Black Onyx - Forgotten Magic

Chapter 238: The Great Illusion Beast

What Gerald saw could only be described as madness.

Phoenix Knights, fighting each other like mad dogs, with the rest of the warriors joining in the slaughter.

It was quite clear that something went wrong. The intensity with which they fought was as if their lives depended upon it.

"Wha- What!" Gerald was almost rendered speechless. He had to gather his composure for a moment. "What the fuck are you doing?! Have you all gone insane?!" he shouted. He was just about to rush forward when an unbelievable pain assaulted his mind.

He collapsed on the ground in agony. The only comparable pain like this was felt when the King used some sort of a mental attack, and even then it was less intense.

Luckily it didn't last long, and he quickly got back on his feet. Only by then, the battle between the warriors changed. Some were now fighting against Orcs and a few of them were lying dead on the ground in puddles of blood.

He rubbed his eyes in disbelief, but when he looked back, he could only see the ground covered with human corpses, and Orcs victoriously celebrating among them.

'Hehe, yes! Die stupid humans, die!'

'Useless struggle, you cannot beat us!'

'He-he'

'Ha-ha'

"Great, just what I needed right now"

The monsters living in Gerald's mind rent-free once again took the opportunity to make themselves heard as if the situation wasn't hectic enough already.

What's even worse, was that another monster appeared in his periphery.

It was small and ugly, about the size of a child. An oversized head was sitting on top of a scrawny body, with sickly yellow skin and two pairs of transparent wings on the back.

It was rubbing its hands and grinning with an oversized mouth full of razor-sharp teeth. It flew soundlessly, like the apparition it was, coming closer and closer, clearly intent on joining on the fun.

Gerald felt another wave of pain hit him when the beast looked at him.

"Eww, what the fuck is this?!" His face scrunched up, "So ugly! Get away from me you freak ghost!"

Pow!

He punched it with all he had, expecting it to disappear into thin air like all the rest, but surprisingly, the punch landed on solid flesh!

The thing screamed in pain.

"Huh?" Gerald freaked out a tad. However, he didn't have time to be confused though, as the shouts and screams from Orcs celebration soon became loud wails of pain coming from humans.

He looked back once more, and saw the group of warriors he was familiar with alive and They were anything but well.

Most of them suffered severe wounds and were at the edge of death. Even if they somehow survived, many would have life-long deformities.

Alongside all of this, they also appeared extremely confused and anxious, seemingly in deep emotional trauma.

Gerald watched it all with slack yaw, unable to comprehend what just happened.

"Hold on," a thought suddenly crossed his mind. "Could it be?" He turned around to where the monster should be.

Only, there now lay a young girl, in her early twenties at a first glance. She appeared to be scared and in pain. She was also completely naked in all her glory.

Gerald looked at her in sheer disbelief as she walked towards him with unsteady steps, using the wall as support.

"Than- Cough!" she coughed. "Thank you for saving me, I was trapped in here for so long"

As she approached him, Gerald started to feel uncomfortable. He got this feeling of wanting to protect the girl, but that clashed with his unreasonably analytical mind.

"God damn it I don't like this" He forced himself to make a move. With a quick spin of his body, he made his strongest back kick he could muster in this sluggish state.

"Ugh!" It hit the girl squarely on the chest and sent her flying. She hit the wall with the back of her head and released a painful grunt.

But then her body started to warp. Her human shape shrank and blurred, soon returning to the form of the child-sized monster.

The thing shook its head and growled at Gerald. It was quite clearly pissed off.

"Fucking illusions," Gerald cursed and spat on the floor in disgust. "I knew some weird shit was going on here So you are the prick responsible for this mess, eh?!"

"Wreeee!" the beast screeched and jumped towards his face. Sharp black claws extended from those tiny fingers in hope of shredding his pretty face.

At the same time, another wave of pain hit Gerald's mind, almost paralyzing him again.

"Get the fuck," he shouted and threw a wild haymaker, "Out of my head!"

Bam!

The monster suffered another punch in the face, and soon it was bouncing off the wall for the third time.

Gerald wasted no time and immediately rushed to restrain it. With only one working hand it was not easy. He placed his right knee on the monster's back and punched it every time it would try to struggle free.

Aware of its physical inferiority, the tiny monster tried to use one of its mind illusions. However, being prepared for such an attack, Gerald persevered through the pain, and keep beating the monster no matter what it showed him.

Surprisingly this little thing was quite resilient. Even after a few minutes of taking Gerald's punches it still had the energy to struggle.

Granted, he wasn't using magic to reinforce his body, so his strength had to be limited, but any normal person would still succumb after just one or two of his strikes.

And this thing took hundreds of them! It certainly piqued his interest. After it finally gave up resisting, Gerald grabbed it and went to see what was happening with Tabbris' group.

The men were currently in a dreadful state. Depression, regret, guilt, shame Emotions such as these were high among them as they wrapped their wounds and took care of the dead.

It was especially so for Tabbris. He buried his face in his palms and grieved silently. He killed his own people! Instead of protecting them, guiding them to victory, he was the one that took their lives.

It was the worst feeling in the world.

"Hey," someone said. He was standing before him.

Tabbris looked up with his red eyes full of tears before wiping them off. "Gerald Why are you here? What is"

The words remained stuck in his throat as his eyes landed on the thing in Gerald's hand. His face contorted in anger and the Hurrican Blade appeared in his hand out of nowhere.

"Pixie!" he growled and Mana started flowing through him, empowering his body.

"Woah, wait! What are you doing?!" Gerald stepped a few steps back to distance himself from the enraged man.

"That's the monster!" Tabbris shouted. "That's the monster who did this! Move away Gerald, that thing's dangerous! We need to kill it!"

"Or maybe..." His eyes reflected a dangerous sheen, "You are just an illusion too?!"