Chapter 1327: The Sky Became Her Arena

The still-circling Cindara was caught head-on by Seraphina and Ataneya.

Seraphina pressed down from above, pinning her.

Ataneya’s fox tails wrapped wings and limbs, then whipped Cindara into the wall.

BOOM!

Stone exploded.

They didn’t stop.

A slam.

A bind.

Another wall impact.

They used almost every trick they had—grappling, wrapping, shoulder-checking, smashing her into rock again and again.

But Cindara never truly counterattacked with her body.

She folded her wings in front of herself, wrapping her entire form tight, curling into a compact ball—like some unfinished evolutionary stage.

No one could tell what she was doing inside.

Phoenix Queen Ignara took the opening to carry Ethan up above Cindara.

Ethan watched for a moment, judged the timing, then jumped from Ignara’s back.

Seraphina saw him dropping and adjusted her claw.

She slapped the round, curled-up Cindara straight into the wall, embedding her between layers of stone so she couldn’t keep rolling.

That was the opening Ethan had been waiting for.

He grabbed a jutting rock spur and slid down the cliff face fast, landing beside Cindara.

Energy spheres formed in his palm one after another.

The first carried Kaelira’s violent purple-red power.

The second was Catheryn’s darkness.

The last was Ethan’s own white lightning.

He drove them into Cindara in sequence.

A series of muffled booms rolled inside the wall.

Purple-red energy wrecked the outer structure. Darkness spread deeper. White lightning used the chaos the first two created, slipping farther in and continuing to invade.

What Ethan wanted was simple:

Let Cindara keep being "in pain and happy."

Every surge of energy entering her was both the nourishment she craved and the best possible cover for Ethan to sabotage her internal structure.

All around them, the fire pillars suddenly swelled again.

The number of fireballs spiked with them.

The mechanical bodies Ethan had seized control of were hit one after another. Their armor burned out, and they dropped—one after another—into the abyss.

Alarm flared in Ethan’s chest.

Too late.

Cindara, still embedded in the wall, contracted sharply.

Dragon body, wings, and armor all compressed together—then snapped back into human form.

Power erupted in her palm.

Ethan thought she was about to blast him point-blank.

Instead, Cindara ignored the target right in front of her.

Her back leg kicked against the wall.

BAM!

The entire stone layer spiderwebbed with cracks.

Using the rebound force, Cindara shot out of the wall.

Ethan turned toward her, the next energy sphere not even fully pushed into his body yet—

And Cindara reached out and simply took it from his hand.

Her other hand clamped around his throat.

Ethan was lifted into the air.

He grabbed her wrist and struggled, but her strength now was nothing like before. No matter how he strained, that hand didn’t budge.

Seraphina surged up from below.

Ataneya appeared above.

One high, one low—closing on Cindara at the same time.

Cindara flicked her eyes over them, calm and dismissive.

The hand at Ethan’s throat tightened again.

Then, slowly, she lowered her stance.

Seraphina exploded upward first.

A sonic crack popped beneath her dragon body as raw force launched her at Cindara. Her claw deliberately avoided Ethan’s trapped body, reaching in from the side with careful precision.

Ataneya came down at the same time.

She threw an infernal sphere from above, and her twenty-four tails followed, sealing off any upward escape route.

Cindara looked around.

The abyss was crowded with the fire pillars and fireballs she’d created.

She sighed, almost bored.

"Still too cramped."

Cindara walked toward the wall.

Mechanical wings unfolded behind her.

She was about to leave—

When Seraphina and Ataneya’s attacks landed in succession.

A dragon claw struck from below.

Fox tails and infernal power pressed from above.

The harassment turned relentless. Even berserk Cindara started to strain under it.

The grip on Ethan’s throat loosened.

His body slid downward.

And that was when Cindara finally snapped.

A wave of energy burst outward from her body.

A visible shock rolled across the abyss. Everywhere it passed, external powers were shattered.

Infernal energy dispersed.

Frozen fireballs cracked apart.

Even Cindara’s own small fire pillars were extinguished in the ripple.

The abyss fell back into darkness.

Pitch-black. Hand-in-front-of-your-face black.

In the dark, Cindara appeared beside Ethan as he fell.

She caught his arm, twisted her waist back, and hurled him upward with all her strength.

"Let’s change venues!" her voice echoed off the stone again and again.

"This place is still too small!"

Ethan was launched toward the top.

His body slammed into the stone ceiling of the abyss. A white shield snapped over him instantly, protecting him as he tore through rock. Stone detonated along his path in a chained series of blasts.

Cindara followed right behind.

Her wings beat with infuriating ease, always staying just beneath him.

Below, everyone looked up.

In the darkness overhead, a line of light kept stretching—growing longer and longer.

Seraphina and Ataneya, bodies still heavy from the shock, forced themselves to look.

And they realized it was a tunnel.

A passage Ethan had smashed open by force.

Ethan kept rising.

Breaking stone.

Punching through layers of earth.

Until he burst through the rainforest floor and shot into open sky.

The tunnel was just wide enough for the others to follow one by one.

But Ethan didn’t get freedom.

Cindara caught up from behind and grabbed his body.

The moment she left the underground and entered the air above the rainforest, the sky’s color changed with her.

No sunlight.

Only fire-red light reflected in everyone’s eyes.

Pillars of flame rose around the rainforest in a ring, linking into a massive circular territory. Countless small fireballs drifted within the domain, slowly filling in every possible escape line.

As Ethan broke from underground into the sky, the energy at his chest finally finished condensing.

Cindara looked over the flame territory she’d created, pleased.

Then she raised her fist and punched Ethan straight down toward the ground.

BAM!

Her knuckles crashed into his chest.

The hit actually helped him—forcing the energy sphere at his chest into full contact with his body.

Midair, Ethan’s form began to break apart.

Black particles scattered.

Ethan vanished from Cindara’s sight.

The others followed through the tunnel and surfaced into the rainforest as well.

The moment they arrived, they saw flame pillars everywhere and dense drifting fireballs—but no Ethan.

In reality, Ethan was standing right beside them.

His black particle state hid his body.

He paused near Feylora and quietly siphoned in the healing energy she was releasing.

Feylora sensed him and was about to tell everyone—

But nobody asked. They just charged straight at Cindara in the sky.

Ethan watched the group disappear into the firelit air and went silent for a beat.

Good thing Elira was still here.

He muttered under his breath, half annoyed, half incredulous.

"Don’t tell me they think I already ran off."