An aura of demigod-level power flared from the Fallen Angel, projecting a dark ward that completely neutralized Isilra's attack.

"Heh heh heh…" The Witch's laughter echoed through the air, sweet and venomous. "You see it now, don't you? The chasm between us." The avatar's head tilted. "It's a real shame. Such a beautiful Moon Elf, and I'm the one who has to break you."

Her voice twisted, shedding its gentle facade and revealing the madness beneath. "I do so love tearing the wings off butterflies… Heheheh…"

"Come here."

The Fallen Angel's wings suddenly detached from its back, snapping together and spinning into a vortex of dark energy. The pull was immense. Isilra and her white tiger were caught in the powerful tether, their bodies dragged uncontrollably toward the Witch.

Isilra felt no fear. A soft glow enveloped her, transforming both her and the tiger into pure moonlight in an attempt to slip free of the arcane gravity.

"Pathetic," the Witch sneered. "You think a little parlor trick can evade my Duality Tether?" She extended a hand, and the very laws of reality seemed to bend around her slender fingers, ensnaring the moonlight and reeling it in.

ROAR!

Just as Isilra was about to be captured, the white tiger burst forth from the moonlight, lunging at the Witch with its jaws wide.

"Insolent beast," the Witch hissed. Razor-sharp talons of black energy sprouted from her fingertips. With a single, dismissive swipe, the great tiger was annihilated, dissolving into a fine mist of blood.

"No!" Isilra's cry was a choked, powerless sob. It changed nothing. The Witch, channeling the phantom of a demigod, was simply in another league.

"Your turn, little elf," the Witch purred, a cruel smile gracing her lips. Her taloned hand reached for Isilra, the divine power of the tether locking on once more.

Suddenly, a shimmering shield materialized around Isilra, shattering the Witch's hold. Sensing the imminent danger, Moonwelldemigod had intervened. A phantom of the demigod herself coalesced in the air beside Isilra.

"Mother, she killed my friend," Isilra seethed, her grief transmuting into raw fury. "I'll have my revenge!"

Freed from the tether and bolstered by her mother's power, Isilra drew her bow. An arrow of incandescent moonlight, far more potent than any she had fired before, took shape and locked onto the Witch.

"How tedious," the Witch sighed, casting a glance across Staghelm City. Fighting a demigod-level healer on her home turf was a losing proposition. "It seems this isn't the right stage for our dance, little elf."

With one hand, she summoned a defensive ward. With the other, she wove a complex sign, preparing to transport them both to the Cult of Four's sacred ground: The Dais of Judgment.

WHOOSH!

The Moon's Arrow shot forward, a blazing comet that shattered the Witch's dark shield. But it was a fraction of a second too late. The moment before impact, both the Witch and Isilra vanished, pulled into the pocket dimension.

"Isilra!" From her sanctum in Staghelm City, Moonwell Demigod cried out, but the name was lost to empty air.

All she could do now was help their allies defeat the other demigods, she thought, her focus turning to the larger battle. She could only pray Isilra could hold on until then. She had managed to imbue her daughter with a protective phantom. As long as the Witch wasn't a second-stage demigod or higher, Isilra had a fighting chance.

Just then, a light brighter than any moonbeam or spell erupted in the sky.

It was the blinding glare of a divine sword.

"Traitor! Your treason ends here!" Alexander's voice, cold and absolute, rang out from within the light.

"Please," the Clown's voice mocked from a distance. "We're both demigods. You don't impress me." Confident he was a safe distance away, he began preparing a counter-attack.

CRACK!

An unnerving sound, like shattering glass, echoed across the heavens. The sky itself, or rather the fabric of space, was breaking apart. The Dodecahedron of Four Elements had fractured the battlefield into a maze of countless spatial shards. To reach his target, Alexander would have to smash through them one by one.

The Clown knew that by the time Alexander reached him, his attack would be spent. That was when he would strike.

"Pontiff Jack, we're with you!" The other two Pontiffs of the Cult, Konak and Yriel, appeared at the Clown's side. A three-on-one advantage. They weren't worried; they were eager. Let Alexander come. Once he was dealt with, Moonwelldemigod would be next, and this war would be over.

"Kill him!"

But just as the three prepared to engage, the distant point of light that was Alexander's Blade accelerated. In two impossible bursts, it jumped between the spatial shards, bypassing the maze entirely.

SHIIING!

The blade's velocity transcended anything the Clown could comprehend. Before he could even register the wrongness of it, the sword was there, buried deep in his chest.

"I said, DIE!" Alexander's roar of pure killing intent boomed from the sword itself. To achieve that single, unpredictable strike, he had sacrificed both of the phantom blades Moonwell Demigod had granted him, burning their power to bend space to his will.

"Hahaha… Alexander," the Clown choked, blood speckling his lips. There was no fear in his eyes, only manic glee. "You can't kill me. Not with that."

He laughed, a ragged, bubbling sound. "You got this one… but how many more of me can you get? Hahaha!"

As he laughed, a bizarre sight unfolded. A perfect puppet copy of himself split from his back. And from that puppet's back, another emerged, and from that one another, and another, forming a nested chain of bodies that telescoped back into the warped horizon.

"Let's see what's stronger, Alexander… your precious blade…"

POP.

The Clown's first body, the one pierced by the sword, burst apart. Then the second, then the third…

"...or my endless supply of decoys?" The unfinished sentence was spoken in unison by the thousands of puppets still chained together behind him, their voices a chilling chorus.

"Pontiff Konak, Pontiff Yriel," the final Clown in the chain cackled, its eyes fixed on the now-distant Alexander. "Go and kill Moonwell Demigod. I'm going to have some fun with our old friend here… Heheheh…"

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