The bright tri-colored blast lit up the faces of the three trapped heroes, drawing nearer and nearer to ending their lives. TJ continued to struggle for a little more before looking up and seeing the blast as close as it was. "Damn it…” He closed his eyes and put his arms up knowing that he himself isn’t enough to defend against something like this. The blasts light stopped suddenly and it grew darker in front of the three. TJ opened his eyes and looked up to see a 10 foot wall of thick rock shield them from the oncoming attack. The blast hit the rock and cracked it causing an enormous explosion of smoke and small rocks to fly out everywhere. "How…?” Lianna asked dumbfounded as Zen placed a hand on her shoulder. TJ smirked, "I know exactly who it was”. A flash of red light blurred past TJ at an incredible speed going towards the darkness. TJ could no longer see the flash of light anymore but he can hear something in the distance. "You three alright?” A voice out behind the three and they all turned around. "We’re good Erik. Thanks for the help” TJ said. Zen and Lianna looked on as Erik walked forward so that he was visible in front of them. "That flash of light just now…was that…Matt?” TJ asked and Erik nodded. "That one is strong when he is serious…” Erik looked over to the darkness and sighed. "It should become visible in a bit. Your cousin located him through the dark with sensors.” TJ looked over into the darkness. "Tierre huh…?” Zen looked at Erik, "How can that be? I couldn’t see anything with my own night vision. What is he using?”. Erik shrugged his shoulders. "I don’t really care for technology, so it’s none of my business.” Lianna began thinking. "It’s probably some type of heat signature or a special kind of sonar.” TJ nodded. "If it’s anyone, I’m pretty sure it was Tierre who could get us out of this.”
Meanwhile Matt was running through the darkness to the coordinates Tierre told him. "It’s a good thing Tierre called us in when he did. TJ and those others would’ve been toast by now.” Matt continued through the dark park leaving red trails and after images as he went along. He looked up getting to the far end of the park leading into the city again and readied himself. "All I got to do is surprise him…I should go around then.” Matt made a sharp turn and run up the edges of the park where he should end up right behind Viper. As he continued to run he began to see the glows of his eyes. "Found him…” Matt muttered to himself. He positioned himself just right behind Viper and cocked his fist back waiting for Viper to sense him. Viper leaned his head up feeling Matt’s presence next to him and slowly turned around. As soon as he did Matt through a straight punch right to his face and collided with deadly force. Viper slowly lifted up off the ground and into the air. Before he could get far enough Matt pulled him back towards him by his leg and threw another uppercut to his face knocking him back into the air again and this time flying towards the others. The park slowly began brightening up to the point where the four could see and they were able to move again. Lianna pointed to Viper in the air flying towards them and Zen knelt down and materialized his rocket launcher. "I’ve got him!” He took careful aim waiting for him to get just a little closer but before he even got his aim adjusted a bright purple light darted past him and towards Viper. The light surrounded Viper and various white marks can be seen forming around Viper as the light spun around his body repeatedly. "Troy?” TJ said confused while someone stepped up beside him. "What did you expect someone else?” It was Ralph with his sword on his shoulder as usual now placing it above his head. Troy had just finished slicing up Viper when Matt spun over his head and spiked him down with a powerful kick. "Let me help out too!” TJ said charging his sword until it glowed white. "Want to split him eh?” Ralph said smirking. He drew his sword to his side like TJ did but opposite the way TJ did. When Viper fell near TJ and Ralph ran towards Viper and went through him with their blades cutting in a X motion and lighting his body in flames and holy light. Viper crashed to the ground past Lianna and Zen and slide a good distance away from them. "Miserable…meat puppets…” Viper mumbled to himself while getting up. He finally stood up and looked towards the sky catching the glimpse of someone heading down towards him. Matt came down from the air in full force, arm brought back to throw a serious haymaker punch. Viper growled viciously which caused the area to shake a bit while the others began to charge at him. "Enough!” Viper yelled and his body began to protrude a violent purplish aura.
Matt gasped at the certain change of atmosphere but couldn’t prevent himself from falling towards him. "Not good…” Matt said bracing himself for the attack Viper began charging. Viper punched the ground and causing an eruption of lava to travel through the ground towards the whole group and through Matt. The attack was absorbed by Matt but the force of the explosion sent him flying away into a nearby tree in the park. The eruption traveled through the ground quickly still with Viper flying just as fast right behind it. Lianna and Zen rolled out of the way just as the attack came to them while Ralph drove his sword into the ground and began absorbing the fire from the attack into the blade, coloring it a deep orange. "Everyone now!”. Ralph picked his sword up with one hand and swung it cutting the air and throwing the fire back at Viper. The attack connects searing his skin but it seemed not to slow him down. He blew past Lianna and Zen and grabbed Ralph by the throat just as he was recovering from the attack. "You’re the guardian of the boy right?” He began to squeeze harder slowly choking and crushing him making it hard for Ralph to breath. "You’ll be no good to him…if you’re dead…!” Viper arm gripping Ralph was pierced through from Troy’s rapier making him let go of Ralph. "TJ! Hit him with everything you got!” TJ nodded charging the sword again rushing towards him while Zen and Lianna rushed from the back. Viper began shaking his arm violently trying to throw off Troy before rearing his fist back. He noticed TJ running at him in front of him while Ralph attempted to also slow Viper’s reaction time down. "This is what you manage?” Viper began laughing but stopped as soon as he noticed the purple and orange aura glow from Troy and Ralph. "What?!” Viper uttered as Troy grabbed him and began lifting him into the air. He held him up with the blade in which he pierced his arm and somersault kicked him into the air following him with wings equipped. "Get ready Ralph!” Ralph nodded and watched as his friend chased after him pulling out his own wings. Lianna and Zen stopped and so did TJ who finally saw the angel abilities at work. Viper attempted to recover in the air but was struck by a purple streak that came from seemingly nowhere. The streak drew a noticeable amount of blood from him. Something he hadn’t been hit by before and what was worse, it actually hurt. "W-what is this…!” Troy stood across from him with his blade held out towards him. He swung the blade diagonally downward and the streak followed his movements cutting Viper accordingly. Troy began swinging the sword faster and faster with purple streaks coming from all directions until finally he stopped and Viper began falling with spatters of blood trailing the sky in his descent. Ralph smirked as his whole body engulfed into flames and right before Viper hit the ground he went through him and a burst of speed and fire blowing up the entire area where he ran through. The smell of fire and burning flesh can be smelled throughout the park as the streak of fire continued to burn endlessly where Viper was to fall. "Did you land Dragon’s Strike Ralph?” Troy said landing. Ralph laughed a bit. "Do I ever miss?” "That was incredible? That’s the power of the Dreams Kingdom?” Lianna asked. Troy nodded. TJ looked at the fire and back at the both of them. "So…I’ll be able do things like that soon?” Ralph walked over to him and put his arm around his neck. "Of course you would. You just-” Before he could finish the sentence and dark explosion erupted near the flames throwing everybody away from the site and into the ground. They all looked on as Viper emerged from the fire unscathed. "No way…” TJ said. Troy and Ralph looked on getting more agitated. "He’s a higher level demon than we thought..” Troy said. "We might not be able to…handle this one.” "Behind us!” Erik yelled out trying to get his earth shield around the team but failed taking on the full brunt of Viper’s fireball that carried him to the other side of the park crashing into the side of one of the bathrooms there. Viper seemingly appeared in front of both Ralph and Troy and grabbed both of them. Troy examined his body and noticed the cuts while still a wound had already healed meaning he didn’t hurt him enough. Viper slammed Ralph into the ground tossing Zen into the air when he did and using Troy threw him at Zen. Troy head rammed into the back of Zen with such force that there was a loud crack causing Troy to fall straight to the ground and Zen to be tossed further into the park. Viper looked at Lianna and smiled who was at the time scared stiff. She began to shudder coming face to face with her first demon and one of this strength. She couldn’t find the power to draw her sword watching Viper rear back his claw while laughing. "No!!!” With a burst of speed TJ jumped in front of the swipe taking most of the damage and knocking them both to the ground. TJ began breathing heavily laying on top of Lianna with a huge claw mark on his back. Lianna only seemed to get a lightly deep cut on her arm but it hurt her enough that she couldn’t move it. The two looked at each other while TJ eventually began laughing while she still seemed to be in shock of what happened. "Hey…” TJ whispered to her. "Don’t…you worry about a thing…I’m going to make good on my promise…okay?” TJ slowly stood up and faced Viper with blood running down his back while Lianna watched. "TJ…stop…” She spoke softly. TJ started into a walk and then into a run towards Viper.
Engaging with Viper TJ swung the sword as hard as his body could manage with his wounds to no avail. At this point Viper was toying with him. Laughing and torturing him, never outright killing him with his attacks even though he could. TJ continued to fight though being punched back, knocked down, thrown into trees, slammed into the ground and even suffered another cut to the face. He rose his sword high above his head to come down with a vertical strike but Viper countered by stepping on him and slamming him to the ground with his foot. Viper laughed as he began to crush and ridicule TJ who grabbed his foot with both hands and tried to move it. "I wanted to enjoy killing you! I’ve had enough fun for today though. I think I’ll…rip out your throat and keep it as a trophy” Viper rose his claw above TJ head while most everyone who was incapacitated looked on. Viper came down but was struck at the hand just as he put his claw down. He looked at his hand and saw a holy dagger jammed right in it. The dagger produced a deep cut that bleed profusely and kept burning with intense pain. "Argggggghhhhh!” Viper stepped off TJ and held his hand desperately trying to get the dagger out but it burned just for him to touch it. TJ’s vision began to fade while looking at Viper. He looked up above and saw two people walking onto the battlefield. One male, one female. The female stopped where he was and kneeled down and closed his eyes and whispered to him in a sweet voice that was soothing. "It’s okay…rest for now…when you wake up all of this will be over.”
The male walked up to Viper and began taunting him taking off his black coat revealing a blue combat outfit filled with various blessed weapons. "I thought you might be here Viper. Guess my brother has a lot to learn. Demons are no laughing matter…and he hasn’t pulled out the true potential of that sword yet. Otherwise, he alone could have strike you down.” Viper turned around and growled angrily. "You!!! I should have killed you when you refused the Chosen title! You wasted my time, all that training…everything I taught you! For nothing! Damn you Cory…you gave it all up! Why!?” Viper’s hand where the dagger was fell off now nothing more than a rotten piece of meat and his arm bleeding still profusely. "I’ll be honest. I knew of what I could do. But just like Granas…I too knew of what TJ could do. While me and our sister had blessed powers and magical capabilities…TJ was perfect.” Viper gritted his teeth. "No…you can’t be serious…”. Cory drew the cross from his belt and held it up to the sky letting it glow brightly. "Yes. Exactly how Granas was, he is like an exact copy. This is why. This is why I let him take the title. Because it’s rightfully his…and not mine.” Cory clipped the cross which is now in the shape of a sphere that glows white into his whip and drew that. The whip began spinning violently around him in a circular motion almost like a barrier. "You little traitor…you will have your death…this won’t be the last time I assure you.” "Cory smirked at Viper. "I’m sure it won’t be…step-father” He rushed at Viper so fast that it appeared there was a skip in the reality they were in because of the distortion effect in the path he moved. Before Viper could turn around he burst into holy flames, screaming as he began to fry. His flesh began to fall of his bones, falling into the ground as ashes that the wind began to scatter. Within 10 minutes, Viper was no more than a pile of black bones laying on the ground that Cory walked over too. He stepped on the skull and shattered it into ashes continuing to walk over to his brother. "How is everyone Marianna?” The whip stopped spinning and moved it self back into his hip pocket as he stopped beside her who was still knelt down beside TJ. "Nothing too bad, though Troy and TJ suffered worse damage. They need to be in immediate treatment now. I only stabilized them as this is no place for me to begin healing. You don’t want us to be noticed right?” She asked Cory. Lianna crawled over to TJ and placed her hand on TJ’s face. "We can…take him to my home…It’s big enough to accommodate them all.” Lianna looked at her and then back at Cory. "We don’t have much of a choice.” Cory sighed. "Yeah, we’ll do that then, and stick around for just a bit. They’re playing hard ball now. Looks like their sending out the stops.” Cory said. Lianna looked at him and Marianna looked back at TJ. "If this is the case…we’ll be here more often than not then…if they cannot handle the battles.” Cory looked to the east and sighed again. "Someone else will be arriving here soon…very soon.”
