Chapter 25 – Overload

Vincent flies up to the roof where Jenna is. When he lands, Jenna runs to Vincent and hugs him really tight. “I thought I lost you”

“I’m not that easy to beat.” He smiles and rubs her cheek with the back of his finger. He begins closing in when Crocell suddenly wakes up coughing. “Ah...the party pooper…perfect timing.”

Vincent walks to Crocell, grabs his collar and stands him up. “Do you see that piece of a huge lifeless body?”

Crocell notices that it’s Uvall’s corpse lying on the Colosseums’ floor.  He shudders with fear.

“I can do that to you, oh let’s say, less than 3 minutes. So what’s it’s gonna be?”

“I don’t have it with me” Crocell’s is trembling so hard; his voice turns into a high pitch squeal.

“Who has the crystals then?”

“Ever since you find Shalbriri’s crystal, he took both of Uvall and mine.”

“I see. So the Dark Lord has both of them?”

“Yes.” Vincent tries to see any hint of lying from Crocell. He’s telling the truth.

“I want you to take me to him”

“What ?? No !!! It’s like putting my head on a silver plate for him!!! ” Crocell gets really squirmy. Apparently the fear of the Dark Lord is widespread among his followers.

“Well, you can tell me the way to go there. Then you can leave me once we get there.”

“No…he will know that I go with you.”

“How ?” Vincent

Crocell covers his mouth, realizing that he said too much.

“HOW DOES HE KNOW THAT???” Vincent can’t contain his anger anymore.

Crocell suddenly tries to run. Vincent quickly tackles him from behind and turns him around. Vincent put one knee on Crocell’s chest, and grabs his collar. “SPEAK! OR I WILL TEAR YOU APART!!!”

Crocell can’t breathe with Vincent’s knee on top of him. “Vincent” Jenna taps him on his shoulder

“WHAT ?”  Vincent turns around like an enraged tiger.

Jenna is surprised by his reaction. She never sees Vincent like this. “Calm down. He can’t speak with your knee on his chest”

Vincent looks down, and then lifts his knee. Crocell gasps for air as the pressure is lifted from his chest.

“I can’t tell you…please…”

Vincent grabs his satchel and draws his sword. “Tell me now or your head will separate from your body.”

Crocell looks at him with horror. Vincent pulls his sword over his head and ready to do a full swing slash. Crocell puts his hand over his head and shout “He put a tracking device on you.. Please don’t kill me…”

Vincent is taken aback, and everything suddenly becomes clear to him. Of course. The Dark Lord IS the voice. I have been working for him the whole time during my loss of my memory.

“So how do you take it off?” Jenna breaks the silence.

“I don’t know” Vincent is ready to pounce him again, but he realizes that Crocell is telling the truth.

“Let me think.” Jenna starts biting his nail again. “There is a way. But it’s quite risky.”

“Tell me.”

“If I am not mistaken, all devices will need something to power it, whether magical or electrical.”

“Right” Vincent doesn’t really get it, but he just pretends to understand and plays along.

“What we can do, is trying to overload the device that it short circuited.”

“I see…and the biggest power source right now is…”
“The Golden phoenix egg.” They both answered together.

“I guess you will be vulnerable after that. Since the Dark Lord knows wherever you are, we need to hide where he can’t find you.”

After a long silence, Vincent has an “AHA” moment. “Come to think of it, whenever we are in that forest, no demons come after us.”

“Quite true. Shall we go back there then?”

“What about him?” Vincent points to Crocell.

“We can trap him limbo and fetch him later. Watch this.”

Jenna opens the Gate of Void and picks the destination. “Just throw him in there.”

Vincent grabs Crocell who tries to put up a useless fight. Vincent pushes him into the gate, and Jenna closes it down. “There. He won’t be able to get out of there for a while. Shall we return to the forest?”

“Fire away.”

~ ψ~

Vincent and Jenna return to the forest of entrance. He pulls out the Phoenix Egg, and braces himself for the worst. “Are you sure this is going to work?”

“Nope. But it’s the only way I can think of.”

Vincent exhales hard. “Here we go.” He begins to draw power from the egg. The egg glows brighter and brighter like the sun. “How do I know that I have short circuited the device?” Vincent’s voice is almost drawn by the jet-turbine-like sound from the energy wave. “You will something in the part of your body where the tracking device is”

“SOMETHING ??? That’s a lot of help.” The sound is getting louder and louder. Vincent’s body is now glowing bright gold. He never feels anything like this in his life. The egg has an unlimited source of power drawn from nature for thousands of years. Apparently, Jenna is right. He begins to feel something at the back of his neck. Albeit small, he can sense a disturbance in the energy flow. “I feel ‘something’ at the back of my neck!!”
“Great !!! keep going until it breaks !” Jenna shouts over the noise that now sounds like typhoon.

Vincent keeps absorbing the energy until his body can’t contain it anymore. “I can’t hold on anymore!!!”

“Just a little more !!! Hang on !!!”

Vincent feels like his body is ripping apart to all directions. With one last inhale, he absorbs as much energy as he can and shouting really loud. “Heeaaaarrrrggggggggggggghhhhhhhhhhhh !!!” Finally, he can hear the sound like a small glass breaking. He lets go of the egg and punch the ground to release some of the energy. The trees are separating from the massive earthquake that he causes. He looks at Jenna “I think I did it”, and everything turns black.

~ ψ~