A large Buffalo Wall rose from the ground and blocked all the incoming projectiles. Green Tooth made his move executing Lion's Grace. Traversing the crumbling city, Green Tooth found the originating area the items were fired from the ruins. Three warriors were standing there, stupified.
"Sphinx beast!" yelled the male mermanians.
"We have no mana here. Run before the beast kills us." shouted a peggian.
The mermanian who Green Tooth appeared in front of froze in her tracks. "How can it be here?" After almost being killed in the trials, she was scared to death and couldn't move. How did this nightmare follow her here?
After the initial shock, the male mermanian realized the beast executed a movement technique with mana. "Where did it cultivate mana at on this barren planet?" he mumbled under his breath.
Leo walked over with the other two in tow. "Hold up, you three." Seeing the three humans walk over, they were perplexed.
"Green Tooth, can you back away before they soil themselves." Leo motioned the Sphinx away. Green Tooth strolled over and stood behind his two disciples. "Why did you attack us?"
Seeing the situation finally deescalate, the male mermanian stepped forward. "We thought you were more local inhabitants of this planet. They tried to capture us before, and luckily our constitution is still robust without mana." The mermanian remembered Leo from the Sphinx zone. So, he felt relaxed seeing the Earthling.
"Ah, that might be my bad. I had locals look for you."
"Why would you look for me? We aren't allies," replied the confused mermanian.
"A winged-human, a few Sphinx beasts, and I have been building a ship to return to earth," Leo told the trio outright not hiding anything.
The three looked at each with hope. They would give anything to return to their people. Without even discussing anything the female mermanian blurted out, "Geph, we should help them."
The peggian shot the girl a look of anger. How stupid was this girl to just outright trust these strangers? He then looked at Geph to make the right call.
Geph just sighed. "How can we trust you, human."
"You can't," Leo replied, almost immediately shocking the mermanian. "You either come back with us or don't. It is your choice."
"Can we discuss it first?" asked Geph.
"Sure. While you do that I'm going to have a look around." Leo said as he walked towards the destroyed pyramid behind them. He wanted to look around at this old city.
The three walked away to debate returning with Leo. The peggian barely trusted the two mermanians, let alone anyone else. "Sepha, how do you know this is not a trap?"
"I don't," replied the female mermanian. "Anything is better than hiding in this rubble like vermin."
Geph nodded his head. If anything, he had to figure out how the beast had obtained mana on this planet.
Green Tooth took Papyrus and Djed to look around the city while Leo waited on their reply. Geph walked over to Leo as he stared at a large wall covered in hieroglyphs. "Can you read what's up there?"
"Just bits and pieces," Leo admitted. "Have you decided if you head back with us?"
"Yes, we will. The peggian is reluctant, but can you blame him."
"No, not at all." A tremendous rumbling erupted deep underground. Leo used his Mana Sense to look through the earth and realized some sort of demon was underneath.
"WHO HAS AWOKEN ME FROM MY SLUMBER!" A loud voice echoed throughout the ruins.
A beast easily as tall as Mau Mau, the Sphinx, erupted from the ground. "That aura, I know it from somewhere." Leo had to think for a second until he remembered that aura. With dread, he recalled what that beast was called. "A Deicide beast."
Geph didn't understand, but something told him this beast was the harbinger of death. He looked over to where Sepha and the peggian were only to discover thousands of pounds of earth covering the exact spot.
The beast saw Geph and Leo in the corner of his eye and swung his tail to swat the flies away. Leo quickly grabbed Geph and executed Lion's Grace.
Sensing the mana fluctuations from Leo, the massive creature bellowed out, "MANA IN BUG!"
The Deicide started to move after Leo. Seeing the beast come after him, he activated the movement technique to the extreme. Leo didn't want to be ruthless, but he wouldn't be able to escape carrying Geph, so he tossed him to the side. Geph tucked and rolled. His were full of fury, but the large Deicide cause his heart to miss a beat.
The Deicide stepped over the manaless mermanian and continued in pursuit of Leo. "Damn, he really is just after me," Leo told himself.
Leo was moving as fast as his two feet could take him. The beast was relentless in its pursuit, and even though it was big, its running speed allowed it to keep up easily. Seeing he couldn't escape by just running Leo stopped faced off against the massive beast.
Leaping towards the beasts, Leo pulled out his Stone Breaker. He then executed Meteor Stick Dance on top of the Deicide. The giant creature tried to shake off the annoying insect, but Leo kept attacking. Upon Meteor's Decent, Stone Breaker couldn't damage the Deicide's hide.
A large arm swatted Leo as he stared at the area he just attacked with all his might. The Deicide's claw knocked Leo off of him. The force blasted Leo into the ground. Even though his body had been reborn entering the Core Builder realm, the impact still broke his left arm, a rib, and several wounds across his body.
Realizing he couldn't even wound the beast, Leo picked himself off the ground and then used Buffalo Dome to cover him. The Deicide used both arms to crush the stone dome. The massive creature frowned upon not finding Leo underneath after smashing into it.
Leo escaped underground, popped out a mile away, and used Lion's Grace to flee on foot. Leo tried to put as much distance away from him and the Deicide. All of a sudden, the ground became shady. Leo thought to himself, "it is not cloudy today." Looking up the Deicide leaped towards him eclipsing the sun.
Leo fired several earth-based attacks at the beast falling from the sky. Everything bounced off of the creature impacting it's decent minimally.
The Deicide landed and before Leo could escape the giant's jaws chomped down on him like a hydraulic grapple claw. The beast swallowed the tiny human to absorbs it's a small bit of mana.