Crash.

  A monstrous battle ensued. Earl and the Ghoul Lord were going at one another, landing hit after hit – each succeeding strike from either side trying to break apart the defence of the other. The Ghoul Lord utilised the dark appendages that sprawled out of its back to keep the pressure on Earl — as well as keep him just at enough of a distance, where the knight would be incapable of striking it down with a single hit.

  The Knights' punches were powerful, after all. Each one felt like it could shatter the creature's bones apart tenfold – but simply failed, only because of the thing coating itself in a strong miasma barrier, allowing it to take more hits than otherwise possible.

  “Come on, what’s the matter? Can’t keep up?” Earl asked, spinning around and kicking the Ghoul Lord back. The Beast slid back a bit, before growling and roaring at the Knight, smashing its hands into the ground, causing the shadow below it to react, before a flurry of more dark appendages with sharp claw like hands shot out towards Earl — all trying to surround the Knight in an instant. Earl smirked, then snickered before exhaling and evading the first couple appendages, before smashing apart the others – blocking, grabbing, ripping and crushing them apart in quick succession.

  The Ghoul Lord didn’t stop – it kept forging more and more appendages out of its shadow, sending them towards the Knight. “Trying to overwhelm me while keeping your distance? What a dishonourable way of fighting. Truly befitting a creature that falls under the rule of the Revenant Monarch.”

  Earl antagonised the beast a bit, his eyes shining a silverish colour under his helmet, as he continued to tear apart the dark appendages with ease. “Don’t act so high human…” Ghoul Lord growled, before engulfing its body in an even stronger aura. Earl's eyes widened for a second. “Absorbing the surrounding Magical Energy to empower itself further? What a cowardly creature. Can’t use its own strength to win.”

  Earl exhaled, stomping his right foot onto the ground, causing a bright silverish light to shine from under him, before a pillar of silver light shot out around him, incinerating the appandages summoned by the Ghoul Lord. The Beast covered its eyes slightly, while it continued to absorb the magical energy from the surroundings.

  Then, Earl leapt out of the pillar of light, dispelling it as well as throwing a powerful punch at the beast — the sheer force of the strike shattering the ground below the beast and causing it to tremble.

  The Beast struggled to keep the Knights attack back, its arms shaking before its eyes shone brightly and it let out a loud roar, knocking the Knight into the air, before grabbing him by his waist and smashing him into the ground. Afterwards, the Ghoul Lord quickly bound Earl down to the ground with the dark appandages spewing out from its back, before stomping onto the Knight, the impact pushing the knight into the ground and blasting a crater where the stomp landed.

  The Beast continued to push down more and more, putting more and more strength into its foot to try and force the Knight into the ground – however, Earl simply snickered before a bright silverish light shone from his armour, blasting the beast back, as well as incinerating the dark appendages once more.

  Then, Earl slowly got back up onto his feet, brushing off the dirt on his armour, before stretching out a bit and then moving towards the Ghoul Lord, which also rose back up onto its feet. The Beast breathed heavily, its blood and saliva dripping from its mouth as it glared at the Knight, its eyes shining red.

  “You know, a Ghoul Lord is usually a very serious threat. A monster that would take at least two Heroes to take down.” Earl started, warming up his wrists a bit. The Beast growled – practically foaming at its mouth. “What? Don’t like what I’m implying?” Earl snickered.

  The Beast let out an ear piercing roar, before dashing at the knight, the magical energy it had been absorbing the entire time slowly solidifying around its body, creating a sort of ‘exterior’ armour. The Ghoul Lord launched a miasma coated punch towards the Knight — the sheer density of the corrupt magical energy around it sparkling and crackling like lightning.

  Earl simply stood in place allowing the beast to get close and throw its punch at him. The punch was indeed powerful — sending a crashing force onto Earl, one that caused lightning and immense magical energy flowing past the Knight, completely destroying the ground behind Earl.

  The force of the punch alone was enough to crack and then shatter the ground below the two — even causing it to split slightly and open a small ‘ravine’ below their feet.

  Once the magical energy had calmed down and the dust settled, the Beast's eyes widened. Earl had stopped its punch with ease - having caught it with his left arm and brushed off the magical energy that had raged from the punch like it had been just a splash of water. Earl exhaled. “That was indeed quite powerful… Unfortunately, when it is coming from a newborn Ghoul Lord that isn’t even a day old, that strength means nothing.” Then, Earl pushed the Beast back, simply slugging it in the face, sending it flying back, before closing the distance between him and it in an instant, his fist erupting in a silverish flame.

  “Allow me to demonstrate what a punch like that can do with actual experience.” Earl stated, taking in a quick breath before holding it, as he launched the fist at the Beast, striking its chest. For a moment, nothing — then the following moment, the exterior armour that had begun forming around it shattered and after that - the beast's body erupted in blood, before a bright silverish light engulfed it — incinerating what remained of its body in a silver flame.

  The Ghoul Lord let out an ear piercing roar of pain, its very silhouette disappearing in the silver light as it was reduced to ashes that were taken away by the gentle wind. Earl exhaled, taking in a deep breath once more, before stretching out.

  “Wasted a lot of time on that thing… I should stop playing around with things like this.” Earl commented to himself, rubbing the back of his neck before sighing and turning around, moving back towards the Kingdom capital. “At least that was taken care of, I suppose.”

  Meanwhile…

  The story has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

  In Roria Citadel Dungeons.

  With the Ghoul Lord being on the outskirts of the capital, most of the guards had been sent to aid with keeping the capital itself safe – leaving very little security in the deep dungeons of the Rorias Citadel. From the shadows, a cloaked figure emerged, the very body seemingly carrying the shadow with it. The figure looked down the hall, listening. A handful of voices could be heard deeper down.

  The figure moved towards the voices, its steps silent – the shadows below it muffling their noise. As it got closer to the voices, they became clearer - a group of guards. They laughed together – seemingly playing cards together.

  Hiding behind a wall, the cloaked figure peaked around the corner. There, five guards sat around a table, all playing cards with glasses of what looked like alcohol filled. It seemed that despite being entrusted with the task of guarding the halls of the dungeons, the guards were taking some liberties down here. “Hah! And that’s another win for me.” A smug guard said, picking up his glass and chugging the alcohol in it down.

  “What a joke! You have to be cheating somehow!”

  “Woah there William, don’t go around accusing me just because you suck at the game.” The smug guard laughed. William looked pissed off, while the other three guards also laughed. After a moment, the cloaked figure stepped out, moving towards the guards, which immediately noticed it, picking up their weapons.

  “Identify yourself, only authorised guards are allowed—” Before the lead guard that was acting so smug a few moments prior could finish his sentence, the cloaked the figure lifted its right arm, slashing the air in front of it — in an instant, all five of the guards had their heads fly clean off, their bodies falling to the ground before their heads hit the ground, blood spewing out.

  The cloaked figure walked past their dead bodies, stepping over their heads before moving further in. At the very end of the hall, the figure arrived at a large cell, inside of which were two people wearing similar cloaks to the cloaked figure. Once they saw it, the two immediately moved forward to the cell door, kneeling before the cloaked individual.

  “Master, we failed you. We were caught before we had managed to reach the Church.” The woman spoke first, lowering her head. “We ask for your forgiveness for bringing this much trouble to you.” The man added afterwards, also lowering his head.

  The cloaked individual remained still for a moment, before pulling off its hood, revealing a helmet underneath, which hid its face – a pitch black ‘face’ on the helmet, with a pair of sharp, pure white eyes.

  “You can atone for your failure once we get back to the rest of our people. Now stand up.”

  “You're too kind, Master.” The two replied, standing back up. The masked person destroyed the prison bars in an instant, with a few swings of his right arm, pulling the debris of the prison cell into the shadows with appendages. “Come on, I will move us back to—”

  “To a new cell, right?” A voice cut off the masked individual. The three of them quickly looked to the source of the voice. Down the same hall that the masked person had just walked down, with heavy steps moved Oscar, a small smile plastered across his face. The woman and man stepped back, visibly nervous. “Damnit… It’s the Dragon Knight.” The Masked man scoffed, before turning to face Oscar, who stopped not too far away from the trio, his arms behind his back and smile unwavering.

  “...I was under the assumption that they’d send their best to deal with the coming threat to the Capital.”

  “Oh were you? That would mean you have something to do with that sudden appearance of the Ghoul Lord.” Oscar opened his eyes, a sharp glare falling onto the masked individual. “I have to say, that is one clever diversion to make, an entire Ghoul Lord to put the entirety of Roria in a panic just so you could come here and free your comrades.” The Dragon Knight applauded lightly. “Bravo for the smart idea, but unfortunately for you – we have more than enough people here in the capital to deal with a Ghoul Lord.”

  The Masked man exhaled, before snickering. “Going to try and stop us?”

  “Correction – I will.” Oscar replied, before drawing out his sword and engulfing it in a bright blue flame, leaping at the trio immediately afterwards. The woman and man behind the masked individual panicked, backing up even more, while the Masked man simply chuckled, the shadow below him erupting up with several snakes, which he then shot at the knight, intercepting his strike. Oscar slashed through the snakes, before facing the Masked man again — however his eyes widened as soon as he did.

  The Masked man in the split second that it took for Oscar to slice apart the snakes he had created had formed a small, black orb with a white shine around it. Then, in the next moment, the man enlarged the orb to a great size. “Careful now, Oscar. Don’t let yourself be turned to shreds by a small singularity.”

  Oscar scoffed, stopping himself before his blade ignited with a bright blue light. “Ancient Dragons Arts – Third technique, Black Hole Starvation.” Oscar prepared his technique, before swinging his blade at the singularity created by the masked man, slicing it apart, before it collapsed in on itself and then absorbed into the knight's blade, unleashing a powerful windforce all through the halls of the dungeons.

  After the entire singularity had been absorbed into the blade, Oscar slashed his sword down, disrupting the wind. However, the masked man and the two other individuals were already gone. Oscar scoffed. “..Used the opportunity to escape…”

  The Dragon Knight sheathed his sword back up before exhaling. “That masked man… He knew my name. And more importantly, was able to create a contained singularity in a split second…” Oscar scratched his chin, a worried expression plastered across his face. Then, the man let out a gentle exhale before turning back around.

  “Something tells me that man will be trouble.”