The roars were so loud and filled with power that they completely captivated the attention of all those present. It was as if time, itself, had gone still as everyone felt those terrifying vibrations sweep through their bodies and minds, turning them to stone, but on Jonah, they had no effect.
Perhaps it was because his all-encompassing concern for his disciple's well-being overthrew everything in its path, or perhaps it only affected those who instantly feared for their future when they heard them. Either way, for a single second, Jonah was the only one who could move in the room, and he used it well.
After the second passed, they found him hugging his disciple, cradling his body in his lap while smiling as if the devil had possessed him. As soon as he saw this, the Saint looked as if he would raise his hand and destroy them both where they stood, but he was interrupted when an unknown analyst's voice echoed in the chamber.
"Two Saint-level beings have appeared out of a dimensional rift to attack the headquarters! Their identities have been confirmed! The Hydra has begun to suck away the Energy resources of all defensive mechanisms, while the Basilisk is using her abilities to render the personnel of the Church useless! She is also attacking the defensive mechanisms to break through! The Saint's intervention is urgently required in the next half-second if all-out destruction is to be prevented!"
Jonah knew the spell that the analyst was using well. It sped up one's speech so much that an entire soliloquy could be uttered in the space of a quarter of a second, and it was used in wartime whenever it was crucial that a message was sent in the fastest way possible.
"Aargh! Alright, I'm coming!"
Even after the Saint let out a frustrated shout, he still seemed to be wrestling with the decision to move on them. He even raised his hand and made alarm bells ring all over Jonah's mind, but then, he closed his fist so suddenly that a loud 'BOOM!' was heard in the chamber despite the roars from the outside.
This explosion helped to wake up the commanders who were all powerful individuals in their own right, and Jonah didn't know whether this was by design or coincidence. Either way, the man disappeared soon after, following which the projection formations in the center of the chamber activated to show the image on the outside.
He felt the breath hiss out of his nostrils as he witnessed it, and the same could be heard all over the room as the commanders saw the beings that had appeared to attack them for the first time.
Although all of them had privileged positions in the Church, the realm of Saints was just too far removed from anyone and everyone who were below it. Information regarding it was so fiercely concealed that the actions of the Heroes on Angaria to hide the pathway to that realm almost seemed childish if compared.
Hence, almost all of them were witnessing a fight of this level for the first time, and right away, they all seemed to understand that it might be one of the most defining moments of their life. This glimpse into the other side would surely benefit them for as long as they lived on the side they were in now, so forgetting everything else, the commanders hunched their shoulders and focused completely on the fight.
All of the defensive mechanisms were automated and could be controlled by the analysts, so there was nothing for them to do. Jonah had already seen that Daneel had entered an almost vegetative state in which he was healing himself slowly, so he, too, turned his eyes to watch as the battle unfolded.
The first thing that would strike anyone with fear was the appearance of the two beings. One was a gigantic snake with purple scales that seemed to be sucking in the light from all around them as it looked like there was an aura of darkness around the being. Only half of the other being's body was visible as they seemed to be below the sea, but this half, itself, was enough to make anyone wish that they could be as far away from where it stood as possible.
If someone glossed over the image, it would seem as if nine snakes were coming from the same point below the sea, but in reality, although the part of them that rose from the water to the air were similar to the being beside them, the heads were very different.
There were no eyes and no nose. Only a large, circular gaping mouth was present inside which thousands of rows of shiny teeth could be seen rotating as the being sucked in visible streams of Energy from the dome that was protecting the headquarters.
The Hydra was reputed to have multiple forms that it could take in battle, and due to his studies, Jonah could tell that this was the Energy swallowing form that was oft used when it was acting in a supportive role. It was capable of sucking in so much Energy that it could reduce almost any defensive mechanism to dust in the space of just a few seconds, so when the Saint attacked, it was his first target.
From their viewpoint, at first, the two Saints of the TriCobra sect had only seemed like large beings whose exact size they could not put a finger on, but now, as the Saint who was still in the form of a normal man glowed so brightly that he was unmistakable while standing at the forefront of the formation, Jonah and the others finally understood just how big each of the beasts was.
He was a tiny insect when compared to them, so after a few quick calculations, Jonah came to the startling conclusion that the body of each being that was above the sea… was each 450 m tall.
Yet when his attack flew toward the Hydra, it became clear that size wasn't everything.
It was in the form of the mammoth palm made of white light. When it reached the spot in front of the Hydra, it transformed into a large bell that was at least 200 m tall. Jonah was familiar with the design: this was a bell that was rung each and every day in the headquarters on the Mainland at noon and dusk. It rung here, too, as soon as it coalesced, and a moment later… Jonah and the others had to blink to make sure they hadn't suddenly gone crazy.
The bell made no sound, but an instant after it appeared, the area around the Hydra transformed to show a familiar landscape. It was that of the Headquarters he had just been thinking about, and as the image of the first Saint appeared out of nowhere along with the sky and the land of the Mainland that seemed so out of place and so jarring that the commanders all rubbed their eyes and wondered what the hell was going on, that venerable being whose image had apparently been perfectly reproduced sprang to life and moved to hug the Hydra.
It was then that Jonah and a few others remembered how the man had changed the very air when he had gone to meet Daneel. If so… was he trying to do the same on a much larger scale to recreate this familiar structure in an attempt to crush this being that would soon be able to kill them all?
No one understood why or how this would work, but as the two gargantuan beings started to fight it out, it slowly seemed as if this was the best thing he could have done.
And this… was because the man was here only as an image, without any of the natural power that he possessed back on the Mainland. That was clearly not the case with the beings from the TriCobra sect, so instead of being able to repeatedly attack like them, he probably only had limited resources that he had to use in the best way possible.
If so, conjuring something powerful that would do his bidding was definitely the most effective approach. As the Hydra turned around to suck the Energy from Saint Rectitude himself, though, a sound that was extremely out of place reached their ears.
It was that of many, many individuals screaming in agony, and as Jonah quickly searched around to see where the source was, he understood that his analysis had probably been right.
Of the third wave… half was twitching on the ground, with their bodies so deprived of blood and flesh that they almost looked like dried husks that had decomposed for thousands of years. Yet their screams were still louder than ever, but as their bodies continued to disappear, they soon stopped and accepted their inevitable demise.
They had been sucked dry to power the Saint.
Over the water, it looked like the fight was starting to heat up as the Hydra had begun to entwine three of its heads around the body of the First Saint. The Saint was still trying to hug the Serpentine being as if he wanted to smother it to death, but as everyone watched on to see how it would turn out… a loud sound was heard in the chamber that made them all turn in Jonah's direction.
Jonah was the most perplexed of them all, but by the time he managed to see that something was very, very wrong, his hands were empty.
Daneel had somehow disappeared from them, and in front of him, there was a large hole in the floor.
At the same time, a bloodcurdling scream echoed over the entire headquarters. As everyone hastily turned around to see from where it was coming from, they also noticed that there was a similar hole in the ceiling. It was on looking through this hole that those directly below it saw the same scene that was visible on the projection, too.
The body of the Saint had a large, gaping hole right where his stomach had used to be. There was no blood as his form was only made up of light particles being manipulated by his Will, but from the way that the rest of his body kept blinking in and out of existence, it became clear that he had been dealt a mortal blow.
Agony shone bright and clear on his face as he looked at a certain point in the sky, and when Jonah followed his gaze, he took in a sharp breath as he saw that a third being had emerged beside whom his disciple was standing.
"The renowned Piercing Cobra strike. Why? Why are you going all out to save this insignificant continent? You deployed three Paragons to save him! Why?!"
The response from this being that was in the shape of a man-sized Cobra with a large, open head was the last thing they heard before they were all knocked unconscious.
"I have no reason to answer you, Hisos… but I really think you should run on back to your headquarters if you don't want it destroyed. I'll be taking this lad who's been very, very naughty… Farewell, then. Oh… and our score is now even. We snakes always pay our debts. Goodbye."
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