Rululan started to feel more and more uneasy as they walked forward, there was no spiritual aura at all except for Vallier's and his, although Vallier's spiritual energy was being seeped away. "!!!" something's eating his spiritual aura! Rululan quickly looked at Vallier and motioned him to lock his spiritual aura, without any question Vallier did so, just then he felt the backlash of loosing too much spiritual aura and lost his footing, one doesn't usually feel if their spiritual power is taken away untill they will lock it. Rululan was able to catch him without making any noise, seeing Vallier still recoverung from the backlash he propped him beside a tree to sit and rest.
The sky started to grow dark, 'rain?' he thought, he looked at Vallier and as he was about to tell him that he's going to go get something to shade them from the rain Vallier held his wrist and shook his head sternly, "why?" Rululan mouthed, the two of them came into conclusion earlier that they should not make a single noise at all or their location will be revealed. Vallier stared at Rululan and pointed on his ears, telling him to listen, Rululan nodded, he focused once more and started to listen, afterwards he looked at Vallier with a confused look, "its just leaves rustling" he mouthed once more, Vallier nodded in response with a serious look plastered on his face.
It suddenly struck him, when they entered the forest there was nothing, no sound, no aura, and now the leaves were rustling. Rululan felt Vallier's grip tighten, he wanted to stand up, he propped him up and started to walk once more. Rululan stayed focused as they kept walking, every now and then he'd hear rustling around them, almost like something was following them, Vallier stopped and waved his finger in the air, he made an incantation, he was finally able to regain enough spiritual aura, the incantation started to spread around them forming a glowing light transparent force shield, "We can speak now but only for 5 minutes, my spiritual aura has still not completely recovered" Vallier spoke, Rululan nodded and without further ado started to explain "My theory is that were already inside the black fog, the path still doesnt have any spiritual aura, the sky is dark almost like a storm is brewing but its not, its the fog" Both looked up at the sky and it was indeed black, almost like a night sky with a brewing storm, Vallier unsheathed his sword from the scabbard revealing a shining silver sword with spell incantations written in ruby ink on the blade. "If we're inside that means the demon is here" Vallier concluded, Rululan nodded.
He then took his iron sword out of its wooden scabbard, Vallier took it and wrote some light incantations to it "that sword will be as strong as mine but as fragile as it looks, be careful" He warned, Rululan nodded once more and gripped it tightly, "once the force shield vanishes, theres a high percentage that the demon will lunge to us directly since it felt a strong radiant spiritual energy" Rululan spoke, "What's the plan?" Vallier asked, Rululan looked at the surroundings a bit more examining every bit of sound and details around tge place, "I just found out!" he exclaimed, Vallier listened to him, "The demon is hiding within the trees, the rustling noises is the demon, yet if it doesn't show in its full form, attacking it will be useless, we need to lure it out" he continued, Vallier looked around and asked "is there a close field here?" Rululan looked around once more when suddenly, he saw the tree with an X mark.
Its the tree Mymyrr made a mark with! if i recall correctly the place before we found tracks of the gleaming snake had a wide field! The force shield blinked, it was about to vanish, "FOLLOW ME!" Rululan shouted as he ran towards the direction of the field, Vallier closely running behind him. 'Once the demon shows himself it will likely use its dark powers to fend us off to a corner and ultimately turn back to a wind entity, theres no other way than to hold our ground once we get at the middle of the plain field' Rululan thought, he was planning more and more about how to defeat the enemy without noticing the dark fog had suddenly turned into a shape of a smoke serpent rushing right towards them, Vallier didn't miss a second in running waiting for Rululan's signal. "WE'RE AT THE CENTER NOW!" Rululan shouted, finally it was time to face the demon, once Rululan turned towards Vallier, he could've sworn, in just a glimpse, he saw Vallier smile with killing intent burning in his eyes as he turned to face the smoke gripping his silver sword tightly.
Back at the air patrol, everyone was debating wether or not they will rush in to their rescue after seeing the fog. Mymyrr on the other hand had his eyes fixed on the fog, squinting every now and then hoping to see a glimpse of the two, "General Rudlert the fog!" a knight shouted in an alarmed tone, their eyes automatically darted to where the knight was pointing, Mymyrr's eyes widened in surprise, "It's Rululan! and Vallier!!" he exclaimed.
In a small plain field Rululan was fending off the north side of the black smoke from that was circling them on where they stood while Vallier attacked the south, a gleam of light would flash at every clash of their swords and the sounds of metals clanging to each other resonated throughout the forest and the fog, "General!" Mymyrr shouted while pulling General Rudlert's cape, General Rudlert nodded and ordered the men to move and help the two, but before they could even dive down, they were frozen with fear, the balck fog gathered into one lump in front of Vallier and Rululan, and within seconds the black fog became a huge, blood red, horned demon, it's sharp claws dripping with blood and its tail resembling that of a scorpions tail, the stinger had a purplish black goo oozing from it. Mymyrr shuddered at the sight of the demon, and his eyes wandered towards the two, without thinking he shouted "RULULAN BE CAREFUL!" just then the demon heard them and created a huge dark shield trapping the two inside and the others outside to only watch the battle with fists and teeth clenched.
Hearing the voice of his friend Rululan looked up and saw the others above them, for a moment he felt safe, but it was quickly taken away as the demon released the shield, Vallier rushed to Rululan's front and shielded him from the demon's tail, "Focus!" Vallier scolded him, Rululan came back to his senses and joined him on fighting the demon. Vallier moved swiftly and slashed his sword around the vulnerable spots of the demon leading the wounds to spurt blood in every cut, Rululan still standing their ground shielded himself from its tail and he kept on analyzing the demon's form. 'Stingers is to poison, Horns is to strength, this demon has the ability to turn to fog and poison it victims with its tail, and its horns to slice them off'.
Vallier landed beside Rululan, still composed, but somewhat sweating, "Have you finished?" he asked, Rululan shook his head, "I need more time to analyze it" he replied, Vallier nodded and wiped out some of the demon's blood that got splattered to his cheeks, "I'll give you 10 minutes this time" after saying it he rushed back to the demon once more and started slashing and cutting again, the demon was now focusing on Vallier as its enemy and Rululan had more freedom on analyzing it. 'It's body is huge and full of muscle which means that it had already eaten a huge amount of spiritual auras already, if it eats more it can spell our loss. Think Rululan, Think.' He urged himself further drowning himself in the sea of thoughts. 'The demon's weak spot, where it started, the fog's very center... center?... storm?... that's it!' his eyes lighted up, he then turned towards Vallier ready to tell him the weak spot of the demon "Vallier! the eyes!"he shouted, upon hearing this Vallier went back to his side to catch his breath. "Took you long enough, Stay behind me!" he ordered, Rululan quickly went behind him, the demon, finding it hard to move due to its wounds, slowly turned to them, Vallier composed himself once more and his spiritual aura started to light up. He moved his index and middle finger together in the air writing another incantation, this time with a spoken spell, "Lights of heavens, Brighter than any foe, bring thy monster, shred its flesh, I call upon the heavenly arc, punish this demon, RETRIBUTION!" as he finished his spell, two huge long light beams almost resembling a giant spear emanated above Vallier's shoulders, crackling shoulds echoed through the woods, as he moved his hands, the spears flew right into the demons eyes.