Levitating, Damien watched the massively tall shadow behemoth turn into motes of energy.... Energy which then began to disperse, returning to the world.
That was the thing with killing Spirit lords; once dead, their astral images returned to their origin, to the power that was used in their creation.
Despite the apparent ease with which seemingly he accomplished the feat, Damien knew that destroying another's astral image wasn't a trivial thing to do. He knew the absurd amount of energy and willpower he had put into it. Elora had only made it easier as she succumbed as her willpower failed to hold against the pain that she surely would have felt from her soul damage. In essence, the easiest way to destroy an astral image was a simple universal rule: be vastly stronger.
He floated down toward the unconscious woman. Looking at her, he could sense that she wouldn't be advancing any further in her paths, and telling from how closely non-existent her astral image was, he could only sense a tiny part, which was still unconsciously protected. She wouldn't die.
Destroying a Spirit lord's image didn't necessarily mean their deaths, as it was still just a part of their path, a truly important part. Mostly, they'd just suffer the setback of temporarily losing stages in their path. Looking at Elora now, he could sense she had suffered more. Her passive aura had decreased significantly, going from that of a fully-fledged Spirit lord to a Monarch on the verge of ascension.
Maybe she could find advancement in conceptual understanding, but aside from that, she was done.
Pulling out an alchemical health potion from his soul storage, he was just about to administer it when he felt himself being approached.
"This one greets the Spirit lord." A voice said.
He turned around to the view of a woman with beautiful black hair and eyes. And from the tattoo on her shoulder, he identified her as one of Cirin's Monarch realm essence wielders. She was accompanied by chosen Ymal, who kept looking around with obvious fear and trepidation as he witnessed the scale of destruction wrought on the land.
He nodded to her in acknowledgment, thinking her there simply as a witness when he was interrupted again, this thing with an explosion of sound and displacement of air.
Appearing and almost blowing Ymal away if not for the Monarch's quick reaction in plucking him, Keilan yelled. "A few days! I left you for a few days and what did you do? You go and start a fight, decimating a city and killing an Empire Spirit lord!" He said while simultaneously pointing at the devastated city, which had been reduced to less than rubble, and then moving on to the dead form of ShadowBlight. "And if that's not all, you then leave another with a terminated path!"
By the time he was done, Damien was sure he could see smoke steaming out of both his ears.
"In my defense, I did give them a warning," Damien said defensively, instantly teleporting in the still-screaming Empire spy. With barely a gesture the snake was reduced to ash. "I told this one to deliver a warning to his superiors not to interfere in my business, and what did they do? They went ahead and attacked the city barely two hours later."
His excuse didn't work.
"Are you surprised!? They are the Empire for crying out loud! They don't listen to any warnings until it gets beaten deep into their skulls!"
"That's what I did! I beat it into their skulls." Damien said.
They both stopped, having remembered that they were not alone and that they were supposed to act as mysterious otherworldly figures instead of arguing like children.
Sighing, Keilan said. "You know that the Empire would have immediately sensed the death of their Spirit lord; heck, the whole world should have sensed this fight just from their manifestation alone. We can't take that kind of heat right now."
"I'm not going into hiding again," Damien's face hardened.
Keilan covered his face in clear exasperation, sighing, "We'll talk about this later," He gestured at the potion in Damien's hand and then to Elora. "Why do you want to heal her? Don't tell me you're banking on her gratitude and adoration for you saving her life after you ended her path.
"No," Damien snorted and then laughed. "That'll be a sight to see, the great poison mistress transforming into my very own adoring fan. Although what I plan isn't too far from what you just said. I'm simply going to turn her into my very own messenger.
"It crossed my mind that they might not take seriously a message delivered by a mere lord stage... a man who they definitely now perceive as a betrayer," He added. "The warnings might stick If it's been delivered in a casket carried by their very own half-dead poison mistress."
He then poured the potion into her mouth; it wouldn't heal any spiritual injuries, only the physical ones, and any temporary backlash from strain would quickly disappear.
Sure enough, her wounds began closing and she began showing signs of stirring.
Addressing the Monarch. "What do you want?"
Clearly nervous at being addressed directly but still showing discipline and speaking clearly. "I wanted to inquire if the lord needs any help or errands delivered."
"I don't know about needing help but I need a message delivered," He told her. "Go back and inform your queen what has happened here. And tell her that I said she should hope for peace but be prepared for war."
The Monarch nodded, taking Ymal with her, and they left.
"Now, for your own errand," Damien said, turning to the awakened spirit lady. "Knowing your Emperor, he'd have already sent a force the moment he sensed your loss," He couldn't help but smile at that. "Or he might even be coming himself. Hopefully, I won't be here when they arrive. What I want you to do is deliver a warning, the same one I gave your spy here," He pointed at the inert spy, having been overwhelmed by the agony and then going unconscious. "Inform anybody that comes to investigate that should they interfere anymore in my interests, they wouldn't like my reply." He said, staring pointedly at her spiritually broken form.
Done with all that, he was about to leave when her voice rasped.
"Please kill me; I can't go back like this." The great Elora Darkfang, mistress of poison and terror of the night, begged.
Looking back, he replied. "What aim would killing you achieve for me," He then nodded at the unconscious spy. "If you die, my message would still get delivered, but it wouldn't carry the same weight as if you delivered it yourself. So be a good girl and wait till your people come for you. You can do whatever you want with yourself after, I don't care."
Turning back, he began making his way back to the city.
"Why are you heading back there? it's nothing but rubble." Keilan followed.
"Before we parted, I told you I felt a pull somewhere; well, this is it, and I'm not leaving until I discover what drew me to this city," Damien answered.
Arriving at the barrier where the city walls had been before it was reduced to rubble, they gently floated off the grounds, taking a slow flight into the city.
Looking at it, the city was unrecognizable from a few hours ago. Most of it had either turned to rubble from the shockwaves or turned to black poisonous sludge, courtesy of Elora.
"Damn, you guys really did a number on this one, didn't you? And you didn't even manifest your astral image," Keilan whistled.
"I was mostly trying to buy time for the people to flee; I couldn't very well add more destruction by summoning my image, could I? Besides, it wasn't needed."
"They must have been smart people to have fled the city quickly, and summoning your image definitely wouldn't have left anything remaining of the city."
They calmly made their way toward the middle of the city, levitating over the temple. Of all the buildings in the city, the temple showed the least damage. Although a large portion was collapsed, the rest was surprisingly intact, with only a few cracks running through the walls of the intact portion.
Damien waved his hands, channeling energy; both the intact and the destroyed parts of the temple were turned to dust, the wind blowing it away an instant later to reveal a large hole bored deep into the foundation.
Damien spread his senses, following the hole until it ended in the mysterious cavern. He said 'mysterious' because his senses soon came to a halt, unable to go further.
He and Keilan looked at each other, agreeing, they both jumped into the hole, the wind whistling past them as they both fell deeper. It took several minutes until they reached the cavern, their feet touching down gently on the soft sand.
Obviously, darkness enveloped the room, but at their level of progressions, the darkness was practically ignored.
The cavern was empty except for two objects which hovered off the ground. He could see layers of runes drawn on the ground surrounding the objects. He detected runes of concealment and containment, as well as enchantments that linked some other runes to somewhere else.
He assumed the linked runes were redirected to other identical runes drawn somewhere in the city that were meant to collect and power the city. Now that most of the city was destroyed, the runes certainly included, there was no place to redirect the energy to, which explained the energy buildup and the runes that were already eroding. Though it would take a few months for the runes to completely erode, the side effects? Probably another decimation of the region.
Getting closer, he sensed clearly what was only faint at the cavern's entrance.
"An energy buildup at this stage could completely level the city, give it a few months and this whole continent could go through another calamity, probably sinking the entire continent at the worst, " Keilan sighed. "I assume the World Spirit isn't thrilled about this."
"No, I am not." A voice intoned, quiet yet carrying with it the weight of a World.