Aeon tumbled on the ground due to his hasty retreat and he was panting heavily. He had only been a split second away from dying. In his mind, the figure of the colossal gray lion remained.
He brushed his wet hair upward to keep them from covering his eyes.
Then, the ground shook violently.
The beast was coming!
Aeon stood up and walked towards the side of the street. Any sane person would've bolted away from there to save himself, but Aeon had always been reckless. Instead of running, he speedily climbed on top of a broken pillar to get a clear view of the creature. Just as he reached the top, the earthquake reached its peak.
A huge gray shadow flashed by him. The beast ran so fast that Aeon could only see a blur. Behind the beast, were three people who Aeon knew pretty well. They appeared to be on the pursuit, but they weren't nearly as fast as the lion. They could barely keep up.
Aeon's gaze suddenly locked onto one person and the other person stared back at him in shock. The speeding figure suddenly changed direction and went straight towards Aeon to grab him by the collar.
After a split second, Aeon found himself hanging on a person's hand, a gust of wind covered his entire body and it made him feel extremely light.
"Kid, what are you doing here?!" Montis yelled at Aeon.
He could also hear Klaus yelling something from the side, but the wind was too strong so his words ended up being inaudible. He ignored the other person and continued looking at Montis with relief.
"I was trying to check on the Samo family," Aeon replied innocently.
Aeon looked around to see that Montis was now back to their small group of three. Aeon smiled crookedly at Principal Toran Fiore who had been staring at him with a cocked eyebrow as he ran.
Although Aeon should've been worried about the principal looking at him weirdly, the first thing that came into his mind was that the geezer was very fast. Really fast! He couldn't help inwardly praising the old man for his speed.
The group of three, plus Aeon, left the area where it was raining. Once again, they could see the sun peeking through the clouds.
Aeon looked towards the back with difficulty. There appeared to be more people running behind them, but they were still too distant and their figures only looked like dots in Aeon's point of view.
Behind that group of people were dozens of large beasts. Another group of beasts, which appeared to be the large beasts Aeon saw earlier, emerged from a street and pounced on the mages, but they disappeared in a blink of an eye. Obliterated by many spells launched in unison.
Now that he thought about it, there were no fire mages amongst the group of three, and it couldn't have been the others at the back.
"Mr. Montis, who launched that huge fireball earlier?" Aeon said with a confused look.
Without even looking at him, Montis responded with a grave expression, "That thing ahead of us."
Aeon's eyebrows shot up and he looked at the gray lion with disbelief. "A demonic beast?! But why is it running away from you?"
Aeon's question was on point. Be it a greater demonic beast or a lesser demonic beast, it should not have any problem fighting three high-level mages. It would be long and drawn out, but it should not reach the point where it had to run away. Unless, of course, if Toran Fiore was secretly an S-ranked mage.
"It sensed a threat. Enough with this, I'll drop you somewhere safe and you get away as far away as you can!" Montis said angrily.
"What?! Why did you pick me up in the first place? I was doing fine!" Aeon retorted.
"There are hundreds of beasts following close behind. If you stayed there, you would've been dead by now," Montis replied.
Aeon looked back only to see that the spot he was standing on a few moments ago was already run over by a couple of large beasts. Aeon clicked his tongue and didn't respond anymore.
As if I would've stayed if I noticed hundreds of beasts approaching.
Though Aeon was annoyed, he knew that Montis was just overly worried.
"Wait," Aeon suddenly said as he frantically looked around, "when you said it sensed a threat, I thought you were referring to the military. So why are we heading directly east?!"
Aeon panicked. They were heading straight towards the subdivision where Suri's family lived. In a few more seconds, the beast would finally arrive in that area.
Montis suddenly halted and dropped Aeon. He crossed both his daggers in front of his chest.
"Kid, it's time for you to go," Montis casted a spell and wind started to envelop his body, "just hide somewhere safe."
"Why now? I thought you would drop me somewhere safe so I could run!" Aeon yelled.
"Change of plans!" Montis replied curtly.
Aeon could see dozens of beasts running towards them. They were clearly drawn to the presence of the demonic beast, just like the others at the back. If Montis dropped him there, he would be feasted on by those creatures.
Montis Leroux bent down and slashed both his daggers horizontally.
A-ranked spell, Shockwave.
Two sharp wind blades emerged from each dagger, but after reaching a certain point, they merged harmoniously. The attack became one huge airwave that swept over the area.
Unfortunately for the beasts, it wasn't as gentle as how it looked.
Zing!
The bodies of the large beasts split in two. Their lower half stumbled as the beasts lost control over their legs while their top half slid forward.
Montis paved a way for Aeon to get away.
BOOOOOOM!
A huge explosion erupted from the side. Aeon subconsciously looked over only to see the body of a large gray lion streaking through the air.
Sixteen gigantic pillars then emerged from the ground and aimed towards the airborne figure of the lion. However, the pillars did not strike the lion. Instead, they crisscrossed with each other, forming a solid cage that trapped the beast.
Toran Fiore's hand glowed with a green hue as the pillars started compressing with each other, squeezing the large beast.
"Kid! What are you doing?! Go!" Montis yelled at Aeon waking up from his stupor.
Aeon nodded firmly, but just before he started running, he looked towards the front.
There, a man wearing a pitch-black armor was rushing forward. His greatsword was glowing intensely as he readied to attack.
He was the person who sent the colossal demonic beast flying through the air. Suri's father, General Samo.
As the lion was being trapped, several other spells rained down on it. The spells were launched by the people behind the general.
However, it wasn't enough!
The beast's entire body surged with flames! Even the earth pillars created by the principal were disintegrated.
Aeon ran as fast as he could after giving a final glance. For sure, he wouldn't be able to contribute to that kind of battle. Heck, he'll just get burnt to death if he gets too close.
Aeon roamed around a bit and finally found cover nearby. He stayed just behind the military composed of more than a thousand soldiers. At least in that spot, he won't encounter any beast because the soldiers would've wiped them out on their way.
The soldiers slowly redistributed themselves to cover the lion's path towards the left and the right. The mages amongst the military were repositioned evenly according to their levels to handle external attacks from the other large beasts. The regular soldiers were also sent out to assist.
The situation could already be considered under control and the beast could do nothing against their encirclement.
Just to make sure, they made the encirclement large enough so that they wouldn't end up getting caught up in each other's spells. They were spread out too thin, but it didn't seem to affect their effectiveness.
Only Montis Leroux and General Samo were allowed to enter their setup and engage with the colossal beast. All the other mages stayed and attack from a distance, even the Serans.
As the beast moved, the encirclement would also move to follow. Whenever it spat out out a huge fireball, Toran Fiore would just catch it with a high-level Earth Wall.
Although everything was progressing smoothly, Aeon couldn't help feeling that something was odd.
The Principal was moving a bit too calmly, and Montis hadn't even activated his Tenro yet.
Aeon was certain that the principal was an A-ranked mage. Possibly, Montis, Klaus, and General Samo were, too. But none of them seemed to be using their S-ranked spells. An A-ranked mage was capable of using two at most, so how come?
They are fighting a bit too conservatively!
If the four launched an S-ranked spell simultaneously, wouldn't that end everything already?
The blazing gray lion tried its best to advance rapidly on one side so that it could break out of the encirclement. Unfortunately, the two Serans it was facing forcefully slowed down its pace.
At that moment, its eyes suddenly glowed.
Aeon sensed a heavy pressure bearing down on him.
Montis Leroux and General Samo immediately stepped back. The encirclement also began to enlarge.
In history, demonic beasts were considered an extremely huge threat to humanity.
But many things seemed to point that they were not.
First, they were only a few in numbers.
Second, they did not have access to spellbooks and lacked several millenniums' worth of knowledge in magic. The only spells they could cast were the most basic ones.
So why were they labeled as extremely dangerous?
The reason was that, after reaching a certain level of maturity, their magic would also evolve, taking a huge transformation. Their element would be much stronger than those of humans.
…
The blazing fire surrounding the beast suddenly changed color. From red-orange, it slowly turned yellow-green. The flames around its body were also redistributed.
They compressed and moved over to the beast's mane, the tip of its tail, and its four paws.
Aeon marveled at the beast's majestic figure.
He never knew that a beast could look so beautiful.
….