Harem app-Chapter 262: Maria

First-person POV - Liam

Luckily, I arrived in time to defeat the angel who was fighting Lila.

"I’m sorry I took so long, but now that I’m here, everything will be fine," I said with a confident smile, trying to reassure her.

Lila blushed softly, letting out a shaky sigh of relief when she saw my face. A small smile formed on her lips as she thanked me sincerely.

"I knew you would come save me," Lila said.

"Of course. I would never allow anyone to hurt you," I replied. "Now tell me, where is Lucia? What happened?" I asked, worry creeping into my voice.

Almost at the same time, Jasmin appeared. A few moments later, Zoe arrived, carrying Lilith in her arms.

Both of them seemed to have at least some idea of what was going on. They looked ready to fight at any moment.

"Unfortunately, she was captured," Lila said, frustration evident in her tone. "The Sword of Judgment they used on Maria had some kind of alarm."

She briefly explained that they had finally managed to heal Maria by removing the Sword of Judgment from her chest. But before they could even celebrate, the angels appeared and attacked them.

The group tried desperately to escape, but the angels were relentless. In the end, all Lila could do was call out to her beloved for help.

"I thought they would at least listen," she said with a bitter sigh. "But it seems they’ve already decided that Lucia and her sister must also pay for their father’s sins."

She explained, seething with frustration, how the girls’ father had been a demon who used his powers to influence the human world. Part of that influence was having two daughters with a human woman.

Angel laws forbade such acts. It was decided that every trace of the man’s influence had to be erased. They even wiped the girls’ mother’s memories and revived the people their father had killed.

Now, all that remained was to eliminate the final fruits of his sin by killing Lucia and Maria. Of course, I would never allow that to happen. I clenched my fists resolutely.

"So where are they now?"

Lila met my gaze, her eyes steady despite her exhaustion.

"Maria and Lucia should be in the angels’ temporary base. They’re still searching for me, so they shouldn’t have left yet."

"Temporary base...?" I murmured, frowning.

She nodded. "It’s like a mobile fortress. The angels deploy it whenever they face a stronger enemy. They won’t execute them immediately, but we have to be fast."

After that, Lila took the lead. We followed her across the rocky plain until, between the stones, a golden arc of energy appeared, floating in the air. It looked like a luminous, unstable rift, pulsing as if made of time itself.

"It’s here," Lila said.

A single guardian angel stood before the portal. Zoe stepped forward, telling us to go on ahead.

I was worried, but I crossed the portal anyway. Zoe had superhuman strength and abilities; she could handle that enemy.

In an instant, we found ourselves before a massive crystalline structure suspended in the void. The angels’ base.

At the entrance, two lightly armored angels guarded the gate. Jasmin moved first, charging like a furious beast.

In less than two precise movements, she took them down, shattering their spears and slamming them to the ground without giving them a chance to react.

"Path’s clear," she said, spitting on the floor.

Without wasting time, we ran through corridors flooded with an almost unbearable golden light.

And then we arrived.

At the center of a vast crystal hall, Maria and Lucia were bound by chains made of pure light. Their bodies were covered in wounds, tears streaming down their faces.

Standing before them was a female figure: flawless white wings, gleaming armor, and eyes as cold as they were cruel.

She twirled a slender blade between her fingers, almost playfully, as she watched the girls suffer. A sadistic smile curved her lips.

"Aria..." Lila whispered, her voice thick with hatred and fear.

The angel’s gaze slowly shifted toward us. A perverse gleam lit her eyes, and her voice rang out, clear, melodic, and sharp as a blade.

"Well, well... so the sinner himself has decided to show up." Her eyes glowed gold as she summoned a massive axe. "That saves me the trouble of hunting you down."

My blood boiled. Seeing Maria and Lucia suffer like that ignited something inside me, something I could no longer restrain.

I stepped forward, fists clenched. With a glance, I ordered Jasmin to kill that woman.

Jasmin charged without hesitation, throwing herself at the angel. But Aria smiled as if amused by an insect and, in a nearly theatrical motion, released Maria.

The chain of light binding her vanished for a brief second, and Maria collapsed to the floor.

Jasmin wasn’t as lucky.

Aria spun her axe as if polishing a blade and, with a single sweeping strike, caught Jasmin mid-attack.

She was hurled across the hall, slamming into the wall with a thunderous impact.

For a second that felt eternal, she remained still, then collapsed to the floor, defeated. Blood stained the golden corridor. My stomach twisted.

Before I could even process it, the situation changed again.

Karl, another angel, swift and brutal, appeared at the side of the hall, eyes burning like embers.

Without hesitation, he lunged toward Lucia, clearly intent on killing her before we could save her.

Without a second thought, I ran toward her and threw myself in front of the blow, because in that moment, Lucia’s body was all that mattered.

I felt the enemy’s blade tear through my flesh, the force ripping through me like fire.

The cold metal of the shaft and the weight of the weapon drove into my back, the pain stealing my breath.

The axe was buried deep. I felt the burning agony, felt the blood slipping between my trembling fingers, tasted metal flooding my mouth.

And then, the sky above the hall shattered like glass.

A furious light tore open a rift in reality, and two archangels descended with the authority of storms, beautiful and terrifying, their armor singing like trumpets of judgment.

Lucia, pale and wide-eyed, looked at me as if she couldn’t believe what she was seeing. Pain turned my vision into blurred watercolors, but her voice cut through the haze like ice.

"You shouldn’t be here. You shouldn’t..." Her words broke, filled with despair. "There’s no way... to win."

I smiled with confidence, forcing myself to stand despite the pain from Karl’s blow.

"Don’t worry. We’ll win," I said firmly. "I have a plan."

For a moment, my eyes gleamed.

After all, it was finally time for the dreams to begin.