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Return of the Fallen Volume 8 Chapter 64

*Crack Boom Boom!*

Explosion after explosion spread throughout the palace one after another. All of the people aboard had no clue what was happening. They all had been a witness to Shin and Kim’s attack moments ago. Sure it had carved a section of the palace and ripped it apart but the damage wasn’t so great that concurrent explosions would follow.

Garn’s first thought was sabotage. It wouldn’t be the first time he faced open betrayal but as he looked around the room to find the hidden rat, he could see that everyone was confused and scared.

He turned away from them and peered downward. Shin, Nunully, and Kimi were still collapsed on the ground and were suffering mana sickness so it couldn’t be them.

Once more he scanned for Asuna but again she was not outside the barrier.

That’s when it hit him.

His senses spread through the palace and he found the culprits.

He gripped his scepter with rage and stamped it on the ground.

“These fucking RATS!”

Garn teleported in an instant and appeared in one of the chambers which housed one of his magic cores. The moment he appeared he happened upon Sam. Sam held his hand up and before Garn made a move, the large magic core powering the floating palace disappeared and entered Sam’s magic storage ring.

“NOOOO!”

Garn launched dozens of sharp wind blades at Sam and tried to take his head right on the spot but before these blades reached Sam, Sam’s green armor covered him entirely.

*Schink Schink Schink Schink Schink Schink Schink Schink*

Sam’s armor was tough but the difference between the two became apparently clear in seconds. His armor started to chip away in large chunks until his flesh was revealed and then even his flesh started to get slashed open leaving devastating gashes that bled profusely.

Sam grit his teeth in pain and changed the gravity around him. Suddenly all of the wind blades were forced to the ground or off to the sides.

“GIVE IT BACK RIGHT NOW!”

Sam shook his head.

“Kill me or don’t but either way, you will never get this power source back.”

Garn began to create lightning and sent bolt after bolt in Sam’s direction. Sam tried to crush it with gravity but this level of lightning was on a different level and moved far too fast for Sam to affect it.

A bolt of lightning drilled into Sam’s chest and his body convulsed violently before he spit out a large mouthful of blood. This though still wasn’t enough to kill him. Sam turtled up on the floor and a dome of gordonia formed around him. It was dense and tougher than most metals.

He knew he couldn’t recover completely in time but he didn’t need to.

Garn raised his scepter and pointed it directly at Sam’s dome. A barrier formed directly in between Sam’s dome and the room and with a wave of his scepter, the barrier cut directly through Sam’s dome and separated, breaking it open.

“Did you think I needed lightning to crack open your shell? So what if you can control gravity around you, it is no match for my barriers. Now die!”

*Boom*

Another explosion sounded out in the palace and Garn snapped back to reality.

(That’s right, it wasn’t just him who snuck aboard my palace. If I kill him now, I only deal them a small blow. They must have come here for the same purpose as he. By now they must have already gotten another magic core. any more and my palace will start to fall out of the sky.)

Garn made a quick decision before sending out another bolt of lightning towards Sam.

*TZzzzt*

The lightning again struck him in the chest and his body almost bounced off the floor from it. Garn smiled before sending one more into him. Sam was now covered in hideous burns and was bleeding from his eyes ears nose and mouth but had not yet died. Garn and controlled his power just enough not to kill Sam but instead knocked him unconscious and left him at the edge of life and death.

Stamping his scepter down, both he and Sam teleported to another chamber.

As soon as he appeared in this chamber, he surrounded Sam in a barrier of wind to make sure he couldn’t move, and at the same time he activated the barrier in this chamber so the rat in front of him couldn’t escape.

“Asuna, you sneaky little shit. Stop right now and I won’t kill your friend here!”

Asuna was just about to use her ring and store the magic core when Garn showed up behind her. She saw the horrible state Sam was in and her heart both wept for Sam and burned with rage for Garn.

“You bastard! Let him go right now!”

Asuna’s eyes glowed with purple light and she tried to teleport Sam out of Garn’s barrier but Garn’s waved his scepter and Sam stayed exactly where he lay inside Garn’s barrier.

Asuna tried once more but again she couldn’t move Sam. Garn smiled with a vicious grin.

“Asuna, have you forgotten already, was it not I who started you on the path of space magic. After you all betrayed me and left Tresta, you also cut off your only connection to learning more about the element of space. Maybe you picked up a few pointers later on from Glacious but even still, you are far behind where you would be, had you not fled the capitol. You were inferior to me then when it came to the knowledge of space and its reaches and you are still inferior to this day.”

Asuna realized immediately that with that scepter in his hand, there was no way she could beat Garn when it came to space magic. She looked at Sam and felt there was no other choice.

(We’re both going to die no matter what. If I can at least cripple this weapon of his for a while, King Brian should be able to come up with another plan and stop him once and for all!)

Asuna knew the difference in power between her and Garn. While she was still only at the 4th stage, the mind-body stage, Garn was at the 5th, the core stage. Not only did he hold the advantage when it came to magical power, but he also stood head and shoulder above her when it came to both knowledge and application. Add the fact that he holds a powerful magic scepter and he controls every inch of the floating palace, Asuna knew there was no way out of this situation and only death awaited her. Still, she would not simply go out quietly. If her fate was to die anyway, she might as well make it difficult for Garn going forward.

Her ring lit up and she reached for the magic core without hesitation. She tried to store the magic core and take away another power source from Garn but the moment she reached forward, a barrier formed around the magic core and blocked her.

She couldn’t grab it in time. She couldn’t take it away, she couldn’t save Sam and even if she wanted to leave here and flee far far away, Garn’s power would not allow her to teleport away.

Feeling hopeless, she cursed at Garn.

“Damn you! To this bastard, to this damn scum of a person, I’m going to die. Sam…I’m sorry. We failed.”

Sam was still unconscious and heard none of this but Asuna still wished to apologize. She felt responsible. Had she been quicker she thought, had she gotten the core, maybe then Garn would have lost enough power so they could get away.

(At least Triska is still inside. Surely by now she’s gotten another core. Maybe…maybe there’s still ho…)

Asuna’s thoughts stopped there as Garn stamped his scepter once more.

“That reminds me, there was one more rat that snuck aboard.”

Triska was forcibly teleported inside the chamber with them and was immediately surrounded by a barrier. The look of shock she wore said everything. She tried to pierce through the barrier with her trident but to no effect. The barrier instantly shrunk down and squeezed her until she could not move an inch.

Garn laughed at her.

“Heheha, you had more time but you didn’t get a single core. What’s the matter traitor, did you get lost in my magnificent weapon. Maybe if you were someone of value, I might have invited you to the palace at least once. Maybe then you would have known the layout of where my cores are located. Though it seems trash is trash and you were set to betray me long ago.”

Garn shook his head.

“I can’t understand how you three thought to come aboard the way you did. No doubt it must have been Brian every step of the way. I took my focus off of all three of you and in that short window, Triska used the teleportation inscription plates while under Sam’s dome. The moment Shin and Kimi attacked me, you three teleported inside my palace. I’d ask how you teleported directly inside my palace and not some random city or other location but that would put me as naive. King Brian is a clever little worm I’ll give him that. He figured a way to get the exact location to get you in.”

*Bwahahahaha*

“He thought up everything but then you all fail at the very last step. Do you not see how terribly funny that is? The gods above and the devils below have played the grandest trick on you all and now look where you stand.”

Garn raised his scepter.

“You stand before death’s door and death…has come to collect. After you three, everyone else you care about, I shall deliver them the most agonizing death and it will be you all that they blame. Hmph, goodbye…traitors.”