177 Ch. 177 'Hopeless'

Niken remembered finding a rabbit trapped in a hole when she was a child. She and her twin brother saved the poor animal and planned to bring it home.

But on their way, a lioness appeared to confront them. Two young children encounter a wild beast for the first time and are more concerned with their sibling's life than the rabbit they have just picked up.

In the end, both of them failed to carry the rabbit along and fled without realizing the lion already pounced on the poor rabbit.

It was a terrible sight, and Niken is still not recovering from her guilt. That's why she can never let the people around her suffer or get hurt.

Every time someone got hurt in front of her eyes, she also feels broken no matter whether that person is a stranger or not. It doesn't matter if she gets hurt. Even though she felt scared and helpless, she wouldn't feel guilty for making the people around her hurt to protect her.

The first time Xiao Yue's memory emerged in her, her guilt for not being able to protect the rabbit grew bigger even more so when she remembered that she couldn't do anything at all without her brother.

Her father, mother, brother, and others sacrificed their lives to make her life calm and peaceful.

Fortunately, she also has memories that Niken has. She made new friends who supported her and gave her courage.

She is not a child who always hides behind her brother's robe whenever there is a problem. She decided to be strong and not burden her loved ones.

It's just... why did she fail to protect her dear one once again? Merylin entrusted her celestial soul in her hands, yet she couldn't guard it properly.

Even though the mermaid princess's soul orb was safe in her grasp, why was she so carelessly giving it to other people just like that?

At first, she thought, that person just wanted to keep it, so Niken gave it up to save Xehan's life.

Who would have thought… the mix-blood would destroy it right away?

"Merylin, I'm sorry." Niken sat limply while looking at the remaining grains of the orb that broke with a blank stare.

Is this all she can do? What is the use of the great time master's strength if she couldn't use her power to protect her friends? What's the point in her having two or three magic circles if she can't harness its power to the fullest potential?

Niken felt helpless and hopeless. She didn't know what to do anymore. For the umpteenth time, she met a dead end.

If she had hit a dead-end before, she still had some hopes because she knew there was still a way out she had not found. But this time, she felt like she was really at a dead end. And there is no hope because she believes there is no way to return the evil mermaid to the way it was before.

At the same time, Kazuto, who was focusing on maintaining the array in the mermaid lake while driving the Elementalists attacking him, felt a pain in his chest.

He felt lost, hopeless, and helpless. He was sure what he felt was not his, which mean that this feeling belonged to Niken! Did something happen to Niken?

Didn't Niken decide to hand over Merylin's celestial soul orb and think of a way to reclaim it? Then why did Niken feel this despair?

Kazuto's concentration broke as time passed, and Lord Traze saw it as a chance to attack him.

"KAZUTO!!!"

However, Kazuto's reaction was relatively slow because his mind was not on his head, so an iron wall slammed into his body and knocked him far away, causing him to hit a tree hard.

"Ugh!"

Just when Kazuto was no longer channeling his energy into the defense array, Lionel was increasingly overwhelmed to defend it alone while resisting the attacks of other elementalists.

Crack! Crack!

Little by little, cracks appeared on various sides of the array.

Seeing an opening to get rid of Lionel, the Elementalists created a dome-shaped cage and locked Lionel forcibly so that Lionel's two hands no longer touched the array.

Seeing that the two intruding Elementalists had already lost to his soldiers, Lord Traze emerged from his hiding place. At first, his steps were slow, but then it got faster and faster until he ran, clenching one of his hands into a fist.

Boom!

In one hit, Lord Traze slammed his fist into the weaker defense array. In an instant, the array was broken to pieces and disappeared in mid of the air, instantly making the evil mermaids inside the water shield eager to get out.

Ceryle's husband started to feel tired because he had to maintain his water shield, while the evil mermaids began struggling to get out.

Moreover, that man was not a fighter and now faced with Elementalists ready to attack him if he did not release the evil mermaids.

He glanced at Kazuto, who was still trying to get up because of the heavy impact of the iron wall made by the Lord. Besides, the man's two hands were now stuck to the ground with two irons making Kazuto unable to get up.

Then he glanced at Lionel, who wasn't much better than the black knight. In fact, that man seemed unable to get out of the Elementalists' iron dome.

What should he do? Should he let go of these evil mermaids? If he let go, wouldn't that mean the evil mermaids would spread out all over the world?

Having no other choice because he still loved his life, Ceryle's husband couldn't help but remove his water shield.

At that instant, all the evil mermaids immediately dived in and swam into the open sea, making Aqua baffled.

What happened? Why did the tortoise shapeshifter release all the evil mermaids?

'Niken, I need you to hold the mermaids.' Aqua tried to enter Niken's mind cells and was surprised by what Niken saw.

Currently, Niken is not in good condition and is dealing with a mix-blood wizard?

Aqua gritted her teeth and swam as fast as she could before the mermaids tried to get out of the lake. She used her power to create a water barrier to keep the evil mermaids from leaving this lake.

It would be very troublesome if the evil mermaids spread throughout the country. Chaos will occur, and there will be many human victims who will die. She must not allow it and postpone this purification ritual.

Only, she couldn't possibly withstand this many evil mermaids since there were quite a few of them that could breathe on the ground. Sooner or later, they would turn to head out over the mainland.

Aqua couldn't be in two different places at the same time, so she would leave the task of restraining these evil mermaids to Kazuto and Lionel.

It's just that, why did her instinct tell Kazuto and Lionel not to be able to hold back these mermaids?

If an evil mermaid made it to the mainland, no doubt, they would all attack the people and kill them all.

Aqua had no other choice but to exterminate them. Killing evil mermaids is much faster and more efficient than purifying the dark force and returning the evil spirits to their original state.

Should she kill them? Is she up to it?

If only the other nation spirits had become evil spirits, Aqua would not have thought twice about eliminating them. But what she was facing right now was the mermaid race—one tribe like her who live in the ocean.

Aqua didn't have the heart to eliminate them all from this world. What should she do?

'Do the purification ritual,'

Aqua looked up and saw a butterfly flying above the watet. She squinted her eyes suspiciously that it wasn't an ordinary butterfly, but the phantasm lord's familiar spirit!

What is vlinder doing here? Doesn't Vlinder already have a master and now live in the Immortal Realm?

Even though she was confused, and her mind filled with questions, Aqua felt she could trust the spirit's familiar words. She decided to lock the evil mermaids into her water cage.

This was the first time she had created a giant water cage to contain hundreds of evil mermaids who were struggling and rampaging towards her. But at least the cage could hold them all for the next few minutes.

Without further ado, Aqua began to concentrate on purifying the polluted water caused by the dark force energy.

At the same time, Niken, who was still immersed in her world of depression, suddenly heard the mermaid's crying voice.

"Xehan! Xehan! What is wrong with you? You! What have you done to my son??"

Niken gasped at this and quickly walked over to Ceryle to see Xehan's condition.

No injury was shown from his body, but the boy's lips turned purple, and some nerves emerged from his face and now spread slowly throughout his body.

What happened?

Niken glared the mix-blood wizard in a fury. "You! Didn't you promise to let him go!"

"I did release him, but I forgot to tell you, I gave him my poison before locking him up."

Snap!

Suddenly something that was holding Niken's raging heart broke at that moment.