The Devil's Warrior Queen
Chapter 190: Survival

Chapter 190: Survival

As the world turned pitch black against her sight, she lost consciousness as she floated in the periphery of dreams.

After what felt like an eternity of being trapped in a deep slumber, her lashes fluttered open and the first thing that came to her sight was the low ceiling with black vines intersecting over it.

Her view blurred for a second as she strained her eyes to thoroughly process her surrounding. Her head ached as she moved, the familiar burning sensation coursing through her body made the memories of how she lost consciousness come to her.

She had lost consciousness after wielding her powers. She tried to move her body, but her movements were hindered by the thick ropes coiled tightly around her body as she laid on a stone altar.

Tilting her head to both sides, she realized there was no one present in the area. Panicking, she struggled to escape from the entrapment as the dark witches were absent, which was a perfect opportunity for her to evade them.

Aware of the fact that her physical efforts were futile, she tried to invoke her unknown source of powers, but she felt utterly drained of energy, as if her power core had been depleted.

Weary gasps rolled off her lips as she wriggled her fingers desperately, trying to eject whatever was left of her depleted powers to break free from the entrapment, but she could only manage to stimulate a faint golden wisp from her fingers that faded as quickly as it was spurred.

The chilly hands of fear clutched at her heart tightly, as the grasp of her situation became apparent. Her powers had either been drained out or the universe had finally acknowledged the fact that she was not supposed to have one, either ways she was left helpless and vulnerable again, her powers had turned invalid, leaving her prone to danger.

Her chest heaved erratically as she drew dreary breaths in, while restlessly squirming with each passing second, the air felt suffocating while she tried to evoke her powers out but every failure with each trial made her feel weary as she felt the energy in her being rapidly sucked out.

She finally stopped trying to elicit her powers, shallow breaths left her lips as she relaxed limply on the stone altar, her eyes drooped heavily as she felt the weight of fatigue upon her. Aware that something didn’t feel right with her, it made her panic even more at the bizarre predicament that she was going through.

The more time she spent, the pain she felt intensified, making it seem as if a fiendish beast resided inside her, ready to rip her within out. Unable to take the unendurable pain, a strained growl escaped her lips in agony.

In her state of hysteria, she heard the sound of distant footsteps coming closer toward her. Tilting her head to the direction where the footsteps were coming from, she could make out five dark witches moving toward her despite her heavily drooping eyes.

She whimpered in fear, imagining the dreary fate of the dark witches slaying her in a gory manner for their rituals.

But when she observed them, they had no weapons and oddly, they seemed rather scared of her than she was of them even though she had lost her powers, but then they didn’t know that yet.

She figured she could use their obliviousness against them, at least to survive until help came, but the longer moment she spent ensnared in the dark witches lair, her hope for rescue waned like her debilitated powers.

The witches stood a good distance away from her with alarmed looks etched on their faces, a hint of fear grazed their faces even as they tried to conceal it. She eyed them with vigilance in case they tried to attack, but they were unyielding to movement as they stood fixed in their positions while exchanging indiscernable whispers.

They stared at her for a long moment after she suspected them coming to a conclusion, because in the next second, they started approaching her, despite the visible fear in their eyes.

Gulping in fear she frantically shrieked as she sensed an inauspicious motive behind their approach. "Stay away from me!"

They hesitated but still, they approached her with slow cautious steps.

"One step closer and you’ll be nothing but a pile of ash." Malika threatened, even as her voice quivered in fear.

They flinched at her threat, aware of what she had done to their kind earlier. Exchanging fearful glances at each other, they whispered distinctly to each other. After they were done with the whispers, one of the witch snatched a dagger from the table and started approaching her again.

Her eyes widened in alarm as the witch holding the dagger moved toward her, undoubtedly ready to plunge it into her, presumably to eradicate her, the lethal threat in their midst.

As her lips parted in dread, before a frightened cry could emanate from it, a loud thud was stemmed from beneath the dark corridors, then afterwards faint screams sufficed the air, making the witches freeze in alert.

Malika’s heart drummed in the rhythmic symphony of fear as the chaos taking place within the dark depths of the corridors was tangible, she could taste the pulsating darkness in the air as it oozed from an unknown malevolent force.

But her rational mind failed to function properly when she felt the sinister presence from within the dark halls drawing nearer like a magnetic pull of malignance.

"Untie me...!" She cried out frenetically in a low voice as if whatever ominous presence was approaching them would hear her.

The witches glanced at her with no motive of releasing her as they dropped their gaze back on the shadowed corridor.

"Untie me right now!" She screamed louder, her body shuddering at the expanse of trepidation, but none of them replied her, rather their unwavering eyes were statically fixed on the dark corridors.

Words failed to seize from her as she pushed her head up to enable her catch sight of the ominous presence as it emerged from the darkness into the dim light of the room they occupied.

As it emerged out, the figure took on it’s eerie form. She was in a state of disarray when her eyes met the callous crimson ones of lord Zamiel.

"Demon!" One of the witches hissed as if she was spitting out raw venom.

Zamiel glanced at her, in that split second, he did a full body survey on her and she saw his hardened face become a tad softer when he saw she was alright.

"Lord Zamiel?" She muttered, slightly dazed, uncertain whether it was truly him that had come to save her, which was quite peculiar, but she was feeling dizzy so she was unsure of whether what she was seeing was reality or an illusion.

Nevertheless, she was reeling with happiness that finally rescue had arrived, regardless of who it was.

As the air crackled with an otherworldly tension, he charged at them, his clawed hands lunged at them, ready to decapitate them at the first strike.

Conjuring their black magic from the deepest depths of dark forces, black mists engulfed him, weighing him down with the overbearing force of their dark hex. Reluctant to give in to the weakening force of their dark magic, he tapped into the core of his preternatural strength as he struggled to move while the dark magnetic force of the hex pulled him back.

Dread overwhelmed her at what was transpiring. She almost yelped in fear seeing Zamiel trapped by their black magic, but when she saw his resilience to keep striving through and the witches finding it hard to ensnare him, she sighed in relief while she was at the edge of her seat.

Veins popped in his neck and his crimson eyes glowed with a fiendish aura. As the witches tried to hold him down, their composure shook as their energies weakened while they fueled a stronger hex to put him down.

With a shaken composure, one of the dark witches lost her resilience as she staggered backward in an exhausted state, making the hex on Zamiel break.

Immediately it broke, the witches froze in horror as if they anticipated what would happen next. In the next breathing moment, Zamiel charged at them without giving them half a second of breathing space.

Everything happened within flying seconds, as if time seemed to bend to his will. Spitefully grabbing a witch by the neck, he dug his fangs into her neck, draining her dry within a matter of a splitting second.

As soon as she fell limply on the floor, he charged towards the others with a hellish ambiance cloaking him like shadows of darkness, and the only thing she saw in those smattering seconds, were streaks of black blood flying in the air, spraying across the wall and bathing the ground.

As he charged toward the last witch standing, black tendrils of vines abruptly jetted out of the ground, wrenching around his limbs like obsidian serpents, pulling him down to the ground.

Within seconds, he was left ensnared by the tendrils as they coiled tightly around his neck, dark mists emitted from the tendrils as he struggled to break free, but every struggle only made the tendrils coil tightly around his body.

"Zamiel!" She screamed hysterically but he didn’t seem to hear her. Her eyes blurred with tears as she watched him helplessly, it made her heart clench painfully.

As he slowly lost consciousness in his trapped state, the green eyed witch came into view, and without saying a word, she exited her sight with a fairly pleased look as a malicious glint flashed in her eyes, leaving Malika stricken with fear, terrified at the fact that she had trapped Zamiel, her source of survival, but at that moment, his survival seemed to matter more than hers.