Lala and Luke were standing over a man who was enveloped by a ball-shaped, translucent, wall of water.
The man was sitting down casually and was, at least at first glance, calm.
He wasn't afraid of the current situation, no, he wouldn't even care if he were to die here. Dying here would actually be a far better fate than he could hope for.
He was scared of what would happen if he were to survive. He was afraid of him, and of what he would do to him.
It would be a fate far worse than mere death.
"Hehehe… Heh.. HA! HAHAHAHA!!!"
The shadow elementalist went from a small chuckle to a full-on burst of loud, crazed laughter.
This was simply his way of coping.
"I'm running out of patience. Answer me!"
Luke was having none of it. He had already wasted over ten minutes questioning the shadow elementalist, receiving nary an answer.
The laughter was the first sound the shadow elementalist had let out of his mouth ever since he had been trapped in the water cage.
"I'm going to repeat myself once more. Answer my questions, or die."
"HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!"
The shadow elementalist, as if cued by Luke, started laughing even more wildly than he already has been until now.
He started clawing at his own head using his fingers and repeatedly leaned to the front and then to the back, like a broken toy.
'Has he gone insane? I just can't figure it out…'
Luke was very confused to say the least. Lala was simply standing beside him, but was pretty shocked by the shadow elementalist's reaction to being questioned.
"Fine, have it your way. I'll give you a few more minutes to decide, but I'll be done talking after that."
Luke didn't have much of a choice.
This man was an enemy that had already killed him multiple times.
He couldn't be allowed to live either way.
'I doubt I could even manage to get any information by torturing him. I don't even know how to torture someone in the first place. Oh well, I can at least acquire a new elemental, so this wasn't for naught.'
*Boom!*
A loud explosion suddenly resounded from the outside.
*Boom, boom!!*
The initial explosion was followed by several louder explosions.
The whole tavern was shaking.
The shadow elementalist started looking around the room, panicked.
"Kill me!! Please!"
The shadow elementalist's placed his bloodied hands on the floor, as he started smashing his head against the hard, wooden tiles.
Luke found this very weird.
"You know something, don't you?! Speak!"
The shadow elementalist looked up at Luke and his black hood slipped off of his head. He placed his hands onto the wall of the water cage.
As Luke's eyes widened, Lala flinched.
The shadow elementalist's eyes were as dark as a bottomless abyss, his skin the color of ash. He had no hair anywhere on his face, and he appeared to be middle-aged.
The lack of eyebrows or eyelashes wasn't what disturbed Luke and Lala, instead it was the two streams of scarlet tears flowing down the shadow elementalist's face.
His pitch black eyes were tainted by a shade of dark red, making his impossibly dark eyes appear bloodshot.
*Boom!*
As he kept crying tears of blood, the tavern shook even harder than before.
'Whatever's approaching us is almost here!'
Desperate times call for desperate measures.
The effect of an elemental that was used outside of the water cage could affect the inside of it without a problem. The water cage was basically a one-way wall.
Luke formed a wind blade.
*Slice!*
He cut off the left hand of the shadow elementalist, causing the latter to wobble, as he was leaning against the water cage.
Blood started gushing out from the stump where the shadow elementalist's left hand used to be, but his face merely contorted for a second, before going back to what it was moments ago.
"Answer already! Damnit!"
"Just kill me!!"
Luke had already guessed that doing this wouldn't accomplish much, but he tried anyways.
*Boooooom!*
The outer wall of the room, where the window was, was suddenly destroyed and both Luke and Lala were welcomed by the terror in front of them, through the dust and smoke.
The village was ablaze, becoming a new source of light beneath the full moon, with the majority of the houses simply ripped apart.
'Just who…'
Luke would soon get his answer.
Someone casually jumped through the smoke and dust and up into the tavern room which was on the second floor, through the hole where the wall used to be.
At the same time, someone rushed in through the door behind Luke.
Luke turned around.
It was Boldee.
He had a look on his face that Luke had never seen before.
An indescribable anguish could be felt from it, and a sense of duty.
Boldee was kitted out in a transparent, full-plate armor, and was also holding a transparent rapier in one hand, while his other one was behind his back.
'…Is that glass?'
Boldee took note of Luke.
"Thank you boy! You have used the token that I've given to you. Now, I can have the battle that I've been itching to have for decades!"
Boldee's eyes shined with resolve.
'The token? …That means!'
Luke turned back around and looked at the person that was emerging from the cloud of smoke.
"Boldee! Why don't you just stay still? I had to destroy this whole village just to drag you out of your hiding hole!"
Luke gritted his teeth, as Lala stared in dismay.
It was a man surrounded by crackling arcs of electricity, with a recognizable set of droopy eyes.
It was Joseph.
Lala was confused.
"Joseph, but why are you here? Don't tell me…"
Joseph pointed at Luke.
"Lala, you were only supposed to keep him occupied until his turn to be disposed of came! Instead, you became his assistant… Although, I can kill two birds with one stone now. Just stay out of my way!"
She was stunned.
Joseph then turned his head towards the water cage.
"As for you… I'll deal with you later."
The shadow elementalist started foaming at his mouth and collapsed from the mere pressure he felt from Joseph.
Luke decided to speak up.
"Why are you here?"
Luke then pointed at the shadow elementalist.
"Is he one of your subordinates?"
Joseph smirked.
"And why would I bother answering any of your questions? You're just a variable that was unaccounted for."
Luke glared at Joseph.
"What? Gonna fight me? Go ahead and try."
Joseph, using his finger, motioned for Luke to come at him.
Luke's eyes narrowed.
'I'll die if I try fighting him now.'
Luke could sense it. That feeling of danger, or of being in the presence of a superior being.
He had been in plenty of life or death situations, so he was able to tell.
Boldee interjected and stepped in front of Luke.
"Leave the boy alone. I will be the one to fight you!"
"Excellent! That's what I wanted in the first place!"
Joseph crazily grinned and spread his arms out.
Electricity crackled around Joseph and he started using it to whip Boldee, but it had no effect as Boldee was completely enveloped in thick, but flexible glass.
"Lala, take the shadow elementalist. We're going to pull back from here."
"But…!"
"No buts, we are going to die if we stay here!"
After some pouting, Lala finally gave in.
"…Fine."
The water cage started floating as commanded by Lala, still containing the unconscious shadow elementalist inside of it.
Lala cut open the wall around the door using a high-pressure stream of water, so that the water cage could fit through as well.
As Luke was running towards the newly formed hole where the door used to be, he couldn't help but feel that something was off.
It was then that he heard Joseph's cold voice.
"You're not going anywhere."
Learning from his previous encounter with Joseph, Luke had already been guarding his lower back with both of his elementals, forming a thick plate of swirling wind, with a trace of fire inside of it.
It was exactly where Joseph had fired a streak of lightning at.
The streak hit Luke's lower back, and simply dissipated after a few moments.
Joseph widened his eyes, as his surprise attack was neutralized.
Luke smirked at Joseph, as he escaped from the room.
As Joseph lost his focus for a moment, a transparent rapier had almost stabbed him directly through the stomach, but he managed to focus his lightning on reinforcing it in the last moment, causing him to only suffer minor bruises.
Joseph then managed to regain some distance from Boldee.
It was a bad match-up for Joseph, as glass could not conduct electricity.
But as both of them knew, there wasn't such a thing as an impossible match-up when it came to a fight between elementalists.