Demonic Dragon: Harem System-Chapter 425: Scarlet and Strax vs Espiritual Guardian

The world plunged into darkness.

The torches extinguished, the stars were hidden, and even the spiritual glow that once permeated the air now seemed to have been sucked into an invisible vacuum. It was like fighting inside the heart of an eclipse. The only light came from the cracks in the Guardian's mask—three vertical eyes of pure energy, pulsating with the will of a Lost Realm.

Scarlet spun in the air, the blood spear emerging from her own body, shaped from the scarlet plasma pouring from her outstretched arms. The weapon was alive, pulsing, vibrating with her rage. Beside her, Strax planted his feet into the ground and swung Artorias' sword, the straight blade humming with a frequency that cracked the stones beneath his feet.

The Guardian did not move. He didn't need to.

He simply EXISTED with such presence that the world around him adjusted to his being. But it wouldn't be enough. Not anymore. freёnovelkiss.com

"Let's get started, big guy," Scarlet grinned, the first to attack.

She lunged forward with the spear extended, spinning through the air like a storm of fury and precision. The weapon sliced through the air with supersonic cracks, each spin releasing small secondary blades that shot out like bloody shrapnel in all directions. The Guardian dodged with impossible elegance, his body bending at angles that no living creature could imitate.

'Now.' Strax followed a moment later. With a roar that caused the very ground to split, he planted his feet for a burst of force and advanced, delivering a vertical slash with the sword. Artorias' blade shone with a deep blue—not a magical glow, but a shine of absolute intent, of flawless purpose.

The impact struck the Guardian's side, and even though he deflected with his arms, the being was sent flying backward, raising a cloud of dust like an explosion.

Scarlet gave no respite. In midair, she spun the spear, throwing it like a mythical javelin. The projectile didn't just fly—it screamed. A spiritual wail that pierced the Guardian's chest, spinning him in the air before slamming him into a stone wall, cracking it.

But he did not fall.

With a fluid movement, like water retreating from a punch, the Guardian recovered and extended his hands. Lines of spiritual energy shot from his fingers, threads of light interwoven, attempting to bind Strax and Scarlet.

Strax drove the sword into the ground and raised his arms. A shield of black energy materialized around him—demonic energy he had been avoiding using due to his Pact with Hades. The threads ricocheted and exploded against the shield.

"You're not getting away!" Scarlet, in midair, moved like a lightning bolt of hatred. She reappeared behind the Guardian, her spear now split into two twin weapons, spinning like propellers. She pierced the creature's side with both blades. Blood did not spill—but something else did. Spiritual smoke, dense, made of memories and suffering.

KRRRRIRIRIIRIRII!!!!

The Guardian screamed. But not with a normal sound. It was a scream that vibrated directly in the soul.

Scarlet was thrown back by a wave of energy. The ground exploded into crystalline fragments as she fell, but she rose before the dust could settle. Her smile was wild.

"Shit... this guy's more powerful in his scream than in his strength, HAHAHA!" She laughed as she stood.

Strax smiled seeing that she was fine and raised his sword. "Let's press him. Don't let him breathe. We need to kill him, fast."

"I like that," she said with a grin. And then, in an explosion of energy, two red bolts surged toward the Guardian.

The Guardian retaliated. With a gesture, he summoned several spectral forms—arms, legs, mouths—that emerged from the ground. They grabbed, scratched, and bit. But Scarlet flew between them like a dance of death, slicing through the ethereal limbs with clinical precision.

Strax charged forward, delivering wide strikes that shattered the ground with every step. Artorias' sword met resistance in the Guardian's illusory flesh, but each strike tore not only through the body but also through the very fabric of reality. It was as if he was cutting through the world itself.

The Guardian changed tactics. He literally disintegrated.

His body fragmented into dozens of smaller forms—shadows with eyes of light, each mimicking his movements. A spiritual swarm.

Scarlet was caught off guard. Three of the shadows drove intangible blades into her back. She fell, rolled, and exploded in a burst of blood that sent the specters scattering. Strax shouted her name, but she was already back on her feet, her eyes burning.

"That's not happening again!" She snapped her fingers. All the blood that had fallen to the field rose back up—a red sea flying toward her. The spear returned, now three times its original size, formed from all the blood spilled there.

She leaped.

And fell, driving the spear through twenty of the specters at once.

Meanwhile, Strax focused his energy. The world around him went silent. The wind stopped. Time seemed to slow down.

"I presume I've never used this properly, but let's see if this is enough…" He began channeling everything into the blade.

Artorias' sword gleamed.

And he vanished.

He didn't teleport. He simply moved so fast that not even light could follow him. He appeared behind the original Guardian—who had now resumed his solid form—and delivered a horizontal slash.

The world exploded.

The Guardian was split in two.

But he didn't die.

Both halves immediately began to regenerate, as if made of spiritual fluid. Only now… they were slower.

Scarlet landed beside Strax.

"Ah... this is getting tough," Scarlet muttered, both of them panting. But smiling. "Let's finish him off." She said.

The Guardian reformed, but for the first time... he hesitated.

Strax spun the sword between his fingers. "You felt that, right? That was… half of what I can do."

Scarlet wiped the blood from her mouth. "And I still haven't drunk enough."

The Guardian attacked with everything. A muffled roar reverberated, and the spiritual field expanded. The ground trembled. All the reality around them turned into an abstract, formless space. The buildings, the square, even the sky… everything vanished. They were now in an arena of pure spiritual energy.

Here, the laws of the world didn't apply.

Speed increased. Time slowed and sped up at the same time.

The battle turned into violent poetry.

Strikes came from all directions. The Guardian now wielded multiple ethereal arms, summoning weapons made of memories—swords of regret, spears of loss, chains of doubt. Scarlet spun in the air, dodging with the fluidity of a drunken shadow. Each of her movements was accompanied by beams of blood that formed into defense or offense.

Strax cut through the environment fearlessly. Literally. With each strike, he tore small pieces from the space, creating spiritual voids that swallowed parts of the Guardian's weapons.

The Guardian advanced with lethal precision, his long, ethereal arms extending like blades of wind cutting through the air. In a movement as fast as a line of light, he grabbed Scarlet's leg. The force of his grip was like forged iron, his incorporeal claws, cold and relentless, tearing through her body. Before she could react, the Guardian hurled her with supernatural violence.

The impact was brutal. Scarlet was thrown through the air, a projectile of flesh and blood, until she collided with Strax with a deafening crash, the sound of bones compressing against the spiritual ground. They tumbled together, like stones in an avalanche, sliding through the ethereal space. The pressure was unbearable, the field vibrating, distorting the reality around them, each movement seeming to tear apart pieces of existence itself.

Scarlet coughed up blood, the pain feeling like a cold flame consuming her chest. Her eyes flashed with a mixture of rage and amusement. "I think he's pissed," she said, trying to recover, still tasting the metallic blood on her lips.

Strax, equally dazed, struggled to rise, his face covered in dirt and blood, but his eyes, as always, held a calm fury. "I think you're right." His feet sank into the spiritual ground as he tried to regain his balance, feeling the energy around him pulse more intensely with each passing second.

They exchanged glances. They didn't need words. Something passed between them, an immediate connection. It was a memory, but not from the present life. It was an ancient dance, from another era, another time. Perhaps a past life, or a bond forged in battles that had shaped them. It wasn't just synchronicity. It was a primal harmony, something that couldn't be described but was deeply felt.

Strax gestured with his hand, and a wave of energy exploded from his figure. Scarlet was hurled into the air, like an arrow shot from an invisible bow. She spun, harnessing the movement, creating a spiral of blood around her, a black aura that seemed to dominate the field. Every drop of blood, every particle of her energy flowed into her, converging at a point of insane concentration. High above, she screamed, and the world around her seemed to dissolve into a single point of force.

"Now!" Strax shouted, pointing Artorias' sword. The blade gleamed with a supernatural intensity, reflecting the light that was born from the chaos. In that exact moment, Scarlet launched the blood spear, a colossus of energy and power. She descended like a comet. But, the instant the spear began its trajectory, Strax followed it, delivering a strike from his sword with all the weight of his strength, his fury, and his destiny. The impact was so devastating that reality itself seemed to bend before it.

The explosion that followed was apocalyptic. A wave of destruction swept across the spiritual field, clearing everything, everything within the reach of its shockwave. The sky tore apart. The ground trembled, no longer just in the physical space, but in the spiritual plane. The Guardian, the imposing presence that had defied everything, was consumed by the impact. His mask cracked, shattering like glass, the fissures spreading irrationally, as if something that shouldn't exist was being disintegrated by the very force of the universe. The energy around him warped, and before he could protect himself, the Guardian was thrown backward, his ethereal form torn apart by the combined fury of Strax and Scarlet.

The spiritual field seemed to breathe. The light was extinguished, chaos had taken over. The Guardian was thrown against the ground, his impervious body crushing into the ethereal soil. He lay still, like a broken stone, the fragments of his mask gently falling onto the shattered terrain.

Scarlet collapsed to her knees. The strength of the battle had drained her. She looked up at Strax, still breathing heavily, her fierce gaze fixed on the Guardian's body, as if waiting for him to rise at any moment. The pain in her own body was nothing compared to the intensity of her own rage. She felt every wound, every muscle overburdened, but it still wasn't enough. Not yet. Not until he was destroyed.

Strax looked at her, his face filled with a mixture of exhaustion and determination. "Is it over?" His voice was low, almost a whisper, but full of a weight that only he could carry. The fight was almost finished, but something inside him, something deeper, knew the Guardian wasn't completely done. Not yet.

Scarlet nodded, but her expression was cautious. "It's over," she replied, though a part of her knew the battle hadn't ended with the Guardian's body falling to the spiritual ground. They had destroyed his mask, but there was still more.