They just had to go and jinx it.

The Eclipsed was now standing before them again, completely unhurt, as if it hadn't just been blasted into pieces.

"Shit," Elias cursed as he looked at the regenerated Eclipsed.

"W-what do we do now?" Lorenne asked as she looked at the creature, she was sure they had gotten the creature with that attack, so how was it completely unhurt.

The Eclipsed index said nothing about fiends possessing more than one ability, most Eclipsed with umbra energy, either had regeneration or any other ability but never both.

Nox and Levi stood defensively before the other two, keeping their eyes on the Eclipsed.

Even the creature seemed a bit, surprised?

It was looking at its clawed hands almost as if it was checking if it really was alive, though, the team couldn't come to that conclusion just yet.

"It's weakness," Nox asked, "what's its weakness?"

"SE overload," Lorenne answered as she looked into her book.

They had just tried that, and yet, the creature just regenerated right before their eyes.

"Then we overload it with SE until it can't regenerate anymore," it wasn't a plan in the least bit, but it was their only option for now.

It seemed the creature was done admiring its regenerated self as its attention was brought back to the four before him.

"Get ready," Elias said as he stood back to his feet, though he winced a little as he still felt a pain from his shoulder.

He had tossed his jacket since it felt uncomfortable on his wounded shoulder.

The shadows detached themselves from the Eclipsed's feet and, much to the group's dread, took the shape of the creature.

Standing before them now were four identical Eclipsed, well... almost completely identical to the original one with the only difference being that the main Eclipsed was a lot darker than its shadows.

"The hell?" Nox let out as he watched the scene before him, fighting an Eclipsed that was basically at tier 4 was already impossible, but fighting multiple ones?

That was just a death request.

'Run,' his mind told him and he was just a second away from doing so, but then he turned to the side and noticed Levi's expression.

He was scared, very much so. Nox could tell by the look on his face and the slightest trembling of his shoulders.

But even so, he firmly gripped his daggers and stood ready for combat.

Running would be the easiest way out and yet... He was standing there with such expression.

Even though he knew he had no chance of winning, he still tightly gripped his daggers.

That was what a solar knight was, a wall that stood between the Eclipsed and humanity. They were the walls that allowed other humans to live a 'normal' life in this apocalypse of a world.

No matter how hopeless the situation looked, they would never abandon humanity and run, and Nox had seen this time and time again during most Eclipsed waves in Zone 9.

This was really what it meant to be a solar knight.

Letting out a derisive chuckle, aimed directly at himself, Nox transformed Morphos into a katana and also took a battle stance, waiting for the creature to make its move.

"It's not like I can outrun that thing anyway," he muttered under his breath, justifying his reason for staying, "might as well just face it and hope for the best."

Levi turned to him with a small smile before looking back at the creature.

"Can you two handle yourselves?" Nox asked, referring to Elias and Lorenne, since they weren't in divisions that taught them about combat.... Lorenne especially.

"Yeah," Elias said, "I'll protect he—"

Before his words could be completed, he let out a scream of pain and fell to the ground, clutching his shoulder.

Lorenne quickly hurried to his side and ripped off the bandage, only to realize that the black vein were spreading to his neck and arm.

"What's wrong?" Nox asked, tempted to turn but he couldn't let his guard down and give his back to the Eclipsed.

"T-the Fiend's previous attack is corrupting his SE pathways," Lorenne explained.

"Can we do something about it?" Nox asked with a frown on his face.

According to Cass's theory, shouldn't it take a while for an Eclipsed to corrupt SE into Umbra energy?

Then what the hell was happening right now...

"N-no," Lorenne answered, "he needs a solar tech that can cleanse umbra energy and we don't have any of that here right now."

"I-i'm fine," Elias said, only to let out a groan, a second later.

"No, he's not," Lorenne said, "we have to get him to the academy soon or even I don't know what would happen to him."

The chances are, he'd just become an Eclipsed, something that was only possible in theory and had never happened before since no human has been corrupted by umbra energy before.

Not any surviving human anyway.

"Then let's deal with this quickly and hope it's the final boss," Nox said before turning to Levi, "I don't know how we'll do it, but you'll two and I'll handle the other two."

With a nod, Levi disappeared and the fiends immediately took that as their cue to move.

The original stayed in place while one of its shadows launched itself towards Nox, the other two tracking Levi to another part of the forest.

Nox's grip on morphos tightened.

Fortunately, thanks to Astra, he was not completely clueless in the art of weaponry.

Though he didn't have enough time, she was able to ensure he mastered at least three weapons, the sword/ katana, daggers and a staff.

Nox let the katana rest on his shoulders, as he looked at the approaching Eclipsed and smiled, before the creature's claws could reach him, he disappeared in a flash of light appearing to its side and swinging his weapon.

The creature's back seemed wide open, but before Nox's katana could make contact, a claw rose from its back, aiming for his face and forcing him to block.

The force of the attack sent him backwards but he soon regained his footing and looked back at the Eclipsed...

"No blindspots?" Nox muttered as he crouched a bit low, "then let's try that again."

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