But the red-colored sword aura again started to turn chartreuse green and then turned into pure dark green!
'Green aura?! Isn't this only a master swordsman could create?' Helena widened her eyes in surprise.
"Don't lose focus!" Duchess Margery scolded from her right side.
Helena frowned a bit and nodded her head.
Meanwhile, Lucius stood there with a gloomy face, held the sword tightly, and radiated an immense killing aura.
On the other hand, the humanoid snake demon split its tongue out and held an eerie dagger in its claw-like hand.
When noticing Lucius's furious gaze, the snake demon made a slight hiss, clenched its fist, and broke the dagger. A moment later, a strange whitish fog came out of the dagger and formed into a figure of a human. But unlike normal humans, it looked more like a ghostly figure, looked transparent, and had a distorted face.
That ghostly figure was none other than King Sewallus!
Although no sound came out of its mouth, everyone in the Royal Garden felt that it was wailing in pain.
Upon seeing this brutal scene, Lucius's eyes turned bloodshot.
He covered his body with golden fire-elemental energy and formed two wings on his back in a blink.
Lucius flapped the two dawn wings forcefully and flew towards the snake demon at an incredible speed. Within two seconds, he arrived in front of the snake demon, moved his right hand while aiming at the creature's neck, and slashed his aura-coated sword.
Meanwhile, the snake demon quietly moved one of its right hands and blocked his sword with its black broadsword.
A clanging sound resounded in the green garden. Lucius coldly snorted as he withdrew his sword, made a strange hand sign, and thrust his long sword at the cobra-headed demon's neck.
Even Abium wasn't able to follow the former king's movement.
The next instant, something extraordinary happened.
A ray of green light came from the long sword's tip, moved towards the snake demon's neck like a bolt of lightning, and attacked it.
A second later, a loud explosion occurred.
That explosion was so intense that it blasted the cobra-headed demon a few meters away.
Not only that, but a deep cut appeared in its neck region and caused eerie dark blood to splatter in all directions.
The snake demon soon regained its balance in midair and slowly landed on the grassy ground with a thud.
At the same time, the deep wound on its neck regenerated on its own and healed entirely in mere seconds, leaving only a small scar behind.
Abium exhaled deeply as he watched this scene from afar.
In the past, he also faced the same problem when he battled against the Greater Demon Kolgath.
Even some low-level demons had unique features that would make them invincible in a battle.
At that moment, the snake demon looked deeply at Lucius and slowly rose in the air. Before long, it hovered 2 meters above the ground and calmly gripped the humanoid figure in one of its hands tighter.
It then opened its snake mouth, hissed at the humanoid spirit, and tore it! Suddenly, the humanoid figure took on the illusionary appearance of King Sewallus and shrieked with its distorted face.
"No!" Lucius became furious as he saw this scene and screamed angrily. Still, he didn't dare to charge ahead recklessly and gripped his weapon tighter while thinking of a plan.
In the meantime, the humanoid spirit slowly started to turn foggy and soon disappeared from everyone's eyes.
No, Abium noticed a small whitish marble in the demonic creature's hand!
'Soul bead. That demon stored the king's soul inside that bead, lad.' Azolla explained in his head.
On the other hand, Lucius showed a disbelief look on his face and showed different kinds of emotions in mere seconds. Anger, hate, helplessness, anxiety, fear, and other negative emotions started to creep up in his heart.
In truth, he always thought of demons as imaginary beings and even told his grandson Tybost not to believe such lies. But now, Lucius had no choice but to believe it.
"The ancient demons actually exist, huh?"
Lucius muttered grimly, flapped his golden dawn wings, and flew towards the cobra-headed snake demon again. He aimed his sword at the exact spot again and thrust it with full force.
But before the sword could reach the demon's neck, the demon suddenly moved towards its left side, evaded Lucius's attack like nothing, and waved one of its right hands.
A second later, Lucius felt that an invisible wall appeared out of nowhere and blocked him from moving closer to the demon!
Then, the snake demon calmly raised one of its hands and used the telekinesis-like power to lift Lucius upward!
Before the other party could flap his wings and back away, the snake demon suddenly moved closer towards Lucius, gripped his neck using one of its hands, and tossed him towards the opposite wall.
Lucius's body flew through the air at an incredible speed and landed on the left side of the Palace Wall in a flash.
With a bang, Lucius crashed onto the concrete wall and slowly fell while coughing up a mouthful of blood.
"Pfft!"
Slowly, he noticed that dizziness suddenly appeared, and he turned pale.
'No! I can't back down now.' Lucius hurriedly stabbed his longsword on the ground and stood up unsteadily.
'I need some assistance now.'
As he muttered internally, he noticed that his daughter Duchess Margery had taken out a strange crossbow with unique black marks from her spatial ring, placed a metallic bolt between the riser, and aimed the crossbow at the demon's head.
The crossbow had a wooden stock made from elm and appeared to be coated with varnish. The craftsman must have made this bow with steel, with a span of two feet. Also, the hemp string was covered with some glue.
'Hm? But why is she using a normal bolt? I think it won't work against this demon.' Lucius frowned a bit and shook his head to ease away the strange dizziness.
In the meantime, Margery opened her mouth, recited a unique word, and locked her gaze on the demon.
A ripple of lightning elements started to gather around the crossbow tip.
For the first time, Susur shifted its gaze towards Margery and showed a surprised expression.
"A high-tier artifact?" It then spoke in Easica's common tongue!
The snake demon then made another hiss at Margery and waved one of its right hands.
Before the lightning-elemental energy could assimilate into the bolt, another invisible power appeared out of nowhere and smashed onto everyone. Due to this, the lightning-elemental energies also disappeared from the crossbow's tip!
The next instant, Duchess Margery, Helena, Baron Auguinare, and all other elite guards were caught off-guard by the invisible force and were thrown in different directions.
'Spiritual attack!' Abium knew of every warrior's weaknesses and sighed.
'This demon is so cautious and doesn't even allow others to prepare for an attack.'
At that moment, Lucius once again flapped his dawn wings and flew towards the demon with bloodshot eyes. Simultaneously, he glanced at Margery and shouted.
"I'll hold off this demon for a while. Use it properly."
On the other hand, the cobra-headed demon turned its snake head towards Lucius and waved one of its hands again.
The next second, Lucius felt a similar invisible power blocking his body!
Before he could even blink, the snake demon controlled Lucius's body using strange spiritual power and threw him towards the other side like a broken toy.
'This demon is playing with them.' Abium couldn't help but shake his head in disappointment.
Lily showed a panicked face at that moment and trembled while murmuring.
"F-f*ck, I don't want to steal anything from that monster. If it notices my actions, I'll be the first to die."
"Don't panic, Lily. You'll get the time to shine. Until then, wait here." Abium whispered towards the blonde-haired girl and turned his gaze towards the demon.
'It's going to attack Helena and others.' He didn't dare to delay any longer and imbued more mana into his sword to give the demon a surprise attack.
At that moment, the snake demon Susur moved its broadsword and tried to throw it toward Helena and others but stopped midway. Not because it felt pity towards them, but because it felt another spiritual wave coming from the front!
Abium also noticed a presence from behind and curled his lips upward.
'She is here!'
"Mage Abium, it's been a while." A familiar voice echoed in his ears.
Slowly, Abium also turned his gaze towards his left side and saw a red-robed woman stepping out of the Royal Palace building and waving her hand at him with a smile.
She appeared to be around 50 years old and had long silvery hair, monolid blue eyes, thin eyebrows, and a wrinkled face.
She was none other than Tabitha!
After giving him a simple nod, she released her spiritual power toward Duchess Margery, Helena, and the others and checked if they were alright.
After that, she calmly shifted her gaze towards the demon and furrowed her brows.
"Do you have any information about this demon, Mage Abium?" She asked.
Meanwhile, Abium quietly walked away from the ornamental tree, moved closer to Tabitha, and spoke.
"I do, my lady. It's a Greater Demon from the Abyss called Snake Demon." He suddenly stopped as he recalled the earlier battle and then added.
"Its regeneration power is on par with Elder Druids and even has abnormal physical strength, My Lady."