Before the explosion

‘We are almost there, but I have yet to come up with a solution’

Zuku thought to himself as they neared the forest housing his brother’s mansion

‘My only option now is to interrogate the Elar for information about the Rune’s, one of their own was just devoured by the darkness, I refuse to believe they won’t collaborate to get out of this mess’

“Ash is in the air” The quite Arisu broke his line of thought

‘Ash?’

He noticed that here was indeed the faint smell of ash in the wind, he had been too preoccupied and didn’t notice, furthermore the smell intensified the more they neared the forest

Zuku frowned and told the rest to speed up

They were soon at the periphery of the woods, and once the trees barred there vision no more they were met face to face with the burnt remains of the withered forest

The siblings were stunned, in the distance they could see their brother’s mansion had burnt down with nothing but a room remaining, but their hearts truly lurched when they suddenly saw the Elar family go into the room

“NO!”

The Half Moon Wolf suddenly burst out as it sped toward the house with the yell or Arisu accompanying it, Zuku woke form his stupor before following with a burst of his own, he would not spare the Elar family if they harmed his brother, even if it meant breaking down any future collaboration

Arisu seemed even more determined to save her bother as she had already started chanting before she reached the door, she planned to summon her other Soul Beast and dive immediately into battle as soon as it ensued

Not wanting to leave his sister to battle on her own Zuku also started to summon his own. And by the time the siblings reached the room they had already finished chanting resulting in two hexagrams appearing, as two different creatures came out of them, one was a large red sabretooth, with flames rising out of its mouth, while its claws looks as hot as magma, this was Zuku’s Soul Guardian, the other was a green wolf that had prickles on its back, protruding directly from its spine, which ended with a protrusion at the neck forming a half circle above the head, this was Arisu’s most well-known Soul Beast, Thorn Crown Princess.

The sudden burst surprised the Elar family which hastily got its beasts to take the front while they summoned their shields

Their surprise though could not be compared to that of the Shenai siblings, who, upon entering saw the horrifying sight of bodies lying on the cold ground, blood smeared all over the place, with but one glance one could tell a fierce fight had happened here

Arisu stepped to front and surveyed the surroundings, she looked through the bodies before suddenly spotting a familiar set of cloths among one of them, her usually calm eyes suddenly showed a storm brewing, she leaped off her mount and landed next to the body and holding it close

Zuku had also spotted the familiar cloths, and anger rushed to his head, his emotions started to boil over as he turned sharply toward the Elar family

“Hey! Don’t look at us like were the ones who did it, we just got here like you did, plus look at the bodies, they must be a few days old already”

The one who spoke was a voluptuous young lady, her chest heaved as she yelled at the top of her lungs, while her hips swayed out of habit, she seemed to have just the right curves for her slim yet busty body

Zuku payed no mind to those details though, but her words had indeed registered through his mind, he then looked back at the body and say that it seemed to have festered a bit, he could tell by the missing wound on the head that it had been a few days, and they had also seen the Elar step into the place just a few seconds before them, so they couldn’t have done anything in the short frame of time

Arisu on the other hand had already regained her calm eyes, though they had a tint of confusion in them, she then placed the body on the floor before getting up and heading back to her mount, she then looked at the other bodies and noted none of them had her brothers figure

Zuku looked at his sister’s sudden change puzzled, even if she was over her shock she shouldn’t just leave her brother’s body on the floor right?

“It’s not him” whispered Arisu, she didn’t know why the figure had her brother’s cloths but the soft sensation when she touched the bodies chest alerted her of the truth, she had even slipped her hand down there when nobody was looking, what she found, or rather, what she didn’t find affirmed her thoughts

Seeing the conviction in her eyes Zuku believed his sister, he didn’t know how she identified the body with a missing head but now wasn’t the time to ask, instead he turned to the Elar family and barked at them in anger

“Whether it was you or not, out brother is dead, now get out of here, we need to search this place for clues”

Zuku didn’t know what the person who did this had in mind, but he had to find out, his brother was either ejected or killed away, he could also have escaped, though he didn’t like hose chances with the Rune his father had put on him

“Is that the first thing that you want to do!? The dead is dead now we need to find a way to get out of this Dimension, stop worrying about corpses and start worrying about those sisters of yours”

The words of the young lady, Elar Valza, hit their mark, even though he knew his brothers body wasn’t here, which they didn’t know, her words still rang true as he didn’t know where to even start

“Bro-bro-brother Y-Yu i-i-i-i-i-i- “

The voice of a child interrupted the conversation, everyone turned to the source to see a teary eyed Ayanna, everyone had forgotten this child in the heat of the moment, and now it seems she had awoken form her own shock of seeing such a horrid scene, only to hear that her brother was one of the dead corpses on the ground, a headless one at that

Arisu turned to hug Ayanna, who finely stopped stuttering, and burst into a crying fit, the sound alerted the other families fearing to go into the room, pushing some to take a few peaks inside, which resulted in more than a few screams

“That is not brother” Again Arisu whispered, but this was not Zuku who was tempered by his role as a commander, this was a little girl who had never seen flesh before this instant, thus her words fell on deaf ears as the girl continued to cry in sorrow

Valza frowned at the scene and turned to Zuku saying “Look we lost one of our own as well, but we must find a way to get out of her, brooding will not bring them back to life”

Recalling that they had indeed just lost Vracdous his anger started to recede, in any case he still had his sisters to save, so he had to leave his brother life up to the will of the Paradise above

“Alright, but first I need you to tell me what those Runes in the clouds were, if you cannot trust you”

True to his reputation Zuku put his foot down from the very beginning, not giving Valza any time to negotiate

Valza grit her teeth in vexation, it didn’t help that the crying sounds of Ayanna still ran through her ears

“It’s not that I don’t want to help you it’s that these things are a secret of the Elar family, I’m afraid I might get punished to death if I reveal them”

Her argument was met with silence, the opposite party wasn’t a fool, he didn’t believe they would hang the second young mistress of the family for exposing such a secret, even if it was actually true so what if her punishment was death? She would die anyway to the darkness

Thus the semi-silence continued for almost a minute, with neither side willing to back down, only the cries of Ayanna could be heard in the room, until a sudden youthful voice rang out form the entrance

“What happened here”

Everyone turned around to see a boy with white smooth skin, a set of determined eyes, and a set of torn down cloths…

A few eyebrows twitched at the inconsistency, but people were overall surprised by the appearance of Adrian, for he looked nothing like the malnourished him from a few days ago

The young Adrian didn’t pay heed to their feelings though as he surveyed the surroundings, he had heard a young girls cry and rushed here with haste, that was especially since he had met fatty Gon in the woods who had told him that this was Yu’s mansion as they were making their way back

‘He.. doesn’t seem to be here?’

He was actually searching for Yu since he thought he was the root of the problem once again; he had steeled his heart to kill the erroneous spoiled noble as soon he discovered his new misdeed

He didn’t spot the corps wearing Yu’s cloths as the beasts were barring sight. Still some of the other bodies were spotted, and the blood all over the place led him to believe a battle had been waged so he turned to the two sides that he believed to be the perpetrators

Zuku frowned as he saw the judgmental look in the eye of the boy but didn’t dine to explain instead her turned to look back at Valza, expressing his stance once again

Seeing as there was no change in the situation even with the young Adrian entering the fray Valza bit down on her teeth before explaining with a forceful tone

“These Runes are part of an ancient mural that we found hidden within one of our castles, the Runes themselves I have no knowledge of…” She stopped to see Zuku frown before continuing with a laugh “You may not believe me but we actually have no knowledge of what ‘Spawned’ what we did was merely sacrifice bounded Soul Beasts and used the technique we learned from the mural to summon random Runes among the ones recorded down, I even believe some of the ones that came out were not recoded by the ancients, so even if I want to tell you what they are I can’t, since I don’t know, the only thing I can tell you is that all of these Runes belong to the Yin set, so the only way to beat that darkness is to conjure Runes of the Yang set’

The more she explained the deeper Zuku frowned, by the end of her speech his face was already black, he knew what she meant by saying all this, but he dared not voice it

“You want us to Ignite” it was Arisu who spoke the words he didn’t want to hear. Yes, this was Valza’s aim all along, she wanted one of the Shenai siblings to use the forbidden technique of the family, Soul Ignite, a technique that used the very Soul of the user to erupt with power, but the consequences didn’t mean just death, it meant the Soul of the person would vanish form existence

“No, you were the ones who caused this mess, thus you must find a way to solve it, I don’t believe that you are hopeless to deal with your own techniques result”

Zuku protested, he didn’t want to use such a method, as though he didn’t fear death if it was to protect his sisters, he didn’t want it to result to that if there were other ways, plus he sure as hell didn’t want to protect these despicable humans too

“Do you think I’m just wasting time to trick you? If I really had a method then I would have already used it, Vracdous would have used it, I wouldn’t have gambled with my life on your whims!”

She shouted like a mad woman, she was seething form anger on the outside, but on the inside she was rejoicing

‘Hehe I indeed don’t know of a second method and since you would never forgive yourself if your sisters died when you could do something then you will definitely choose to use the forbidden method’

“Everyone! The darkness is almost here! Run! Run to the woods”

“Run? We’ve already run so far and it keeps catching up, we can’t run anymore, it will catch up anyway and we will. We will…”

“I don’t want to die…waaaaa save me mommy daddy”

“Damn it! Why did I come here, I should have stayed with Malesia back home, I would be in bed now...”

“Wuuu wuuu”

Came the cries and panicked voices from the outside

The two sides then carefully came out of the room as they watched out for each other, but when they saw the darkness approaching, they lost the will to argue anymore, for the bitter despair was at their doorstep

“I’ll do it” Interjected Arisu but was straight out rejected by Zuku

“No, if anyone must do it I will, my mastery in fire is higher than yours, I will have a better chance at taking the darkness out”

‘Why don’t you both do it’ is what Valza wanted to say but she knew she would be the first to face the might of the technique if she spoke those words

‘Hehe, it seems the stories of our technique have become exaggerated, there is no way I can contend with this darkness with my weak Soul alone, even if me and Arisu both Ignite at the same time we still might not have enough power to take it out’

Both Zuku and Arisu knew this fact, they looked at each other and nodded, Arisu then started to back up stealthy with Ayanna, she wanted to make some distance while Zuku bursts, then she would use the technique herself and cleave both the Elar’s and the darkness together, they had already used their shield in the room so she was confidante she could take them all out, while their Ignite wasn’t as exaggerated as it was made out to be it was indeed a force to reckon with, for their ancestors use of this technique always turned the tide of battle around, crushing all opposition, but that was only when the person had a strong Soul and a great mastery over fire

On their level though they didn’t have the capital to erupt with such power, but she and Zuku were willing to bet their very Soul to give Ayanna a chance, of course, they had to take the Elar’s out too since they didn’t want to leave her in their wicked hands, they would definitely kill her to hide the truth of their blunder

Inhale~ Exhale~

Zuku took deep breaths, calming his mind in preparation for the activation, once he had reached the prefect state he started to take wide steps toward the darkness, peering into its depth, like a challenger………

“Huh?”

A sound involuntary escaped his lips as he peered into the darkness, or precisely, at the edge of the darkness, for he saw a figure walking ever so slowly, taking leisure steps one after the other, making the darkness at his back seem insignificant

Seeing Zuku stop and stare the rest looked in the direction he was peering at, they were left breathless from awe at scene

“Brother!”

The one to scream was Arisu, her eyes showed another turmoil as she seemed hesitating as to whether leave her sister here or leave her brother to the approaching darkness

Her choice didn’t seem to matter though as the figure came to a halt, his demeanor was playful and mysterious as he surveyed everyone with his green enchanting eyes, eyes that seemed to have all truth revealed before it

The faces of the people were a sight to behold, some were shocked senseless that he was alive, some were awed by his presence, some were suspicious of his arrival, and one had stopped crying after half a chapter

After looking everyone through, Yu spread his hands to reveal the Castle Core hovering above them, then the Core started to float up with him guiding it, it continued to ascend until it was high within the sky

He looked toward the sky and then toward the center of the ruins, and mouthed out, ever so slowly, the words

“Welcome to Southern Paradise

Where Not everything is what it seems”

He suddenly raised his heads and spread his arms wide, as if calling for the heavens to affirm his speech, and that they did for the Core burst into light, light that covered the sky, light that made the darkness seeking the Core retreat in fright

Light…. That ended despair