While the two forces were still circling around the true battlefield, Zach’s group found themselves in thick waters. They somehow managed to contain the destructive panther to a small area hoping that it would get tired soon. It was doable only because they found the balance between defending, retreating and grabbing the agro of the monster.

Zach’s ideal outcome would have been the death of the panther before Kolt could catch up to them but contrary to his expectations, the monster panther was too much for them to handle. It was not only far more powerful than he had expected but also more durable and had considerably large reserves of stamina and mana capacity. As a result, not only did his men get severe injuries while fighting off the monster, they were also surrounded by Kolt’s army troops from the surroundings. He could see it all on the mini-map as a rough outline of the troops could be found scattered around their current position and they were slowly closing in on their current location.

All the battle statistics indicated utter defeat of Zach at the hands of the panther. Zach could barely hold the enemy back by investing everything at his disposal. There were seven deaths among his men who bravely sacrificed themselves in order to keep the panther from attacking Zach and the others.

Two of them couldn’t keep up with the pace of the battle as they died without knowing what struck them at the start of the battle. The panther didn’t wait for them to get used to what a true guerilla battle looked like and squished the two into mush with his powerful punches. This served as a lesson for the others who began fighting the monster from behind covers.

Three others soon succumbed to exhaustion as the pace of the battle turned out to be beyond their endurance limit. In the end they blew themselves up when they knew that their deaths were close just so they could deal some damage to it and ease the burden of the rest of their comrades. The panther of course didn’t even register the damage from the three grenades and soon got up from where it had been flung off to and shrugged it off before resuming its attack.

It wasn’t long before another mistake led to the death of two more soldiers under her command. Zach grew desperate because she felt responsible for these people. None of them deserved to die in such a manner.

The rest of the soldiers were so battered and wounded after luring and defending against the panther that they would be unable to last very long.

Zach couldn’t stay behind his forces any longer as he pulled out all the weapons at his disposal one by one in an attempt to fight against the black panther. Neither cold nor hot weapons seemed to work on the monstrous being as it stood unfazed under the barrage of bullets. Even a grenade launcher couldn’t deal any damage to it. He cursed the conditional activation of the Lightning rod that kept him from using such a destructive weapon in a life threatening situation like this. After all, what was the use of such a powerful weapon when he couldn’t even use it to defend himself in critical situations?

Just when he was about to lose all hope of ever escaping this predicament alive, he saw an anomaly on the mini-map at the corner of his vision. He had been ignoring it all this time because he already knew the position of Kolt’s troops. Therefore, he ignored the two other forces that had come out of nowhere and were now flanking Kolt’s troops from both sides.

Chaos erupted among the ranks of Kolt’s troops as horns blared and the irregular thundering sound of horses galloping spread across the forest. It felt like the whole army was in disarray due to the arrival of the new forces.

Even the panther seemed to be distracted by the sounds as it momentarily stopped its assault. It was not long before the forces appeared within Zach’s line of sight. Both the forces wore different colors and had different flags but Zach couldn’t recognize anyone that he could consider an ally. He wondered if these two forces had come to take advantage of the chaos to spirit him away as their personal slave just like Kolt intended to do with him. There was a high possibility that other influential families of Elizabeth city had made their move after figuring out the incident at the wedding earlier.

Flustered he looked towards the others one by one hoping that someone would be able to clear his doubts away. Luna whose robe was completely disheveled by now was just as clueless as he was while Diana was too worried about her soldiers to even think about anything else. She used this momentary respite from the battle with the monster to allow her soldiers to breathe.

The first to recognize the colors of the two forces was none other than Luther family leader who was the most experienced in terms of the knowledge of the various families of Elizabeth city. He had spent his entire lifetime in the high society there after all. His eyes sparkled as he stared at some of the soldiers who were heading towards them by charging through the blockade of Prince Kolt’s forces.

“What is it? Who are these soldiers? They don’t look like Kolt’s soldiers. I wonder what they want from us.”

Zach questioned Bruce as soon as he saw that Bruce looked like he knew something about these soldiers.

“Looks like we got some reinforcements. Can you see those soldiers bypassing the blockade to advance in our direction?” Bruce pointed towards the soldiers who were wearing either bronze tunics or lustrous mage garbs with hoods marked with a weighing scale.

Zach nodded in response immediately since he was curious about the same thing.

“That specific mark and the way these soldiers are equipped, I am positive that they belong to the fighting force of Elizabeth family. They must have come to help us out.”

Zach couldn’t help but think about Christina who had placed herself in harm’s way just so he would be able to escape from the clutches of the Prince earlier. Looks like that wasn’t the full extent of her support at all. She had even prepared the fighting force of her family to come support him when he was at his lowest.

Zach couldn’t help but notice another group coming from the exact opposite direction. At first he had thought that Elizabeth family had flanked the Prince’s forces from both directions in a carefully planned strategy but then he noticed the difference in how the two forces were dressed. Instead of the weighing scale as the insignia, the new force donned an insignia comprising of two crossed swords on their chests. Unlike Elizabeth family, this force comprised of seasoned fighters and mages since Zach could tell from the disciplined way they moved.

Bruce explained before Zach could ask about this new force, “Those soldiers belong to the Macrae family. It appears that the Macrae family allied themselves with Elizabeth family to help us escape. God knows we need all the help we can get with a monster like that. The man leading the Elizabeth family seems to be Barry; Christina’s brother.”

Bruce wanted to thank Barry for keeping his promise earlier but this wasn’t the time for that because the panther monster was back in his berserk mode and began to lash out at everyone in his path. But the reinforcements that both the families had brought with them were able to tie it down with the help of the Special Forces team who were rejuvenated after receiving the momentary respite from the continuous battle.

Seeing that his trump card had been rendered useless by the arrival of the two families, Kolt became furious as he spit fire at his commander to stop the advance of the two families.

The commander in turn could do nothing but take out his anger and frustration on his soldiers. So he yelled like never before and ordered the troops to take out all the enemies.

The soldiers on the other hand were tired of the long pursuit. They had been fighting since the beginning and the constant losses led to a blow to their morale. Even their prince was panicking on the inside and they could see it on his face. How could they still move with the same zeal when their prince’s strongest fighter was being held back by the enemy force?

Macrae family wasn’t the strongest in Elizabeth city for no reason. There martial and magical prowess was second to none even in the more developed cities. They could even be compared to some well known forces of the capital in terms of quality of training and discipline of their forces. The strength of the Macrae family further jumped since the one leading the forces was none other than Sarah who was the brilliant daughter of their family head. She was not only competent when it came to her own strength but also a strategist far ahead of even her father.

The royal forces were being cast aside like useless trash by the side of the road every where the forces of the allied families passed. Kolt couldn’t contain the fury searing his insides and shouted in the loudest voice he could muster. He had long since forgotten his grace and position as the Prince of the Norman Royal family.

“Do you all even know the person you are fighting for? Do you know his background? Where he came from? Or who that woman beside him actually is?”