Chapter 145: Armad’s Miyura

The Armad that stood before Uznu wasn't the old Armad that got trapped in Kuyurussa'ayi's pocket dimension. The transformation was remarkable.

This new Armad looked surer and more confident of himself.

And the miyura was also new. The mark shone brightly on his forehead in complete contrast to a few hours ago when his forehead was bare.

Deafening silence descended on the battlefield.

Meanwhile, a staring contest took place on the other side of the battlefield between the two sides of the war. Bihanzin was having it worst: half his men had defected to Deniz's side.

"The Strong rules the world. Everything belongs to the strong. Take it if you can," Deniz had said to him, tauntingly.

His thought was in a dither. Sure, his plan was still working and approaching completion, but it was not as it should: he hadn't envisioned the appearance of Deniz Ururu who had been imprisoned for treason.

The crown prince must have released Deniz Ururu from prison for this purpose. He must have somehow found out about the secret alliance between Deniz Iluru and him. And that was why he released Deniz Ururu, the one person that could call King Deniz Iluru to order.

Bihanzin sighed. He swept his gaze over his soldiers and quickly assessed the situation. Many of his men had fallen. Could his Sword be enough?

Armad was also studying things on his part. His soul had returned. But what baffled him was how it happened or better yet, who made it possible? He was certain someone had helped him in that aspect. But who? Bihanzin? Nusi? Hidaya? His grandfather Zaikid?

After becoming whole again, the soul fragment that was lost several years ago had transferred everything it went through while away (some of them no different from what Armad underwent) to him. What Suwainah did to his soul fragment only served to infuriate him further. He helped her but she betrayed him and threw him to the wolves. He was meant to rot inside the Black Stone. It was an inescapable prison. He could remember it being dark and silent at the beginning. Then the Dordor came and everything changed. He had to fight for his life every day.

Now that he remembered it, the world inside the Black Stone had the same Dordor as the pocket dimension Uznu used to imprison him. The creatures looked the same. Their replication ability was the same. A normal Dordor shouldn't have that ability. Dordor could either be sentient and live with humans or demonic and eat humans. A Dordor couldn't be both. But those creatures seemed to have to be both sentient and demonic.

Suddenly, Armad found himself thinking about the SECRET that could destroy the world. The words he heard from the mysterious 'essence board' when he first met Nostalgia and her siblings.

Armad glanced at Bihanzin. Why did he keep the information secret? Armad didn't tell anyone about it for many reasons. But it had always stuck in his mind. He felt uneasy just by thinking about it. What would the fate of the world be if others were to find out? Terrible. It would be worse than terrible. Probably that was why Bihanzin was keeping it a secret. But it couldn't stay a secret forever.

So many things had happened which Armad felt were related to this 'secret' left behind by Amraikugyu. If they survived the war, Armad would seek answers from Bihanzin.

Thinking about it now, the war had started, in part, because of Uznu. If Uznu didn't interfere with the jinzidal tournament, everything wouldn't have become this bad. If Uznu didn't torture and sell Armad as a slave, Nostalgia wouldn't have to save him and become a 'criminal'. Although Nostalgia had refused to go with their false story to blame everything on the slaves and Armad, the truth was the jinzidal Kings had waited long for this. They had been looking for an opportunity to deal with Bihanzin.

Armad felt a surge of hatred toward Uznu, the root of it all. He sold him as a slave and, as a result, set everything in motion. And then the man made it worse by kidnapping Nostalgia from Jekis.

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Armad's temper rose to its peak. He used pol sense to find his storage ring. It turned out to be close to him right now.

Armad turned in the direction of the ring and found his comrades running towards him. Ilias, Spoon, Inara, and the ten anti-slavery crusaders that received his lightning from Nostalgia. It was a warm sight for Armad to see everyone alive.

There was no time to exchange pleasantries. Ilias reached his finger to remove the ring and give it to Armad, but he felt a sudden surge of electricity as he touched it. There was a burst of light around the ring and then a small portal opened above it.

Nostalgia jumped from the portal. Her new robe had two swords strapped to its back.

Armad gave her a sidelong look. The two swords especially attracted his attention. But he wouldn't be fooled. There was no way he was letting her fight against Uznu. Her mind tricks would most likely not work on him and she was far weaker than Kiru when it came to sword Bending.

Nostalgia pouted and gave him an appraising look of her own before walking ahead.

"I will take over, relax," she said.

While the two young couples exchanged words, the portal above the ring was closing. Hidaya transformed into a white streak of light and shot into the ring dimension. Another split second later and she returned to her throne with her mother in her arms. This happened unnoticed by anyone except Bihanzin, who had just realized about the woman's arrival on the battlefield.

Bihanzin regarded her for a short moment before he looked away and focused on Daljari. He dare not consider her as an ally yet.

"What are you doing?" Armad asked Nostalgia who was trying to walk into the battle. "Go and rest some more, this is no place for pretty people."

She turned and stared at him for some time before replying, "So, what are you doing here?"

He couldn't find a reply to that.

It took an effort and some arguing before Nostalgia agreed to stay behind while he fought, but not any farther.

Up until now, Hidaya had had a detached attitude toward everyone on the battlefield except for her brother. But right now, she was observing Nostalgia with knitted brows, a gleam in her eyes.

***

From the time he lost his miyura, Armad had felt incomplete, but, today, he felt whole again. With his miyura, years of pol could be increased effortlessly and without limit. He once increased his pol from 51 years to 104 years while fighting the guardian – Han'Diyuza. At that time, 104 years was the limit of his body. But now he was different: he was lightning. A few hundred years wouldn't even make him sweat. Even he didn't know the number of years he could channel from his miyura before he reached his limit.

All he wished, for now, was to make Uznu pay for his various atrocities.

He lunged.

<Lightning overcharge activated>

The Miyura glowed as lightning covered his entire body. His years of pol increased as the mark became brighter.

Armad didn't necessarily need the lightning overcharge to expand his core. After all, with the death of his djinn, his core was already so big. But Armad didn't want to take any chances. He would use everything he had from the very beginning.

1,100 years, 1,200 years, 1,300, 1,400…

It reached 2,400 in seconds. Armad clapped his hands and the sky darkened.

"Lightning Arm!" He intoned.

A great mound of thunder appeared in the sky and made its way downwards. Countless others followed. All of them came together into a gigantic lightning fist.

Still unsatisfied, Armad clapped his hands again.

"Wilberforce!" He said.

His eyeballs turned brownish. The color of the Wilberforce Tribe. Brown spots appeared on the descending lightning fist as he eyed it.

"Rein!" He intoned again.

While the Ururu could see into the future with their eyes, the Wilberforce had the Rein.

When the lightning fist was almost to the earth, the brown lines covering it compressed it. It was reduced to a smaller size.

"Thunder!" Armad said. He was yet unsatisfied.

In response, rain of lightning began to pour down into the lightning fist hanging in the air, gradually making it black. It was even darker than Uznu's eyes.

He pointed at Uznu, and the ball went straight for him.

"Order of Sammai. Negrinki!" Uznu didn't try to avoid it but started chanting some incantations. His hands went to his chest, producing a reddish smoke as soon as his palm touched his skin. The smoke quickly transformed into a smoky tomahawk. A giant, smoky tomahawk.

Uznu could have used his eyes to see the future using Miss and know where the attack was aimed, but that would have been a disaster for him. Rein was unstoppable unless it connected with its target. It worked just like a remotely controlled weapon. During the war of the commandments, the Wilberforce commanders had struggled with Miss. After losing several cities to the Ururu, they realized they could just use their miyura to mark a person's pol and make their attacks unstoppable. A marked attack couldn't just be dodged by seeing the future. It would respond to your actions and follow you.

Armad's attack might look sinister, but it was a tier below Uznu's. So the man decided to take it head-on.

The lightning fist collided with the smoky tomahawk.