The rumbling earth and the collapsing skies came to a pause. The Divine Guards, who had escaped into the distance, thinking that everything for this planet had come to an end, were stunned into silence. They truly hadn't expected that things would actually end like this, and so... simply at that.
They had heard tales of rampaging Metal Spirits. Although it hadn't happened in a very long time, there was a special alert placed on Divine Guards like them to watch out for them this time, that was why they were so quick to report things. During a Force Eruption dense region like this one, the Metal Spirits that were native to their world could very easily go out of control. Luckily, this hadn't happened yet, or rather not until now, but that was beside the point. What they were more keen on was the fact that things shouldn't have ended so easily.
A Metal Spirit was a force of nature. The more it observed, the more powerful it became, and in the end, the worst of them could even stand toe to toe with monstrous existences like the Void Beast. Of course, that was only in the most extreme of cases, and unlike the Void Beast, such Metal Spirits would usually not have their minds intact when they reached such a state. But it was a huge worry nonetheless.
Often, it took the efforts of an entire seasoned army, at the cost of many, to reel in this sort of enemy. So how had Leonel done it all on his own?
At that moment, several auras that both matched their own and even surpassed them rushed in from the distance. In the lead, there was an Ancestor Issa, but this wasn't too surprising to them. Most of the Ancestors were still focused on elucidating the secrets of their new Lineage Factor to worry about other things. So, currently, only Ancestor Issa and Ancestor Alvaro were heading the charge and leading the family currently.
However, when they approached, ready for battle to deal with the Metal Spirit, having responded quite quickly at that, they found... nothing?
Ancestor Issa frowned. Her time as an Ancestor was very precious, she couldn't just move around as she pleased. If it wasn't because the fluctuation of Force in the air was a bit odd, she would have already turned around and left the punishment to the forces beneath her. However, since something seemed off, she turned to the female Divine Guard.
"Divine Guard Elilen, what is the meaning of this?"
"This... I..."
Seeing the flustered appearances of not just Elilen, but all three of them, Issa's gaze narrowed. What was happening here?
In the end, Elilen could only just describe the happenings to the best of her ability.
"A Force Eruption? Littlest Nova? Metal Spirit..." Issa mumbled, looking down.
But... why was it that there was no Force Eruption here? And mine, there was no mine either. There was Leonel, she noticed, looking down toward the earth below, but he didn't seem to have acknowledged their appearance at all, remaining entirely focused on Little Tolly who was in his hands. In fact, after several moments, he put Little Tolly away and caused the Segmented Cube's shuttle to appear before him with a wave of the hand. It really seemed like he would just leave like that.
Ancestor Issa frowned and she waved a hand, clearly having plans to seal Leonel in place. But the moment her Force moved, a rippling barrier of the Segmented Cube seemed to have deflected it, as though it stood in a world of its own that Issa couldn't interfere with.
Leonel finally looked over, a sharp coldness in his eyes that made Issa's pupils constrict. She saw Leonel as nothing more than a child, but at the moment he was anything but. It even felt that he had the ability to kill her if he truly wanted to, an illusion that she couldn't shake no matter how many times she tried to reset her mind.
Her frown deepened, but she soon relaxed. What kind of nonsense was all of this, exactly?
They had summoned a child of the Morales back, and yet he had ignored him. Then a month later he shows up and rather than appearing with an explanation and an apology, the first thing he does is plunder their resources? What kind of joke was that?
"Arrest him," Ancestor Issa said lightly. The other Divine Guards had heard the story clearly enough. They made a move to apprehend Leonel immediately, some more hesitant than others, but none daring enough to show so physically. In the face of an Ancestor, Leonel's prestige wasn't nearly enough, and that was doubly so since he had yet to be coronated and his father had died.
However, they had only moved a small measure when a golden laser suddenly whizzed by. The heat seared their faces, their bodies going taut before they could even fight against the instinct.
Issa was the most frozen. An entire half of her long hair had been sliced off at the ear, her earlobe bleeding just the faintest bit before the wound quickly corroded under heat.
Leonel took a step into the Segment Cube and almost vanished from view. But before the hatch closed, he looked up.
"If the Morales family wants to take the Patriarch position away from me, feel free to do so. Just know that I'll then treat you like every other family in the Human Domain. Don't test my patience. I'm not a child that you can order around as you please.
"How many Ancestors have you killed in your lifetime, Ancestor Issa?" Leonel asked coldly.
Issa, still in a state of shock, seemed to have been frozen cold all over again.
"No answer?" Leonel spoke lightly as he looked away, the hatch slowly closing. "Well, I've personally killed over 50, a sight I'm sure you personally witnessed. That number seems to be more than the amount the Morales have in total."
Click. The hatch closed and the shuttle shot off into the distance, closing in the central city of the Morales.
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