The Way of a Demon Lord

Adrian got on one of the black horses brought by the sentries. He whipped the reigns, prompting the horse to ride away with full speed.

In a few minutes, Adrian was three hundred meters away from the mansion. He looked back. A gigantic ice blue circle hovered above the mansion, slowly rotating anti-clockwise.

Adrian turned ahead and whipped the halter harder, causing the horse to accelerate. When he was about four hundred meters away, the massive magic circle began to fall down- its altitude lowering every moment.

When he was four hundred and fifty meters away, the ethereal maid circle crashed onto the mansion. The whole Count estate was frozen in an instant. And it was only the beginning. Chilling energy surged to every direction, freezing everything it crossed path with.

The regular humans were frozen in an instant. The low level circlers stood no chance. Even many of the mid levels died in moments. The rest survived but that would not be the case for long for long. Antonymously, they were out of the fire and into the frying pan.

Only the high levels were able to survive. And even amongst them, the weaker ones had to face some injuries.

The icy air sweeper through everything for the first few hundred meters. After the three hundred meters mark, it started to slow down and even the intensity decremented.

The wave met Adrian near the five hundred meter line. It barely affected him. It was nothing more than a cold breeze.

"Woah!"

The horse halted in its track. Just the cold wind that permeated from the frozen lands behind made it shiver. He turned around.

Everything within a kilometre range was coated in a layer of blue- be it the buildings, the walls, the plants, the roads, or the living creatures. Nothing was spared.

The closer one got to the Synders Estate, the thicker the crust and the colder it felt. Cracking sounds erupted as some humans ran out of the dead lands with all their might- some using their speed, some using fire to envelop their body or some using all their energy to fight the cold that seeped in.

Each and every single one of them were higher mid level circlers or above. The higher level circlers at the very centre of the sphere of ice were already dead. And everyone weaker fell prey to the gust of iciness.

Adrian trotted a few meters away and stopped. He stared at the Synders Estate. A few minutes later, Irene appeared in his sight.

She rode a board of ice through the streets, using two long stalactites as poles to manoeuvre through the obstacles. She got out of the frozen zone and slid with the board to him, stopping only a meter away.

"Where did you learn that?" He smiled.

"Read it in a fairy tale." She answered nonchalantly. "Always wanted to try."

"Mhmm. Hop on." He beckoned, moving a little backwards on the horse. "Our job here is done. We are leaving Uropolis tonight."

Irene stepped on the foothold of the saddle and rose to the steed's back, sitting right in front of him. Her back pressed against his chest.

Adrian caressed her cold cheek with his warm one and whipped the halter. The two rode away from the scene.

******

Ten minutes later.

"Greetings, your highness."

"Greetings, your highness."

Two men rode out of the Citadel, catching up with a youth who mounted a majestic horse. The youth had orange hair and orange eyes. He had a serious look on his face.

Two men were already following him. One was a moustached man wearing a monocle, while the other was a burly middle aged man with white hair and red eyes.

The two newcomers kept their distance from the white haired man but stayed close to the prince, despite knowing how much of a maniac he was. Both of them had four stars plastered to the chest of their coats.

The prince nodded at them and went on with his voyage.

In a few minutes, they reached their destination. For a whole kilometre ahead- unlike the other parts of the city which was covered with snow, it was covered with solid ice.

The monocled man turned to one generals. The old man had brown hair and brown eyes. "General Blaze, if you would please."

The old man nodded and rode ahead. He reached his arm out, a mid sized red circle formed. The circle rotated clockwise. The more it rotated, the redder it got. After a whole minute, it turned fiery red. One could see the undulations emitting from the circle with naked eye.

"Hyah!" The old man shouted.

A fiery beam, whose thickness exceeded a meter blasted forth. Ice crushed into shards, shards melted into water, water evaporated into the air.

The general cleared the road. The path lead directly into the Synders Estate.

The party advanced forth. In a matter of few minutes, they reached the Count residence. The thickness of the ice here reached up to two inches.

General Blaze stepped forward again.

"Don't." The prince said. "You may decimate clues."

"Forgive me." The old man bowed and stepped back.

The prince stepped down from the horse. The others followed. All of them tapped their chest. The orange in their coat started to glow. The heating circles of their uniforms activated.

The prince ignored the frozen guards who had a posture of running away, and entered the main mansion.

It looked like more of a cave of ice than a residence of a novel. General Blaze casted a spell. A circle formed above him. Orbs of fire rose up from it and began to hover in different spots of the hall, lighting it up.

Just ahead of them were the frozen corpses of the Sentries. Three were standing and the other three lied on the ground. The ones lying were bloodied while the ones who stood were without external injuries.

He walked to the other two bodies lying in the hall. The Counts of two generations had big holes in their chest.

"It's just as we thought." The prince sighed as his eyes peered into the distance. "The Rebels have new Calamity classes, and they are stronger than that 'pioneer'."

He turned to his subordinates.

"We can't treat this revolt lightly. I believe the 'High Table' will not sit still."