"We...We're saved? What happened?" One of the standing elder Nighthowlers asked in confusion, and they were given a clear answer that sucked out all the doubts in their heads like a vacuum.
"You're saved, for now at least and what happened, you ask?" Seunghyuk appeared as he walked out of the darkness and joined the five elder Nighthowlers, helping the fallen ones to stand up slowly while Jisung warily checked the state of the King as Seunghyuk continued, "I couldn't just leave you there fighting without me doing anything. It just does not sit well with me, so I still ended up coming anyway."
The air hanging around the seven of them while facing the King was starting to feel heavier, like it was a thin sheet of paper trying it's best to support an anvil and trying hard not to break and tear apart. Seunghyuk stared right into the King's irked eyes and knew that he was under full spotlight from the King's eyes at that particular moment. It was his show— Seunghyuk's death show.
"Is it not humorous? You two humans could have ran away even with your weak legs, and both of you came back with the thought of being able to help five strangers that you have merely just met. What's the logic here?" The King asked and his brows gently relaxed when he realised that he had gotten the upper hand and had won in attitude, "Even my five experienced elder Nighthowlers could not do anything, what makes you think both of you could be of any help?"
"Well, I think we're the least of your problems right now, because..." Seunghyuk thought rapidly on the spot, like his brain was running a whole kilometre within a second, and immediately put on a confident, yet slightly frightened look on his face, trying to make it look all natural as he pointed to the back of the King saying in feigned solemnity, "That...Whatever that is..."
The King was definitely tricked, a flash of annoyance mixed with a hint of fright flickered across both his eyes as he promptly whipped his head backwards in frightened curiosity.
That was all it took.
Seunghyuk summoned his Snake of Ophiuchus naturally, letting the snake slither out from thin air while he immediately shouted, "Serpens Caput Strengthen!"
The King was alarmed and growled lowly as he ferociously turned his head back with incredible reaction time. Jisung immediately tightened his hand grip on an imaginary ball of air and twisted it forward, his brows knitted slightly in concentration as he sent raging water pouring forward with his skill of Aquarius's Water Jug, like a rushing waterfall forcing a piece of driftwood to fly downwards at the speed of a bullet train. Seunghyuk's summoned Snake of Ophiuchus, strengthened with a golden, hard head, flew forward, cutting through the air and pierced through the heavy atmosphere, aiming at the King's head.
"You frustrating flies—" The King was only able to say three words of five syllables at most, while unleashing a barely-structured Tornado Claw that inched slowly like an injured worm which got absolutely obliterated by the combined attack from Seunghyuk and Jisung.
The golden-headed Snake of Ophiuchus broke through the weak attack of the King and crashed face first into the King, ramming into the King's face with so much strength and force that it sent the King flying backwards in a high arc, then landing with a loud thud on the hard ground of the path.
"Quick! We must run! The King has regenerative abilities, he will not die even under combined attacks like this!" One of the elder Nighthowlers shouted with a hurried tone as he immediately took off with the four other elder Nighthowlers, and Seunghyuk followed immediately after, with Jisung getting pulled along from behind like a snow sled.
As the seven were dashing down the path like seven mad man, the King's ferocious grunts echoed down the pathway, shaking all their eardrums until they felt uncomfortable. Just as the King was about to stand up like nothing much happened to him and give chase, Seunghyuk spotted a corner to what of seems like an endless path. Finally, Seunghyuk followed the elder Nighthowlers with Jisung behind him as they turned the corner to the left, temporarily disappearing out of the King's sight. However, the feeling of easiness did not settle in at all, it was like danger still hung above them like a heavy anvil that would drop down and smash them flat anytime.
"Come on, take the stairs! I opened the portal up there, on this building's roof! I can feel it's energy rushing out from up above! We have to hurry!" The same elder Nighthowler spoke again, and with every word that flew out of his mouth, he sounded more and more anxious, "The King would never stop until we enter the portal. We would be safe there! As I have mentioned before, he would not dare to move a finger recklessly in his own kingdom!"
All of them dashed up the staircase, heavy footsteps drummed messily like a weirdly mixed up polyphony, and amongst their messy thumps came a lighter, yet faster footstep that caused all the other footsteps to sound faster. A messy thumping of shoes hitting the metal of the staircase sounded throughout the whole area, accompanied with the exhausted pants from Seunghyuk and the others.
"Why is he here already? He's too fast!" Jisung exclaimed as he trailed behind Seunghyuk, being the last person and the closest person to the mad King who was chasing all the seven of them down hungrily like a beast who had lost all reason, "Hyung! We have to go faster!"
Seunghyuk knew there was no way they could go any faster as they were already hopping up two to three steps to get to the rooftop of the building. Even then, with the Nighthowler King's insane speed and agility, it was almost like imitating the sound of a crow cawing in front of an audience of actual crows.
"No one will be going anywhere! Everyone will erect their graves right here!" The King hollered out with crazed eyes, especially glaring at Seunghyuk and Jisung whom unleashed a huge attack at him moments ago, "Perfect Mirror!"
At that shout of the King's skill, Seunghyuk's eyes went wide with shock and fright, immediately grabbing Jisung's shoulders and jumping off the flight of staircase to the left while shouting at the top of his lungs desperately, "Jisung! Hold on to the side bars of the staircase!"
Jisung was clearly shocked when he was abruptly thrown off the staircase but he obediently grabbed onto the side bars of the staircase like Seunghyuk did. The five elder Nighthowlers heard the cry of Seunghyuk, but they were too caught up in the moment of running and dashing up to the rooftop that they were unable to react as quickly to Seunghyuk's shout of desperation.
All of a sudden, a total reflection of whatever happened just a moment ago, which meant that a horde of seven people—Seunghyuk, Jisung and the five elder Nighthowlers—running up the staircase came running down oppositely towards the elder Nighthowlers that were still on the staircase. Like a mirror, the King's skill reflected whatever happened the second the skill was chanted, and if it was used well, the skill would be fatal.
Almost like at that exact moment, the reflection of Seunghyuk, Jisung and the five elder Nighthowlers dashed downwards at rapid speed towards the real elder Nighthowlers, knocking them downwards as they rolled and slid down the staircase steps.
"I said no escape, did I not?" The King reiterated, and immediately casted Aura Pressure to press the elder Nighthowlers to the ground, which seemed to also have effect on Seunghyuk and Jisung whom were hanging onto the side bars of the staircase where gravity was acting strongly on their bodies, hence their hands started to slip downwards as Jisung screamed out, "Hyung! What do we do!"
Seunghyuk racked his brains out trying to think of something he can do to fix the whole situation but his mind came up with absolutely nothing but a simple statement: Just go with it.
Therefore, Seunghyuk went ahead without a plan, simply forcing his way upwards with purely the strength of his wrists, which did not seem to work too well with two major forces, gravity and aura pressure, acting downwards on him. However, that was no reason to just throw in the towel and let go, so he continued to attempt shifting his hands up the side bars of the stairs until he would be able to pull his body upwards and roll up and over to the other side.
"Jisung! Can you use Aquarius's Water Jug and shoot it upwards?" Seunghyuk asked with visible difficulty as he struggled to go against the stubborn forces pushing him down, his biceps and triceps flexing so hard that when his arms exerted force, his arms were at the point of breaking open.
Jisung pressed his face together like a sciences paper ball as he exerted force on his dominant right arm, then raised his left hand to the air with his one right hand supporting his whole body weight, similarly gripping an imaginary pocket of air and sending a strong jet of water that shot up into the air.
"Thanks Jisung!" Seunghyuk quickly said as he felt the forces getting weaker as the water jet shot upwards provided a stronger pressure area which pierced through a portion of the King's Aura Pressure, allowing Seunghyuk to quickly vault over the staircase railings and land over on the other side on the staircase again, "Come on! Jisung, your hand!"
Jisung quickly threw both his hands onto Seunghyuk's and was left hanging on only Seunghyuk's grip. If Seunghyuk let go, Jisung would fall flat onto the ground down below and would possibly lose his life considering the scary height.
"Jisung, you're coming up!" Seunghyuk said with determination and with slight difficulties, Seunghyuk managed to get Jisung safely up and standing beside him, "We're lucky to still be barely unscathed."
The King suddenly walked over the five elder Nighthowler's struggling bodies pinned down to the floor with the Aura Pressure, and came face to face with Seunghyuk and Jisung like he was saying: You would not leave unscathed now.
Seunghyuk quickly raised a huge wall of fire which the King immediately twisted it apart with his Tornado Claws. Seeing the unfortunate turn of events, Jisung promptly summoned his Horse of Three Kingdoms, and casted Zhu Geliang's Intelligence, allowing Jisung to be able to predict the Nighthowler King's next moves.
"Hyung! A claw to the right!" Jisung warned as Seunghyuk immediately sidestepped to his left, fully avoiding the bullet-speed attack from the King, and as a counter attack, Seunghyuk sent out his Snake of Ophiuchus again and shouted, "Serpens Cauda Strengthen!"
The snake turned its tail to pure gold, while Seunghyuk immediately used his Charm skill to put the King in a dazed state, which brought about peaceful silence for about half a minute before the King was hit hard in the upper thighs with the Snake of Ophiuchus's golden tail, then a lethal poisonous bite as a finish, leaving the King crying out loud. The Charm skill has been broken, but the goal was already accomplished as the five elder Nighthowlers had already stood up in the short half a minute time when the King was dazed. Just like the King had suddenly become the bullied, the elder Nighthowlers sank their claws into the King's skin numerous times which made Seunghyuk see the sight of bright red, near amber, colour of the Nighthowler King's blood.
"Now! Run!"
At that simple shout from one of the elder Nighthowlers, everyone took flight and dashed up the final steps leaving a fuming, injured Nighthowler King behind, trying his utmost best to catch up, but everyone had already reached the portal way before the King could.
"Kim Yangwon, farewell," Seunghyuk frowned as he put his hand up and waved sarcastically, using the Nighthowler King's real name as a deliberate disrespect.
Hence, just like that, Seunghyuk, Jisung and the five elder Nighthowlers disappeared right in front of the King's face.
"These annoying fleas! I'll crush all of them! I will crush them all lest they become a greater threat to my throne in the near future. Nepowa Latropia!" The King fumed as he himself opened another portal to the Nighthowler Kingdom.