Now that Thea had let out some steam, she had a way more relaxed expression on her pretty face, she turned to see Marlene and nodded at her, before saying.
"I'll go lend a hand up there", the long night of the Maelstrom Sea was still ongoing, so the white light from Aurora's domain, slightly pierced the black clouds and illuminated the nearby area.
Naturally, before using such a showy spell, Aurora made sure that there weren't more enemies in the vicinity, otherwise they will give their cover away and that didn't go along with Daimon's plan.
But even then, it was better to end the battle as soon as possible, Thea was blocking the nearby space to prevent anyone from sending messages or escaping, curiously her darkness worked even against items from system users.
As that time when she interfered with the portal created by Remi using the black scroll that Marcus handed him, suggested.
It was similar to how Aurora was somewhat resistant towards Adam's tricks, a proof that systems aren't almighty, at least not the things that can be bought from the store, because the rewards are on a different level.
There is also Sarah who was completely unaffected by Adam's charm, though Daimon theorized that is related to the fact that she is half Nethereal, that or because she has a few screws lose, so the way she perceives things might be different than normal people.
So far Daimon categorized Adam ability to trick others as a way to distort perception, since he couldn't directly order others, but made them like him, until they became crazy about him, like it happened to that girl from the Penddra family, at least that's what he currently believes it to be.
Thea soared into the sky as she went past the clouds to go help Aurora finish the battle sooner.
…
Past the clouds there was a violent turmoil ongoing, the white cubic ethereal fortress was being assaulted both from the outside and the inside, outside there was dark blue lightning impacting the fortress, while inside half of the area was covered by an ominous black mist.
The enemies did it like that because, lightning might get in the way of the black mist and benefit Aurora instead, also unlike lightning mana which was present in the clouds that surrounded the whole area making it easier for the black robed guy to attract it towards them using his domain, the black mist wasn't a natural element and so it didn't exist in the atmosphere but was produced by the body of the masked guy, in a sense it was similar to battle aura.
The difference is that battle aura is produced by a knight's life spark, mixing mana and vitality, while that black mist seems to come from the bizarre deformed body parts of those who had chosen to become Nethereals, or from that black sphere that some of them have.
"What the hell are you doing, hurry up and reinforces, my lightning isn't especially effective against light, and that disgusting mist of yours is weak against her, we'll only die if we don't do anything!", shouted the black robed figure to the masked guy.
"Shut up, do you think I'm as stupid as you, I tried to contact Lord Garrius but there is interference, there should be someone that is skilled in spatial laws, blocking the nearby area".
"Fuck, that's why she dragged us into this turtle shell-like domain, so we can't get out of the space restrained area", the black robed guy couldn't help but curse, they were played with.
The masked guy saw a white ray of light coming towards him and he snorted, as he created a dark mist wall in front of him to fend off the attack, unfortunately he couldn't completely block it, but it was enough to stall it so that he could dodge it.
The black robed guy raised his hand and lightning condensed on his palm forming a blue lightning spear, which he threw at Aurora that was being protected by a white cubic barrier, at the same time the black robed guy summoned more lightning to hit Aurora's domain from outside trying to force Aurora to divide her attention, but before the lightning spear could land, a black portal opened in front of Aurora and swallowed the attack.
All the presents felt a new presence appearing into the battlefield, surprisingly Thea could appear inside Aurora's domain, without telling her beforehand.
"Are you done on your side", asked Aurora, to the elegant black-haired woman holding a spear, that came out of a portal next to her.
"Mm, those two clows weren't a threat to begin with, the problem are these two", answered Thea.
Aurora smiled as she nodded, her domain focused on defense, she could trap enemies and keep them here, battles of attrition were her specialty, but right now they didn't have that sort of time, because if too much time passed without these guys reporting back to their superiors, they will suspect and come to see what is happening.
The angelfish clan seemed to be important for both Marcus and the scheming guy, otherwise they wouldn't have sent two recently ascended, high stage Stellar ranks to capture a group of non-combatant girls on the Lord realms, and three early-stage Arch ranks.
Naturally the bosses didn't lower themselves to come here, they just gave the task to the subordinates, but they couldn't be blamed, who would have thought that a Maximum Stellar ranked would appear out of nowhere.
Especially Marcus who hadn't experienced any setback in his mission considering he has made a few high stage Stellars submit to him, but that has started to change, starting with Remi's "death".
"I'll take the lightning affinity guy, the Nethereal is yours", said Thea as she became a line of black light that zig-zagged towards the black robed guy.
Naturally the enemies weren't willing to be separated, otherwise their only chance to defeat Aurora will disappear, unfortunately they had no say in this, unlike the black mist domain which was ethereal, the white fortress was solid probably because its base was the spell Silver Fortress which increased physical defense as well as magic defense.
Aurora snapped her fingers and a white wall raised from the ground, dividing her domain into two, successfully separating the two high stage Stellar ranked enemies from each other.
She didn't do this earlier, because that would have eliminated the advantage she had, due to the incompatibility of the affinities of the enemies, if they didn't have to worry about their elements clashing against each other, they will both summon their domains at their maximum output to worn out Aurora's one.
But with Thea participating in the battle now, there was no need to worry about that, because the enemy won't have attention to spare, to attack Aurora's domain while fighting with her.
The black robed guy saw that he was now isolated from the masked guy and he sinisterly laughed.
"You just lost your advantage, without that annoying black mist in my way, I can go all out!", since the elegant black-haired woman arrived to this battlefield so fast, she must have had easily defeated Fabio and Milo, so the black robed guy didn't underestimate her, even if she was one realm lower than him, he saw how his lightning was easily blocked earlier.
"I don't believe you can keep controlling the space under a lightning storm!", shouted the black robed guy, his body exploded in dark blue electricity, as his domain which had the form of a lightning storm formed behind of him.
The whole area was flooded in lightning that even engulfed Thea, covering her little in comparison, pretty figure for a moment.
Seeing that his sudden attack took his opponent by surprise, the black robed thunderously laughed, as he released even more electricity, the idea was to not leave the opponent even react, and fry it to death.
"It's a shame that such a pretty woman will end up as a burned corpse, but whatever, once I become a Maximum Stellar ranked, what woman will be out of my reach…", the hoping voice of the man behind the black robe was interrupted as he dodged at his right, avoiding by a few millimeters a line of black light that was aimed at his chest.
Or so he thought, but he then felt a horrible pain coming from his shoulder where a clean hole appeared.
"Damn it all, that hurts bitch!", shouted the man as he saw Thea coming out of the lightning storm, completely unscathed, there was a thin layer of darkness covering Thea's beautiful body and any lightning that approached her was absorbed by it to never be seen again.
Thea rolled her spear on her hand and a black portal was created due to her maneuver; a large quantity of electricity was ripped apart from the domain of the enemy just like that.
"Royal Fang, Dimensional Chasing Hydra!".
She then turned into a line of black light that charged towards the enemy, her figure formed a giant black snake made out of darkness.
Wherever that darkness snake figure passed, the lighting was erased, which made the black robed guy's face became unsightly, his mana decreased every time his lightning was erased.
In other words, unless his lightning was strong enough to make the flying mass of darkness what controlling a spatial breach, unstable, his domain was useless.
"Fuck!", the black robed guy took out his weapon, a dark blue saber and charged while his body exploded in blue electricity, the best way to deal with a space user is with attacks that have mass, but lightning isn't known for being heavy, so the only way he had to counter Thea's fighting style was using his weapon to fight at close range.
In a sense, Thea's fighting style is similar to Aura's one, their elements are incredibly fierce, but in exchange they lack in the wide area of affectation department, so they adapted to force their enemies to fight them in close combat.
Aura used her insane lightning-like speed to hunt her enemies down, like a proud wolf attacking its prey head on, Thea on the other hand, took advantage of the unpredictable property of her space-oriented darkness to take the enemies by surprise, with attacks that ignored distance due to her portals.
You might think that the giant darkness snake that is charging towards the black robed guy is too showy to take the enemy by surprise, especially since she is fighting against the fastest type of enemy, one with lightning affinity.
But who said that Thea was inside that giant darkness snake?
The black robed guy suddenly had a bad premonition and all the alarms in his heart screamed in danger, a black portal appeared below him from which the giant head of a snake came out opening its snout trying to bite off a piece of the body of the enemy.
"Humph, do I look that stupid to you!", the black robed guy became a current of blue electricity that escaped from the encirclement of the two giant darkness snakes, on time.
But before then he felt danger behind of him and tried to escape once again, unfortunately this time he was one step too late, a black portal appeared behind of him, and a black spear came from within it, piercing his stomach and pinning him against one of the walls of Aurora's domain, due to the force behind of it.
"Blegh!", the guy vomited blood combined with small pieces of internal organs, due to the impact, the physical strength of a direct descendant of a magic beast that has taken human form, like Thea is no joke after all.
But that's not what mattered, he had an expression of disbelief behind that black robe, as he saw the black-haired woman who slowly came out of a horizontal portal in front of him.
"I-Impossible, you can't have enough control over space to move yourself and other completely separate objects like that… you aren't even a high stage Stellar mage", he slowly spat out.
Moving through space requires a lot of focus, if one gets distracted a small error can send you a few kilometers away from your original destination, the black robed guy couldn't believe that Thea was skilled enough to sent her spear through space, while she was also moving through it, into the head of the giant darkness snake that appeared below him.
Thea snorted, why should she explain her powers to an enemy, she has heard Daimon saying many times that idiots lose because they talk too much during a battle, so her only response was pointing her pretty elegant finger at the black guy's chest, to shot a line of black light.
"Aghhhh!", upon impact a hole the size of a beach balloon opened on the chest of the black robed guy, it's not like the guy didn't want to dodge but he couldn't, once the spear pierced him, it was as if a mountain was pressing down on him.
Thea won't explain it, but that is one of her strongest spells called "Space Shackles" which as its name states, makes the nearby space act as a lock, fixating the target on the spot, naturally such a strong spell has a downside to it, which is that she has to touch the enemy for it to work.
In this case, her treasured black spear acted as an extension of her, so the moment the spear touched the enemy, the fight was over, there is also the fact that with the spear inside of the stomach of the black robed guy, Thea just had to give the order and a portal would have opened inside of him, separating his body in two parts.
Annoyed by the pained screams and insults coming from the black robed figure, Thea retrieved her spear and then smacked the no head extreme, making a few teeth fly out of the mouth of the enemy.
The hood of the black robe stopped covering the face of the enemy due to the strong impact, revealing how he looked.
Surprisingly, it had some sea magic beast characteristics, in this case a small pair of fins of his neck and spiked teeth similar to those of a snake as well as black eyes without any white, judging by its lightning attribute, Thea thought he was a descendant of an electric eel magic beast kind of race.
But she hasn't heard of any race that has completely black eyes like those in any of the snake type of races, either at the Maelstrom or Mermen Seas.
Seeing that the guy had fainted Thea shrugged, she used a lot of mana earlier and judging by the explosions of mana at the other side of the wall, Aurora was about to end her fight too, so she just pointed at the now fainted guy and both of them disappeared from Aurora's domain.
She then came out of a portal near where Marlene was, the defeated enemy which was frozen, as if something was keeping him in that position, floated next to her.
She just casually entered the barrier created by Aurora and then gave Daimon an expecting gaze, which made the latter chuckle as he handed her one of the wooden tubs that contained three-colored water.
The Empress sweetly smiled and after keeping her "reward" in her storage ring, she left the barrier and sat next to Marlene as she took a sip of a bottle, without forgetting to offer her friend.
One must know that Thea really values her drinks, and those with whom she is willing to share a cup are really scarce, Karmandi, Lina and Marlene being the previous only three, until Daimon caught her interest lately.
Marlene didn't refuse, after the rollercoaster of emotions that she has experienced recently a drink didn't sound like a bad idea, and using the three-colored water they won't get drunk, so there was no problem.
Thea was using it as a replacement of a mana potion, but Marlene simply drank while she contemplated what the future awaited to her clan that lost the place they considered their home, ever since they escaped from the Mermen Sea.
'I guess we can always go live at a new galaxy where no one knows about that stupid superstition', she thought as she stole a gaze at the "empty" space behind of her, where Daimon and the others waited for the battle to be over.
