Fa took a deep breath and raised her hand. "Begin!"
The battle erupted in an instant.
Fa focused her mind, extended her palm, and whispered, "Gather!" Though her earth magic was still far from mastery, she could barely manipulate the sand on the ground. Arya quickly drew her longbow, pouring wind magic into the string. A whirlwind burst from her arrow and fused with Fa's sand particles, forming a small but violent sandstorm. It raged across the square—sand churning, wind howling—blinding the enemy and giving the team perfect cover.
"The sandstorm's here!" one of the sand bandits shouted in panic, raising a mechanical shield. The grains struck it like bullets, ringing out in sharp, piercing clangs.
Salsa's soul form detached from the mechanical cat, becoming a floating orb of ghostly blue light. She waved both hands and chanted softly. The ground cracked open with a boom, and thirty skeletal warriors clawed their way out of the sand. Dark red flames burned in their eye sockets; when they swung their bone swords, jets of searing flame sprayed out. Sand bandit armor melted instantly into molten metal, flesh sizzling beneath it. At the same moment, ten shadow demon wolves materialized from the void, their tar-like fur flowing, corrosive purple light flickering between violet fangs. They charged the enemy. Wherever their venomous drool landed, it ate black holes into corpses; when those holes swallowed the fleeing soul sparks, the wolves' coats briefly glimmered with stolen light.
TISK activated the sonic disruptor. A piercing wail rolled across the square, jamming the bandits' comms and mechanical weapons. Many of their prosthetic arms sparked and locked up with a pathetic whine. He swung the warhammer he and Rex had upgraded together; its head glowed with metal magic, and every strike against the ground triggered a small explosion. Blasts chained one after another. Bandits were hurled through the air. TISK roared with exhilaration, "We did it, Rex!"
Rex stood calmly at the rear, releasing dozens of nanoscale magic drones. The tiny craft darted through the air, firing pinpoint laser beams into vital points. Armor burned through; screams followed. At the same time, his robotic arm shifted into a sonic cannon and unleashed a shockwave that sent a whole squad of soul-race guards flying like ragdolls.
The enemy counterattack
The enemy reacted fast. Thousands of sand bandits and soul-race warriors poured in from every direction. The square became a boiling cauldron of shouts, clashing steel, and magical detonations.
From his elevated position, Cthulhu looked down on the battlefield. When he saw Salsa's soul form commanding skeleton soldiers and shadow wolves, surprise flickered in his eyes. "A soul-race traitor in their ranks?" He gave a cold smile. "Interesting."
He raised both hands and pressed them to the Soul-Devouring Bell. Black magic surged from his fingertips in a burst of moonlight-like darkness. "Let the feast of the dead begin—with the traitor as appetizer!" Black mist poured from him and struck the ground, splitting it open in hundreds of fissures. First came endless skeletal warriors with rusted longswords, then skeletal knights on bone horses, warriors swinging corrosive greataxes, and most terrifying of all—skeletal mages wielding black magic.
"Watch your trash summons crumble before true necromantic power!" Cthulhu waved a hand. Dozens of skeletal mages hurled shadow orbs. The shadow demon wolves shrieked as they were struck, collapsing into bubbling tar. Salsa's skeletons fared worse—they simply disintegrated into dust. Salsa's soul form was forced back dozens of meters, her blue glow dimming by two-thirds. "He… he's draining the bell's original energy!"
Cthulhu pressed the advantage. A hundred-meter soul-whip scythe appeared in his palm, its blade wreathed in undead hellfire. Wherever it swept, the stone bricks were etched with abyssal runes. Just as the scythe was about to cleave Salsa in two, Rex's sonic cannon fired. The shockwave scattered the scythe into black mist, earning only a sneer from Cthulhu: "Mechanical parlor tricks dare challenge the master of souls?" He summoned a hundred scorpion-tailed undead; their secret-silver-laced tails carved bleeding black grooves into the ground.
"You betrayed your own people!" Cthulhu's voice rang from the platform, thick with rage as he pointed at Salsa.
Salsa laughed coldly, her soul form floating higher, blue light burning brighter. "I never agreed with your ways, Cthulhu. You are the one who betrayed the soul-race by enslaving spirits with dark magic!"
Cthulhu's expression turned vicious. He thrust a black shockwave straight at her. Salsa hastily summoned shadow tentacles from the ground to block it. The collision produced a deafening explosion that knocked nearby bandits flat.
The fortress lord's transformation
In the chaos, the fortress lord—now only half alive under TISK's hammer—crawled toward Cthulhu, fingers digging into the sand, voice bubbling with blood: "My lord… give me power… I offer my soul!" Cthulhu looked down at him and touched his forehead with one finger. "Your soul is merely a snack for the dark."
The fortress lord screamed in agony. His body twisted and swelled. Muscles ballooned, skin blackened, armor split apart. His height surged from two meters to three. His arms became massive claws, eyes glowing crimson. He became a terrifying monster and charged Fa's team with earth-shaking steps.
"Careful!" Arya shouted. She drew her bow and condensed all five elements into one arrow—light to pierce darkness, wind to tear air, fire to burn, wood to bind, dark to corrode. The arrow struck his chest in a blinding explosion, yet the wound closed almost instantly.
Fa activated her Star Eye; silver light flared as she foresaw the beast's strike. She dodged fluidly, stabbed her short blade—coated in earth magic—into its leg. Sand poured into the wound, trying to slow it, but the beast kicked her away like a doll.
Fa hit the ground hard, clutching her chest. Arya rushed to her side and helped her up. "Fa, are you okay?"
Fa shook her head, teeth clenched. "I'm fine. This thing is strong. We have to work together."
TISK and Rex met the beast head-on. TISK's exploding hammer blew chunks of flesh from its arm. Rex's sonic cannon staggered it. Nanodrones peppered it with lasers, but the creature's hide was too thick; wounds closed faster than they could kill.
Awakening of the four crystals
The battle reached a stalemate. Fa's knuckles were white around her blade, Star Eye surging with silver light. She glanced at Salsa—her summons were being overwhelmed, skeletons crumbling, shadow wolves melting.
Rex suddenly shouted, "Fa, Salsa, Arya, TISK—you forgot the crystals we got from destroying the four statues in the ruins! Feel their power now!"
They remembered: earth, metal, wood, and dark.
Fa closed her eyes and resonated with the earth crystal. Sand rose into walls, shielding her teammates from a killing blow. "Got it!" TISK roared. Metal crystal light flowed into his hammer; runic silver patterns appeared across it. He brought it down on the beast's leg. The impact cracked the plaza and sent skeletal knights flying.
Arya touched the wood crystal at her neck. Vines erupted along her bow. "Wind and Wood Symphony—" She fired. The arrow bloomed with fire and spun with wind blades. Vines exploded from the ground and bound the beast's legs.
The most dramatic change happened to Salsa. When she touched the dark crystal on her forehead, her blue light contracted into a dense core. Her shadow wolves solidified into black metal-armored beasts; skeletons fused with them, becoming "Dark Wolf Knights" riding shadow mounts. Ten knights charged, bone swords burning with dark flame. Cthulhu's undead shattered into light particles wherever they struck. "This is… the awakening of true darkness?" Salsa's voice trembled with excitement.
Meanwhile, the sonic disruptors had crippled the bandits' and soul-race mechanical weapons, letting Rex's remaining drones pick off distant threats with surgical precision.
Fa stood, exchanged a look with Arya and TISK. "We finish the beast, then destroy the Soul-Devouring Bell."
Arya nodded and nocked another arrow. "I've got you."
Fa activated Star Eye fully; silver light enveloped her. She charged, blade spinning, earth magic forming sand armor along its edge. She predicted the claw swipe, dodged, and buried the blade in the beast's abdomen. Sand detonated inside. The monster roared, blood spraying.
"Now, Arya, TISK!" Fa shouted.
Arya's fire-wind arrow split into flaming tornadoes that burrowed into the wound. TISK's hammer smashed the beast's head, exploding half its face into gore. Rex closed in, sonic cannon tearing open its chest to reveal a pulsing black heart. One of Salsa's dark wolf knights lunged, sank fangs into the heart, and pumped corrosive venom inside.
The beast gave a final wail and collapsed into a puddle of stinking black sludge.
Star and Darkness—the final choice
With the fortress lord dead, Cthulhu finally unleashed his true power. His black robes exploded outward. Countless twisted human faces emerged around him; wails poured from the bell like ten thousand ghosts. The ground split; endless undead surged forth while skeletal mages floated above, shadow orbs charging.
"Mongrels, witness the ultimate fall of souls."
He pressed both palms to the bell. It swelled to ten meters tall, its dark crystal core showing thousands of tortured faces. His soul form flickered, undead runes glowing on his forehead, octopus-like black tentacles coiling around the bell's frame, each tip burning with hellfire.
Salsa's soul was nearly transparent, her mechanical cat body collapsed in a corner, her shadow barrier crumbling. "Fa… he's devouring the souls of the entire city…"
TISK knelt on one knee, hammer planted in the ground to keep himself upright, armor scorched and cracked. Arya's bow was splintering, her five-element light dimming. Rex's chassis smoked, only a handful of drones left, yet still fighting.
Fa's Star Eye suddenly blazed like a sun. Silver patterns spread across her face. An ancient voice echoed in her mind again. "Time… stop."
Everything froze—blood droplets hung in air, skeletal blades mid-swing, even Cthulhu raising the bell. Only her teammates' soul lights still pulsed warmly.
"Rex, concentrate all energy on the bell's resonance core! TISK, shatter its magic conduits with your hammer! Arya, prepare a light-element shockwave to sever his soul link!" She turned to Salsa's fading light. "Hold on—we're ending this now."
Rex's lenses flared. Remaining drones merged into a silver stream and bored into cracks at the bell's base. TISK stood, runes blazing, and struck the bell's weakest point. Arya gathered her last light into an arrow.
Fa fused earth and Star Eye power into her blade and hurled it at the blue glow in Cthulhu's left hand—his soul lifeline. "This is the price for abusing souls."
Time resumed with a thunderous crack. The Soul-Devouring Bell split down the middle. Countless black motes scattered. Cthulhu shrieked; the left side of his soul body was scorched by starlight, several tentacles disintegrating into blue sparks.
"The Star Eye bearer…" He staggered back in terror. "So it was you who defeated the blood elf in Golden Merchant Fort…" He glared at Fa's right eye, hatred and fear warring in his gaze. "You think destroying the bell ends this? We will never let you or your companions go—next time we meet, your souls will fall!"
He dissolved into charred black mist and fled. The bell fragments clanged to the ground. All mind-controlled residents woke, blinking at the devastation.
Fa staggered to Arya, managed a weary smile. "We… won?"
Arya caught falling star-sand in her palm—grains glowing faintly as they merged back into the desert. "Looks like our enemies aren't just the soul-race and blood elves… there are greater unknowns out there."
TISK slapped his hammer against his palm, face smeared with soot yet grinning wide. "Who cares! Let's just sleep for three days straight in Shad Fort first!"
Salsa's soul drifted to the bell's remains. hesitated, then touched a large fragment. Cold energy flowed into her like a river. The cracks on the fragment began resonating with her soul frequency.
"Salsa, don't—!" Rex warned, but it was too late. The fragment melted into her light. Her glow deepened, becoming the color of an entire undead starry sky.
Memories flooded her—Cthulhu's incantations, ancient soul-race contracts, residual necromantic knowledge from the bell's core. Her soul trembled, then stabilized—more solid than ever. Whispers of the dead sang in her ears.
"I… can feel the boundary between soul and matter blurring." Her voice shook with thrill. "This isn't a curse. It's ascension."
Rex scanned her rapidly. "The fragment has resonated with your soul. It has greatly increased your affinity with necromancy. But remain cautious—the energy is still dark."
Salsa laughed softly, light returning to her mechanical cat body. Her blue pupils glinted slyly. "Don't worry, Rex. I was never the one swallowed by darkness—I'm the one who tames it." She flicked her fingers. Strands of undead energy rose from the wreckage and formed several translucent shadow spirits that danced happily around her.
Hearing that, Rex began scanning the remaining dark residue, his mechanical voice unusually relaxed. "Calculations indicate we have approximately seventy-two hours of respite. Recommend prioritizing city defense repairs—"
"Yeah, yeah, you old fossil." TISK slung an arm around Rex's shoulders. "First round's on me—there's a guy in the oasis who brews killer sea-buckthorn wine—"