553 DLIII. The Sulfur

"But... this... this stinks of sulfur!" the Packmaster gasped, looking Dag in the eye and leaving all the warriors behind them petrified.

"Sulfur?! What does it mean?! How can a body be full of..."

Just as Kranus was commenting on those words, the gas inside the enemy soldier's arm was completely ejected from its container and small orange sparks began to come out of the empty cavity, in which the ulna bone was supposed to be.

Dag, as soon as he saw that piece of flesh was behaving like an explosive device, burning the tendons and ligaments that wrapped that gaseous substance, dropped it to the ground.

The arm touched the ground and he stood motionless for a few seconds.

Suddenly, the skin tissues and the clothes that covered it, including gloves, caught fire, leaving not a single residue of that limb, which disappeared as if it had never existed, leaving a stain of ash on the stone tiles of the square's floor.

"What the fuck..." Reidar exclaimed without concluding the sentence and taking a step back, as did everyone else except Dag, who stood still watching the scene.

*tsss*pfff*psss*

With a subtle noise, similar to that of the fuse of a bomb that is consumed by a flame, all the corpses around them released those same sparks, which in a few seconds reduced the bodies of the newly defeated soldiers to flames and then ashes, leaving on the ground only the bodies of the allied warriors who died in battle.

In an apocalyptic scenario, the air around them filled with the blackish smoke generated by combustion, enriched by the strong stench of human flesh burning in the open air, making the air almost unbreathable.

This smoke rose upwards, forming a thin cloud that for a few minutes obscured the sunlight, covering the heads of the warriors in the square, who still could not realize what was going to happen.

"Shit... they made fun of us... damned..." Dag said in a low voice, lowering his gaze to the ground and clenching his fists, while a strong feeling of anger flowed through his veins. 

The leaders of the two Clans and Freydis, Reidar, and the two Generals looked at him without speaking, waiting for him to give them the solution to that conundrum, but during this phase, the young Master turned in the direction of the palace, looking upwards at a precise point, as if he had perceived a presence.

"Hihihihihihih... you're ridiculous... you let a little boy notice our trap before you... hihihi... all this time... all your dead men... for what? All wasted! Hihihihi!" 

A chilling and psychopathic voice echoed under the porch as if it came from every direction.

"Who's here?! Who is speaking?!" Kranus yelled, raising his voice and looking at the same spot as Dag, towards the castle tower.

"What does that mean? Where are the bodies of the soldiers we just defeated?! Grrr... I don't like it..." Bloodfang said with his baritone voice, growling in anger.

Dag's gaze continued to stick in the same spot, and when the cloud of black smoke generated by the burning of the bodies faded and disappeared into the air, a stone balcony of the same color as the castle walls appeared.

Above it, an ambiguous figure held his arms resting on the railing, and his gaze turned downwards, on the army of the two Clans still trapped in the square.

"Hey, you! How dare you stay up there and look up at us with that air of superiority?! Our men have defeated your army, you and the other leaders who are there with you will have no escape! Get down and fight like a man!" Bloodfang continued to scream, whose anger grew so much that his hand claws grew spontaneously, unleashing gray smoke.

"Other leaders? Hihihi! Don't be silly, the other leaders aren't here... their presence is not necessary... it's possible you haven't figured out what's going on yet?..." 

"Be quiet, scum" Dag said, as his purple eye shone in the fog spread inside the square and the muscles of his dark arms continued to pump gallons of blood, vibrating like two cannons ready to explode.

"Uh? Hihih! And who are you?" the strange little man on the balcony chuckled, who was still too far away to be recognized.

"I told you you must shut up! Get that laugh out of your face!" the young Master yelled.

The scream was incredibly powerful and the breath emitted from his mouth turned into a shockwave that swept the floor under his feet, causing his own allies to tremble, who looked at him as if he was about to turn into a chilling monster.

A thin purple aura covered the shape of his body while his gaze remained pointed upwards.

The man on the balcony did not answer and slowly turned backward, entering a door and disappearing from view, leaving everyone speechless.

"Can someone explain to me what the fuck is going on? Who's that guy and why did he say we just wasted our time?! What does that mean?!" Bloodfang exclaimed, turning to Dag for explanations.

"Get ready, the doors are about to open" the young Master replied, looking ahead to him and speaking enigmatically, having immediately understood what that man was referring to.

The warriors of the two Clans had fallen into the trap of the Lies Of Loki, who as true masters of deception, had simulated a battle of which only the location was something real. 

When the gates of the palace opened squeaking, all the warriors returned to the fighting position, realizing that the moment of celebration was still far away, and held their weapons waiting for a second fight.