Chapter 206: Home Stretch

Fuo shot forward and swung her blades at the Imp King, who swiftly zipped out of the way and fired a yellow beam at Fuo, who blocked with her ice blades, which absorbed the impact and shattered. 

She fired another beam, Fuo flew up swiftly to avoid it, the side of her waist getting struck a bit, damaging a pouch attached to that spot. Huh, she flies pretty fast, she zips around like a bug. And those beams look like they could inflict a fair bit of damage. 

"I am the Imp King, Aeolu, I do not know who you are, but no one wakes me up and lives to tell about it!" She exclaimed, before zipping towards me rapidly. 

She's fast, but...with my eyes as they are now, I can follow her movements with ease even in my normal state. As she neared me and began to fire a yellow beam at me, I swiftly extracted all my Karma and slammed the back of my fist onto her face, I felt something break as she got sent flying back and crashing onto a tree.

Blood poured out of her nose and mouth as she let out a gasp of pain and collapsed onto the ground. Huh, she's plenty fast, but not very strong, I'd be able to deal with her with ease...but this isn't my fight. 

"Hey, Fuo! Is she too much to handle for you or shalI take over?" I inquired, letting lightning crackle around my hands. 

"Stay out of it!" She responded immediately. 

She flew up and swooped down towards the Imp King, firing an ice arrow at her, which she deflected by firing a yellow beam with a pained expression. Fuo then formed a couple of ice blades and flung one at her legs, she tried to charge up another beam but failed as she suddenly winced with pain and stiffened, before letting out a scream as her left leg got chopped off by the flung blade. 

Fuo then took a deep breath and blasted a deafening howl down at the Imp King, before she swiftly closed in and slashed off her arms, blood pouring out as she let out another agonizing shriek of pain. Fuo then pinned her down by slamming her foot down on the middle of her chest and pressed the edge of her tail against her neck. 

"Hey, Kuro, life force!" 

She sure does get straight to the point, doesn't she? 

"Yeah, yeah, I'm coming," I sighed, walking over to her as I entered Soul-Eater Mode. 

"Wh-what are you doing...?" 

"Just shut up and die quietly," I replied, as I pierced her shoulder with my claws and bit into the side of Fuo's neck. 

"Why do you always use your fangs on me-...whatever, hurry up and transfer it already!" She urged me impatiently. 

"It literally takes like two seconds, how impatient are you?" I inquired, as I finished and pulled my fangs out. 

"I can't help it, I've been waiting for this for weeks!" 

She really looked giddy and excited, she was beaming like a Cheshire cat...I don't know what that actually is though. 

"So, what abilities did you get?" I asked curiously. 

"I can fly even in my normal state now. Let me show you!" 

She then flew up and zipped around like a bug, flying around me, a bit unsteadily at first, before quickly getting the hang of it. She was fast, but the zippy way she moving around was kinda annoying. 

"What about that beam thingy?" I asked. 

"It's amazing...it doesn't use any Mana, I just have to gather sunlight in my hands and blast it out. I'm going to try it out," She replied, pointing her palms at a tree. 

Her hands began glowing bright yellow, getting brighter and brighter as she grinned with a gleam in her eyes. She continued to charge it up for a while, before stiffening her arms to lock in her aim. She then fired it out in a large beam, blasting through the trunk of the tree, the top half of the tree falling down onto the ground. The beam carried on and struck another tree behind it, blasting off a huge piece of its trunk. 

"Hey, not bad...," I remarked with a whistle. 

"The more I gather sunlight and charge it up, the more powerful the blast is. This is perfect, I love this power! I can also summon the Forest Imps, Snow Imps and Pixies, but they're all really weak, so I doubt I'll be summoning them much," She explained, descending back to the ground. 

"They'd be useful as disposable pawns though, like if you want to slow someone down during a fight. But yeah, they're not gonna be much use beyond that."

"Well, I don't care about the summoning power that much. I can now fly without entering Vampire Mode, and more importantly, I can fire out these beams now!" She exclaimed excitedly. 

"You said that attack uses sunlight, right? Does that mean you can't use it in the dark or at night?" 

"Hm...according to Atticus, I probably won't be able to use it if I'm inside a cave or something, but as for at night...moonlight works too, though the output might have a different effect, I won't know for sure till I try it out though."

I walked over to the tree that she blasted and gave it a quick glance...it may use sunlight, but it doesn't look the same as damage caused by flames...it didn't look burnt. And the edges of the spot that had been blasted were smooth. 

"Hey, zap my arm with a weak beam, I wanna see what it feels like," I remarked, as I walked back towards her. 

"Uh...sure, if you say so," She replied, before firing a small beam from her fingertip. 

"Huh, interesting...it stings a bit, but it doesn't really feel hot...I can feel a slight radiating sensation too," I observed, before eliminating the tiny bit of damage with my Healing Factor. 

"Yeah, I don't care about how it feels, all that concerns me is how much damage I can inflict with it!" 

She's still all giddy and stuff. 

"Alright, settle down. Come on, let's keep going, we should reach Silvland soon, we won't enter though, we'll go around it...that should take a couple of days or so."

"Sure, let's go. After we're past Silvland, it shouldn't be more than a couple of weeks before we're back huh..."

Yeah, that's right. We were now in the home stretch, just about a dozen days or so away from reaching the Rustlands, and then, it'll be time to end this... 

...

...

A couple of days later, on the 5th of September, we made it to the snowy area, having passed Silvland without any problems. Now that Fuo had gotten her final power-up, she was pretty much back to her normal, grumpy self. All that child-like excitement was gone, the hype had died down, so to speak. 

"We should have gotten teleportation scrolls, the type that teleports the user a significant amount of distance in the direction they point it in," She sighed, after we took down a couple of Ice Wyverns. 

Well, we didn't fight them ourselves, I summoned a couple of Giants to do it for us. I mean, at my current power level, there's really no benefit in me fighting mindless monsters. And so, I decided to combat any monsters we run into with my own monsters. 

It should be smooth sailing once we're out of Ice Wyvern territory though...after all, the Abominable Snowmen and Lesser Cyclops were both under my control, both those monster types were ruled over by the Giant King, whose life force was a part of me now. The Snow Serpents are also under my control, and the Snow Imps are under Fuo's control. 

That just leaves the Devilpenguins and Icemen, which are ruled by the Devil King and the Undead King, respectively...not sure how walking blocks of ice qualify as undead, but whatever. The Devil King is out of our reach, and the Undead King is in the Ghoul Forbidden Zone. But those two monster types were really weak, so they aren't a concern. 

Anyway, we were currently in the cart, the horses pulling us along south towards the Rustlands. And my anxiety was getting harder and harder to push down or ignore, all the what ifs and worst-case scenarios were consuming my thoughts, a growing sense of dread swirling inside me. 

"Hey, isn't there a way that we can get back faster? We've been at this for well over a month," Groaned Fuo, rolling around the cart in boredom. 

It was kinda annoying, but I couldn't help but agree with that notion...I wanted to get back as soon as possible too. But it's not like we had any teleport-... 

"Woah, how did I not think of this already!? We can get back in an instant!" I suddenly sat up with a start, as the realization hit me like a bolt of lightning. 

"What? Hey, you're not just saying that, are you?" She asked with a hopeful glint in her eyes. 

"Nope, I'm not...it's so obvious, how could I have missed it. Think back...remember how I brought you before me when you were looking for me in the Goblin cave?" 

Her eyes widened as she figured it out. 

"We can get back by summoning monsters and then undoing it while holding onto them!" She realized, standing up in the cart as if she'd been struck by lightning. 

"Exactly. I can get straight into the forest area and hunt down the Beast K-...," I began, before stiffening as I felt a faint sense of...bloodlust. 

It seemed to be a fair distance away, but my senses had been sharpened quite a bit after consuming those three monster kings. It was really faint, so barely-existent that it almost felt like I was imagining it...but there was no doubt about it, it was definitely there...someone with murderous intent was out there somewhere ahead of us...I couldn't quite tell how far, but definitely out of the reach of my Lightning Sensory Field. 

"Hey, is something wrong?" Inquired Fuo, as I stopped the cart and got off. 

I used Store on the horses and cart, as she got down as well. 

"Hang on," I replied, as I closed my eyes and focused on my heat sense. 

It had taken me a while to get the hang of it, and I still hadn't fully mastered it, but I could sense heat within a radius of a full kilometer of my position, nearly three times the range of my Lightning Sensory Field. 

There...about seven hundred and fifty meters straight ahead...let's see, one, two, three...eight heat signatures. Definitely human...or at least, human shaped...I think. While I had a wider range with my heat sense than with the Lightning Sensory Field technique, the latter could sense the surroundings in greater detail. 

"There's eight people up ahead, and they're making their way right towards us. It could just be Adventurers on a Quest, but that's not very likely...since Silvland and the Rustlands aren't on good terms, it doesn't make sense for Adventurers from the latter to come this far," I remarked with a frown, before looking around and spotting a cave, "Well, whatever, it doesn't matter. Let's go in there and wait for them to pass, and then we'll summon our monsters and teleport back, 'kay?" 

"Okay, sure," She replied with a nod, as we headed for the cave and hid by the entrance, after quickly covering our tracks...fortunately it was snowing pretty heavily and there was a strong breeze blowing. 

The Stealth barrier had gotten damaged and unusable during her fight with the Imp King, the pouch she kept it in got zapped by one of those beams. I named the beams Solar Beam or Lunar Beam, depending on the time of day she uses them in. She couldn't think of any names when I asked her what she wanted to call them, so she deflected and asked me to name them instead. 

Anyway, I could feel myself getting impatient, as the group I sensed slowly got closer and closer...and then, it turned into a sinking sense of dread, as they began to slow down once they got within a hundred meters. The entrance to this cave was a bit narrow, so I couldn't see them right away...and the instant that they came into sight, my heart rate spiked. 

It was Shiro, my imposter...with Persia, Az, Rion, Azeria, Rex, Ekai and Gela. Why...? How...? They suddenly stopped, as Shiro began looking around with an impatient look on his face. I quickly turned away and bit down on my lower lip, suppressing my bloodlust to the best of my ability before it could surface. 

"Oh, no...this is bad," Frowned Fuo with a look of concern, "We can't fight all of them...what do we do?" 

Good question...what do we do? I was struggling to think coherently right now. Why are they here? Based on Shiro's body language and the bloodlust emanating from me...they were looking for me. But how? How do they know where I am? It doesn't look like he knows exactly where I am...but if he keeps searching this area, it's only a matter of time before he finds me. 

I could run away using the undo-summon teleportation, but...would I get a better chance to kill him? If I miss this chance, who knows when he'd next leave the Rustlands? But what about the others...and what about Fuo? If he sees an opportunity to win, he could, and definitely would, attempt to take her hostage...after all, the instant I die, he'll no longer be bound by the handicap I had not-God inflict on him. 

She's my only ally, I can't afford to lose her...I have to fight all eight of them alone. It won't be easy...but it's not impossible. Thanks to my new abilities, I should be able to get them out of the way without hurting them. Then it's decided...I'll kill Shiro right here, right now. He's starting to walk over here, he spotted the cave...it's now or never. 

"Sorry about this, Fuo...I'll see you soon. If I don't, then...I'm probably dead." 

"Wait, what are you-," She began, before I interrupted her by summoning a Goblin by her feet, had it grab her ankles, and then undid the summon, both it and her vanishing as I did. 

Now, then...I won't be able to restrain my bloodlust for much longer...and I won't bother trying. I entered Vampire Mode and focused my gaze right behind him, as he got within fifty meters of the cave. He stiffened and stepped back the instant he sensed my bloodlust, I reacted immediately by using Teleport to slip behind him, with lightning, flames and wind swirling around my fist. 

"Damn it, you-!" 

"I'll kill you now...Imposter!" 

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