The Phantom Riser

CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX - THE STRONGEST (2)

“That’s enough beast, your master stands before you,” Jovak said as he subdued the Fire dragon. He had killed Victor and in turn, inherited his ability. He would have preferred to have Victor on his side rather than steal his ability. It was quite a bother to have to carry the title of Ascient. An extra ally would have been sufficient. In fact, more than sufficient considering how powerful he was. But Victor was never going to join him. And the power of the Ascient was one that he definitely had to get. At least, it was one he couldn’t allow to roam free. However, the fire dragon rose once more, a mere shadow of its true self, flame embers that fought hard to stay awake and in one swooping move swallowed Jovak whole!

In a few seconds, Jovak burst his way through using a wave blast. He was somewhat disappointed. How had he failed to tame the fire dragon? Was there some kind of special pact involved? Or…

A fireball came straight at Jovak which he easily parried to the side. Of course! He had failed to kill the Ascient. But how had he survived that energy blast a few moments ago? Another special item? Or did he hold back? No? he was sure he made full contact with him. But that was trivial. His fire cloak had expired and he had no more fire summonings left. Without help from the Phantom and the Beast, there was no way he could win.

“Jovak, we have a problem. The items---”

Jovak looked back upon hearing what Isaac said. The Red Vase and Dominic’s necklace; two out of three of the special items had gone missing. But that was one of their problems. One of their members; Draco, the lightning Riser was also missing.

“Where is Draco?” Jovak asked. His anger was very apparent. He stared at Kiro’s sphere. For some time, there had been no changes. Wait… wait, for a moment, it looked like the sphere actually got bigger. Was he hallucinating? He hit his forehead a few times as if trying to reset his eyesight. For the others, it was the first time seeing Jovak like that, but Isaac knew exactly what it meant. He was more anxious than angry. Losing in a battle of wits would do way more damage than they could imagine. He had made himself into a tactical powerful overlord. A psychopath with no weaknesses. That was the image he had carved out for himself. But to be outsmarted in such a manner… the Phantom Riser had been leading them by the nose the whole. Wait, what of the Ascient? Jovak had completely lost sight of him. “Tell Leroy to return with the Beast. I’ll pull out the Phantom before he has the chance to escape,” Jovak said.

He walked furiously to Kiro’s sphere. With one strike of his palm, he shattered the sphere into many pieces. Before his strength, Kiro’s defense was nothing more than brittle glass. And right within this ‘brittle glass’ was nothing! Absolutely nothing. Not Ardan. Not Kiro. Nothing. Jovak let out a loud cry. A wounded beast was what he was. And those responsible would surely pay the price.

***

Kiro, Victor, Lucas, Theodore, and Olivia sat inside a cave. In front of them were Ardan and Draco, both of whom were tied up. Neither Lucas nor Kiro was wounded, thanks to the water of life; the special item which they had all taken before the fight. They were both exhausted, however. “So, where is she?” Theodore asked.

“In an imaginary space. Apparently, one of their members; Leroy is capable of such. But it won’t be long before it wears off and they are both returned to Jovak. He’s definitely not going to let us go easy next time,” Kiro said.

“You do know that I could just shoot out lightning to give away your position, right? It would take mere seconds for Jovak to get here,” Draco threatened.

Kiro let out a soft, exhausted smile. “Give it a try then,” Kiro goaded. There was silence for a while. Draco did nothing. Not for lack of trying though. He just couldn’t do anything. His ability wouldn’t activate.

“What the hell did you do to me?” Draco yelled.

“That would be Olivia. You can’t use your ability thanks to her.”

“Then why didn’t you bring her along then? She could have been useful right?” Ardan asked.

Kiro was well aware that he was just trying to poach information from them. And he was definitely not going to reveal his ally’s weakness to someone, much less his enemies. “I think you have bigger things to worry about,” Kiro said.

The thing was that, as long as Olivia was staring at a person, they would be unable to use their ability. The problem was, at that time, she could only use it on one person at a time. That would make her a priority target in an all-out battle. She was unable to use any other ability as a result and her physical stats were far from impressive. In the end, she would end up being a liability than an asset. Even worse, against someone like Jovak who had stolen multiple abilities, her ability would only be able to cancel out one because they were from different origins. And that wouldn’t exactly do them a lot of good.

“So, other than you two, you met up with a mind reader, a teleporter, and a power nullifier. Luck?” Ardan asked. He was starting to get suspicious of Kiro. So much that Kiro felt that killing him might be on the safe side. “You even got all three of the special items,” Jovak said, staring at Azulon behind him, the Red Vase, and Dominic’s necklace. Pretty bold of you to steal from a thief.”

“By thief you mean Jovak, right? We’ll be fine,” Kiro said.

“How do we get Karenia out?” Victor asked.

“Well, I have an idea. Theodore can only teleport to places he has seen or is seeing at the moment. By linking my mind and his through Lucas, we were able to get him to within my sphere and out. By linking his mind with Lucas, were able to get Draco, who happened to be guarding the Vase and the necklace. But what if Ardan has seen this illusionary construct? It might be an illusion, but it exists. Just not within our realm. What do you think?” Kiro asked. The entire cave was filled with so much awe that no one said a word.

“Is he always like this?” Theodore asked.

“Like what?”

“Having a solution to everything. But you come up with the craziest ideas. It’s almost like you can see the future.”

Kiro and Victor passed stares at each other. In a way, you could say that he could see the future, seeing as he had lived through it once already.

“I think it’s worth a try. But it is going to hurt,” Lucas said.

“Victor, you stay here with Olivia just. She definitely would need protection. I’m sure you can handle these two. Lucas is coming with us just in case. We don’t want to get stranded in an illusion.”

“Can you even go there? Seeing as you are immune to illusions?”

“Crap. Victor, you go. I’ll stay back.”

“Here we go,” Lucas said.