Chapter 257: 257. Reward.
"Every time, you have always taken from me. Every time, you have stolen from me, why? Why?!!" He screamed and the sky rumbled, his blue eyes slowly began to be corrupted with black. The lines of his veins on his skin were turning black.
He was going to use dark magic... As they had expected.
"Today I shall destroy you forever, so that you can never take what is mine, ever again!!"
With the intent to destroy Barak and even Neriah, Lyle stretched out his good hand toward them both. His eyes grew darker and darker and his rage was inconcealable, he channeled his dark energy.
However, "Fool," Barak scoffed. With the swiftness of a falcon, he moved before Lyle’s dark energy could completely leave his body. With a swing of his blade, Thaddeus who stood in defense by Lyle’s side was disarmed and grounded, and the other man fell to the ground without being touched.
Quicklier than the wind, Barak positioned himself in front of Lyle.
Looking straight into his eyes, he said, "Pathetic," in the same second, he pulled a lasso from his side. Before Lyle could breathe, it was thrown over his head, fastened round his chest and his hands were tied together.
"You—" He tried to move, tried to break free. His eyes that had gone dark quickly began to revert back to their usual blue, and his dark veins were slowly fading.
Lyle’s eyes widened and his muscles stretched as he shifted and wiggled, glaring at the ropes that bound him. "What is this?!" He barked, feeling the weakness that was suddenly overwhelming him. "What—Ahh" He screamed in pain as he tried to emit his dark powers yet again only to be met by bone crushing pain on the parts of his body where the lasso wrapped.
"You basta—argh!!" He cried out in pain again, falling to his knees for the pain was unbearable.
"Careful now," Barak mocked. "That is no ordinary lasso,"
While he spoke, slowly, Thaddeus tried to reach for his sword again, but as soon as his finger touched the tip of the sword, a thick vine like swamp green sprung out of the earth, bursting through his palm.
"Argh!!!" He cried out in pain as the vine curved back down, stabbed through his ankle back into the ground, rendering him motionless and in pain.
Barak cast a glance at the one who had done this, and Neriah shrugged, showing him a proud smile.
"Now what was I saying?" Barak turned back to the groaning Lyle.
"Ah right, that lasso is one of the few divine weapons left to us by the god Narcissius. It consumes black magic and purifies it. So the more you struggle the tighter it would become, and the tighter it becomes, the more it would try to drain out every bit of dark magic in you, and the more it tries to drain you the more painful it would be for you."
With those words he turned his back to Lyle and walked to his wife.
"You—You—I will destroy you both! I will destroy everything you—" A sudden gush of wind flowed past their midst and with it came a huge trunk of wood smashing right into Lyle’s stomach, stealing whatever he was going to say from his mouth and causing him to cough out blood.
All eyes turned to her as she moved from Barak’s side with eyes wide open and a psychotic look on her face. Slowly, she hunched down until her face was close to his own.
"Lyle," his name rolled off her tongue with distaste,"you still do not seem to grasp what is going on here." A chuckle left her lips.
"The only one who is getting destroyed here is you." The smile left her face as she leaned closer and spoke again, "And Lyle, I failed to kill you once, I won’t fail again. This time, dear goddess, I will take my sweet time, and I shall make sure that the pain, the torment that you caused us, I will recompense in a hundred fold."
She straightened up to her full height, "Just you wait. I will make you beg for your life in languages you never learned."
"Take them." At those words, formerly unseen knights emerged from every corner and with a look of disbelief in his eyes, Lyle along with his men were carried away.
***
"That was easier and quicker than I expected." Barak said as they rode back in their carriage.
"Well, considering we killed off most of his men back then in fortia, his manpower weakened because security was tightened after your disappearance, so it would have been hard for him to bring in more men to Trago. Whatever was left of them were captured in the forest of the damned today." Neriah explained.
"Indeed, you are right. Yet still, the fact that he could be captured so easily because he lost some men shows what a weakling he is. It makes me feel ashamed for ever falling into the trap of such a weakling." Barak frowned.
"You would never have fallen if he hadn’t tricked you." Neriah pointed out.
True, Barak nodded.
"It’s just—"
"Enough now." She put a finger over his lips. "Do not dwell on him. Instead I should fill your mind for the whole of our journey back to the palace."
The frown clouding his features could not remain. A soft smile spread across his face as he leaned closer to her.
"From the moment I first laid eyes on you, you have always filled my mind, my dear spitfire." He leaned closer and she was made to lay back-flat on the chair.
Her hands snaked around his neck, pulling him even closer.
"Good." She blushed. "However, Do I not deserve a reward?" She asked.
"A reward?"
"Earlier, you complemented my acting, which means my performance was excellent... So, do I not get a reword for best starlet in all the land?" She asked.
"Ah, I see... And what does my darling desire?" He coaxed, "Whatever it is, you name it, it shall be yours."
"Well then, if I remember correctly, you still owe me a unicorn ride." She shrugged.
"Tomorrow night," he simply said and her smile was inconcealable.
"And one more thing,"
"Anything."
"The Lepron shield is yet to wear off, so..." She simply let her words trail off, and the grin that was pasted on his face made it clear that he understood what she was asking of him.
"You, my dear, are just so..."