Chapter 53 - Power Of Sacrifice 2/2

After a while limping through the woods and she remembered what Lera had done to Klad's arm and snuck through town looking for the girl to be healed at least a little.

She avoided fights and the sight of demons, heretics using assassin's stealth skill and then heard Lera's screams calling for Mifa and mourning for Sura.

Athena limped as fast as she could as she felt her organs loosen inside her and a sharp pain in her right leg, not to mention her left arm that was dangling by itself and gnawing at her head.

When Athena, through an alley, arrived on a street farther from the center of the battlefield, she saw Sura's decapitated body, Lera crying inside a red barrier, and Mifa at the demon's feet.

"Mifa?" Athena saw the demon grab the girl from the ground by her neck. Her heart got even faster when she saw Mifa about to die. (What do I do? What do I do? Think, think!!) Athena urged her brain for a solution.

On the way there she had already thought of several skills and spells that could be useful in a fight against the demon and she knew the answer, but then the rush was too high and now she knew she could make peace with Anemus, she didn't want to to die. Not now.

The skill in question was [Mana Drain], in the game it was the only skill a mage, wizard or sorcerer could use.

When used, this skill would drain the surrounding natural mana and give the mage, wizard or sorcerer a pseudo-invincibility.

HP would stop being reduced for a few seconds, spell cooldown would be halved, and the caster would have unlimited MP for forty seconds as the skill would be activated.

After the skill's effect wore off, the side effects were not being able to use magic for one hour and there had one in ten chance of dying.

The effects were powerful, but the side effects were severe and therefore it was a skill considered as a last resort by mage, wizards and sorcerers.

However, Athena didn't know the limitations and side effects of the skill in this world and if it lasts less than forty seconds, the chance of the demon surviving was high.

Anyway, Mifa was about to die and suddenly nothing else mattered. Athena mentally apologized to Anemus, Fotiá and Lunnia and took a deep breath.

"[Mana Drain]"

The instant Athena said the skill in a calm voice distorted with mana, the flow of mana across the area changed and the woman's body glowed with a white aura that rippled and whipped wildly like a storm.

Athena's eyes that were green turned blue, veins pulsed violently in her neck, her skin turned glowing white, her blond hair became a veil of white light that floated as if underwater and the ground where Athena stepped cracked and trembled. .

The aches that Athena felt disappeared as the mana ran through her body and put things in place and her body felt lighter and hot.

Athena moved the broken arm as if it were still whole, checking its functionality and swung her right leg, ascertaining the pain that no longer existed and with that action the ground tore like a cloth to the demon's feet.

The man turned his face back, feeling his skin tremble as if warning him of danger. He ignored his instincts and moved his arm toward the girl in his hand.

"What do you think you're doing?" Athena asked in a distorted voice as she appeared beside the demon, with the man's arm in her hands. "Let her go."

The furious look on Athena's face didn't match the calm in her voice and even so, it made the demon tremble, let go of Mifa and jump away.

At least he thought he had walked away.

All this in a matter of milliseconds. The moment the demon released Mifa, Athena threw his arm anywhere, took the girl in her arms and then kicked the demon in the ribs which made a loud cracking sound.

"You overreacted..." Athena said in a voice full of affection, as she brushed the bloody hair from Mifa's face.

Athena laid Mifa on the floor, pulled one of her dresses from the [Dimensional Bag], covered the Mifa and cast {Absolute Barrier} on the girl who opened her eyes and smiled at the sight of Athena's face.

Leaving Mifa there, under the protection of the tenth cycle magic that was now possible with an unlimited mana source, and did the same with the group of children with Lera.

"Athena... Sura is..." Lera said and Athena looked again at the Half-Elf's body.

Athena took the head and put it to the body and with {Shape Earth} she covered the body with a box of hard earth.

"I'm sorry... Death is something irreversible." Athena said in a mournful voice and Lera cried louder.

Meanwhile, inside a building, where the demon was after being kicked, the man felt his ribs come back into place as he caught his breath and coughed up black blood.

For the first time in his life he was feeling his heart racing with fear, and for the second time that day, he was overwhelmed by the same woman.

Feeling fear, anger and shame, still inside the building, the demon began to gather miasma and called the lesser demons within a hundred yards to him.

The surrounding demons rushed to answer the man's call and circled the building in the sky and on the ground, and then they all disappeared in a stormy, dense red-black aura that hid the place.

The demon laughed, snubbing the sacrifice of the lesser demons and feeling the newly acquired power, he laughed heartily as he devoured all the miasma in the place.

"Now no one will be able to oppose me and when I get the location of the seal, the demon lord Mammon will reward me with a real name! Fufufu..."

The demon was beginning to revel in his new possibilities when he felt someone's piercing eyes on his back.

"Pleased?" Athena asked in a calm, menacing voice.

The demon turned to Athena who seemed to have even more mana than before and laughed wildly.

"HAHAHAHAHA!!!!! Now you are a gift! I'll-"

Athena didn't wait for him to finish, she didn't have the patience for it anymore. With a sword that wasn't her own, she ripped out the demon's jaw.

There, unlike what the demon thought, there began execution through endless torture. Athena cut and he regenerated, Athena plucked and he regenerated.

Every time he was cut and or torn, Athena would wait for him to regenerate and repeat it all over again until he began to shake and cry.

"No! Please! That's enough! I don't want to di-"

Athena cut off his head and waited. His head melting into miasma and swaying on his kneeling body.

The demon lunged at Athena and in response, she slashed him into large pieces. Athena did not intend to make his death easy and she also did not intend to allow his soul to return to hell. So she covered the place with mana, making an eternal cocoon so that when she gave the final blow, his soul was trapped in an eternal prison.

When the demon stopped resisting, reacting or begging, Athena decided it was enough and destroyed the man's body by burning it with white flames.

That wasn't magic, it was pure and condensed mana with {Hellfire} magic properties. Athena called it "Flame of Punishment".

The demon's soul flew, trying to escape to hell and Athena trapped him in a pure white colored mana crystal, just like her current mana was and then threw him into her [Dimensional Bag] to never leave.

***

With the mana of the area having an owner at the moment, no one on the island could use powerful spells anymore. So heretics who only knew how to use magic were quickly subdued and only those who knew how to use swords or any other weapon remained in the battle.

The mercenaries and enemy soldiers, who used skills, still had their powers to use and kill each other. It because skill didn't need the world's mana to create some phenomenon.

But anyway, the battle was about to end.

The sky darkened again, just like earlier, but this time it was different. Amidst the black clouds, a ring hole was present.

"Whoever doesn't want to die, leave!" A powerful voice echoed across the battlefield.

People looked back and standing in front of the temple of all the gods, Athena spewed mana into the sky like a reverse waterfall.

Red rays appeared from among the black clouds and small balls of fire rained down all over the place, igniting the forest and wooden buildings.

The mercenaries, defending themselves, looked up and their jaws dropped as they saw the massive meteor descend where there was a gap between the clouds.

The warriors disentangled themselves from their opponents and hurried to where Athena was.

The enemy tried to chase them, but it was useless. Halfway between where the battle was still going on and the temple, Athena had raised a hard wall of mana that only allowed the passage of those Athena allowed.

After all the mercenaries fled, there were still hundreds of people there. These people were either crushed or burned alive by the flaming meteor that burned and destroyed a third of the island.

"You could have won the war in Basilian alone, couldn't you?" Lobana asked as she wiped her bloodstained face, but she got no answer. "Don't ignore me A-!!!"

When Lobana looked back at Athena, the woman was breathing hard on the ground.

"Athena!"