A Sinless City {Job/Elyx}

“No, keep it alert. We don’t know when the enemy is going to strike again,” she told him when he asked if he should let his bird rest. She glanced up at the creature, checking to see if he looked exhausted, but he did not really look very fatigued, so she nodded and then averted her gaze elsewhere. She raised her arms to stretch as far as they could be stretched, making a satisfied noise as her joints produced cracking noises. It was not good for her bones, she knew, but it was a habit now, one of those habits that were hard to get rid of. Lynn then laced her fingers behind her back since she didn’t know where to place her hands. Then the sudden warning from Elyx made her stop. “Huh?” she asked, confused with an eyebrow raised. Her hands fell to her sides as  she received a strange, foul smell from the surroundings. “Ew, what’s that smell?” she asked in a voice like she was gagging, face scrunched up in disgust. “It’s awful, man. What the fuck?” she kept on complaining. As the seconds ticked by, the stench only grew stronger. It was not the smell of anything dirty, but the smell of enemies approaching. Sometimes when there are a lot of enemies, the smell that she would get turns into an unpleasant one, making her want to vomit.

A thousand shadows loomed towards them, some on buildings, some on low ground. Lynn looked around frantically, now in a stance that was battle ready. Their enemies had appeared slower than she had wanted them to, but now that they were here, she was kind of shocked at how many of them were there. “This is bad,” she told Elyx in a slightly shaky voice.  It was not the end of it. One of the shadows kind of somersaulted down one of the buildings and landed in front of all the other shadows, making some kind of an entrance move and raising his weapon before introducing himself as ‘Rhask’. He said something about meeting his crew that was going to beat Lynn and Elyx into a pulp for being nosy little bitches. That made Lynn burst out into a fit of untamable laughter. “Oh my god, that was funny,” she said through breaths she struggled to take. Clearing her throat she looked at Elyx. The man known as ‘Rhask’ was done with his introduction it seemed because he disappeared in some kind of smoke. “Hm, well, looks like he’ll come back later?” she asked Elyx, then turned to the shadows that got closer to them and became humans, a great number of them wearing dark cloaks and masks, the darkness mage getup, while about a second group with smaller numbers wearing lesser dark clothes as they approached more cautiously. “I’ll take the weaker ones,” Lynn told her partner.

Seems like a great guy, I can't wait for him to meet my palm. Elyx would tell Lynn as he would fill his right hand with a sphere of spinning wind, the air around them beginning to grow violent. So many enemies located in front of them, they were all like bowling pins that needed to be taken down. Fortunately, he was a professional at games, and he was able to get a strike on them every time. Only one of them will be talking smack when I get close to him. The God of Ishval promised before he would nod his head to what Lynn had told him. That was fine by him, he would like to not have to hold back when he shamed all of the mages in front of them. It was not going to be a quick elimination either, that would be far too merciful for them. Elyx hated arrogance, and the prick that was Rhask was beyond that. Was there even a word for it? Prideful sounded like a sugar coated version of it, but there did not seem to be a word to help amplify the meaning. How unfortunate. All right then, tell me if you need anything then. All those over there, they are mine! And with that, his body would blur as the sphere in his hand began to grow in size, obtaining the wind around it and adding it onto its own power. The mages seemed ready to fend him off, but they would be lucky to even catch him. And so some of them fired some spheres of magic towards him, all of which seemed to have no effect on him. While sustaining a bit of damage, his body was able to heal it rather quickly. After marching through, one unfortunate short dark mage would end up receiving the impact towards the stomach, launching him far into his army of allies and knocking a whole line through. One quickly tried to engage with him in melee combat, a quick uppercut to the throat, in fact, to end things quickly. Quatro! He would mentally call towards his lineage, and his body would coat with white magic as the dagger hit his throat, but bounced off like the metal had hit a brick. Not a single atom of skin had been cut through, and now the Sky Deity Slayer was pissed off. That was not very bright of you! Another palm of wind, but it was coated with more darkness as it slammed against the throat of the second mage. Elyx held that enemy up by the throat as the darkness swarmed through the body, leeching the magic power before it entered his own system. Once the drain was finished, he dropped the body as it laid limp and jump back.

Once Elyx agreed to her, she grinned like a child who was given candy, and averted her gaze to the weaker looking adversaries. It was rather stupid of them to have huddled together in the first place. They should have mixed up with the stronger ones, so that they could not be targeted like this. However, that was not Lynn’s business. Her business here was to take them out of their path, so that Lynn and Elyx could face the man known as ‘Rhask’. What a stupid name, really. Lynn made a mental note to remember to let him know how stupid of a name he had when they met again. The Ice Dragon Slayer turned her back to Elyx and the group of enemies he was going to take, focusing on the group she was going to take. “Are you all prepared for the cold? Because winter is coming,” she told them, a pair of wings sprouting from her back, spreading on each side of her as she rose into the sky above them. Zlatan followed her, activating his protection bubble and staying  close to his mistress. The darkness mages raised their heads as she ascended, most of them throwing random spells at her, all of which bounced off the bubble and dealt damage back to them. “Nice try,” said the sorceress, calling upon a blizzard upon them with her arms raised.

As she did so, a storm of wind and ice would begin to fall in the area that the apprentice mages covered, freezing some to death and weakening most of them. The blizzard only grew stronger as time passed, taking out more and more of them. Their darkness magic had no effect on her, thanks to the bubble, and not to forget Zlatan’s weakening roars. The area of effect had snow piling up now, burying some of them while some tried to shield themselves from the heavy snowfall, which was useless anyway since her guardian’s protection bubble was too strong. A minute later, Lynn began to feel like they were managing under the blizzard? She would not allow this, and with the snap of a finger, the snow that fell began to explode as they met the ground, dealing even more damage now in the form of icy blasts. The enemies began to panick, putting up even more defenses that were only broken, as more of them lost it, dropping like flies to their demise. “Oh yes...winter is here,” she laughed as she watched her magic do the work, taking lives one by one, of their enemies, well half of them anyway. She glanced over to see how Elyx was managing since he was taking the larger half.

Now that he heavily weakened one side of the whole lot, it was time to make sure that they are out once and for all. The others will be heavily weakened, but if they were able to brace themselves for what was coming up, they were going to make it. Hey, that meant that after this was all over, they can go back to their dumbass friends when they got home about how they survived a nuke. Amazingly enough, a magic nuke can be survived. It was weird. Oh well! Time to carry it out. This spell fusion required a lot of energy, and it would restrict him from using two of his spells for quite a long while, one of which actually is his H rank spell. Damn. Oh well though! This was designed to take out a huge number of enemies, and these fools brought it upon themselves. Oh my, the snow around here is lovely. Is it winter already? My, time seems to be going by so quickly. Soon, it might just be... And with one snap of the fingers, the atoms in front of his body were splitting, and once atoms were split, they created an explosion. Now imagine over Octillion atoms splitting up. That was a nuke. Judgment day... And with those cold words, the nuke would drop onto the huge wave of enemies, causing many of them to fly, the ones who were already weak. It was always a mystery to him as to why they never tried something while he was speaking. Oh well, it was over for them from the start. And he was glad for what Lynn did. The nuke was flashy, it was probably best not to look at it.

How are you doing over there, Goddess of the Winter. The Sky Deity Slayer would ask, his smirk on his face as he looked over to her enemies. Seems like she was just doing what she normally did. Kicking ass and having fun. For some reason, he felt a sudden rush of energy. Battle, it was the adrenaline running through his veins that made him so happy. What else could it have been? Oh well, it was time to look back to the current situation at hand. The remaining enemies that were there for him now. As for all of you that remained, congrats. This next spell will be your prize. Make sure to remember it well before you even dare step back on the land of Era! The boy would exclaim before placing his hands out towards the grounded enemies. They were about to be blasted away with a huge bellows coming up. Hey, it could have been worse. It could have been the nightmare bellows.

“Goddess of the Winter? I like the sound of that, even though people usually call me ‘Ice Queen’,” she replied, amazed by his giant explosion. The dark mage apprentices were dying under her spell, she observed. She could imagine how the cold was destroying them. From their skin to their insides, it would creep slowly to their heart, freeze everything over until there was nothing left to freeze. Zlatan decided to play as well, crash landing in the middle of the entire bunch, crushing most of them as he went rampant. Lynn was glad he was enjoying this. Usually he would do it because it was his duty, his purpose. But now it looked like he found a playground for himself. Lynn laughed as she watched him go crazy, chewing off their heads and leaping from one mage to the other, roaring in joy. With the excitement that Zlatan was causing, Lynn’s blizzard grew even stronger, everything becoming blurry and hard to see with the amount of snow that was falling. At this rate everything was going to be covered in snow. If the sun was not shining right now, it would already have been a pile of snow. Thank god for the summer heat. Lynn folded her arms, a grin spreading across her face. She liked the fact that she had turned the entire area into something that resembled the north where she trained with Einar. It made her feel sort of nostalgic, but she was not the type to be missing stuff, so in half a second she had already gotten rid of the memory, focusing on the current situation.

Sometimes it was hard to get rid of such memories, but those were different times. Right now she was making Einar proud by using the magic that she had taught her. Well she was making both Einar and Ganymede proud. Even though one of the two were now dead, and by her hands. Ganymede was the only mentor who pushed her past her limits. It would have seemed impossible to most people, but Ganymede was rather heartless. He didn’t usually care about what Lynn thought at that time, he only cared about what he wanted, and what he wanted was for his pupil to become someone who would conquer. Even though he himself could not achieve this power, mostly because of the people who were opposed to him, he wanted someone, his successor who was his pupil, to be able to achieve greatness. And Lynn was not the type of pupil to fail their master. She will achieve greatness very soon, whatever it takes. It is what he wanted for her, why should she not want it too?

In a few minutes, all of her foes had been cleared out, making her grin even wider with triumph. She looked over to Elyx and noticed that he too was done. “Awesome,” she said, slowly making the cold go away so that the weather was normal again. She dusted her hands off her clothes, now descending towards ground level and looking around, realising they had not completely finished their task here. The rascal named Rhask had run off, and now they had to find him. Where could he have run off to? Anywhere in this huge ass town. “Ugh, now we have to find Rhask,” she told Elyx, looking around as if she thought she might find him within her range of sight. She gave Zlatan a look and he immediately understood. Listening to the vibrations beneath his his feet, the winged lion searched the surroundings for any trace of the Archmage by echolocation. But it seemed the mage had either ran out of range or flew off somewhere. She did not know if he was capable of flying or not, but she doubted it. She remembered him carrying some kind of weapon. Wondering what the weapon could do, Lynn tapped her cheek with her index finger. It could not possibly allow flight. Or so she hoped. The fact that it was pretty dark in appearance made her brows knit.

“Let’s go find him,” she told Elyx if he had not already thought about finding the dude. “We can’t let him jeopardize our mission.” Then she would climb onto Zlatan, hoping that Elyx would do the same. Even though they were both slayers, she wondered if Elyx would have motion sickness on Zlatan. The only reason Lynn did not have motion sickness while flying on Zlatan was because of the fact that she had been doing it forever. She got used to it. Either that or it was because Zlatan was not a vehicle. The only form of transport that had a life in her lifetime traveling was Zlatan, so that could be a possible reason. Now that she had concluded this, she would turn around to check on Elyx. She wondered if being H-rank had helped him overcome this sort of thing. If it did, she could not wait to be H-rank, even though she had Zlatan for any kind of travel. She did not necessarily need it, but it would be nice to have, anyway. She could keep Zlatan less exhausted from carrying her around, not that she was a fat lump, but the longer the journey, the more tiring it was for him, this was obvious. So now they searched around Era for this man, Archmage Rhask.

There was no reason to fear being on the back of the flying lion. Many might think of him to be worried about transportation due to him being a Slayer. However, the unique thing about the Sky God Slayer effect was that he was not affected by the movement of a flying being, since it only would make him enjoy the movement. After all, his home wasa in the sky, and being able to resist any negative effects added onto that. If that was not enough, then there was Stella, willing to protect him from being paralyzed by movement. Yeah, he was pretty much covered. So with that, he would place himself onto the back of the flying animal, Pride, before he would nod his head. He could not have gone too far, I'm sure we will find him. For now, let's just focus on detecting him. I can sense him from a far distance, and I will need you to tell Pride where to go. The Wizard Saint would tell her before placing his palms on the back of the lion. It was nice to get back into the air once again, and he could be able to Air Step using the effect of Bound Iris, but why waste his energy? Lynn was offering him a ride that did not require his magic, and he was not even a heavy person, despite the weaponry and keys that he had on him. Perhaps he should treat her to something later for saving him the pain of getting out of his lazy stage. Then again, the last time they did something "fun", she nearly got him drunk... That was an unfortunate day. Right before he opened his big mouth, he would refrain from giving the offer. Instead, he would then make an alternative statement.

Thanks Lynn. All right, shall we go? Choose any direction you want, and I'll tell you if we are getting hotter or colder. The reason why he would not give out Rhak's location was because the distance between the greater source and the many mages of Era would have just about an even magic level. This was simply because he was getting away, and if Elyx felt the sudden drop in magic power, he would then tell Lynn to have Pride go the other way. In other words, he had no idea where Rhask was. Even he was not perfect, despite how much fun it would be for that to be the case. He was once a runaway Lerale, now he is a God of Ishval. Oh how things change so quickly. In the end, he would end up being successful. Now, Lynn was attempting the same thing, aiming for such big enemies such as Rhask.

Rhask had probably taken his grand time getting as far away from them as possible while they were fighting his stupid minions. Lynn had hoped she stayed back and let Elyx go after the Archmage. Now they were going to have to spend so much unnecessary time looking for him. Thank god for Elyx’s ability to detect him. She guessed he was either going to detect him by sensing his magic power or his scent, though she doubted Elyx could remember his scent too well by just meeting for a few moments and having to search in an entire town afterwards. If H-rank abilities included that, then Lynn could not wait to be H-rank. First of all, she would use it to detect her enemies straight away in jobs so she did not have to spend so much time going around looking for them. It was trickier for those enemies that knew how to fly. Otherwise, Zlatan could use his echolocation technique to track them down. “Alright, then let’s start by traveling east. I see some kind of shady neighborhood around there. Maybe that’s where Rhask is hiding,” she told Elyx. She was not sure, of course, if Rhask was there. It was a blind guess. At least they had somewhere to go search for him instead of roaming aimlessly in the air hoping he would pop us.

Zlatan took a turn and now they were headed eastwards, passing by a very illegal looking area near the borders of Era, which was supposed to be the city that housed the Magic Council. In fact, she wondered if the Magic Council allowed such places to exist, because politics? Lynn was not the biggest fan of politics and she barely understood these things, but she knew that there were some things the government, and the Magic Council, had to let slide for political reasons that should not be allowed, however, if not for these reasons. The thought made her sort of interested in politics for a while, until they passed that area and was flying over a tiny forest. The neighborhood that Lynn mentioned was a bit far from where they were fighting Rhask’s soldiers. “We aren't exactly there yet, so if you feel anything wrong or whatever, just let me know so that I can tell Zlatan to turn back, or go wherever you suggest,” she told Elyx so that he was aware. Lynn had no clue where they were supposed to go, clearly. Tying her hair up into a ponytail, Lynn fanned herself. It was rather tiring and since the weather was not very pleasant, she was beginning to sweat. She shifted herself on Zlatan’s back until she was comfortable.

They were going to the east fair enough for now. He would activate his sensory to see where he can locate the source. After a bit, the energy did not seem to be trailing away from him, it was just there. They seemed to be in hot pursuit since they were not closing the distance. In order to carry that out, they were going to have to take a little shortcut. We found the right path Lynn, we just need to keep traveling towards that direction! The Sky Slayer would tell her, everything looking good so far. As long as no monkey wrench was thrown into the plan, they should be all right. Placing his eyes down onto the ground, he would see the ant-sized people located below them, chuckling a little bit as there were just traveling by. There were only a few of them since the population smartly decided to stay inside. Hopefully, Rhask did not strike at them, they were not going to have a good team if there was a hostage to deal with. Placing his attention back, he would then feel a sudden drift in the magic, it was beginning to turn. Go a bit towards the north, he's trying to shake us off! He would tell Lynn, pointing Northeast now, hoping that she would follow his command. With that, the both of them would end up charging over towards the direction the enemy was going if Lynn made her move. If she had another plan, it would have to be done quick, because Elyx's was based on chasing rather than being sneaky. While he could jump off and land safely before traveling on the ground, by running, he was sacrificing his senses and would focus more on avoiding the buildings and killing anyone by running them over. This seemed to be his only choice. If Lynn were to comply with his command, he would lower his tensions a bit so that he could continue to sense where the opponent once, entering his sensing state. There was no scent that could escape the Slayer, that was for sure. With that, he would then begin to get a read of his opponent, getting closer to him and seeing what he is trying to do. I'll take a wild stab at this, but I think he's trying to get recruits to back him up. I suggest we be careful when traveling, we might end up having a few of them try to shoot us down. The Wizard Saint would tell her before ending up focusing on their task once again. Eh, I guess we could just charge as fast as we can from this point, it does not seem like he will be going much further since we're nearing the edge.

Lynn was glad to hear that they had traveled in the right direction, causing her to command Zlatan to go even faster, which he did. She hoped that the stupid Rhask did not expect them, otherwise he would be escaping out of their grasp once again and that would be annoying. It was already a bother having to find him so if he had any more plans, Lynn would go berserk and probably freeze the whole town, not like she was capable of doing such a thing. She did not have enough power. If she was H rank like Elyx however, she might be able to do something like that. Sadly, she was not H rank and freezing the whole town would have to wait. Now that she thought about it, she wondered how long it took for Elyx to reach H rank. Maybe she should ask, but now was not the time to be curious of personal things, so she kept her mouth shut. All these random thoughts had almost made her miss what Elyx said next about changing the direction northwards. “Got it!” she shouted in reply, snapping out of her head and steering Zlatan so that they were moving to the north now. So Rhask did expect them and he probably had more back up plans. What a little annoying piece of shit. She hoped she could kill him and end this right away.

Then Elyx spoke her thoughts out loud. He said that Rhask probably had recruits and will probably try to shoot them down. This made Lynn smirk. “Oh don’t worry about getting shot down. Zlatan is great at midair evasion,” she told Elyx, just to assure him. He then told her that they should charge as fast as they could. Lynn heard this and so did Zlatan and in the next few seconds they were zooming through the air at incredible speeds, you would have thought you saw a yellow flash in the sky if you looked up. “We’re almost there!” Lynn shouted, seeing a little group of men in familiar uniform and one of them looking very much like the Archmage Rhask. As soon as they noticed that Zlatan was charging towards them, they began to run, but it was too late. Zlatan landed with a loud roar, probably destroying their eardrums and throwing them off balance with his mini earthquake, the result of his landing. Lynn hopped off immediately and hurried over. The ground underneath Zlatan’s feet had sunken in, creating four tiny craters inside one huge one. This would probably leave a mark in Era until someone came to fix it. The Ice Dragon Slayer made sure that the surrounding was cold enough for them to stay still.

They were nearing the source of power before the landing had been made, causing the earth to shake as they made their dynamic entrance. It was pretty badass, he'll be honest. But now he had to add onto the effect, they could add bark, but it was a bit that ended up working on the opponent. Rhask was evading, but was unable to find the recruits in time, he was open for the taking. Elyx took it upon himself to take the job and place his feet on the ground quickly, creating a similar shockwave in the process so that they can intimidate the leader, who was too busy fleeing from the scene. There was a queasy feeling in his stomach, now allowing him to use the Sky God Bellows. It seems it had yet to feel better, which was fine since he did not rely on it too much for taking an opponent down. The same applied for the wind spheres. Seems like he was going to have to play by the blade, bringing out Bound Iris so that he could extend it. Using the Effect of The World's Access, the end of the light blade would heavily extend so that it would take on a new form, allowing it to reach a devastating 100 meters. With Air step, he would then begin to charge at his opponent, Rhask evading the first slash before jumping onto the tip of the blade, planning to use it as a surface to attack Elyx with. The Sky Slayer would swing it once again to launch Rhask away, but the boss held onto it with a tight grip, very stubborn. However, this prevented him from advancing. The Wizard Saint needed to retract the boss off of his blade. Using the Worlds Story effect, five blades of light would form around the blade before firing off to the hanging enemy, who would eventually give in on his grip and let go of the weapon, falling onto the ground to face the group of them now instead of running away. Elyx would put away the Worlds Access since he had just learned the danger of using it in this fight. So they were going to have to use magic, and he wasted a lot of it before. Now his techniques were waiting before they can be used again. Lynn was going to have to take charge for him right now before they can continue any further. The Wizard Saint would rest his tired wings, not bothering to attack once again. It was not like his body was tired, he had plenty of magic, but he used a lot of his best things, which have a huge cooldown to them in the end. Even the Spell fusion had a damaging cooldown that he was forced to follow. At the end of the day, he needed to wait a bit more. This was Lynn's chance.

Once they landed, Elyx took no time to attack the Archmage who seemed a bit surprised, but once attacked did not falter in fighting back. He clung onto the long sword that Elyx used, making it hard for the God of Ishval to deal with and everything was literally just a big blur to Lynn because she had not even thought of how to enter this scene of flashes she could not follow. She just watched as everything slowed down and Rhask was on the ground. Elyx seemed to be exhausted or something, because he did not continue to do anything for a while, which Lynn took as her turn in the show. Zlatan let out yet another roar, weakening and deafening their enemy who stumbled backwards. Lynn thought of how exactly she should deal with Rhask. She did not want to give him special treatment. So she began to freeze the ice inside of him. It was harder to do than with his apprentices since he was a higher ranker obviously and had more magical resistance than his followers. Then, he began to grunt, as if he was physically resisting to this as well. Lynn tried very hard to freeze his insides with her mind, jaws tightening as she forced her magic into this action. Rhask slowly came to his feet, glaring at her as he clearly struggled to keep his insides at normal temperature.

“Elyx if you can keep him still, I can try something,” she told her partner, turning to look at him. Now that Rhask was up and ready to attack back, Lynn’s hold on him had been released. ‘Fuck,’ she thought, taking a step back. Rhask looked very angry, but she could feel that he was very wary now, and also a bit afraid of Elyx. The fact that he was not so full of energy made Lynn relieved in a way. He was a bit more powerful than Lynn, but nothing compared to Elyx. The only reason that Elyx did not fry him to ashes already was probably because he did not want to overdo it and cause unnecessary damage to others. At Elyx’s level of magical prowess, he could probably level countries...maybe even more than that. He could probably wreck an entire planet! But now, if he did that, that would be no good, so Elyx was probably limiting his damage output. Rhask would probably be turned into nothing real fast if Elyx did not mind losing the rest of Earthland as well. Lynn then focused on keeping the weather as cold as she could. She could see snow falling now, and piling up very slowly around them. It was winter again.

The order was to try to hold him still. Okay, that seemed like something that he could do. Before giving the chance to charge however, he would be met with a sudden new shadow sort of being. Dark magic, how casual. But it felt a bit different, a little creepy. It certainly can send chills down a spine. With that, he would step to the side, only for this sudden new being to try to get in his way. Damn it, he was trying to stall! Elyx could not let it happen, and he would have to exert some magic. However, if he did that, he would only limit his options against their enemy. And besides, if he tried to go around the being, that would have Lynn focus less on an attack of Rhask and more on the new Shadow Being that was in front of her. Seems like Elyx had no choice, he was going to have to slice with Bound Iris. In doing so, he would aim a stab to the chest with the weapon, only for the body of the being to suddenly mold a convenient hold. The physical attack was unsuccessful. It would try to return the favor by aiming to slice at the Sky Slayer's throat. Elyx moved his head back before aiming a high kick with a metal boot to the face. However, the head of his opponent would deform once again... The attacks weren't working! Quatro would then place his palm out towards Elyx... It seems like there was one way to do this. Placing his eyelids over his light brown eyes, they would soon turn into a bright white color before then opening them again, meeting eyes with the shadow being. It would end up being frozen in place, the Perfect Paralysis damning his opponent and keeping it still. With a final slice to the throat, he would force the being to dissolve into the darkness without a trace. No effects can be made while the perfect paralysis had been placed. And while Elyx did not like to resort to using it, he damn well knew that he was not going to get anywhere without it. And with that, he would continue to pace towards the real enemy that was Rhask. Lynn might have been able to carry out an attack during that fight, or perhaps kept Rhask still. If not, they were going to have to do it soon before he escaped once again, or before backup were to arrive. At that point, they were going to have a much harder time, because they were just about done with using their magic. Or at least, any of their tame magic... If they wanted to take it to an extreme... They'll probably shatter Era in the process. Probably a monkey wrench to their plans.

Just when Lynn asked Elyx to help her out with the stupid Rhask dude, something else had to come up, and it was a shadow thing that she had never seen before. It was probably Rhask’s creation. She knew he and his minions were all shadow or dark mages after seeing how they fight back. Lynn did not know how she was going to deal with Rhask while Elyx obviously would have to deal with the shadow. With a grunt, she turned to Rhask who was now glaring at her and glancing cautiously at Elyx thought it was a great idea to attack her now and lunged forward. Lynn rolled out of the way, ending up in him shooting straight into Zlatan’s mouth with some kind of shadow speed boost or something, but Lynn did not see it. What she did see was that he entered Zlatan’s mouth and very quickly was out of it, because Zlatan had spit him out. He probably tasted bad. Rhask shrieked and tumbled as far away from Zlatan as he could before turning to see the lion that had almost swallowed him and making a horrified face. Lynn could see the saliva on him and made a disgusted face. Zlatan made an equally disgusted face. Now she felt like never laying a hand on Rhask, not that she thought Zlatan’s saliva was disgusting.

“Ew,” she said loud enough for Rhask to hear. He responded by standing back up abruptly and making angry grumbling noises before telling her to shut up and wiping some saliva off his face. She blinked, the sight of him being grumpy like this reminding her of an angry little old man. He decided to walk towards her now instead of running, bringing out a weapon that she had not seen him use before. A secret weapon? This was no good. The first thing she needed to do was get rid of the weapon because she had a bad feeling about it and the amount of magic power it was emitting make her mind race. If Elyx was going to take more time than he should with the shadow creature, then Lynn was going to end up dead by Rhask’s hands. Zlatan roared even louder, telling his mistress through telepathic messages that it would be a good idea to get onto him now and evade Rhask’s attacks by flying. “Good thinking,” Lynn said and mounted Zlatan, holding onto him tightly as they rose into the sky as Rhask slashed at the space that they were in a few seconds ago. It was a good thing he could not fly. Lynn checked Elyx’s situation and she was so glad to see that he had defeated the shadow being.

The being had been defeated, and now Lynn made her escape. Seems Rhask... Rhask... What was that all over his body? It was like a sticky form of water... And it certainly did not seem to be water alone Elyx did not dare question the liquid, it might have been a trap. There seemed to be no presence of power from it, so maybe he was just assuming things. Regardless, he had a chance to strike from behind while he still could. The Saint would place his blade, Bound Iris, back up before firing five swords of light towards his opponents back. All five of them would end up striking, pinning against his back as Rhask would emit another shriek like the one he made before. Did he not ever get tired of screaming like that? With that, he would then place his blade up against the enemy, who would then use his own ability to take out the blades without placing his hands on them, forcing them to return back to their owner, who no longer had the element of surprise. Seems like a bit of wind manipulation was now in order. Placing his palms out towards the sides, he would end up creating two spheres of wind in his palms once again, the palms taking their place. This was his signature move once again, and while the attention was not 100% on him, he was planning to take advantage. He would then quickly boost his speed stats to match his opponent before adding onto his own power, placing his feet against the ground swiftly as he practically blurred once again. Rhask had not been given a chance to retaliate as the brunette would place his wind against the exposed stomach of the boss that the duet were supposed to defeat. With that out of the way, he would send Rhask flying once again. Seems like the Guild Master of Golden Phoenix was not one to turn his back on. However, Lynn was now able to attack, since all of the focus was now placed on Elyx. In the meantime, the brunette would just smirk at his opponent, knowing full well that the blindside was where Lynn was as of this moment, and that if he were to be charged at, Lynn could get in between and cause some serious damage. However, who was he to predict the leader of the enemies of this job? So with that, he would keep standing in front of his damaged opponent, who seemed to refuse to go down. One was thinking, one was waiting. Hopefully his plan was to stall long enough, and to keep the attention onto him. If unsuccessful, he can't guarantee a hit for Lynn

After Zlatan and Lynn took off, Rhask was left to face Elyx, which she was glad to find out because if Rhask was after her, she might end up dead or something, who knows. Lynn then waited for the perfect chance. All she needed was for her opponent to stay still. She was dead set on rupturing him instead of doing anything else because if that was successful, it would be the end of their tiring job. She was already tired, but she did not plan on losing determination until the mission was complete. She was now behind Rhask although in the air, watching as Elyx used a wind attack on him which had injured him to an extent. Rhask was not done with, however. He was probably angered now, as he moved forward towards Elyx. Maybe this was her chance? She did not know. Rhask was powerful, and so was Elyx. Elyx was definitely more powerful than Rhask, she knew. So maybe he was creating an opening for Lynn right now? Zlatan moved a bit closer. It seemed Rhask had forgotten all about Zlatan and Lynn, driven with fury and rage, his attention a hundred percent on Elyx. Maybe he was planning to finish off Elyx and then coming for Lynn. However, he did not plan well enough because Lynn found the perfect opportunity to freeze him in a cocoon, and thanks to the shock that he received, he was slow to react. Lynn then channeled the ice into his body, anything liquid in his body slowly cooling down to very low temperature. He did have the determination to turn and hurl something at them, but Zlatan evaded it with ease, whatever it was that he managed to shoot at them with. Once that was out of the way, Lynn focused on the ice within his body. It was definitely harder than using this technique on less powerful people. His magic resistance was the highest she had felt since the job she had done with Izayuki. This technique itself was adopted from Iza’s own rupturing technique that she had learnt on that job. Iza had used it on less powerful mages, so it had a higher chance of being successful. Lynn, however high the risk, was using it on the boss of this job. Every passing moment drained a huge amount of magic energy from Lynn’s body and as Rhask groaned and tried to struggle from the ice cocoon, she had frozen most of his insides and was ready to rupture him. Zlatan thought it was a great idea to land now, which might have been a good idea. Lynn summoned all the energy in her and with great strain she was able to make the ice implode in him.

Lynn was able to get their opponent by trapping them in a sphere of ice. Elyx would keep his distance, not wanting to get in the way of whatever was about to happen. As long as the boss did not get out of the cocoon that it was in, the three of them should be fine without him getting in the way. With that, he would tilt his head to the side before then closing his eyes when the explosion of ice occurred, probably shattering the boss enemy inside. Elyx would hold up his right arm to block any impact from the ice shards that would also be sent towards him… Yet… While the man inside was done, he was actually getting up as if it had barely done anything! How much damage was this dude going to take!? Now the Wizard Saint knew he was going to have to do something really damaging to get towards Rhask. And so he would have to go on a personal level, but he was going to have to sign a contract with the Sky Deity. And this time, it was going to be a much bigger one than before. One that was going to force him to accept the darkness for the moment. Placing out one palm out to the side, he would then begin to open the first contract, signing it as a regular finale dark sphere had been made. However, the second contract was preventing him from getting in the way. He would feel a small burning down inside of his throat as he would end up placing his palm upwards above his head. The wind that was vibrating was beginning to spark when the atoms was not going to hold together any further. However, while it was increasing in size, Elyx was going to need time, and time at this point was not something that he could have alone. Ignite was not with him on the job. So all that he had left to rely on was Lynn and her pet, which he had yet to learn the name of yet. It was just too damn hard to get, and it was an unfortunate name to be named since no one would get it right for the next few days. On the plus side, despite having that, it was a strong enough beast. As long as the Ice Dragon slayer and the flying lion were able to hold off for long enough, he could continue donating to the spell that he was about to carry out. The darkness was flowing through his body freely to give him an advance in power, and it burned… But it felt amazing all at the same time.

Lynn groaned as she finished the spell. There was an explosion, but Rhask was not dead. Yet. The ice dragon slayer soared up and away from Rhask as she glared down at the son of a bitch who could not be put down just yet. She didn’t want to have to do this for the amount of bloodshed this may cause, but her mind was made up and she gave Zlatan a grave look. She was going to ask him to tear Rhask into bits. Zlatan knew what her look meant, and glanced over at Elyx for hope. He did not want to kill anything or anyone like that. Zlatan was an innocent soul and would not be able to bring himself to do something so barbaric. Thankfully Lynn followed his line of sight and saw what he was looking at. It looked like Elyx was preparing for an attack because he did not only look like he was concentrating, but he looked like he was about to release something (like a fart), if her eyes were not playing tricks on her or something. Zlatan flapped his wings so loudly, Lynn was snapped out of some kind of phase that she was in...it was probably her loss of energy. Anytime now, she might just drop down unconscious or something, not that she was worried about it because Zlatan was there and ready to protect her or save her if she did drop down and faint. But because of the fact that this fight was not over and the job was still to be completed, Lynn decided it was a good idea to keep herself focused and not to flip out. Instead of doing something (which was even more stupid than flipping out), she decided she could hold Rhask down for Elyx at the moment.

Focusing on all the energy that she had left, Lynn froze the water vapor in the air around Rhask and manipulated the ice particles to combine and hold Rhask down. Zlatan hovered near her so that he could catch her if she was going to fall after losing so much energy. Lynn had never lost consciousness from losing energy, but it was possible at this rate so it was not wrong to be careful about it. Her wings began to flap weakly as if they were trying to move through a thick sticky syrup. Lynn’s mind felt like it was going at the speed of the fastest thing in the universe. Blood rushing through her veins, was that adrenaline? She could not even feel her own body to tell if it was adrenaline or not. Her entire body went numb, as if the ice she had created had transferred to her.

At this point in time, it was far too late to just accept turning around. The second contract had been signed, meaning that he was going to have to give half of his body up for the moment to the darkness that was his own magic. His purple eyes would gain a rainbow effect, constantly turning into all seven of the rainbows in the form of a quick slideshow, blending into one another. His who body had not been given to the darkness, so he was able to control it. However, his limits have been broken and any strain left on his body would end up being his own fault. Was it something that he was willing to risk? In this case, definitely. They were going to be running around in circles at this rate, gaining no progression if they were unable to do a thing about Rhask. It was risky, but worth it. He knew it would put the final seal on the being. So the darkened sphere that had been formed would eventually begin to ripple the air violently, allowing it to spin violently as it would then begin to rip the matter of the earth itself. His eyes were locked onto the target that seemed to be bound, seems like Lynn was listening. Or perhaps that was just a coincidence. Regardless, she had done the task needed for him, only to look somewhat fatigued at the end of it. He would try to hold back, he can’t cancel the spell that had been activated once any form of contract with the sky deity had been signed. So with that, he would end up forcing his eyes to avert back to the bound Rhask, who had no control over his body now, making him an easy target, a free hit for sure. He’d blur into the air once again, using the speed that Stella had given to him when Rhask was right in front of him, giving the free speed needed to carry out the task. Right arm lifted with the sphere in his right palm, he would lunge it forward towards the stomach of the man, allowing it to grind into the stomach of the being as he would then crush the sphere. As a result of this, the world had gone into a negative for a bit, all of the surroundings seemingly stopped... It was all over. Rhask would end up in a moment of his own, where he got to see the Sky deity once before dying to it as the explosion would only affect him. With that, in the real world, Rhasks’ body would end up falling forward and face first onto the ground, a defeated leader.

The activation of Elyx’s spell felt magical as everything surrounding him broke into ripples. Just in case his magic was unable to identify friend or foe, Zlatan created a bubble of protection to keep Lynn and himself safe. Rhask was completely done for. He had nowhere to run, nor did he have the power to. The defeated man stayed still, waiting for his end, hoping it to be quicker. Lynn almost pitied him, after trying to escape so many times, he failed, and now was going to die in the hands of his enemies. How hopeless Rhask would feel. But there was no time to pity him, for this would only lead to the failure of her own job, which also means - no rewards. She watched with unblinking eyes, the excitement as Elyx’s magnificent display of power running through her veins. It always happened. Every time Elyx did his magic, she would be thrilled to no end as if she was a little girl watching a show she really enjoyed and it was her favorite scene. This brought a thought to her; did everyone feel this way? Would she feel the same watching another H-rank do their magic or was it an Elyx charm? It was already funny to think of Elyx having a charm. Maybe she should use this as a topic of conversation on another job or something.

The battle ended with Elyx being the victor. Rhask laid in defeat on the same spot Lynn froze him. The ice that held him had already melted into the ground around him. “Dude, that was impressive!” Lynn said as soon as she dropped down from Zlatan’s back and approached Elyx, wondering if he might be okay after doing something so draining. “If you’re hurt, I can take you to a hospital nearby,” she added, a bit worried. “Or do you want to continue our adventures from the first job, hm?” she asked in a rather sarcastic tone and threw her head back laughing. As you can see, she wasn’t very useful at trying to help someone recover from severe energy loss. Maybe this was her method - trying to cheer them up with bad jokes. “In any case, since we’re done here we should get back.” She hated wasting time and proceeded to help Zlatan lift Rhask up to get him onto the lion’s back since they were supposed to bring him back. Lynn kicked around the many things that were lying near the place Rhask collapsed, then reached down to pick up his weapon, shaking it to remove any dirt and then bringing it back with her onto the back of Zlatan as she climbed onto him and waited for Elyx before departing.

The impact of the dark sphere was devastating, so much so that it would cause time itself to stop. Yet to Lynn, she saw only the beginning and the end of it. Nothing of the negative at all, and maybe it was better. There was no reason for her to see the power of the sky deity in him. The one that was tired of being called weak,, the one that tried to rebel against all of the other deities, and only ended up failing in the end. It was such an unfortunate scene to be considered weak, and to unleash the power of the one who wanted revenge, all of that power to be bottled up inside Elyx, it was going to be taxing on the Sky Slayer. He felt a bit of the darkness around him, his head hung down as a shade would emit on and over his eyes. With this, he would end up tiredly looking up at the sky, feeling himself calm nearly instantly from the use of the spell. While he was still able to carry out a fight, he was not in the best state. The spell he used ended up costing him a lot of energy, but not to the point where he would actually look weak. He was then reminded of the being that helped him even carry out the spell in the first place. Despite him probably being the most hurt out of the both of them, he would then decide to ask her the question. Are you hurt? The Reiaki would ask, a smile on his face in response to the joke that she let out for him. She did nearly force him to drink, and it damn well sucked. Taking up the offer that Lynn proposed to him, the both of them would hop onto the back of the flying tiger before he would place the palms of his hands onto the back, pressing a little bit, but not with so much pressure that it would hurt the animal. As it is, it muse suffer from having two people on its back. So tell me, where do you wanna go now? Claim the jewels? Back to your guild? Or do you have any other ideas? The Sky Slayer would ask, but not turn his head to look to her. As it was, they were going to need to focus more on speaking rather than eye contact. And considering the fact that he was prepared to fight against getting drunk if she so chooses to go into a bar and drag him along, he would probably need an answer from her. It was not that he did not trust her, but he did not trust her intentions... Perhaps that was just about the same thing. Regardless, the both of them had done their job, but they had plenty of moonlight to let shine before the next day arrived.

The first thing that Elyx said to her made her blink a little. Why was he concerned if she was hurt or not if he was the one doing something that could have hurt him? “Um, no? You’re not the one to ask that question,” she scoffed, amused. When he got on the back of Zlatan, he asked her where they were going now and she raised an eyebrow at him. “Look who didn’t read the job carefully, hmmm? We still have to turn Rhask and his weapon in, silly,” she said while laughing as she patted Zlatan on his back, signaling him to depart from their current location. They were headed for the Rune Knights headquarters to turn in the unconscious murderer and the weapon he used. She was pretty excited, not only to receive rewards, but also to take Elyx to another bar. It was always funny to watch a newb get drunk and she wasn’t successful in getting him to the level of drunk she wanted the last time. This was her second chance. “Though I do have somewhere else to go after this,” she began, checking the sky to as if to see how late it was, “and I don’t want to go alone. Do you mind accompanying me?” With a smile, Lynn asked for the very first time, for Elyx’s help. He probably thought it was strange or suspicious, but she was a bit paranoid being in Era around all those Rune Knights after realising the fact that she had committed a few crimes even though that was before she was fully came to the legal side. Lynn climbed down her guardian as she reached for Rhask’s body, calling for Elyx, “Hey help me out here.” Zlatan stayed back outside as Lynn and Elyx went straight in without knowing exactly where to go. At least, Lynn didn’t.

They walked wherever their feet took them (unless Elyx knew the way), but at last a man in white robes stopped them with a high-pitched greeting and a very excited question. “Is that the Archmage Rhask we’re all trying to capture!? You brought his murder weapon, too!” Hands trembling with a look as if he was hungry, the man waved a hand at them and told them to follow him. Lynn shrugged at Elyx and did as she was told. They reached the end of a long corridor, a room with an unnecessarily large amount of space and a man behind a desk in the far corner.

“Hello,” Lynn greeted, hoping it wasn’t too awkward, then rested the body of the archmage on the patterned rug in front of the desk. She stood back and waited for him to check what they brought and reward them with the appropriate amount of jewels.

Lynn would ask him if he was willing to go with her somewhere. This could have been one of two things. The first one was obviously his suspicion, and that she was trying to get him drunk once again. And the second was that she truly did not want to go alone. Both of them ran a big risk, and to weigh them out he needed to think for a little bit about what he could do. Seeing as they were nearly home, he'd rather not get drunk. But the chances of a dark mage still around ready to capture her and begin to slaughter her... Yeah, those were there as well. All right, sure. I'll go with ya. The Reiaki would explain before slumping the deadweight of a man over his shoulder. Nearly killed him, but he still had a heartbeat despite all of the impact that had been done. With that, the both of them would walk aimlessly. If Lynn really knew so much about the job, she probably knew where to turn in the body as well. Alas, that was not the case as they were just aimlessly walking around, to little of their notice of course. Fortunately, a man in a white robe would arrive on the scene. Lynn would place the body down along with the weapon. In exchange, the man would throw the bag of jewels directly at the face of the Sky Slayer, causing him to stumble back a bit, but he caught the heavy bag of jewels that ended up in between his palms now. Er... Thanks... He was more phased by the surprise, since there was not really much pain that went along with the bag of jewels. With that, he would end up looking over to Lynn before the man with the white robe ran off with Rhask and the weapon, not even so much as a hello or a goodbye had been said. Seems like the desperacy to find him was large, but at least that had been done.

All right... That is now done. Now shall we go? his tensions were rising once again, he was not going to drop his guard when it came to Lynn. She tried once, and she was most certainly going to try again now that the jewels were there, and they were going to have plenty of money to have drinks. He might be paranoid, but she gave him a reason to be, and he was going to take full advantage of it. Though she may or may not know about him being suspicious of what she planned to do... How she was going to do it? He had yet to learn.

The man behind the desk rose to his feet and walked around his long, narrow desk to examine the body of the Archmage and picked up the weapon, checking if it was something that could be potentially used to kill more than a helpless fish. Lynn coughed impatiently and was a bit thrown off when the man in white robes threw a bag of jewels at Elyx, who catched it. Looking from the white man to the other one, Lynn made sure that there was nothing else to add, then she gave a smirk in Elyx’s direction and said, “Thanks, we’ll be making our way out now,” before turning to leave. She assumed it was the end of their job and so she decided to leave. Now was their time to chill since their job was not only one of the harder ones, but it was past sunset. It was naturally time to chill the fuck out. “Alright, since I’m the one who knows the directions to where we’re going, you can just take a nap on Zlatan or something. I’ll make sure we get there before it’s too late in the night,” she told Elyx in a believable tone as she mounted Zlatan and waited for Elyx to get on behind her. Once they were both secure on top of the winged beast, she patted him, giving him a telepathic message of where she wanted him to to take them.

The ride wasn’t long enough for someone to actually take a nap if they wanted to restore energy, but it was just enough to not kill Lynn’s mood to have fun. The night was still young and she had not given up her determination to get Elyx drunk. Zlatan landed softly in the middle of the dark, deserted street and Lynn stepped down to the cold concrete as she looked around. “Zlatan can’t be with us, so let’s go,” she told Elyx as she led him into a dimly-lit alley, and in the corner was an entrance to a narrow stairway. The LED sign above it said ‘Levels’, the name of the place. Lynn didn’t say anything else as she took the initiate and casually entered, walking down the steps. It wasn’t the hour yet, so the place was quiet and quite bright, at least enough to see where you were stepping. “Watch your step,” she said, either way. On reaching the end of the stairway, they would be greeted by an empty bar, a bored bartender playing a board game with a bored waiter behind the bar. They shoved it away as soon as they saw that they had guests, and immediately welcomed them, telling them to have a seat. Lynn took the centermost seat at the bar and patted the barstool next to her, a gesture for Elyx to come sit beside her. “We’re going to have to wait for the person I’m meeting. It’s a bit early now,” she told him and ordered two shots. “In the meantime,” she began and handed him the first shot with the salt and lemon.