Lord Shadow

Each battle has a name.

The Battle of Hastings.

The War of the Roses.

Why does it matter that battles have names? Because names bestow meanings.

A name attached to a date or particular conflict can shape our understanding of what the conflict is all about.

The battle between Azief and Sasha that day was called the Battle of the G.o.ds.

For the first time, mankind saw what happens when two great people who possess such an explosive power battle each other, how each and every one of their actions could affect the world.

For those who saw the battles from the distance, looking up from the ground, looking from the forest, from the black caves in the fire region, from the cover of the cloak protecting their face from their sand on the desert region, all they see was two being fighting a celestial war up high on the clouds.

They saw men....defy the very nature of human. Booming sound filled the sky, as both of those beings battled each other for supremacy.

Lightning flashed, and thunders roared.

They were like G.o.ds of Old, cruel and unsympathetic. Their battle that day affect so many lives, and taken many souls even though they only fight each other.

Their actions ripple.

It is also because of that battles, that years from then on, a treaty between the most powerful people will be established.

The Battle of the G.o.ds was the first battle involving a truly high level user against each other and put alarms all over the world, for the man called Lord Shadow.

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Sasha flew pa.s.s the clouds of the suffocating heat of the Flame region as she keep coughing black blood from her mouth.

Behind her, was the man with the black hood, flying as fast as lightning, separating the clouds with his dash amidst the clouds with a momentum of a raging dragon

The man did not say anything but his anger is boundless.

For the past hours, she managed to keep him from her by relying on her magical trove of artifacts and because of her chariots but she knows she couldn"t run forever.

Sometimes she would shoot some energy blast at him but the man just deflected it with his bare hands.

The physical body of the man exceeds what Sasha has ever seen in her life.

Not even Katarina has such st.u.r.dy physique that she could just deflect a compact energy blast with just her bare hands.

But the man can and he does it with such ease. Thankfully, his speed is inferior to the chariot. If not she would be dead by now.

The man killing intent was not hidden at all. Sasha knows the man meant to kill her the moment she fallen into his hands.

So she would not herself get caught, no matter the cost.

But she also knows she does not have a chance of survival if she keep running. She has been thinking of something the moment she discovers that the man have no intention of letting her go.

But the price is too steep and she hesitated. Still…..even at this moment, with the man in the hood hot on her tails…she still hesitated….because the price is truly steep.

But she keep holding her bag of holding and looking at it, delaying the inevitable.

"HALT!" The man yelled from behind with voice akin of a thunder peal but when she heard that yell, the faster the chariot became, and the weaker Sasha became.

Her Essence was running amok inside her meridians, and she could feel her vitality drained each second; feeling like her life force was snapped out of existence.

The feeling is like losing a memory you never know you had. Feeling a sense of a loss of something you never knew you had.

As Sasha looks at her chariot she knew she doesn"t have much time to decide

The Flame Spirit Horse is almost extinguished as her essence tree is beginning to rot and the energy she could supply to the chariot is running out.

She can"t keep this long.

She gritted her teeth as she pop some more pills inside her mouth….but the potion she needs to drink, she still hesitated.

She will not drink it unless it was truly the last resort.

Her Essence Tree was forcefully replenished when she down that pill and she could feel her longevity shortened.

She coughed a lump of black blood inside the fast flying chariot as she grit her teeth enduring the pain and the headache that came.

Then a sound exploded from behind her chariot, sounding like something detonated.

She looks back in alarm and frowned as she could see the man in the black hood punch through the air.

The air compressed around the man hand and a ball of wind compacted and shot towards her like a wind cannon.

The compacted air was surrounded by a swirling dark red mist making it look fiendish and induce fear in the enemy heart.

The wind changed direction as the wind cannon pa.s.s through the clouds and crashed the behind of her chariots and the chariot rocks like it was colliding with a twenty ton truck.

Sasha could not help but feel her internal organ was shaking because of the impact and she almost let go of the reins.

But she keeps holding on even as her skin was lacerated.

Sasha eyes become red. Her hand still tightly holding the reins of the chariots but her nerves are frayed.

Her internal organs are in a mess, and her energy is in chaos.

"Heh" she smiles bitterly. She could not accept this. She refuses to accept this.

Then she brings something out from her bag of holding and something comes out from her bag of holding.

A vial of greenish potion is in her left hand as her right hand keeps holding the reins.

She could not accept this outcome! She contemplated of drinking the Life Burning Potion. She got the Life Burning Potion when she defeated a Snow Ghost in the White Mountain.

It was a terrible monster and powerful.

She could not accept dying here….just because she makes a small mistakes. The chariot still sails through the cloud like thunder.

And Azief is still following the chariot form behind.

Looking from the ground one could misunderstand because all they could see was a streak of yellow streak pa.s.sing the clouds like lightning and a black lightning.

For someone who does not have vision abilities they might even misunderstand them as natural disaster.

They see lightning. They hear thunder roaring when it was actually Azief and Sasha while the sound they heard was the sound of Azief attack.

And sometimes some places were attack from the sky as it leaves holes in the ground.

Azief who was pursuing Sasha is perplexed. It has been hours but he could still not reach the chariot.

As he dodges another spike of diamond from Sasha attack, Azief still pursues her. Because this time Azief is interested in the chariots.

Sasha value has just gone up in Azief eyes. If before, he wanted to devour the essence inside Sasha body, now Azief wanted to know about the chariot.

Azief is not boasting but his speed is one of a kind in the world.

Before, even Will could not outrun him…of course since Will has begun tapping the Speed Source, he has becoming even faster.

But for a mere Seed Forming Low Realm to outrun him and in the air, nothing shocked him more.

He is convinced the reason Sasha could escape him right now is because of the Golden chariot.

Azief did not even have the chance to use any one of his sabers to attack her because the moment he would equip the saber, he would lost her.

The only thing he could do was keep pursuing her while attacking him with his physical body.

Even though he only used his physical boy that alone is terrifying enough. With his boy refinement stage, when he punched out air will compressed and explode.

Then as Azief maintains his speed suddenly, the chariot teleported ten kilometer ahead in a matter of second.

Azief was shocked beyond belief.

"Tch" he clicked his tongue.

"You think you will escape me, Sasha!" He yelled as he activates his essence.

The moment he activated his Essence, his skin turn golden like the sun.

His flesh turns golden illuminating all under him like the break of dawn, lighting all under darkness, his veins expanded as energy courses through him like a hundred stampeding warhorses.

Air was sucked around him and air compressed under his feet.

And then he pushes his feet forward. The moment he did that, the air under his feet exploded and creates a supersonic sound quake.

He instantly traveled just behind the chariot in a matter of second as he continue his pursue.

Azief was in airs.p.a.ce of the flame region at the time.

When that sound was produce, the Black Dragon of the Volcanic Range of the Flame Region who was hibernating opens its eyes.

Azief of course did not know this but what he did was waking the Black Dragon that once terrorizes China.

He had awoken the Black Winged Calamity as it was called by the people of China. The Dragon open its eyes, and slowly its wing s was open….and then it flapped its wing.

By the time, the dragon opens its eyes, Azief and Sasha already enters the Plains region.

And it"s descended. That day, the people living under that Volcanic Mountain range either got eaten by the dragon or burn to ashes.

Tragedy abounds and death and destruction looms in the Flame region.

However when Azief and Sasha reaches the Plains region, Sasha jump out from her chariots and began gliding through the air.

The chariot turns into a flash of light and returns to Sasha hand turning into a mark on her left hand.

Azief notices this and nodded.

"A Blood bound artifact" he mused.

"Gotcha!" Azief said.

What Azief fear is that Sasha would always running using that chariot. As long as she didn"t use that chariot Azief is confident he could restrain her.

Azief dives down to the ground as he looks at Sasha dropping down from the sky. Azief was smiling.

Azief knows even from that height she will not die because of the impact. The reason why Azief wanted to dive down is because he wanted to capture her.

As Azief think of what he was about to say when he captured her something happened that is beyond his imagination.

An explosion of golden fire engulfs Sasha.

The golden fire spread through the clouds, painting the sky golden and one might see a golden aurora streak around the horizon.

A few moment before that explosion happens, Azief could see that Sasha drink something.

Then the explosion happens.

Golden and powerful explosion.

So powerful in fact that Azief which was 5 kilometers from the site of the explosion was sent tumbling 10 kilometers.

He could feel his rib broken as he cashed to the ground and accidentally lopped off the left side of a considerable sized hill.

When Azief regain his senses, all he could hear was ringing in his ear and pains in his rib and then what he sees in the sky filled him with shock.

There, on the sky, Sasha was floating, with a golden Halo on her head, and rings of golden fire under her feet; she looks like an enraged Celestial G.o.ddess.

And the aura she emitted was the same as him…..a High realm Seed Forming.

Azief coughed a little blood as he felt his cracked ribs with his hand. But he is not afraid. He only smiles in satisfaction.

Even when he was like that his body is repairing itself, quickly mending his bones and healing his wounds.

His Violet Palace was hard at work as it heals him. Then he got up and he sneered at Sasha who was floating in the sky.

He stares at her and she stares at him.

"Now, that"s more like it" he says as he slowly floated to the sky again. When he finally reached the same height as Sasha, he smirked.

"It seems you have something under your sleeve. You surely have many items that shocked me. The chariot is already a powerful artifact. Now, this. What thing you eat that could make you this powerful? Whatever it is, I bet it has some pretty bad price."

Sasha then said.

"Stop wasting time. I will lay you to waste" she said as she dash forward in the sky toward Azief.

Azief who was standing there laughed.

"And now it begins!" He exclaimed in excitement as he also dash forward, compressing the air beneath his feet and fly to the sky like a shooting star

Sasha was forming a fist with her hand and air compresses around her knuckles and spikes of levitating diamond formed around her hand as she flying to meet Azief in combat.

Azief on the other hand open his hand and make a palm with his hand. His palm was golden.

Some Laws swirls around his palm. The fabric of reality was affected as the atmosphere around him seems to be distorted.

It is a pity that Law was just a shred of laws and not even partial.

If Azief just understand even a partial Law of the World, with one flick of his finger, he could have stopped Sasha in her step.

But if it was that easy, understanding laws would not be that amazing wouldn"t it?

Deadly Aura swirls around his palm as the golden skin was enshrouded with black mist. His attributes was melded into his palm.

And then in just a matter of moments, they collided with each other and a sky quake happened and shakes the clouds in ten kilometers radius.

The battle between them begins.

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MENWHILE IN THE WORLD GOVERNMENT HEADQUARTERS

A man can be seen sneakily entering the Vault of Weapons.

The Vault of Weapon was made from marbled stones and was high as a four-story building with a width of five baseball field.

Inside it, the World Government stores all their weapon gained by battle with monsters and rewards from completing a quest.

The man entering the Vault was short. 5"5 tall, the man also had a little limp in his left feet and he walks slowly but with determination.

His hair was short and his eyes were hazel. His body also a little bit plum. Behind him, four guards can be seen to be unconscious.

Not far away from the guard an incense burning could be seen stuck in the ground emitting purple smokes.

An Artifact.

No doubt, the short man was using the incense to make the guards unconscious.

The man was sweating from head to toe. His hand keeps having these tremors and his heart was beating wildly.

But he needs to do it.

"I need to do it" he said as he clenches his fist.

He wipes his sweat and slowly he moves deeper inside the Vault.

He light up the Light fragment and light fill the area around him like a flashlight lighting his way.

As he walks forward, he could see hundreds of weapons inside the vault.

All kinds of weapons that the World Government acquired from hunting monsters were stored here.

He could see hundreds of kinds of swords, spears, staff, futuristic weapons, and many more could be seen.

He could also see doors in every part of the Vault marked with numbers. Mostly the door will lead to some kind of Artifact weapons or s.h.i.+elds, or other high tiered weapons.

But he spares not even a glance for them.

What he is searching for was a Hyper Drive. Even as he was searching high and low inside the vault, he could not help but think of what will happen to him if he got caught.

To be honest, the man himself does not want to do this. But he had no choice. His family is with them.

Ayu and his son Jamal is with them. Slowly he walked deeper and then he reached the door. The door was marked not with a number but with an acronym.

R&D.

The man smiles as he could see that the salvation for his family is at hand. He takes out the key from the pocket of his pants and slowly he slide it inside the keyhole.

And then slowly he opens the door and then when he fully open the door he gasped and was so stunned that he falls back and fall to the ground with shock.

The reason why he was so shocked is because when he opens the door, he sees someone…someone he did not expect.

Will the Dark Speedster was waiting for him, sitting on chair relaxingly with blue lightning swirling around his body

"Oh, you"re late, Budiman. I was waiting for you." Will said as he got up from the chair and slowly approaches Budiman.

His step was slow but Budiman could not help but pray that Will step will become even slower.

Budiman could not even move an inch as he was frozen on the ground, paralyzed by fear. When finally Will reach him, he squatted and looks at Budiman eyes.

Budiman lower his gaze and look at the ground as his hand was trembling in fear.

Budiman was already thinking of his end.

"This is it! I"m busted. Raymond will execute me." This is his thought but then Will said something that rekindled his hope for life.

"My friend wanted to propose a deal with you, Budiman." And Budiman slowly look up and ask.

"A deal" he said stuttering in fear. He gulped and then he asked.

"Who"s your friend, Dark Speedster?" Smiling, Will answered.

"I think you"ve met him before when he crash your battles.h.i.+p."

"You don"t mean?" Budiman widened his eyes as he finally understand who Will is talking about

"Lord Shadow" Will said slowly and then he said

"Hold on tight" Will grab Budiman arms and then he run leaving only a blue lightning trail in the air.

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That day, all the upper echelons of the World Government were shocked to found out that Budiman was a spy planted by the League of Freedom.

President Hirate on the other hand had to listen the Quorum complaints about the missing hyper drive.

Will was awarded with a seat in the Quorum for his service and intelligence.

Will manage to uncover a conspiracy that would have probably toppled the World Government organization if the conspiracy was let to fester.

All the while, the forces of World Government were deployed to search and capture Budiman.

Pandikar was sentenced a house arrest by the President Order with Raymond Army guarding him and taking control of the Admiralty.

Pandikar was also suspected and is waiting for the Quorum decision.

From the intelligence that Lord Will has given the Quorum, it has been said when Will have managed to uncover the conspiracy he quickly went to the vault only too discovered the unconscious guard and Budiman taking the Hyper drive.

As he tries to capture Budiman, Warp appears and teleported almost instantly with Budiman on tow.

His statement was taken and the evidence was presented to the Quorum.

There is no suspicion on his story, so the World Government has posted a bounty on the capture of Warp and Budiman.

Of course, unknown to all these forces, Budiman is now inside a Palace with his family. The Palace is called the Grain Palace.

It was the same Palace that Loki, Sofia and Sina stay in when they were hunted by the World Government.

There is a puppeteer controlling the events of the world, shaping it according to his will with his machinations and plots...and he is shrouded in shadows.

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