The Kind of Evil

The Prime Lord began to reveal his full power after he realized the real danger in the situation he was in. He thought that those three wouldn't be a problem at all until he found out that his life was in danger. He used hellfire to coat his body, which could easily melt steel by just being near it as a defense mechanism.

The problem began to appear when Uriel was unaffected by the hellfire. Her black sword and even the robe she wore didn't melt by it because of her Aura. She ignored the black flame that acted like a shroud that could move freely by the Prime Lord's will. She could cut through the hellfire and his body like it was nothing.

Lenin flew up high into the sky and used everything she got to distract the Prime Lord with her spells. The lightning bolts, ‎the wind slashes that could cut through the Prime Lord's skin, and created ice needles from the rain storm that could give him frostbite. She was beyond the Prime Lord's reach, and she could do anything freely without interference.

‎

‎Astrea used her divine power to purify the Prime Lord's demonic energy. She also devoured the Prime Lord's life essence, weakening him gradually and rapidly as Uriel wound him.

‎The Prime Lord spread his wings and immediately avoided Uriel because she was too formidable. His next target was Lenin, but he realized it was a wrong call because Lenin had waited for him to target her.

‎Lenin had a bright blue sphere in between her hands, the same sphere that wiped thousands of Corrupted, but a lot smaller. She immediately released it and threw it toward the Prime Lord. The blast and the radiation were devastating and destructive, weakening the Prime Lord.

‎Astrea once again created a divine barrier even though her body was barely able to use any more of it. Uriel stayed in the barrier and watched how Astrea struggled to maintain her facade.

‎"Don't you mess up. I'll kill you if you do," Uriel stared at Astrea with a faint smirk on her face.

‎"Shut up..." Astrea rolled her eyes as she maintained the divine barrier, preventing the radiation and the heatwave from killing them. "Why don't you help me? You can easily make a better barrier with your power. Aren't you the strong ancient race, Aris?" she narrowed her eyes and stared at Uriel, mocking Aris.

‎"That will blow our cover. Uriel isn't supposed to be that strong," Uriel muttered as she readied her stance and stared at the Prime Lord's wings slowly melted away.

‎Uriel and Astrea noticed a sudden fluctuation from within the Prime Lord's body. The surge of power brewed from his body, and Uriel immediately jumped as high as she could, reaching up high to the sky.

‎Lenin was confused, but the moment Uriel grabbed her hand, she got startled. Uriel pulled her down and protected her behind her back. Lenin didn't know what was going on at first, but then he realized Uriel was trying to protect her.

‎"Protect the others, now..." Uriel muttered as she stared at the Prime Lord.

‎Lenin nodded and flew down as fast as she could to grab Astrea. She glanced at the Prime Lord, who had grown larger as the hellfire above his head turned into a sphere that expanded rapidly.

‎"Wow, you remember about me," Astrea looked at Lenin who landed in front of her. "I'm touched—" before she could finish her sentence, Lenin carrier Astrea in her arms and flew toward Thalior and the others.

‎The Prime Lord gathered the hellfire and demonic energy into the sphere. He watched Lenin fly away while Uriel ran as fast as she could. He then raised his hands, compressing the sphere into a smaller sphere and becoming denser.

‎Lenin landed in front of Thalior and the others as she carefully put down Astrea. She then created layers of advanced Mana barriers similar to nanoparticles, making it impenetrable and solid.

‎"That's not going to work, he will devour your Mana barriers like it's nothing," Astrea said as she slowly raised her hands and used the remaining divine energy she had left to reinforce the Mana barriers.

‎The Prime Lord clapped his hands, the sphere exploded, released black flames, turning the sky into pitch black. The shockwave turned the ground into tiny cubes, cracking it before it floated and disintegrated into dust. The spell that Lenin used was pale in comparison to what the Prime Lord created.

‎The vast land turned into a massive crater and the sky became clear. The snow disappeared, the cold winter turned into a hot summer. However, everything seemed dark as if the world was being devoured by blackness for everyone on the scene.

‎Astrea gritted her teeth as she reinforced the Divine barrier and watched the shockwave approaching. She closed her eyes and used every last bit of her strength before the shockwave hit the barrier.

‎Even with the Divine barrier on the outer layer and the five layers of Mana barriers, everyone felt the scorching heat. They felt like they were being burned alive, and the worst part was the demonic energy and the hellfire that devoured Mana. Lenin and Novia couldn't use any magic, and the Mana barriers were slowly cracking and crumbling.

‎The knights's armor slowly melted, panicking and hurriedly removed their armor as soon as possible before the iron melted into their skin. Nobody could use Aura as the demonic energy had devoured all the Mana that existed in their surroundings. Everyone struggled, but Astrea was the one who took the big chunk of damage from holding off demonic energy.

"Your Holiness..." Thalior looked at Astrea's skin on her palm, and her fingers started to dry and peel. Blood started coming out of her fingertips as she kept reinforcing the barrier, even though her hands were already trembling uncontrollably.

They felt it like it was an eternity even though it was barely half a minute. They were suffering from the intense heat and how their skin turned red as if they were being cooked. They could only pray that Astrea could maintain the barrier because they knew the moment the barrier disappeared, they would turn into ashes.

The moment the heatwave went past the barrier, Astrea collapsed and went on all fours, screaming in pain. The barrier shattered, and everyone immediately went to the front to protect her from the Prime Lord, even though they wouldn't stand a chance. However, they were petrified when they saw the aftermath of the spell that the Prime Lord had cast. There was nothing but silence; not a single sound was heard except the breathing of the knights and their own heartbeats.

Everyone slowly turned around and saw nothing but two valleys because of Astrea's barrier that prevented the heatwave and the shockwave from obliterating them and the path behind them. As far as their eyes could see, they couldn't see the end of the valleys, and when they looked down, they noticed how deep the valleys went. They were standing on the edge of a cliff with more than a hundred meters of deep valleys below them.

"Is this really the power of a demon?" A knight asked with a trembling voice as he fell to his knees, losing strength out of shock and fear.

"A single spell that can obliterate a whole kingdom... You must be joking..." Another knight muttered with tears lingering in his eyes.

The remaining knights stood there, staring down at the melted armor and weapons. They silently stared into the distance with blank minds, not knowing what to think or what to feel.

Thalior, Xena, and Novia were staring at the massive crater that could fit a big city on it. They were like ants trying to fight a human, and realized that they stood no chance against the Prime Lord. They realized how humans could go extinct within days. They then noticed that the Prime Lord had disappeared without a trace, nowhere to be found.

"We survived..." Novia muttered as she swallowed hard because her throat was extremely dry that it was painful to swallow.

"But for how long?" Xena asked as she looked at her armor and sword on the ground, melted and became one with the ground.

Everyone overheard Xena's question, and they realized that their survival was meaningless. They might have survived that day, but it was because they were extremely lucky. It wasn't because they feared death, it was because they feared that they couldn't protect humankind from demons.

Astrea slowly got up as she groaned in pain, snapping everyone back to reality. Novia, Lenin, and Uriel went to check on her condition, but thankfully, since she was a Saint, she could recover from any kind of wounds immediately because of her divine power.

"You can lose all hope..." Astrea said as she slowly turned around to look at the knights. "But don't let those whom you swore to protect feel hopeless. We are their hope, so live with your head up even if death is breathing down your neck. We are sharing the burden, and we are the only ones who understand each other. You're not alone, you'll never be alone," she assured with a faint smile on her face.

All the knights looked at each other, realizing they had the same gaze. The hopelessness, the fear, the desperation, and the acceptance of the inevitable doom of humanity.

"Lift your heads, protector of humankind, bear your burden to your grave," Astrea said in a calm voice as she smiled gently.

All the knights lifted their chins up and nodded as they all stared at Astrea with determination. Tears fell to their chins, those tears were the last string of their doubts, released and wiped off.