The trolls fled from the scene as soon as they witnessed the fall of their tribe's warlord. Fear struck their minds; they didn't want to end up like their leader. They ran with just a single purpose: to get away from the silver haired demon, who wanted to kill them just for his entertainment.
But Zeno didn't bother himself to chase them; instead, he walked in the direction from which he had come, his bow already returned to a normal black dice, which he placed inside his pocket.
"Gather all the blood you need; I'll keep an eye on you," he said after he got close to Eliana and Henry.
However, like the trolls, the two mercenaries just stared at him with frightened looks; they couldn't believe what they had seen. A troll warlord was considered a threat to the villages living near the borders due to his large appetite. That was why almost all mercenaries would be deployed upon knowing that a warlord had appeared in the tribe of trolls, and heavy casualties were always expected.
'Taking down a warlord just like that,' Henry thought, gasping at the whole situation.
This was not his first time to see a warlord, and he also had experience fighting one. Its high-speed regeneration was a headache for them, and that battle lasted for a whole day before their group of twenty people managed to take down the troll with six of their comrades dead.
However, the man staring at them did it in a matter of seconds. He didn't know how, but the thing that caught most of his attention was his weapon, which had different forms. He knew of the existence of several weapons with unique characteristics.
And it was every mercenary's dream to have one in their arsenal. To see such a weapon up close was already a great encounter for Henry.
"Hey, did you hear me? Get all the blood that you need," Zeno repeated himself before checking his tattered clothing stained with blood.
"Y-yes! W-wait for us in a second," Eliana panicked upon hearing Zeno the second time around, while Henry stood up.
The two of them searched for George's belongings and found the container they prepared next to his armor.
Unlike Henry, Eliana's thoughts were not focused on the battle. In that small amount of time, there was this little thing that blossomed inside her. She was now looking at Zeno with adoration. The prowess he showed captured the heart of the young lady, but knowing that she would die later at that man's hands, sadness devoured the sensation she felt.
. . . . .
Zeno sat down on a nearby boulder while waiting for Eliana and Henry to finish extracting blood from the dead trolls. He played with his black dice by making it spin on his palm. Then he looked up and stared at the sun.
'Hot,' he thought.
Eliana saw Zeno and decided to approach him.
"Your eyes will get hurt if you stare in the sun like that." She fretted.
"That thing won't be affecting my eyes." Zeno said this while still looking at the ball of light hanging in the sky.
"Why? Are you blind?" Eliana asked with a face full of curiosity, and the man nodded before replying to her.
"Sort of; my eyes are a little bit different," he said.
"So, what do you see?" she asked.
Zeno averted his gaze from the sun and looked at Eliana.
"I-it's okay if you don't want to answer; I'll go back to help Henry." She said this after getting no response from him.
Then she turned her back on Zeno, but after a few steps, she heard his voice.
"The properties of this world, the process after creation, and the fall before destruction. The birth of life and the death of its soul," he replied.
Eliana faced him once again.
"I-I can't understand what you're saying," she complained, but Zeno didn't reply and stared again into the sun.
Upon seeing him not talking at all, Eliana chose to return to Henry and help him finish their assignment. After an hour had passed, the container was completely filled with blood, and it was time for them to return.
However, Zeno stood up and walked closer to them, then Henry dropped the container beside him and held Eliana's hand.
"Can we change the part of the deal? Take my soul as payment. Just keep her alive," Henry pleaded. He couldn't accept the fact that he would return alive while two of his friends were dead, and Clive would be happier if the one who would survive was his sister.
"No, Henry, I made this deal. Say hello to Clive for me." Eliana said before she let go of his hand and walked towards Zeno.
Henry wanted to carry Eliana and run like they did before, but he knew that it was useless against that man. They would end up like these corpses laying on the ground.
"You're a brave woman," Zeno complimented Eliana after he saw her coming to him.
Eliana smiled as soon as she heard the words, although her eyes couldn't hide what she truly felt.
"Promise me, please spare him," she said while her crying face was looking at Henry.
"I'm a man of my words," Zeno nodded and asked. "Are you ready?"
"Y-yes," she uttered before closing her eyes.
The next second, Zeno tapped Eliana's forehead with his finger. And as soon as their skin touched, Eliana collapsed to the ground. Then, a small particle of white light flew out from her body and went to the red dice hanging in Zeno's ear.
Henry fell to his knees after seeing the scene unfold in front of him. He cried and blamed himself for being powerless to protect her. If he didn't let her join them, she would still be alive.
The sudden thought of not being able to see the smile he cherished in this world made it harder for him to breathe. He wanted to avenge her, but he was not powerful enough to win against Zeno. He couldn't even manage to convey his true feelings for her.
He continued to shed tears so much that he didn't even notice when Zeno brought Eliana's lifeless body in front of him.
Zeno didn't say a word and started to walk away from them.
"Where are you going?" Henry shouted a question, which he didn't answer. "I will get stronger. I will find you and kill you one day," he added.
"Do as you please," Zeno replied before he disappeared into the thick layer of trees.
. . . . .
Henry carried Eliana down the mountains while the container of blood was hanging on his back. He arrived at the border before sunset.
The guards approached him as soon as he entered the town. They wanted to do an inspection on him, but upon seeing his state and the lifeless woman on his arm, they ignored the idea. They let him pass without any interrogation.
They were not that heartless to conduct an investigation into a dead person, and they knew how hard it was to lose a friend during a mission.
Henry continued to walk to the center of the town. People everywhere looked at him, but no one dared to come near him. He stopped at a small building that looked like a clinic, then entered through the open door.
"Welc-Henry! Oh my! Eliana..... What happened?" An old lady rushed forward to cater to Henry as soon as she saw Eliana lying in the man's arms. She guided Henry to a nearby room, and they gently placed Eliana in the bed.
"She's still warm, but there's no heartbeat!" The old lady exclaimed.
"Her soul was taken," Henry explained.
"What? Since when?" she asked, then she put her right hand in Eliana's chest, and it penetrated inside her body. Then, from inside, she searched for the woman's heart and pumped it.
However, there was no reaction, and the old lady retracted her hand and then looked at Henry.
"Tell me everything!" she said.
. . . . .
Like what the old lady wanted, Henry told her the events that happened, from the moment they ran away from trolls, George's sacrifice, their encounter and Eliana's deal with the strange man, the troll's massacre, even about his weapon, and until the very last second of Eliana, he said all and didn't omit a single detail.
"Grandma Terry, what should we do?" Henry asked after he saw that the old lady was staring at Eliana with worry on her face.
"If you examine her body, aside from her swollen foot, there's no injury or bloodclot, but there's also no pulse, which means she's dead. However, this warmth," she said after touching Eliana's hand again.
"I need to do some research about this case, and you need to come with me; we'll seek an audience with the earl, but I need to heal Clive first," Grandma Terry added.
"Yes, I'll go with you," Henry affirmed before looking at Eliana.
. . . . .
A few days later, a strange story about a blind wanderer who took away the soul of a young woman circulated in the villages near the borders. It became the talk of the townspeople, and because of this, doing missions at the Mountain Range of Phantasms was prohibited for the moment. The Earl even set a curfew in his territory, and the security was tightened more around the town.
. . . . .
However, inside the mountain range, where the moonlight was the only thing that lit up the place, several eerie cries disturbed the peaceful night sky.
A person was going to the highest peak of the mountain. Mindless beasts tried to attack him, but they were sliced in half by a jet-black battle scythe as soon as they blocked the man's path.
He looked like a grim reaper with his tattered clothing that was drenched in the blood of different monsters. Dead creatures with limbs missing were scattered on the brushes, and most of them were larger than a basilisk. It was a bloodbath; they've been slaughtered without mercy.
Then, upon arriving at the top of the mountain, Zeno walked towards the cliff. His scythe was now nowhere to be seen. And as soon as he reached the place, the wind blew in his direction, and his silver hair with stains of blood had flown a little.
He stared into the darkness, and then the red dice dangling from his ear spun, and the surface, which contained a single white skull, glowed.
"Eliana," Zeno whispered, and letters started to appear on his right wrist as soon as he said the word. He looked at his wrist and saw the name he had uttered written all in red capital letters.
Afterwards, he closed his eyes, and after opening them, a circle made of a thin white line appeared with him as the center. Then, it enlarged and covered the whole mountain range, but it didn't stop there. It grew bigger and bigger until it covered the vast land of Exgreia, and after that, it vanished into the darkness.
"Hmnn, in the heart of the empire," he said, then he looked in the direction of the Plain of Fantasies and smiled.
'Interesting, four people have actually detected my presence,' he thought.
. . . . .
At the same time, in the Realm of Illusions, a heavy fluctuation of energy was felt. It distorted the space that was separating the Spirit World from the surface, and this made it visible for a few seconds before disappearing again.
When this happened, the Spirit King was sitting in a crossed-leg position with his eyes closed, under a waterfall.
"Intruders," he said then his eyes opened and green lightning flickered on his body.
. . . . .