Nebula and his companions found themselves trapped between two inevitable dooms—one pressing them down like a mountain, the other standing before them, eager to erase their very existence.
Pinned beneath the crushing weight of the Guardian Bane's energy, their bodies refused to move. Every breath felt like inhaling fire, their limbs shaking with the futile struggle against an invisible force more merciless than chains.
The cold ground beneath them reeked of blood and iron, the air thick with the scent of death. Gunfire and distant screams from the tavern's destruction still echoed in the background, but here—in this grim clearing—time seemed to slow, stretched thin by the weight of impending doom.
Nebula clenched his teeth as he fought once more to rise—but it was useless. His fingers barely twitched, his revolvers useless in his grip. With each attempt, the unseen pressure only tightened, grinding his strength into nothing.
His mind spiraled.
(How could I be so reckless?)
The realization hit him harder than any blow. He had dreamed of rebellion, of tearing down the Gog Empire, of freeing those suffering beneath its heel. But here he was—pinned like an insect, helpless before their tools of oppression.
To have possessed a technology like this… what else did they have? What other horrors had the empire conjured in their wretched labs? If this was only a fraction of their power, then what chance did he ever have to stand up against them?
His hands clenched into fists, his nails digging into his palms as hopelessness crept in.
Then—a shadow moved.
A metallic whistle sliced through the air.
His stomach twisted in frustration, his gaze squinting as he looked up—just in time to see it.
The minotaur's chain-hook, gleaming with fresh blood, spiraling straight toward him.
His pulse slowed. This was it.
There was nothing he could do. No guardian, no strength left to resist. He could only watch as the gleaming hook raced toward his demise.
(Forgive me, everyone… I've failed us all.)
He shut his eyes, bracing himself for the cold sting of death.
Then—
Boom!
A thunderous crash split the air.
The ground trembled violently, throwing dust and debris into the sky.
Nebula's eyes snapped open, his vision momentarily blurred from the force of impact. The incoming chain never reached him.
Because something… something enormous… had blocked its path.
A monstrous, violet-scaled body stood between him and his demise, armored in thick, jagged plates of draconic hide. The chain-hook had struck its side with a resounding clang—only to ricochet harmlessly to the side, unable to even dent its impossible defenses.
Perched atop the gigantic beast stood a lone figure.
A raven-haired girl, her face smeared in white skull paint, her expression unreadable. Her posture was unshaken, arms folded beneath her chest, as if the chaos around her was nothing more than an inconvenience.
The girl tilted her head slightly, her gaze locking onto Gregor and his entourage with seething fury.
Then, in a voice dripping with venom, she spat her words like murderous daggers.
"How dare you hunt what's mine?"
The atmosphere thickened with bloodlust.
Dark clouds choked the sky, shrouding the battlefield in eerie twilight. The air itself felt charged, humming with the weight of an impending massacre.
Gregor's gaze lifted to the figure standing atop the towering drake, his expression unreadable yet laced with a quiet intensity.
"Margaret the Reaper…" He called her name with an eerie calmness, his voice measured like the final rites of a condemned soul. "You interfere with the work of heaven—"
"—Keep your twisted work to yourself, Bounty Priest." Margaret cut him off, her voice laced with venom. Her piercing gaze fixed maliciously onto him, the white paint of her skull mask cracking as she clenched her teeth. "These prey aren't yours to hunt. They're mine alone to harvest."
A brief silence passed, the tension thick enough to suffocate.
Gregor's eyes narrowed at the defiance as he exhaled sharply, his fingers tightening around the bounty papers. "Don't try to reap where you didn't sow, dear Reaper," he warned, his voice lower now, nearly a whisper. "Greed is a very deadly sin."
Margaret chuckled—a sound devoid of amusement, filled only with venom. She leaned slightly forward on her mount, her fingers drumming against the beast's scaly hide. "Not as deadly as what will befall you if you don't evacuate this place, Priest."
And then, her patience snapped.
"Sly!" Her voice ripped through the battlefield like a death knell. "Reap whoever stands in my way—erase them from the surface of this world!"
The draconic beast, Sly, responded with a thunderous, guttural roar that sent tremors through the earth. Its powerful limbs coiled, muscles rippling beneath its thick violet scales before it launched forward like a living meteor, sending weaker foes flying.
Gregor's eyes narrowed. A direct battle against Sly was suicide. Even though he also had a myth-level guardian by his side, Margaret's drake remained the current dominant force in this battlefield.
Hence, his primary target was Margaret herself. To kill her would mean the end of the drake's existence just like any other guardian.
"Vengeance!" He barked, his white robe billowing as he stepped backward. "Unleash the wrath of heaven upon that daughter of the devil!"
The jet-black minotaur answered its master's call, its smoldering-amber eyes burning with fury. Its massive hooves cracked the earth as it lunged forward, its enormous chain hook spiraling toward Margaret like a steel viper, aimed to tear through her body.
But Sly was faster.
With a feral snarl, the drake's powerful maw snapped mid-air, catching the chain hook in its fanged jaws.
The moment it did, its head twisted violently, yanking the minotaur off its feet with a force that sent shockwaves rippling through the battlefield.
Gregor's eyes widened in surprise as his guardian—his supposed unstoppable force—was wrenched from the ground like a ragdoll and hurled violently into the distance. The beast let out a guttural cry as it spiraled helplessly, chain still attached, before disappearing into the smoke and dense ruins with a deafening crash.
The bounty priest scowled in frustration, his breath hitching. That should not have happened.
But Margaret was far from done.
Her cold, painted eyes locked onto Gregor. "Now then, Priest," she mocked, her voice dripping with amusement. "Let's see what the so-called hand of the anointed looks like… when it's torn apart limb by limb."
Gregor's fingers curled into a fist.
The rest of the bounty hunters and their guardians stood frozen in fear. Lesser-tier beasts—rare-level dire wolves, classic-level ravens, and common-level serpents—tensed as the monstrous drake turned its green reptilian eyes toward them.
Then—it pounced.
Chaos erupted.
Sly's claws sliced through flesh and armor alike, its weight smashing through nearby foes. It was a massacre, its mere presence an unstoppable force of annihilation.
Bounty hunters screamed in terror, some trying to flee, others raising their weapons in futile defiance. A desperate swordsman lunged, only for Sly's tail to whip through his body, bisecting him instantly.
Some hunters released a flock of raven guardians, hoping to blind the drake—but Sly merely snapped its huge jaws, devouring the creatures mid-flight.
The battlefield was drenched in ruins, blood, and unrelenting horror.
Margaret remained atop her mount, watching with a satisfied smirk. She had no intention of interfering. This was a harvest. And her prey was being reaped.
Gregor gritted his teeth, his composure slipping. The battle was no longer his to control. The bounty priest tightened his grip on his papers, his thoughts racing as the drake annihilated all in its way.
Meanwhile—
Nebula exhaled sharply from relief upon witnessing the sudden shift in events.
Margaret may not have been an ally but her arrival and actions had slightly disrupted the scales in his favor, throwing Gregor and his bounty hunters into disarray. What was once a carefully orchestrated execution had become a battleground of uncertainty, and that was something Nebula could use.
But first—he needed to break free.
His mind raced. The Guardian Bane was unlike any technology he had encountered before. Its invisible gravitational force was suffocating, pressing him and his allies against the fractured ground like insects caught beneath an iron grip. But… how could it be destroyed?
The answer shortly came to him like lightning in a storm.
Naritsa.
She was a Guardian Vessel, a being of unmatched rarity—one who could wield not just a single guardian, but an entire pantheon of them. Though she lay restrained by the same oppressive force, she alone currently held the power to save them from their predicament.
Nebula clenched his jaw, struggling against the invisible weight pinning him down, his muscles trembling with exertion as he slowly turned his head toward her. But just as he parted his lips to speak, Daryl's voice rang out first, cutting through the chaos.
"Princess Naritsa, vessel of the Daughter of Fire." He called out.
Nebula's breath hitched. Daryl's tone carried a gravity rarely heard from the boy.
"I know you do not revel in chaos, nor do you thrive in violence," Daryl continued, his dark eyes burning with urgency. "But there are moments when hesitation is the true enemy. You host a legend-level Beast King, one capable of bringing kingdoms to their knees. That power was entrusted to you for a reason. So why do you not make use of it?"
Naritsa's lips parted—but the words died in her throat.
She had no answer.
The realization struck her like a blade to the chest. She was her own greatest obstacle. She held within her the flames of a god, the strength to incinerate entire armies—yet she had allowed herself to be shackled by the fear of devastation it could bring. By the delusion of thinking that there could be peace without necessary action.
And then—she felt it.
Her trembling hands stilled as a new sensation coursed through her veins.
Amidst the silence of her severed connection to her lower-tier guardians, there was one presence that had never truly been suppressed—untouched by the Guardian Bane.
A heartbeat of fire and fury.
Haila.
The phoenix's slumbering power still pulsed within her, waiting. Watching.
And now, she would answer.
Naritsa's fingers curled into fists. She shut her eyes, inhaling deeply.
Then she whispered the words that would set the battlefield ablaze.
"Grant me your strength, Haila."
The response was instantaneous.
Her ruby-red irises ignited with a cyan glow, a searing sapphire flame surging through her entire body. The very air around her distorted with heat, sending cracks racing across the open battlefield.
Then—a sound.
A piercing screech split the heavens.
From behind Naritsa, a monstrous avian silhouette materialized, its elegant form shifting between flames and physicality. It was the fourth beast king, Haila—its wings spread wide, its body woven from the purest infernos.
The world trembled.
The sheer force of the phoenix's presence sent a concussive shockwave outward, shaking the ground and causing the Guardian Bane's tech core to crack—then shatter.
A pulse of liberating energy surged through the battlefield, instantly severing the device's effect.
Nebula felt it first.
His body, once pinned against the ground, was suddenly weightless. His fingers twitched, then clenched.
Then—he grinned.
Margaret, who had been seconds away from ripping Gregor apart, halted mid-attack. She watched the new scene with solemn eyes, knowing full well what this meant.
Her true prey—Nebula and his companions—was slipping from her grasp.
As for Gregor, his composure finally cracked for the first time. His pupils shrank as genuine terror settled into his bones. "The Guardian Bane failed?" he breathed in disbelief. His grip on his bounty papers tightened, the edges crumbling under his trembling fingers.
"The Guardian Vessel is more terrifying than I anticipated… This is beyond a world-level threat."
Nebula, finally free, let out a slow, dark chuckle.
"Famous last words, Bounty Priest," he murmured, rolling his shoulders before re-summoning Oni. The massive smilodon materialized beside him from a shimmering dark vortex, its saber fangs gleaming, its green eyes locked onto its next kill.
With a deft flick of his wrists, Nebula spun his revolvers, the metal catching the flickering flames of the phoenix as he aimed directly at Gregor. "Your twisted sense of heaven's will won't be saving you anytime soon."
Jasmin and Laria wasted no time summoning their own guardians, their beasts growling with renewed vigor.
Daryl, the only one without a beast companion, shifted into a defensive stance, gripping Laria's shoulder for support.
And at the heart of it all, Naritsa stood, wreathed in flame.
The phoenix's wings unfurled behind her, casting an ethereal glow upon the battlefield. The sheer force of its heat caused metal to warp, bodies to tremble.
Her voice was no longer hesitant. No longer weak.
It was a declaration of absolute judgment.
"Death to the opposers of peace."
The battle had begun anew.