Chapter 46:

"Boo." Solaris grinned manically, the shadows and light on his face only making seem more demented.

Luke gave a yelp of shock before sending a wave of spiked ice towards Solaris.

"Don't get so defensive." Solaris sighed, before using light speed to dodge the ice and get close to Luke, "It's not good for your heart, Raspberry Boy."

"How did you know?" Luke narrowed his eyes, carefully backing away,

"I know everything." Solaris gave him a small, sweet smile before touching Luke's forehead with one finger.

Shreds of wood from the floor was ripped away by some unknown force and merged into wooden swords.

We all instantly realized what Solaris' was trying to do,

"Get ready to dodge!" Kyle commanded, summoning his petal shards to create a shield while Emilia activated [Light Teleport].

Solaris' sent a dagger flying towards each of us, which we dodged effortlessly. Solaris frowned before clicking his fingers and summoned another four wooden daggers. Kyle, Emilia, Luke and I braced ourselves to dodge again but the daggers never came towards us.

It went towards Luke.

***

LUKE:

I dodged the first dagger that flung itself at me, it's tip sharp and glinting, until I realized I had fallen into a trap. The other three daggers surrounded me, leaving no space to escape and slowly advancing towards me. I drew out my sword and adopted a steady stance. Suddenly, five more daggers surrounded me.

'It's alright, all I have to do is dodge them.' I comforted myself.

The first three daggers shot at me, and with complicated twists and turns, I avoided the sharpened edges. I breathed out a sigh of relief until I felt my back go unusually stiff.

"LUKE!" Ivory screamed, running towards me.

***

IVORY:

Luke looked at me in shock, a thin stream of blood flowing from his mouth.

"NO!" Solaris shouted, as the time limit ended, and we started fading away back into our original time.

A blink of darkness flashed for a second before we were back in the greenhouse.

"Don't touch it!" Kyle yelled as Luke reached for the dagger in his back, "The blood flow will get even worse, let the blood clot first."

"Prince Kyle…" Emilia eyed Luke, before leaning to whisper in Kyle's ear, "I don't think I can heal him. This is beyond my abilities."

Sizzling and crashed was heard outside and all of us ducked behind a large, leafy tree. Footsteps thumped closer towards us, and we all held our breaths, the tension and fear hanging over us like a heavy shadow.

I spotted Solaris' silver hair and my heart stopped. I glanced towards the others and their eyes were widened as well.

"Run." I hissed, pushing them away.

My vision blurred and my head felt unnaturally light, but I maintained my composure.

"But-" Ivory persistently argued, holding onto my arm, "We can go to-"

"Kyle, Emilia." I looked towards them, "Don't let your emotions blind you."

Kyle opened his mouth as though he wanted to argue but when the footsteps thumped louder, he swallowed his words and nodded. Kyle and Emilia nodded at each other and grabbed Ivory and started dragging her away.

I stared after them, a fond smile on my face.

And then I died.

***

IVORY:

I opened my mouth to start protesting, to scream to do anything to make them let go of me.

I looked back and Luke was gone. In its place was a small, rotten raspberry.

LUKE!

***

"Shhh…" Emilia hushed us, as we lay hidden in the shadows, perched on a tree and spying on Solaris.

He was up in the sky and throwing fireballs everywhere, killing any person he saw running.

"I have a plan; I know how to defeat him now." Emilia whispered.