Chapter 347: Wyverns
"They are not dragons," Jenni corrected herself. "Wyverns?"
Agnes churned her dark essence, ready for a fight, as the pack of flying lizards flew right towards them. All of them were fiend-rank monsters. Agnes could deal with one or two of them with relative ease, but taking care of a whole pack was going to be nearly impossible, especially when she would have to look after two non-combatants.
However, before she could act, a golden figure with widespread wings came flying from behind the wyverns, throwing a huge spear of essence through one of the monster's heads, killing it instantly.
The monster's corpse fell as the golden figure swooped down on their roof.
"Playtime's over," Gale said, opening a portal to his domain. "Get in quickly."
The wyverns charged after him, but runes formed at a tremendous pace to create a great barrier behind him, obstructing their attack.
"Quick!" Gale shot them a glare.
"Me too?" Agnes arched her eyebrow. "I can help."
"Stay out then," he said and turned to the other woman.
Dawn pulled Jenni towards the very suspicious-looking portal. The closer she got, the more the intrinsic fear clawed at her.
"Where does this portal lead to?" she asked.
"Aren't you curious about the secret?" Gale smirked. "Well, now you don't have to be anymore."
"It's going to be fine," Dawn said and pulled her into the domain.
With that out of the way, Gale withdrew the barrier and brought out his sword. He flashed one look towards her. "Try to keep up."
Agnes glared at him, but his figure shot up once again, taking the fight to the sky. She sighed and manifested her wings of darkness to chase after him.
By the time she caught up, he had already beheaded two of them, taking their corpses into his spirit domain. Winds swirled around him as though listening to his call; they formed blades of attack and obstructed any of the wyverns' moves before he killed them.
Agnes attacked one at the back with her sword, dark essence churning with her best capacity, but even then she found it hard for her sword to dig through the tough skin of the wyverns. She had to pin her sword at the same place multiple times to finally wound it severely.
It flew away after that. Agnes chased after it, her wings spreading more to give her extra pace. She flew over it to swoop down onto its back, her sword digging into its head.
Agnes felt the essence washing over her body and turned around. By the time she had dealt with one, Gale had finished up a dozen.
"Don't worry," he told her. "There were more of them."
He gestured for her to follow him and flew in the direction they came from. They flew for a few minutes to soon come across warriors fighting off lizard creatures on the ground while being obstructed by the wyverns from the sky. There were a couple dealing with flying attacks, but they weren't nearly enough to deal with the number of creatures flying around.
Gale brought out the bow and began shooting at the wyverns, charging the arrows with void essence, then radiance. Each of his arrows struck a target, and it exploded, blood and flesh flying about in a splatter.
Nobody complained though, so he carried on.
As though not wanting to be outdone by him, even though he already had, Agnes flew down to help the guildsmen. There were only about a couple dozen of them; barely three were gold rankers while the rest were high silver or mid-silver rankers.
"Who was that?" asked a frightened priest, who was supplying healing to the warriors. "Where do you come from?"
"No time for questioning," Agnes shouted and joined the fray.
****
"What is this place?" Jenni asked.
"This is the—" Dawn cut herself off as a massive corpse of a wyvern flew to drop only a few meters away from them. "Let's get closer to the tower first."
"I'm feeling terribly weak," Jenni complained.
"It will pass," Dawn said and pulled her towards the single monument within the realm.
More of the corpses came down flying; thankfully, none of them fell over them, much to their relief.
Jenni's chest heaved after running for several minutes. Normally, it wasn't supposed to happen, but this place, the presence here, suppressed her essence power greatly.
"You haven't answered my question," she said.
"This is a soul domain," Dawn told her.
"Meaning?" Jenni tilted her head.
"Just as it sounds," Dawn provided.
"Like we are literally inside a soul?" Jenni sounded flabbergasted as if she wasn't going to believe that. But Dawn's expression didn't change. "Are you being serious?"
She nodded.
"Whose soul is it?"
Dawn showed an expression which said: who do you think?
"Warden?" Jenni still used the old name most of the time, forced by habit more than anything else. "Why do you seem smug about that?"
Dawn provided nothing.
"A little proud too?" Jenni stared at her. She chuckled. "You're like a mother hen proud of the little chick who finally managed to catch a worm on its own."
"That's a very bad example," Dawn said, her cheeks turning a tad pink.
Jenni laughed harder. She looked around, taking it all in. The sky wasn't like the dull red of the front lines, but a perfect blue with stray clouds moving around...
"Why does a soul look like this?" she asked.
"A soul can be anything," Dawn said.
The atmosphere inside the soul domain changed abruptly as wind rushed in, more clouds churning in the sky, and finally, purple lightning flashed with thunderous roars.
"This place is giving me chills," Jenni said. "What happened?"
"I don't know for sure," Dawn answered, "but I can make conjectures. It is likely an aftereffect of Gale utilizing his power on the other side. Whatever he does seems to reflect in the soul domain..."
"So if he's fighting, it's a storm," Jenni said. "What if he's cooking?"
"Usually, a warm environment, the sun beaming."
"Will there be a natural disaster if he's crying?" Jenni asked.
Dawn shrugged.