Still coughing blood, Ezra stared at the pitch-black portal as he staggered to his feet, black lightning crackling along his skin.
Upon standing, the Emperor appeared beside him, white lightning crackling across his skin.
Ezra hit his father, "Qui-
His words were cut short as he puked a lot of blood in the opposite direction.
The Emperor with his memory still fresh about the effects of Ezra's blood, stepped back.
"Where does it lead too?" the Emperor inquired, sensing the ominous energy permeating through.
"De-Blergh!"
Even more blood stopped him talking, so he gestured with his hands to the Emperor.
Pointing at shredder, and then at the portal.
The Emperor understood the message.
Channelling his lightning, he gave shredder a good rotation before striking the portal.
*Bam*
The portal repelled the attack, rebounding with double the force and sent both Ezra and the Emperor flying backwards.
Ezra broke through one of the cave's walls before falling to the ground.
The Emperor, being the initiator of the attack, flew further back.
Ezra, already weak, cleared the rubble of his chest one by one, moving them away as fast as he could.
But he was exhausted, and so he was slow.
Spitting out the last of blood in his mouth, Ezra exhaled heavily, panting with both hands placed on the floor.
He was doing his damn best to get back on his feet, that last attack had drained him of all his mana.
Thankfully, with how enhanced his body was, Ezra was already recovering.
Lifting his heavy muscles, a mana stone appeared in his hand which he then placed in his mouth.
Then, Ezra saw the formation lines drawn on the floor emitting light.
Alarmed, Ezra moved to destroy it, when…[Don't]
Zydrax spoke.
'What?!'
[Don't destroy it] he said. [I have use for it]
Zydrax had just informed him that the formation needed to destroy the rest of the formation to stop it from reinforcing the portal.
[I said that you need to cut the routes connecting the formation to the portal]
In front of his eyes, neon particles exited the formation lines on the ground and came towards him.
[Relax. It is my doing] it said as Ezra watched the first of the particles sink into his chest.
Rather apprehensive, Ezra was surprised that he felt…nothing.
No difference at all even as purple particles rose from all over the room, specifically from the formation lines and the blood pool.
Ezra watched as they sank into his chest.
[What are you doing] Zydrax questioned. [Get up quickly]
The Emperor was back on his feet, brushing off the rubble from his body as was Getrahan.
Ezra saw the portal shake, its ominous aura rising when suddenly, it spat out something from within.
Landing a distance away, Ezra made out a disfigured body with crimson scaled skin and sharp black nails.
*Pop*
Right after something else popped out. Ezra made out a round red object as it bobbed all over the place, landing right beside him.
Then Ezra saw it clearly, and his pupils shook.
The creatures of his nightmares just a while ago.
It had been manhandled, twisted in an uneven way, but there was no doubt about it.
It was a demon's head!
With his mortal enemies in front of him, standing wasn't daunting anymore.
"Ah!" rising with a grunt, Ezra picked up the mismatched head, taking a better look while the purple particles continued descending into his chest.
Suddenly, the blood with the head he held was sucked out, as was the blood within the headless body.
Both were combined and then sunk into the formation.
It wasn't Ezra, so it could only be Zydrax.
"What are you doing?"
[Stop worrying about me and get that portal to close]
The Emperor appeared at Ezra's side, casting a deep glance upon him.
The man himself was dirty, bloody and dusty.
At this time, more bodies and heads fell through in consecutive order, three in total.
"We need to close the portal" Ezra intoned, heading for the portal.
"Except we attack together, I doubt our attacks would even go through"
"We don't need to destroy the portal" Ezra said. "We just need it to shut down its power source"
"You want to explain why your chest has become a purple light show?"
"Nope" Ezra responded perfunctorily.
Getting close to the portal, they experienced intense discomfort as mana within their bodies went awry as a reaction to the ominous energy swirling within the portal.
That wasn't nearly enough to stop them though.
Imbuing Darkane with silver aura, Ezra stabbed into the ground an inch away from the portal.
But…
*Kang*
Instead of immediately breaking, Darkane was repelled.
Tapping the edge of the sword on the same spot, Ezra found it to have hardened, the surface smoothened like a gem.
He expected resistance, but this was too much, it was probably the portal's effect.
If nothing else, it would take more than such lacking efforts to break through these.
As such, Ezra put his back into it, switching out Darkane for Skyfall, the blade gained a shade of red as Ezra imbued with fire and rotated briefly within both hands to get the feel for it before taking a stance.
'Breakthrough'
He swung it like a pickaxe, breaking apart the hardened surface and destroying the formation route at that spot.
There was little rebound, pushing him back a bit.
"We have to cut off the formation lines connected to the portal"
You didn't have to tell the Emperor twice as he channelled lightning for the umpteenth time today into shredder and slammed right into a formation line, disrupting two at the same time.
Getrahan reached them at this time.
As he raised Skyfall for a second strike, his senses told of an approaching presence.
One different from the Getrahan.
On cue, the portal spat out another body, larger than those which had come before, and most importantly-it wasn't headless.
With bright scaly red skin and small ears, hinged legs and an elongated head a bit wider than that of a horse, not to mention the sharp looking red wings with a wingspan too big for the cave, it grabbed their attention no doubt.
The wings cut through the walls of the cave easily.
Apparently, the wings weren't just 'sharp-looking'
Most importantly, it gave off a presence matching theirs.
Ezra was most shocked.
'What's that doing here?'
Grandmaster level demons didn't appear this early during his time as Kevin.
'Things have changed again' he realized.
'Was it because of my intervention?' he wondered but dropped out his thoughts right after.
Unlike Ezra, Getrahan had immediately engaged the creature, taking advantage of the low flight zone, he pummelled the creature with his hammer, hitting it right at the center of its head.
The collision created a sound wave that destroyed the cave, blowing away the top to expose them to the sun.
Greatly disoriented, the demon crashed.
Taking advantage of the first strike, Getrahan landed one more on the same place, with the Emperor following up with a swing to the same head.
Shredder cracked its skull, digging deep into its brain as lightning cooked it from within, killing it.
Right then…
*Slam!*
Something slammed into the Emperor and blew him afar.
"Gah!"
It was Ezra.
But what could have thrown Ezra with such force?
The Emperor got his answer.
The portal had spat out another demon.
This one had the same frame as a human, but was twice the Emperor's size, holding a large black axe that didn't look any shabby, and an ugly face.
Most importantly, it gave off the same presence as the last one.
*Kang!*
And it was in battle with Getrahan.
Father and son got back on their feet and attacked.
Ezra was irritated, he'd been hit from behind.
Just as they reached Getrahan-the portal spat out yet another demon.
"Tsk" Ezra clicked his tongue. "Keep them busy, I'll close the portal"
They had to close the portal before another one popped out.
While not yet back to full capacity, Ezra was sufficiently healed.
He imbued Skyfall with fire and then darkness, creating dark fire, his body wasn't healed enough to handle the strain of adding lightning.
'Let's hope this is enough'
The Emperor charged at the third demon, and immediately engaged it.
With the corpse of their comrade laying just meters from them-no more words were needed.
As they felt the energy from Ezra's sword, they moved to stop him, but Getrahan successfully blocked them.
Putting more strength into the arms, he slashed, a line of dark fire cut through the hardened surface and broke off more than enough formation lines.
Immediately, the portal destabilized and shook the ground, throwing the fighting grandmasters off balance.
On cue, the portal began closing, shrinking into oblivion.
Though breathing heavily, Ezra watched the process attentively.
Satisfaction welled from within as the last of the portal was about to zip up.
But then…
An outstretched arm came through, on which were nails longer than common sense.
