From the high wall of his fortress, Nero watched as the gigantic stream of chaos energy was drawn in. It flowed like a river over the fortress, up to the highest tower in the center.
There, it flowed through a crack in space from their dimension into the dimension of the Polykenas. Half of it would be used for their next project, and the rest would be used to create new Polykenas.
That was the compromise Nero had to make, as the losses from their last conquest had been unexpectedly high. Nero had already absorbed the black crystal and gained a powerful increase in strength once again. Xersies, Ramor, Ester. Shire and Fril were bathing in the raw chaos energy. They, too, would experience a considerable increase in power. Once they had absorbed all the remaining chaos energy, they would immediately close the gate and search for a new planet to attack. Nero had been feeling an incredible sense of urgency lately. He sensed that something big was about to happen, and he knew he had to prepare for it.
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A small man was running through the streets of a large city called Drul. The small man moved frantically, looking back and forth. Under his arm, he held a stack of old books and parchments.
Someone was following the small man, but he didn't notice. Two other men stood high up on a tall building. They looked down at the man.
"What do you think, Master Trul?" asked one of the men, a brown-haired muscleman. Master Trul, an old man with long white hair and a bald spot, replied in a hoarse voice, "It's definitely using some kind of magic, but I can't tell you what it is."
"Strange... Should we stop it?"
"Of course, Jayce, it's clearly not human after all."
Jayce sighed, "Of course, Master." He opened his mouth. A roar came out of his mouth, which hit the man with the books unprepared on the side. The man was thrown into the side of a house wall. He crashed hard against the wall, but when he fell to the ground, he was no longer the shape of a man, but had changed.
His skin had been replaced with a multitude of green scales that covered his body from bottom to top. The man had lost all his hair, his face was strangely distorted, more like the snout of a lizard.
A tail grew out of his back, his eyes had become two black slits. His hands had mutated into long claws, as had his feet.
"So it really is a Lizzian," said Jayce as he jumped down. He landed, but the only sound heard from his arrival was a soft 'clink'. A small sound wave emanated from the spot.
Master Trul simply flew down, the wind seeming to obey him as it carried him.
The Lizzian moved incredibly fast. It stood up and crawled up the wall. It hissed at the two men. Then darkness gathered around them as the lizard unleashed its magic. A gigantic creature came running down the street toward the two men.
Jayce backed away. "What the fuck is that?"
The huge creature ran on four long, spider-like legs as it came toward them at unnatural speed. Master Trul stood still. His old eyes were gray. He had been blind for decades. He heard the stomping of the gigantic creature as it made the ground shake, but he felt nothing in the wind.
"It's just an illusion!" the old man realized. The lizard man had used the moment of distraction to run away.
He had already run the entire length of the street, but now Master Trul raised his arm. A wind barrier formed directly in front of the lizard, which ran into it. Jayce continued to retreat from the approaching monster.
"Jayce, it's just an illusion! Snap out of it!"
Jayce blinked his eyes. He raised his hand and clapped. The sound of his clap was amplified a thousandfold by his magic as it blew through the street in a powerful wave. Window panes shattered, but when the sound hit the monster, it simply dissolved into shadows. Jayce cursed angrily. He looked at the lizard, which was already getting back up.
The lizard man raised his hands as he commanded his magic once more, but this time Jayce was prepared. He snapped his fingers, and a small sonic explosion struck the lizard in the chest, immediately hurling it back against the wind wall. The two ran toward the creature. Master Trul raised both hands. Wind pressed down on the lizard, preventing it from getting back up, but they had no way of stopping it from using magic. Suddenly, the lizard disappeared, replaced by a fountain of water that created a tsunami in seconds.
Master Trul heard the water rushing toward him, but he didn't move. He simply held his hand up, pressing the lizard down. The illusions were not strong enough to completely influence him. So the water flowed harmlessly past him, but Jayce was not so lucky. The water hit him with full force. He was about to be washed away when he clearly heard Master Trul's voice next to him, despite all the noise, "The more you believe in the illusion, the more influence it has over you!"
Jayce concentrated, "This isn't real, this isn't real, this isn't real!" he muttered to himself to convince himself. And indeed, the pressure of the water fell away. He was still in exactly the same place and hadn't moved even a tiny meter. He was even completely dry, "This is starting to annoy me!" he grumbled angrily.
He ran toward the lizzian, who was trying to crawl out from under the wind cover in a panic, but Master Trul wouldn't let him. Jayce let out a short whistle, which distorted into an incredibly high-pitched sound. When it reached the lizard man's ears, the shrill sound rang so loudly that the creature immediately lost consciousness. Master Trul still didn't let up as Jayce approached him. He checked his pulse. The creature's scales were cold, as was the skin beneath them, as with all cold-blooded creatures. Jayce signaled to Master Trul, "It's not an illusion, Master, you can withdraw your magic."
Master Trul hesitated briefly before ceasing to cast his spell. Immediately, the wind wall and wind blanket disintegrated. Jayce grabbed the lizard and tied it behind its back. He pressed a small stone onto the lizard's scales, which immediately began to glow. He activated several symbols, which immediately began to glow. These were intended to suppress the magic for some time until it could be taken to a secure cell.
Jayce lifted the unconscious body of the lizard over his shoulder. "Shall we go?" he asked Master Trul. The latter was looking around with his blind eyes and reading the air. He could have sworn he had sensed something, but now he could no longer perceive anything.
"Master Trul?" Jayce asked again, "What is it?"
The old man hesitated for a few seconds before turning his blind eyes back to Jayce. "No. Let's take our little informant back to the academy. Let's see what interesting things he's stolen!"
With that, the two men walked away with their new prize, who lay unconscious on Jayce's shoulders.
What the two men didn't know was that deep in the darkness of one of the buildings sat a creature. Its skin was unnaturally black, as was its fur. It walked on all fours, its yellow eyes having turned a deep black. Master Trul Fril almost noticed it, but he realized early on that Master Trul could sense movement through disturbances in the air.
The creature remained completely still the entire time the two were there and the old man had his magic active.
It remained sitting still for at least another half hour before moving away at lightning speed. It jumped across rooftops and ran along the streets at lightning speed. Its eyes darted back and forth, watching every movement, but there was a strict curfew at this time of day, so there was hardly anyone out and about.
He was once again on a strange planet gathering information. The Duce hadn't waited a day before searching for the new planet, but he gave Fril some time to recover and get used to his new strength.
All of the generals received a significant power spike after destroying the planet. Not only the generals, but all of the Polykenas. Fril would have called it a great success if it weren't for the approximately one million casualties they had to suffer.
Fril was not a strategist, not a military commander, he was an assassin who only operated in the darkness, but even he understood how heavy this loss was.
Now he was back on a new planet, in a new city, once again surrounded by foreign cultures, foreign beings, foreign magic, gathering information for his Duce. Fril smiled. It was a gruesome smile that only a Polykenas could muster. Even if the mages had discovered him, he could have killed them with ease.
He wasn't worried. He was stronger than ever before; he felt like he could fight thousands of magicians and not even break a sweat.