The Essence Flow

Chapter 220: A Real Fight

“RELLIE!” Len’s scream was raw, torn from her throat as the earth itself betrayed them, a jagged wall of stone erupting with a deafening roar to sever the hall—and their team—in two.

“What the…!?” Alira spun, her eyes wide, searching the empty hallways. The attack had no source, no origin point she could see. It was as if the castle itself had turned against them.

“We have to take this down! Now!” Len’s voice was sharp with command, water already swirling around her fists, shimmering with frantic energy.

Alira’s usual cheer was gone, replaced by a grim, focused expression. She gave a single, sharp nod.

“Leave it to me.”

She brought her palms together with a sharp clap, and as she pulled them apart, a sphere of roiling orange flame ignited between them. It grew, feeding on her fear and fury, swelling from the size of her fist to that of a shield, the heat making the air around it waver.

With a guttural cry, she hurled it forward.

BOOM.

The concussive blast shook the corridor. Stone shattered and earth turned to superheated slag, leaving a gaping, smoldering hole in the center of the wall.

Len didn’t wait for the dust to settle. She moved fluidly through the breach, water still coiled around her arms, ready for a fight, ready to defend…

But the scene on the other side was worse than any battle.

The hall was empty. Eerily silent. No Rellie. No King.

Only her friend’s dagger lay on the cold stone floor, gleaming in the dim light—a silent, devastating testament to what they had just lost.

**

Sylra leaned forward, her analytical mind snagging on the impossibility. "What was that?!" she asked, her eyes fixed on the screen where the earthen wall had erupted. "Since when does he use Earth Essentia?"

"Eryndar's techniques," Rheon clarified, his voice a low rumble of approval. "Buried deep."

"Wait... I think I've read about it on Towan's notes," Elliot added, his own mind racing to connect the theoretical scribbles to the raw power they'd just witnessed.

Lytharos let out a low whistle. "That kind of finesse is surprising, given it's so far outside his elemental affinity."

But Sylra's focus was elsewhere. Creating a wall that size was one thing—a brute force expenditure of Essentia. But the placement... Her eyes narrowed. "*He wasn't even in the same hallway...*" she realized, the tactical implication sending a chill down her spine. He had shaped the earth from a distance, through solid stone, with the precision of a surgeon.

"I thought I'd never see him use the techniques Eryndar taught him," Elliot murmured, the pieces clicking into place. "He told me they were a secret. Something to be kept for a real fight."

The unspoken question now hung in the air between the four observers: if this was what Towan considered a "real fight," what other secrets was he about to unveil?

A guttural, raw scream tore from Len’s throat, a word she would have been scolded for using in the noble courts.

“FUCK!”

It was more than a curse; it was the sound of shattered composure. The perfectly maintained face of the noble heiress crumbled into dust, revealing a core of pure, frantic terror for her friend. The force of it even startled Alira, who was used to Len’s calm control.

Len whirled on Alira, her eyes wide and wild. “What do we do?! We can’t just leave her! We need to get Rellie!” The plan, the exam, it all felt trivial compared to the image of Rellie alone and captured.

Alira’s face, usually alight with fiery passion, had gone cold and hard as forged steel. There was no smile, no quip. Her voice was low, flat, and terrifyingly serious. “The fastest way to end this is to get the flag,” she stated, the logic a cold blade cutting through Len’s panic. “We get it, the test finishes, and we get her back. Now.”

Len’s chest heaved, the rational part of her mind wrestling with the storm of emotion. For a single, suspended moment, she hesitated. Then, with a sharp, jerky nod, she accepted the brutal calculus. The time for stealth and caution was over.

And their sprint began.

This wasn’t a run; it was a frantic, desperate charge. They abandoned all pretense of quiet movement, their boots pounding against the stone in a reckless rhythm. They weren’t in the mood to take their time. Every second wasted was a second Rellie spent in the hands of the King, and that was a price they were no longer willing to pay.

They ran through the castle's grand chambers, a blur of motion fueled by fear and fury. They didn't check corners, didn't scan for traps—their speed was a weapon, their only thought a desperate, forward momentum faster than they had ever moved before.

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Until they skidded to a halt at the entrance of a vast antechamber, its far wall holding the final door. The flag was just two rooms away.

And there he was.

The King.

He stood motionless before the ornate doorway, a statue of shadow and silence, as if he had been waiting for them for an eternity. He didn't tense, didn't ready a stance. He simply was—the final, immovable obstacle in their path. The sight of him, so calm, so assured, while Rellie was Goddess-knew-where, ignited a fresh, white-hot fury in their chests.

Len’s hands curled into fists, water instantly coalescing around them in shimmering, violent spirals. Alira’s knuckles were white, a low heat already distorting the air around her, her usual playful spark replaced by the promise of an inferno. They had found their prey.

A single, sharp look passed between them. No words were needed. The plan was simple: destroy what stood in their way.

“You are not leaving this room,” Len snarled, the words dripping with a venomous, icy anger he had never heard from her before.

Unexpectedly to Towan—who had anticipated a fiery barrage from Alira—it was Len who shot forward first. Her movement wasn't her usual elegant, flowing style; it was a direct, furious lunge.

A sudden, explosive strength, born entirely of her rage, powered her fists. She threw a one-two combo, her palms open not in a redirection, but to deliver crushing, concussive blows aimed to shatter his guard.

The King didn't meet force with force. As her strikes came in, his hands moved in minimal, precise circles. He didn't block; he redirected. His left palm brushed the inside of her first wrist, guiding the punch harmlessly past his shoulder. His right forearm met the second, not stopping it, but flowing with its momentum, spinning her slightly off-balance and leaving her exposed. He was a sculptor deftly chipping away at a block of marble, unimpressed by the raw force behind the chisel.

*Her right is wide open.* Towan’s mind, calm as a frozen lake, registered the flaw in Len’s enraged assault. Her reckless power had overextended her, leaving a clean line to her ribs.

His left hand, palm open and fingers rigid like a blade, shot forward in a devastating hook, aimed to drive the air from her lungs and end her part in the fight.

Len’s eye twitched, a cold spike of realization cutting through her fury. *Damn it!* She was too committed to dodge.

But the impact never came.

A forearm, sheathed in roaring, defiant flame, intercepted Towan’s strike with a sharp CRACK of force meeting absolute defense. Alira had materialized in the motion, having read the same opening, not to attack, but to defend.

"Got you!" Alira grunted, her voice strained but triumphant, fire sputtering from the point of impact.

A fierce, savage smile spread across Len’s face. Trust. This was it.

She didn’t retreat. She capitalized. Pivoting on her front foot, she dropped her weight and threw a single, brutal uppercut straight into The King’s exposed jaw. Her fist was sheathed not in a gentle flow, but in a violently compressed sphere of water.

It wasn’t just a punch. It was a depth charge.

The water exploded on impact, a concussive blast of pure force that resonated through the antechamber. The King’s head snapped back, a spray of water and a stifled grunt echoing in the sudden silence as he was thrown off his feet, crashing onto the stone floor.

"He isn't down!" Alira shouted, her voice sharp with urgency and a tinge of disbelief. While the King was still on his back, she saw her chance. She brought her clasped hands high above her head, a hammer forged of pure, roaring flame, and drove it down to crush his chest.

But the figure on the floor was not a wounded man—he was a coiled spring.

In a motion of impossible, fluid grace, The King twisted his hips, his body pivoting on the stone so Alira's fiery hammer slammed into empty ground, scorching the floor. In the same continuous motion, his legs scissored through the air, wrapping around the arm she had committed to the strike with the force of steel cables.

A sharp, brutal twist of his torso, and Alira was wrenched off her feet with a cry of pain and surprise. He rolled, using her own momentum, and in a flash of disorienting speed, he was on top, her arm bent at a vicious angle in a merciless joint lock. The fight had gone from a stand-up brawl to a brutal, close-quarters submission in the blink of an eye. The slightest increase in pressure would snap the bone.

"Tsk!" A sharp hiss of pain escaped Alira's lips as she screwed one eye shut, the strain on her joint a white-hot fire. Instinctively, she enveloped her own arm in a protective cocoon of searing flame, a desperate gambit to force him to release his grip.

But The King didn't so much as flinch. The flames licked harmlessly over his weighted vambrace and glove, his hold remaining an unbreakable vice of leverage and control. He was prepared for her elemental defense; his technique was designed to overpower it.

"You FUCKER!" Len's roar was pure, undiluted fury. She lunged forward, her foot aiming a bone-shattering stomp at his exposed ribs, a move that seemed born of street brawls, not noble duels.

Seeing the new threat, The King didn't scramble. He disengaged with the same brutal efficiency with which he had attacked. He released the lock, shoving Alira's flaming arm away from him, and used the momentum to kick backward, fluidly evading Len's stomp which cratered the stone where he had just been. He landed silently a few paces back, once again a motionless, judging statue, having turned their desperate rescue attempt into another lesson in his overwhelming superiority.

Alira pushed herself up, a sharp intake of breath hissing through her teeth as she clutched her aching arm. The ghost of the joint lock still screamed in her muscles, a stark reminder of his lethal precision.

"Are you all right?" Len asked, her voice tight, her gaze never leaving their opponent.

"Yeah," Alira gritted out, forcing the pain down and rolling her shoulder with a wince. "All good." She settled back into her combat stance, but the usual playful fire in her eyes was now a smoldering, focused ember of pure determination.

Across the antechamber, The King observed their recovery with an unnerving stillness. He didn't advance. He didn't speak. Instead, he slowly lifted one hand, palm open. Then, he curled his index and middle fingers inward twice in a slow, deliberate, and utterly contemptuous gesture.

Come here.

It wasn't a challenge. It was a summons. The arrogance of it, the sheer, dismissive confidence, sent a jolt of pure, incandescent rage through Len. Her eye twitched, a single, violent spasm that betrayed the storm of fury barely contained beneath her noble facade. He wasn't just fighting them; he was toying with them.