Chapter 205 War With The Cult (Part 5)

"Are we actually going to this properly for once?" Leo asked with a raised eyebrow. "I'm sick of fighting you two just to have you run away at the end."

"This time will be different. We're going to kill you and finally be rid of your constant interference." Trent said with a serious expression on his face.

"You're not strong enough to back up those words Trent. I'm pretty sure the cult wants me alive anyways, are you turning your backs on the Malum?" Leo asked.

"Malum...? What are you talking about?" John asked with a confused and hostile tone.

"Your so called 'Great Ones' are actually called the Malum. That's what I was told by a cultist a questioned in Zoren at least." Leo said with a shrug.

"Names don't matter nearly as much as the power they've given us." John said.

"Really? So you don't want to know what the name for your kind is, John? The ones like Trent are called Imperiums, that much you know, but what about you? You're obviously not like them so do you want to know what you are?" Leo asked.

"Who exactly came up with these names!?" John asked with a tone of irritation.

"It was told to me by something... That's not important though, is it? Anyways, I thought it would be good for you to know what you are before you die.

You and those like you are known as Sanguine Devoran, we just call you Devorans for short though." Leo said.

"Sanguine Devoran..." John mumbled to himself as his gaze wandered across the ground around his feet.

"Now that I've told you, it's time to say goodbye." Leo said.

Leo's arms were currently hanging by his sides. He turned his hand so that his palm was facing John.

A blue bolt of lightning erupted from Leo's hand and arced through the air. John was still looking at the ground as the lightning stretched towards him and only looked up at the last second.

The lightning was a few centimeters away from his chest when he created a barrier between himself and the attack.

The lightning was so close that he couldn't create a normal barrier, he instead molded it around his chest like a piece of armour.

The lightning slammed into his chest and the barrier around it cracked and shattered. The electrical power jolted through his body as it flung him back several meters.

"Aarggh...!" John winced from the pain as his body jolted from the electricity coursing through him.

"You idiot, pay attention!" Trent shouted in annoyance. He lifted his hands and created several arrow like shapes made of fire around him and flung them at Leo who responded with an equal number of firebolts in return.

Each of their attacks exploded into small balls of fire as they collided, neither one being significantly stronger than the other.

"How many abilities do you have? Wind, lightning and even fire! It's fucking ridiculous!" Trent shouted.

"You're such a hypocrite, you have multiple abilities yourself." Leo said.

"It's not the same." Trent replied with an indignant tone.

"Uh huh, sure." Leo said as he flung several Wind Blades towards Trent.

Trent lifted his hand pointed to a spot on the ground beneath the Wind Blades and fired a ball of fire that exploded when it made contact with that spot. The flames engulfed the wind blades, destroying them with the force of the explosion.

"Your lightning seems to be the only thing we need to worry about, your other attacks are weak!" Trent shouted as a smile appeared on his face.

Leo smiled as he heard Trent attempting to taunt him. He flung his own hand forwards now, twisting it as he did.

The air infront of him began to swirl in a circle, creating a 5 meter tall tornado. The tornado moved across the battlefield and went through Trents previous attack, catching fire as it did.

From Trents point of view, his ball of fire suddenly turned into a swirling mass of wind and flames and started heading straight for him.

He quickly responded to the fiery tornado by creating another explosion just infront of it in hopes that it could be disrupted like the Wind Blades had been.

To his dismay the tornado was unfazed by the explosion and even seemed to add the flames to itself, growing even larger as it approached.

A barrier suddenly appeared around Trent, creating a dome that was a few meters big. He turned around to see that John was standing behind him.

"You saw that it had absorbed the flames from your attack yet you thought that more flamed would be the key to destroying it?" John asked with a disappointed tone.

"Don't try to lecture me after you got distracted and allowed yourself to get hit!" Trent shouted back.

There was a hole in John's cloak, revealing the area of his chest that took the impact of Leo's lightning. The skin was slightly charred and every few seconds his body would jolt slightly, seemingly still feeling the effects on the attack.

The tornado continued forwards until it finally engulfed them and the dome barrier they were in.

The fire surrounded them as the tornado came to a halt. It continued spin on the spot, constantly smashing its flames against the barrier John created.

Every few seconds cracks would appear on parts of the dome for a moment before John would repair them.

After about thirty seconds of constant effort, John dropped down to one knee and his breathing became heavy.

"I can't keep this barrier up for much longer, do something!" John shouted.

Trent looked around with a panicked expression on his face as he tried to think of something that could help them escape from their current predicament.

"He's got to be getting tired as well, maintaining an attack like this must be draining him quickly. If you can just gold out for a bit then he should run out of energy." Trent finally said after realizing his ability couldn't help in any way.

"Fuck... He better get tired soon, I can't hold this for long!" John shouted back.

'If it was anyone else's attack then they would be right.' Leo said. He had been able to hear what they were saying thanks to his Battle Aura.

Leo considered it as being the first step towards learning how to manipulate sound with his ability but it wasn't really the case.

He could sense all movement within his Aura and Battle Aura, including sound waves. Much like how your ears recieve sound waves and transfer the information to your brain, Leo's Aura is doing the same thing.

In short, his ability is taking on the role that his ear would normally. He isn't actually affecting sound but considers it useful since he's able to sense the sound waves already.

'I'm barely using any Energy at all. All I have to do is absorb the energy from the air around the tornado, making it cold in that area.

Thanks to the fire there's a massive difference in temperature between the tornado and the air around it. That's what's keeping the tornado going.

They think I'm using energy to keep the tornado going but it's actually the opposite, I'm absorbing energy.' Leo said to Dreifus.

'You're really lucky to have received information about stuff like this, without it your ability wouldn't be very useful to you.' Dreifus replied.

'You're not wrong.' Leo replied.

"Dammit I can't keep going!" John suddenly shouted from within his done barrier.

'Thats my cue.' Leo thought.

From three different points in the air around the tornado, lightning sprung out of the sky and arced towards the dome barrier.

The lightning went through the base of the tornado and slammed into the dome engulfed within it.

A thunderous boom echoed out and a flash of light lit up the area around the point of impact. There was a loud cracking sound, similar to that of glass, which Leo assumed was the sound of the barrier breaking.

He stopped affecting the air around the tornado, causing it to collapse in on itself a few seconds later.

The ground was burnt to a crisp and the spot where the lightning impacted the ground had created three seperate craters.

Leo walked up to the spot where Trent and John had been within the dome and looked at the ground.

"They're gone..." Leo said with a confused expression on his face.

He looked around but saw no traces of the Imperium and Devoran.

'I didn't think it would be enough to kill them so I doubt they've been reduced to ashes. How did they manage to escape?'.

As Leo was trying to figure out what happened, the ground beneath his feet began to shake like an earthquake was taking place. He could feel the intensity of the vibrations both through his body and his Battle Aura.

When the vibrations finally stopped a few seconds later, Leo looked towards the city.

'That wasn't natural and I'm sure it came from the city... Whatever made the ground shake like that is immensely powerful, too much so for anyone other than myself to handle.' Leo thought as he started running towards the city.

'It might not be something you can handle either...' Dreifus said.

'I know.'