Book 3: Chapter 8 (2/9)

Thinking so, Brandis headed for the portal attempted to go back to Toria Continents. However, Lazela had long predicted Brandis could be cowardly making an escape after hearing she created powerful Saint-tier Wind Magic spells instead of trying to fight and capture her alive. She placed two clones that guarded the portal preventing him from escaping. The two clones repeatedly casted [Wind Strike] spells, forced Brandis to halt his movement preventing him from being able to reach closer to the portal.

Brandis bragged about how powerful he was to Lazela about that he could come and go to any nation without worrying about being killed. While it was true to some degree, but not entirely true in certain cases. If it was Kain who attacked Brandis today, he would have been killed by Kain in less than ten minutes without Kain even using his Devil Form.

Brandis repeatedly dodged all of Lazela’s clones’ attacks. Seeing there was no other way out, Brandis decided to fight back. He strongly jumped up high, rolled in mid-air, and delivered a powerful blow onto one of Lazela's clones using the huge blade that he was carrying and broke through her [Wind Blades] spell.

“This is my chance!” Brandis happily thought to himself as he attempted to swing another powerful blow using his huge blade onto that clone but it vanished before his blade could touch it.

Lazela was wounded by Brandis's powerful blade swing attack, but it didn’t break her focus of chanting for the self-created Saint-tier Wind Magic spell she was chanting. Lazela also dispelled that [Replica] on time to destroy that clone before it was killed by Brandis. If one of her clones dies, the same effect will be placed on Lazela which means she will be dead as well.

Brandis didn’t stand idly allowing Lazela to finish chanting, he rolled toward another clone and attempted to attack using the same tactic. Lazela and her clones wanted to cast [Wind Walk] spells to fly up to avoid Brandis’s attacks, but doing so would allow him to escape back to Toria Continents through the portal then her goal of stealing the Magical Portal Key from him would fail. That was why Lazela made her clones repeatedly attacked Brandis using [Wind Strike] spells while she continued to focus on chanting for her Saint-tier spell.

Three minutes later, Brandis failed to kill any clone but managed to cause many wounds on Lazela. Even so, those wounds were nowhere near enough to kill a mighty level 100 Wind Walker creature such as Lazela. On the other hand, Lazela had finished chanting for the Saint-tier Wind Magic spell she had created. Lazela didn't want to waste any more time with Brandis, she casted [Wind Immersion] and transformed herself into a Wind Elemental Monster. While the monster was still having Lazela’s head, its arms and legs became small whirlwinds instead. Brandis didn’t see anything strong about that Wind Elemental Monster at first until he received one punch delivered by it. The punch wasn’t strong, but it contained powerful Wind Magic that blew Brandis at least fifty feet away. Before Brandis could land on the ground, the Wind Elemental Monster appeared behind him and delivered a strong right leg kick, and blew his body up two hundred feet into the sky.

Despite wearing armor chanted in magic to increase his Magical Resistance rate, Brandis felt like some bones of his body were broken to pieces after receiving a punch and a kick from the Wind Elemental Monster. Despite that, Brandis wasn’t someone who could have died that easily. While still in mid-air, Brandis gained the balance and carefully looked for Lazela as he was starting to fall back down toward the ground.

“Her moving speed earlier was incredible. I felt like she appeared behind me in an instant just like [Teleportation] spells of Thunder Mages. Is she going to appear behind me and attack again using the same trick?” Asking himself that question, Brandis didn’t think anything else as he turned around and swung his huge blade regardless if Lazela was behind him or not.

Brandis wasn’t wrong making that kind of decision as Lazela appeared behind him again with the intent to deliver a powerful elbow attack, and blew him down toward the ground believing it would be enough to knock out Brandis. Lazela didn’t expect Brandis to still have enough consciousness to deliver a surprise attack against her like that, but it didn’t matter anyway. Brandis’s huge blade went through Lazela’s Wind Elemental Monster body while her powerful elbow successfully landed on Brandis’s chin and blew him down toward the ground.

The totally defeated Brandis Hayward was laying on the ground heavily injured but was still conscious. He looked at the Wind Elemental Monster that slowly transformed back into Lazela and begged, “Please spare me. Please don’t kill me. I begged you.”

Lazela wasn’t surprised to hear Brandis begged for her to spare him, but she was surprised because his tone sounded very normal. It didn't sound like someone who was heavily injured. Lazela raised her guard while she and her clones began chanting for [Sonic Boom] spells again but quickly stopped after seeing Brandis finally lost consciousness. Lazela carefully checked Brandis's body and happily found the Magical Portal Key hidden on him. Lazela quickly took the key, dragged the heavily injured Brandis, and threw him back into the portal. Lazela immediately closed the portal after that using the Magical Portal Key she had just confiscated from Brandis.

Lazela cheerfully whispered to herself, “I was afraid that the Pope may have opened the portal for him and didn’t give him the Magical Portal Key. So glad that my effort didn’t go to waste.”

Lazela had no intention of killing Brandis. Killing him would cause her much more problems in the future since the Mages Council can open another portal connected to the realm of Wind Walkers to hunt her down. Injured Brandis and seized the Magical Portal Key from him on the other hand wouldn’t cause any problem. Brandis was the one that opened the portal and walked into the realm of Wind Walkers voluntarily. No one forced him to it. If anyone was to blame, it would be Brandis for his failure of protecting the key.