From out of the glowing rift in front of him, a young woman wearing golden robes with black accents appeared.
Her eyes like Marcus' were a light purple, and her waist length hair was mostly a light platinum until becoming black at the tips.
"You called boss." Alyna said, a beaming smile on her face.
Unlike the last time they had met when she had just been freed from the curse of undeath that had turned her into a dread wraith, the gloomy and melancholic air around her had completely vanished. Her life now was like a blissful dream compared to before.
"Yeah, I know I warned you beforehand, but thanks for coming. I was in a bit of a bind fighting against those two."
Marcus, with his hand outstretched, pointed towards Arriba, and Zorot.
The two of them had ceased attacking him for the moment thanks to his summoning Alyna.
Arriba had backed away warily, while Zorot wore an expression of shock and disbelief.
"Impossible. That is a power only a great spirit should have." The demon muttered to himself.
He had spoken quietly and almost certainly did not expect his comment to be heard, but Marcus responded anyway.
"That is correct. I'm a great spirit. You two are a bit too much trouble for me to deal with on my own, so, I've called in my adjutant to take some of the pressure off of me."
His confirmation of his race seemed to further shock Zorot and put a surprising amount of fear into the demon. Normally great spirits were considered to be among the strongest entities on the planet and when one showed itself to anyone as an enemy, they were sure to be destroyed.
Of course, Marcus was a far cry from the power that a fully realized great spirit possessed. He had learned that normally to qualify to be one it was necessary to be at least level ninety-seven. He was still more than twenty levels below this.
"The addition of one more insurgent will not make a difference. You will all fall to my power and authority." Arriba screeched once the surprise of Alyna's appearance had worn off.
With the wave of his scepter, he sent a barrage of spells and blasts of necrotic energy towards Marcus and Alyna.
The two of them swiftly jumped into a dark portal that Marcus had created to avoid the barrage and reappeared around a kilometer away from their previous position.
"Alyna, I would like you to keep the demon that is puppeteering that body busy. He is fairly strong, but I'm pretty sure you can handle him."
"It's fine if I do more than just occupy his attention, right? You don't care if I go ahead and defeat him." Alyna said, his lips curved up into a confident grin.
"Sure, go ahead. So long as you aren't putting yourself in too much danger."
Having Marcus' permission to beat her opponent, Alyna felt ecstatic. She wanted to show off just how much stronger she had become thanks to her training in the Special Dungeon that Marcus had guided her and her friends to.
From out of her item box, she pulled out two top tier adamantine scimitars.
They were twin blades, with one having the pattern of a sun and the other having the pattern of a moon on it.
This was the first time Marcus had ever seen these weapons and he was honestly impressed by them. Both were clearly powerful weapons and had been made by a true master.
"Razing Twilight."
Unleashing a whirling attack, Alyan vanished from her place next to Marcus and rushed directly towards Zorot. She was thrilled for her first battle as Marcus' subordinate. Finally, she would be able to repay some of the enormous debt she owed to him.
Her fierce assault knocked Zorot out of his daze, and the demon was forced to focus all of his attention on blocking her rapid series of attacks.
When he finally reached it the scepter transmitted images and pleas directly into his mind. It offered him great power beyond his wildest imagination. It would give anything to prevent its own destruction.
A weaker person might have given into the temptation with little resistance. Despite how monstrous it was, the undead weapon was immensely powerful.
Still, not for a single instant did Marcus consider accepting the scepter. In his eyes it was a blasphemous creation that needed to be destroyed.
"NOOOOOOO!"
Screaming loudly and forcing his way past Alyna, Zorot rushed to stop Marcus, but he was too far away.
Before the demon forgemaster could prevent his greatest creation from being destroyed, Marcus had already swung his hammer.
The culmination of all the damage the undead weapon had incurred over the course of the battle reached its limit with this last strike and it shattered into hundreds of pieces.
"Cleansing Luminesce."
An unimaginable amount of malice released from the now broken scepter, and Marcus immediately cast his light magic to purify the remains of the undead weapon.
Thousands of baleful souls erupted from the broken undead weapon, but before they could get far the light Marcus was emitting reached them.
Unable to resist the allure of release from their centuries of torment, the souls of the people that had been trapped within the scepter flew towards Marcus.
When they touched the light around him the ill feelings that had festered within them were exorcised and they were freed from the hell that had been their exitance.
Watching this, Alyna wore a somber expression. At one time she had been in a similar position to these people.
Nevertheless, thanks to Marcus she had been released from the agony that had been her life.
Casting the same spell that Marcus had, she let her magic and emotions wash over the specters and help them pass on peacefully.
During all of this Zorot had collapsed to his knees at the shock of watching his masterpiece being destroyed. This was the perfect time to attack, but his mind was in too much disarray to do so.
As for the Ghost King, having the connection to his scepter severed had hit him with an immense spiritual backlash that had stunned him. The two had been intertwined for so long that their beings had been tied together.
"Alyna, I will leave the rest to you. There is something else that requires my attention." Marcus said, once the remaining trapped souls had been brought down to a manageable number.
Canceling his magic, he floated down towards the ground and focused on his spectral arm.
He still had Arriba held in its grasp underground and brought the Ghost King back to the surface.
Unlike before, the deranged look in the phantom man's eyes was now gone. Replaced by a blank and feeble look.
The undead weapon had been the one truly controlling him, and now that it was gone, he was simply a broken shell. If he were ever to recover, it would not be any time soon. Time which Marcus was not going to give him.
His scythe raised high; he channeled the energy emitted by his Supreme Skill into the weapon.
Empowered to the highest possible degree that he could currently manage, Marcus brought his weapon down on the Ghost King. Stay tuned to m v l e m p y r
Without any resistance, his scythe cut through Arriba's neck and separated his head from the rest of his body.
Purifying light flowed through the Ghost King's form like a web until he completely fell apart. Marcus' strike had finally destroyed Arriba and set him free from his three hundred years of misery.