Chapter 59: The Commander Unleashed
Just as it felt like the fight was finished before it even began, the red divinity suddenly started coiling around Raigar’s hand. A small, sharp spike created by the dark energy formed right in his palm.
Raigar yanked his arm back and violently shook away the coiling red energy.
"Don’t f*cking use this disgusting thing on me, you son of a bitch!"
The Bishop stood up, his face finally revealed from under the ruined hood. His whole body still looked entirely human, even though the red divinity was leaking from his pores. This clear mismatch showed he was a failed product of their dark experiments. Blood started to spill from his bruised face.
"Huh...? So that is the reason why you are such a weak ass," Raigar scoffed. "And that is why people failed to track you. But still, you have that disgusting thing, ’Anathema’, running through your veins. Just carrying the power of the heretics is enough reason for me to kill you."
The Bishop glared at him with bloodshot eyes. The red divinity flared around his hands. With a sudden burst of speed, he launched himself straight at the commander!
Raigar didn’t wait. He simply raised his hand.
[Beast Fang Art: Shatter!]
He vanished from his spot and appeared right in front of the incoming Bishop. His punch connected squarely on the Bishop’s chest. The impact was enough to launched him backward, crashing through several buildings and houses before his body skidded across the ruined street and finally halted.
Dark blood spilled across the cracked pavement, but the Bishop still managed to sit up, looking at Raigar with a much more cautious gaze.
"Sigh, what a pain. You shitty parasites just don’t die quickly," Raigar cracked his knuckles.
"I was planning to hold back inside the city, but it seems I have to finish you right here."
Raigar raised his hand toward the sky. A massive magic circle opened above him, stretching several dozens meters in diameter as a huge amount of mana poured into it. A giant boulder of Earth magic started to construct itself in the air. The broken debris from the streets flew up and attached to the core, rapidly increasing its sheer size.
A massive boulder formed in just a few seconds. Before the Bishop could even react to the spell, it was already completed!
[Beast Fang Art: Earth Shaking Explosion!]
The giant boulder launched downward, slamming into the Bishop’s body before he could even attempt to dodge. The massive rock kept going, breaking through the remaining buildings and tearing up the road. Several acolytes who were busy preparing spells on dead bodies were also caught up in the destructive path.
Just as the boulder slowed down and it seemed like the attack was over, bright beams of light started to leak from the cracks in the rock. A massive explosion tore open, destroying whatever existed in the nearby vicinity.
*BOOOOOOOM!!!*
The whole city began to shake from the massive impact. Without wasting a second, Raigar channeled his mana again.
[Beast Fang Art: Earth Barrier!]
A giant barrier made of earth appeared around the blast zone. A massive cloud of smoke blew up into the sky. Even the thick barrier began to crack from the sheer force of the impact, but thanks to his quick thinking, the rest of the city outside the blast zone remained safe.
"Sigh... Did I overdo it?" Raigar shook his head and looked around the dust-filled crater.
Suddenly, several powerful presences appeared around him.
"Hey, you piece of shit! Are you insane? Why did you use that attack in the middle of the city?"
A woman appeared wearing a cloak, but a fluffy fox tail protruded from her back. She was an S-ranker who had earlier been called inside the city along with others.
A man sitting cross-legged on a nearby rock chimed in.
"Yeah, man. You should have calmed your anger. Why go to such lengths just for a little Bishop? You are definitely planning to get a beating from the SS-rankers."
Raigar sighed, shaking his head.
"Well, something was definitely wrong with that parasite. He was mutated, but he still had human traits and managed to keep himself hidden up until now. Even I couldn’t sense him. It would have become quite a threat if he managed to escape this place. I could easily sense that he was not just a regular Bishop. He was close to becoming an Archbishop."
The fox-tailed woman looked intrigued, sensing his serious tone. If that Bishop somehow managed to slip away today, he would definitely become a massive threat in the future. An Archbishop is a being a hundred times stronger than a regular Bishop. If Raigar’s suspicion was correct, then he did well to clear out the future threat.
"Okay, well done. For now, we should check out the rest of the city and wipe out any remnants of the corrupted ones," she said.
The two newcomers nodded and disappeared from the plaza in a blur of motion.
Left alone on the broken street, Raigar looked one last time at his crumbling barrier. It started to fall apart. Not even debris was left inside the crater; everything was wiped out.
He stretched his body and looked around for any sign of surviving heretics. Finding none, he leaped from the ground, flying through the air with incredible speed, and disappeared.
The area now remained silent, devoid of any people, with only the dust and smoke of the intense battle left behind.
...
Outside the city, far behind the high mountain peaks and deep inside the thick canopies of the forest.
A person sat slumped against a large tree. His body was battered, and blood spilled from every part of his broken form. He was barely keeping himself alive.
He opened his blurry eyes, trying to look ahead as he heard quiet footsteps nearing him.
"Why did you save me?"
The approaching figure didn’t say anything at first. He just stepped closer and bowed down to meet Bishop’s eyes. His sharp crimson eyes bore into the Bishop, as if trying to see through his hidden secrets.
"Well, I told you earlier. I can do whatever I want. Since I am a neutral party, I can save you just because I feel like it. It is nothing."
Alden shrugged his shoulders, acting like what he just did was the most obvious thing in the world.
The Bishop narrowed his eyes in suspicion, glaring at him with a cold stare. But his body remained unresponsive. He had actually been hit by Raigar’s devastating attack and caught in the explosion. Just before his body could break apart, he felt a sudden pulling force, and someone dragged him all the way here!
Alden looked at him with a bright smile.
"You can go now if you want to. I don’t mind. My work here is already over."
[Ding!]
[The Event ’Bishop Emergence!’ has completed!]
[Quest 1: Reduce the Casualties in Wynthalor! — Completed!]
[Quest 2: Contribute against the sudden attack! — Completed!]
[Quest 3: Help the Bishop escape the city! — Completed!]
[Ding! Granting suitable Reward according to contribution rate and completion of the quest...]