Way of the Knights

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Raven turned to Alwina - the Sect Master's arm and asked: "You have the severed arm with you right? Give it here, let me see it." 

His words shocked the listeners, most specially Alwina and the Sect Master. 

"How the hell did you-"

"Temporal Scrying, can see up to nearly year from the past. Hurry, let me see it!" Raven impatiently interrupted Alwina before she could even finish her words. 

Normally, Alwina would've said something about the rude tone of Raven but since she could feel the urgency of the situation, she just took out the severed arm of the Sect Master carefully from where she stored it. 

The severed arm was placed in a rectangular case, surrounded by numerous seals that prevented anything from contaminating it. With one flick of a brush, Raven deactivated the runes which caused Alwina's eyes to widen since he did it with so much ease. 

Raven was oblivious to what she was thinking and even if he isn't, now's not the time to address that. He carefully opened the case to see the current state of the severed arm. 

What he saw caused his expression to become really ugly. 

The arm doesn't even resemble an arm anymore, it's like a carcass of something serpentine. It was awfully mutated and was pulsing with black goo as if it was alive. It looked like an oversized, fat, hideous worm. Even the Sect Master felt a bit disgusted to see what his previous arm looked like now. 

"Gross. But I can work with this." Raven commented softly, earning a few eye brow raise from those who heard him. 

Raven didn't elaborate on this anymore. Instead, he lifted the Brush of Wisdom and began drawing numerous runes in the air. Instantly, the surrounding area was illuminated by a sea of gold and silver light. 

Raven stood up and pointed the brush towards the Sect Master, more specifically on the place where his arm was missing. 

Multiple runes shot towards the corrupted flesh, releasing intense gold and silver brilliance. The Sect Master felt a stinging sensation on his arm, he could also smell his flesh burning. Nevertheless, not a single grunt of pain was heard from him. He also didn't ask what Raven was doing since he knew that whatever it is, it's for his own good. 

After directing some runes towards the corrupted flesh on the Sect Master's body, Raven redirected his attention to the severed arm and wore a somber expression. 

He raised the Brush of Wisdom once more and began drawing runes which were ever stronger and released a brighter gold and silver radiance. 

Everyone was in awe of Raven's work, none of them even think that because the runes were releasing so much brilliance, the illumination on Storm Dweller's peak could be seen by the roaming disciples below, alarming them ever so slightly. 

Raven remained focus on his task though. Once the runes he needed were formed, he immediately sent them working on the severed arm. 

Black wisps of smoke, leaving traces of agonized faces before dissipating, could be seen coming off of the severed arm. Nevertheless, the runes created by Raven were relentless, it didn't matter whether the severed arm was alive or not, if it was capable of depending or nor, or whether it has the concentrated Will of the Devil Emperor or not, the runes of Raven didn't falter and grilled all the nasty stuff away. 

"This will take some time before it returns to it's original appearance." Raven stood up and said, "Once that happens, reconnecting the severed arm should be simple. Now, did our prisoner raised a ruckus once more?"

A sigh of defeat escaped the Sect Master's face before smiling wryly and replying to him: "Thank goodness your extremely capable. And yes, our prisoner raised a ruckus once more."

"What happened this time?" Raven assisted the Sect Master on sitting down as the runes continued working their magic. 

"I'm not exactly sure what, I could only venture a guess." Sect Master replied, "It probably heard about our little plan to launch a decisive strike and decided to weaken our forces pre-emptively."

"It attacked the same way as last time." Alwina continued the story, "It sent two of it's finger this time around, at this exact place too." 

Raven's face turned incredibly unsightly upon hearing that. Two fingers this time? Dealing with one finger is already difficult enough, yet it sent two? Raven didn't consider that as a pre-emptive attack anymore, the Devil Emperor was clearly trying to kill the Sect Master.

"It took everything in my power to stop it." The Sect Master replied, "Thankfully I made some recent breakthrough and raised my strength. I had to sacrifice an arm but in the end of it all, I still managed to repel the attack."

"However, as you can see..." Alwina glanced at the severed arm and sighed lightly, "Had we been late on severing that infected arm, my husband would've been the Devil Emperor's puppet already."

Raven and the War Gods felt really frustrated about this situation. Thankfully, they returned now and Raven could even flush out the infection and re-connect the severed arm. Had they been late for even one more day, they couldn't even imagine what could've happened. 

'Really, had we not arrive today, then Senior Brother would've been in a more delicate state. The 'Will' of that damned prisoner is extremely strong. Even though the arm was severed, some of the corruption remained on the severed stump that are still connected to his body. Give it time and that corruption will spread until it reaches the point where it could influence Senior Brother's mind. That would've been the worst case scenario.'

"I'm guessing Elder Flame is currently working overtime to monitor the damned Prisoner." Raven commented, earning a nod from the Sect Master. 

"Elder Flame had increased the security, and it's taking all he got to confine the Devil Emperor, the other 'Keepers' were also working with him so that this incident doesn't occur again. I would've asked for Elder Flame's help to cure the corruption but it's too risky." The Sect Master replied. 

"...and the Cleansing Flames we left on the Chapels are nowhere near strong enough to suppress the spread of corruption. So you decided to sever the arm instead and leave the rest up to fate." Raven completed the Sect Master's statement. "That was lame. You easily gave up just like that? I'll have you know that if your 'Will' was that weak then the Devil Emperor will really make you it's puppet."

"I know. I know. That's my bad." The Sect Master mirthlessly smiled. "I got a little complacent since I know there's someone who's even more capable that I am that will inherit my place."

"Thanks for the compliment but it is way too early for me to replace you." Raven snorted. "Don't go thinking that you can escape your responsibilities that easy. I'll have you know that even if you turn into a mindless puppet, I can pull you back to reality and make you sit on the damn throne once more. So don't go thinking that you can escape that easily." 

"Geez, you are ruthless you know?" The Sect Master smiled wryly while Raven simply snorted. 

Of course their whole exchange was just to ease up the somber atmosphere around. Though, the Sect Master didn't doubt Raven's words even for a second. If Raven said he could do it, then he could. Period. 

"Anyways, we're back." Raven stated, "Give me some time and I'll think of a way to prevent that damn Prisoner from making too much ruckus. I'll also solve the unrest of the disciples since they're still afraid of what they just witnessed."

"Mn!" The Sect Master nodded, smiling brightly as he said: "Having a competent Heir feels pretty cool. I could feel my burdens getting lighter." 

"I just wish that mine is as competent as yours." The Grand Elder commented from the side.

"Well, if he's not then I'll make him one." Raven replied. "If they're not willing then they can screw the hell off."

"Bwahaha! Right! We have no use for incompetent fools here!" The Grand Elder said, feeling really pleased. 

"By the way...how's your journey? What did you encounter at the Peak of Mount Olympus?" The Sect Master asked. 

"Ugh..." Raven groaned, causing the Sect Master to feel puzzled and the War Gods to smile wryly. 

Henry took initiative to speak: "The journey was arduous. The climate is incredibly unforgiving and switches without any warnings. The trials were just as hard if not harder. We're really lucky to have Raven accompanying us. Without him, we for sure wouldn't be able to go very far due to our horrible luck."

"Yeah. He supported us all the way and quite practically carried us all the way to the top." Theo stated. 

"It's thanks to him that we remained in our peak conditions all the time to clear the trials. The ever-changing and unforgiving climate was rendered completely useless by him." Charles added.

"It's because he's there that we reached the top and got a lot stronger compared before." Logan stated. 

"Is that so?" The Sect Master raised a brow and looked at his heir, "Then why are you so grumpy about it?"

"Because I was conned!"

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