[Amidst the battlefield]

  Shortly before Darganth assumed his true form, Jennia and Alire arrived to support Alicia.

  Making their entrance by unching a concentrated assault against a high order member who had the unfortunate position of being the one to attack Alicia in the wrong moment, they caught not just him and his colleagues by surprise, but also Alicia.

  As the mix of light and darkness spells impacted the man's body, it brought enough of a shock with it to bring the fight to a momentary stop. For a moment after, everybody present waited with bated breath for the storm of energy to subside.

  When it did, a few audible gulps could be heard from the high order's side. Not only did one of their own die, but the attack was strong enough that it fully destroyed his body.

  This was quite a danger for them, as their phoenix fmes could only heal if anything was left. Considering that the main threat to their life they previously had to deal with, apart from the complete destruction of either heart or brain, was cking the mana necessary to regenerate, this was unsettling for them.

  Just as Jennia and Alire wanted to take advantage of this reaction, a ray of fmes shot at them and forced them to dodge.

  “I'll take care of them, meanwhile you all have to keep the abomination busy.” Isaiah shouted.

  His words brought the other high order members back to their senses. And when they resumed their attacks on Alicia a moment ter, Isaiah dashed towards Jennia and Alire.

  Amused by the boldness of doing so, the two let him approach unobstructed. As soon as he reduced the distance between them by about half, Isaiah shouted in fury and unched a burst of fmes at Alire.

  “Traitor, you'll be the first to pay!” He cursed at her.

  Moving fast enough to appear as little more than a blurry wall of light that moved out of the fme's path, Alire dodged them before coming to a stop with a slight frown.

  Without pause, Isaiah turned to her again and continued attacking. Firing multiple bolts of fmes at her, he rushed closer and simultaneously became covered in raging fmes.

  “You beastmen were always unruly, but siding with a monster? That's too far.” He shouted in fury.

  Dodging again, Alire reappeared with a confused expression.

  “You really think she's a monster, don't you?” She asked.

  Seeing him not answering, she said a moment ter, “Well, it doesn’t matter, I'm not going to let you continue to insult my sister-in-w.”

  With those words, Alire slowly rose from the ground as her aura avatar formed around her. Looking at Jennia and wordlessly telling her that she got this, Alire unsheathed her sword.

  “Don't forget to leave him for Alicia.” Jennia reminded her before walking over to the remaining high order members.

  Seeing this, Isaiah moved to intercept her but was quickly blocked by Alire. Forced to jump back to dodge the ssh of aura, he didn't have the time to get away before she reached him.

  Swinging the aura avatar's sword, she went completely on the offensive and slowly pushed him back. In return, Isaiah started unching waves and beams of fire at her from the moment her first strike finished, though these were having trouble dealing serious damage to the avatar.

  Jennia was meanwhile reaching the fight between Alicia and the high order, tipping the previously even fight in the two's favor as soon as she joined.

  Quickly noticing this, Alicia suddenly started attacking even more ferociously. Ignoring the dozens of burn marks and areas where explosions had knocked her scales loose, she jumped at the nearest enemy and brought down her cws on him.

  The sudden shift caused the others to fall into disarray as some scattered away from Jennia and some away from Alicia.

  “Stop!” “Stick together!” Despite two of the seats attempting to regain control of the situation, it quickly devolved further.

  Not only that, but their actions also exposed them to Alicia's attention. Recognizing them, she grinned viciously and unched herself at them.

  With a roar, her dragon's breath shot out and smmed into one of the two, catapulting him hundreds of meters into the distance.

  Reacting quickly to this, the other one spun around to face Alicia. Sending out a wave of fmes at her approaching form, she formed two phoenix wings behind his back and flew up.

  A moment ter Alicia broke through the fmes as she jumped out of them, much to the seat's shock. Initially attempting to outrun her in the air, the woman quickly realized the futility of this as Alicia closed the gap by a noticeable amount in only a few seconds.

  Spinning around and letting her fmes explode outwards, she quickly became protected by a phoenix made out of fmes. And without hesitation, she controlled it to plunge straight at Alicia before the tter could react to this.

  Barely being able to bring her arms in front of her, Alicia was still knocked back by the impact. Catching her descent after just a second, she looked up to see the phoenix approaching again.

  Dipping below it as it tried to smash into her for a second time, she shot higher with a strong beat of her wings while turning around at the same time. Before the woman could control the construct to change directions, Alicia struck it square in the back with her dragon's breath.

  The spherical bolt of gravitational energy that she shot tore through the construct's center, leaving not just a hole in its path but also catching rge parts of the fmes in its gravitational pull. This caused parts of the phoenix's form to trail after it, ripping off even more parts of the construct.

  Amidst the hole this created, Alicia saw the female seat that had conjured this avatar. Panting heavily, she clutched her abdomen with a pained expression while being noticeably surprised by the development.

  Hesitating for a moment as she was confused as to why she felt pain despite not having been struck directly, Alicia was just about to dive down and finish her when an explosion beneath her left wing brought her out of bance.

  Reacting quickly by activating her personal shield, she saw three more attacks flying past her just a moment ter.

  Turning around, she found the seat she had previously hit with her breath attack running towards her enraged and firing spears made of red energy at her.

  Taking a gnce at the woman whose phoenix avatar was slowly dissolving around her despite her best efforts, Alicia ignored her and dove towards the other seat.

  As she came closer, his attacks also became more dangerous, with her shield's diversion of their trajectory getting weaker and weaker. Soon the first was well enough aimed to still gnce off of her, with the small contact being enough to cause the spear to explode and knock her a meter or two to the side.

  Recognizing this as a warning, Alicia changed her approach and no longer simply endured the attacks. With a swing of her cws, she sent four sshes ahead of her and at the seat.

  Reacting as soon as they formed, said seat quickly let go of the attacks he was currently forming and instead propelled himself away from their path. Flying back by expelling concentrated explosions from his hands and feet, he spun wildly as he was catapulted to momentary safety.

  Using the opportunity, Alicia waited for the perfect moment before suddenly increasing the gravity in the area around the man by a considerable factor. Having formed the spell a few meters underground where her opponent's control shield didn't extend to, Alicia's spell activated fast enough that he had no chance to react.

  Plummeting to the ground head first, the man only managed to bring up his arms to protect his head before impacting the ground.

  Forcing himself up with shaky steps, he could barely make out Alicia's approaching form due to his blurry vision. Nonetheless attempting to focus, he pushed down his fear and tried to conjure a fire shield around him before she arrived.

  But despite his efforts, when Alicia arrived just two seconds ter he was protected by only a few localized patches of fire. Easily tearing through this patchy sphere, her cw also tore through the seat's body.

  Looking down at his dead body, Alicia smiled as she felt the satisfaction of just partial payback.

  But despite his, she couldn't help but wonder again whether she had made the right choice. Dwelling on the matter for a few seconds, she was ripped out of her musings when Darganth's roar echoed across the battlefield.

  Spinning around, her eyes widened as she saw him diving after Lucius in his true form.

  Realizing that she spaced out and reminded herself of why she was doing this, Alicia rushed back to the main part of the battle.

  While flying there, she spotted the female seat she had previously weakened slowly dragging herself there too. Taking a slight detour and nding right behind her, she caused the woman to tense up.

  To her surprise, this wasn't followed by an attack as she instead sighed in resignation.

  “Just do it.” She said after a moment.

  Steeling herself for what she thought would follow, the woman was confused when Alicia didn't attack her. Turning around, she took a step back in surprise when she came face to face with Alicia in her human form.

  “Why didn't you attack me?” Alicia asked.

  Furrowing her brows at the question, the woman took a moment before answering, “Why would I, it's not like I have a chance anymore. Well, I never had, but you've wounded my bloodline manifestation, so it's even worse.”

  “But don't you teach to fight to the st against monsters? And you certainly believe me to be one.” Alicia asked.

  Grimacing insulted at Alicia's words, the woman needed a moment to realize that Alicia thought her words to be true.

  “Don't think that just because others believe Isaiah's lies, I do so too.” She said, “Still, I am deserving of your wrath just like the rest and I know it, so don't feel bad for me.”

  Intrigued by this reaction, Alicia thought for a moment before simply walking past the woman.

  “Don't dare to do something funny. If you don't then we'll continue talking ter and you'll at least get to survive.” Alicia warned before returning to her true form and dashing away to aid Jennia.

  The female seat she had talked with was left stunned by this and just stared after her for a few seconds. For a while, she wondered whether this was some sort of trap or something else, though when she saw Alicia rejoining the fight and simply tanking another bloodline sorcerer's attack, she realized that she was no longer seen as a threat. And considering that the beast even Isaiah's attacks could do were to knock a few scales loose, she could see where this came from.

  With that realization also came the relief that maybe she would truly survive this ordeal. Smiling softly at the possibility, she sighed as the adrenalin of the fight left her before colpsing from exhaustion shortly after.