily tanked the strike.

Luxinna grabbed Artos sword and ran current through the blade.

Remember the relationship between elf and lighting?

Artos felt his world turned upside down. Behind Luxinna, the [River Breath], guided by two-spirit, dissipated to nothingness as a torrent of electricity dismantled Artos’ control over his spirit and then his conciousness.

[Devil Flame: Black Bat]

[Infernal Ice: Hell Shackle]

Emily cast the shackle of aquamarine to bind the elf’s feet. Meanwhile, the staggering Amitate attempted to finish the elf with giant bats make out of black inextinguishable flames.

Luxinna unleashed an ion beam from her mouth, reducing the bat to nothing. She then shed her feet’s exoskeleton and walked out of the ice shackle without caring a damn.

[Ourinaros: Wind Breath]

Magnolia’s lion of a storm knocked Luxinna off her feet.

[Ampule: Downburst]

A floating mermaid unleased a torrent of water down on the beastly form of Luxinna.

[Frost thorn: Freezing Thorn]

A spiky sculpture beside Magnolia fires a dozen thorn on the waterfall pinning Luxinna, freezing her in icy popsicle a series of crackling and popping noises.

Silence.

“Hey, do you think we got her?” Amitate dared ask. Apparently, he was alien to the concept of tempting fate.

It was then the shuddering of ice answered Amitate’s question.

No, being buried under ice wouldn’t stop Luxinna Alter.

The frozen tower crumbled. A figure cladded in the overcharge of electricity rose from the falling rubbles. The standing trio sensed the presences of death as the falling ice exploded. They saw a flash of lightning. They knew what was coming and threw every they could to stop it. Shards of aquamarine ice impaled the floor and ionized air blew away the black fames. The blast of wind dug the hole in the floor, but missed the demonic elf. Everything failed. The unbeatable beast cladded in an armor of doom slammed into their midst.

Magnolia saw that sharpened claw and her terrified face reflected from her execution’s glass face plate. In that semi second, the young heiress time slowed as her life flashed past her eyes. She wondered why and how did she end up here. Before the grim reaper knocking at her door, one last regret lingered in her mind.

She never found out how her sister is doing.

It was then the miracle arrives.

Torrent of flames blasted from the ceiling and hit the unbeatable avatar of destruction. The swirling flames swirled like an ocean of inferno and carried the monster away from her. A woman emerged from the fire, cladded in a mental of flames, shining like the breaking ray of sunshine.

Then she heard the alluring and energetic voice which chimed like dancing sparks.

“Whew, it appears I arrive just in the nick of a time.”

…

The remaining 33 Stars watched her arrive in full.

Clad in a mantel of sun fires, the knights of Horizon Dawn stepped from out of blazing flames. Melody Solarmaria updated her clothing again. As the most fashionistas of the knight, she updated her combat gear after decently exposing herself to Earth’s culture courtesy of Rem. Melody sported a new elegant form-fitting blouse made of Aria-steel thread and Alchemically produced fiber made of ground Sicilian Ghost Dragon’s scale. She whistled, silently thanking Cytortia who spent a month researching new products from their loot during the Millian crisis and produced a thread made from crushed dragon scale in an Alchemical technique that would have won her Alchemist of the Year award.

Being a recent material, Melody only finished making her own gear, but she went all in on extravagant. Melody wove a skintight legging, vermilion scarf and dark brown leather jacket not unfamiliar to a fashion magazine. She even adapt Rem’s night vision filter into a stylish goggle.

Flames around the bend into the tornado, which formed into the symbol, declaring the abolishing of disaster.

Emily stared at the woman who trounced both her and Aryssa in the glamorous department stepped past her to confront the monster. A familiar man in a helmet and trench coat floated down beside her on a circle of sigils.

“What a flashy entrance,” the Chronicler turned toward the utterly battered 33 Stars with annoyance dripping from his voice. “I hate to be a git, but, seriously, you were warned.”

“Enough shit chat,” Melody cracked her fingers as her scarves fluttered in the air. “I will handle the tree hugger on drug. You fix the deadweights.”

The Hope Dawn, the symbol of Horizon Dawn, burned to announce Satholia’s knight’s arrival.