The death of the enemy leader and his teammates came as a slight shock to Reign and the others. They had easily defeated them, too easily.
Reign knew that the enemy was adept at using monsters to fight for them, but he was also certain that that was not the only thing they could do, the leader for one was quite good at handling the sword, his footwork, breathing, and the way he swung the sword were all signs that showed that he had trained a lot with the sword.
Reign's last attack, although a powerful one, shouldn't have been able to simply kill the man so easily. Reign had expected his attack to be evaded or be blocked, for which he had multiple follow-up plans.
He had run a simulation in his head and was certain that he would be able to kill the enemy in about 5 to 7 attacks depending on how the leader responded, but all of it was useless as the man didn't even lift his sword or try to move before Reign's swords cut him.
It was evident not only to Reign but to Wolf and the others that the enemy had decided to give up and die in this challenge. They could guess that the reason was that they were either not confident about beating Reign and the others in a fight at the moment or didn't want to show more of their powers.
Wolf was the one that took a long look at the men, he wanted to remember their faces in case they ever saw them again. If they did, they would attack them on sight.
As for what they just did, he could respect it. There was no penalty to dying during this challenge, so it truly was better to simply die and not show your enemy what you are capable of.
If they fought with everything they got, they might have been able to see more of Reign's, Shadow's, and the powers of the others, but they would also have to show the same to them.
The party that was superior in close-quarters combat would have to show less and would end up victorious, and Wolf had no doubt that it would be them that would have won no matter how powerful the enemy truly was.
In one way, this worked well for them as they didn't need to use any of their trump cards either. They could go all out during this hidden task and as such had a higher chance of finishing it.
After dealing with the enemy team, they quickly charged at the monsters that were currently fighting against Liona and the others. Laura, Beast, and the others were already helping them out as they had managed to kill the other members of the enemy team quickly, only Wolf, Shadow, and Reign were left to fight the remaining three enemies, and the others had full confidence that they would be victorious.
The team made quick work of the monsters, about a fourth had run away after the control the enemy had over them was lifted, 3 more had decided not to flee, but charge at the enemy team and were currently busy with devouring their remains.
The rest were strong, but they were unable to survive long against Reign and the others. The monsters that had feasted on the dead bodies stared at Reign and the others for a short period of time before leaving the area.
"That, that went a lot better than expected," Shadow said as he leaned against a tree.
None of them had thought that the enemy would simply give up and die as they did. It was of course nice to have such an easy victory and nobody really complained. Well, Wolf and Beast were looking a bit worried as they stared at the corpses that had not been mutilated by the monsters.
They were worried about how the enemy had just given up and died, even though death wasn't true in the challenge, it was still not something that a person would want to experience. The pain was still there, and nobody would voluntarily want to experience it.
But the enemy had no qualms about it, some of the weaker members of the group did seem scared a bit and they didn't know whether they were acting or not. But most of the group had smirks on their faces when they died, making it certain that they didn't care about dying.
To have such an enemy, one that would go to such lengths to simply not show their powers was what worried Beast and Wolf. They already knew that the enemy was shrewd and that they would be a bother to deal with, even now they had no clues about where their base might be.
But what they had learned today was that the enemy wasn't just a group of sly foxes, but that they were a terrifying bunch that would go to any lengths for their goals.
If not for Beast thinking outside the box and allowing them to surprise the enemy as they did, they would have most definitely suffered casualties, and the worst part is that the enemy would have probably done the same thing and simply died in the end, not showing anything to them.
Upon making sure that everybody was safe, the team ventured forward. The top of the building was close to them and there was nothing stopping them from reaching it. At least they hoped so.
The team climbed 2 more platforms before they stopped at a staircase. The stairs leading up were not the same rock stairs that were present on the other platforms, instead, they were milky white and shone with a pale white color.
There were no blemishes or dirt on the stairs and a simple glance could tell them that the material they were made of was not normal.
The team all glanced at each other before nodding and stepping on the stairs. With each step they took, they felt a relaxing wave of energy washing through them, making their fatigue go away and slowly healing their bodies from any injury they might have sustained during the fights they went through.
Beast's summons and Tank's four generals were summoned out, not by Tank or Beast, but by the mysterious power that flowed through the stairs. The same happened to them, their injuries quickly healed and their fatigue was gone.
The stairs were forty meters wide and all of them could walk side-by-side on them. It took them about 2 minutes to reach the top, but none of them felt tired at all.
Upon reaching the top of the staircase, the team was greeted by a huge white room. They were unable to see where the walls of the room are since everything was so white.
The only thing that stuck out from the huge area was a gate. The gate was some 40 meters high and shone brilliantly as its golden doors stood tall.
Runes and symbols could be seen carved on the door while a lone knight stood in front of it.
The knight was wearing a pitch-black suit of heavy armor and held a greatsword in his hands. His blood-red cape fell down to the floor and a heavy aura could be felt from him.
Black smoke oozed out from the inside of the armor and fell down on the white floor, turning a part of it black.
The knight simply stood in front of the gate, his sword in front of him while his two arms rested on the hilt. A pair of shining red eyes could be seen in the slits of his helmet as he stared at Reign and the others.
A glance at the knight was enough to make Reign and the others tense, they could sense just how powerful the being was, even though it was hundreds of meters away from them.
They started walking toward the knight, certain that he was the last obstacle that they needed to go through before finishing the hidden task.
The sword of the black knight was not a normal one. It was a full 3.2 meters high while the knight stood at about 2 meters high. They couldn't see how he looked thanks to the armor, but he was not bulky and probably had a slim build.
The sword was half a meter wide and had red lines that looked like blood moving across it. The heavy aura that Reign and the others could feel was actually coming from the sword, not the knight himself.
The knight was more mysterious, even though they could tell with a glance that he was powerful, they were unable to sense anything from him.
Reign was unable to sense any mana coming from the man or the sword, but the pressure was still there. He tried sensing souls, but he couldn't.
The nearer that Reign and the others came to the knight, the brighter and more dangerous the red lines of the sword became, it was as if they were looking at rivers of blood, not 3cm thick red lines.
When they came to about 10 meters away from the knight, he finally moved.
This 𝓬ontent is taken from fre𝒆webnove(l).𝐜𝐨𝗺