I'm Trapped Inside a Prince as the Most Powerful Entity-Chapter 59: Golden Mask

The urgent shouts of the Syndicate Masters echoed through the antechambers and corridors leading away from the main command center.

"All units, evacuate! Secure the retreat of all personnel! This is the highest priority!" Operatives scrambled, their disciplined formations breaking into a controlled chaos as they relayed orders and began to fall back from the breached sections of the headquarters.

Amidst this turmoil, a figure moved with calm purpose against the flow of retreating men. He wore a gleaming golden mask that obscured his features entirely, and his dark, tailored attire spoke of nobility rather than the rougher gear of the Syndicate grunts.

His hand rested on the pommel of the sword at his hip. This was the First Prince of the Roland Kingdom.

He navigated the labyrinthine passages, his senses guiding him towards the epicenter of the disturbance. Soon, he reached a wide corridor.

At its far end, bodies of Syndicate operatives lay strewn across the floor. Adam stood amongst them, dispatching the last few guards with brutal efficiency, his movements deadly.

Adam, too, sensed an approaching presence, a power signature distinct from the cannon fodder he’d been dealing with. He turned, his borrowed sword still dripping, to see the golden-masked man standing silently at the corridor’s entrance.

"You’ve come quite far," the golden-masked man said, his voice smooth and uninflected by the chaos around them. "I believe it’s time for you to rest."

With those words, he drew his sword. The blade was a sleek, unadorned length of polished steel. Then, he vanished.

Adam’s eyes, which had registered the man’s strong energy, narrowed slightly. The speed was remarkable. He had known the newcomer was powerful, but this instantaneous movement was beyond what he’d anticipated from a mere Syndicate leader.

The First Prince reappeared directly in front of Adam, his sword already a blur as it sliced horizontally through the air. Adam leaned back, a mere shift of his weight, and the blade hissed past where his chest had been moments before. It was a clean dodge.

The First Prince showed no surprise. His attack flowed seamlessly into his next movement. He spun on his heel, the momentum carrying his sword in a full 360-degree arc, culminating in a powerful downward slash. As the blade descended, a tangible wave of white energy, sharp as a razor, shot from its edge, speeding directly towards Adam.

Adam raised his own sword, angling the blade precisely. The white energy slash struck his sword not with a clang of metal, but with a hiss. He deflected it, twisting his wrist, and the destructive energy careened off to the side, gouging a deep furrow into the stone wall of the corridor.

A chime sounded, audible only to Adam.

[System Alert: Host body integrity nearing critical limit. Operational time remaining: 30 seconds.]

Adam knew that any truly powerful ability would drastically shorten this already minuscule window. But the thought of leaving without Alina’s parents was not an option. He needed a swift resolution.

Just then, Alina rushed into the corridor from a side passage, having followed the sounds of fighting. She stopped short, her eyes widening in shock as she saw Adam engaged with the golden-masked figure.

Until this moment, she had witnessed Adam cut through every opponent with terrifying ease. To see him actually fighting someone, being forced to defend, meant this new enemy was incredibly strong.

Her gaze fixed on the ornate golden mask. Could this be him? she wondered. The leader of the Spider Syndicate?

The First Prince’s masked gaze flickered towards Alina as she entered his peripheral vision. He registered her presence – a young woman with an anxious expression.

His mind instantly connected this to the reports from the Masters: the attackers consisted of a golden-haired young man and a girl. So, these two are the only intruders, he thought with cold certainty. Then I will eliminate them both here and now.

Without hesitation, he swung his sword at Adam again, another white energy slash erupting from the blade, faster than the last. Adam met it with his own sword, deflecting the shimmering arc of energy. But as the energies dispersed, Adam felt a prickle of warning. His gaze, already sharp, instantly darted towards Alina.

The First Prince was no longer in front of Adam. He had moved with that same impossible speed and now stood directly before Alina. His sword was raised high, arcing down in a lethal strike aimed straight for her neck.

"No!" The single word was a thought, a flash of refusal in Adam’s mind. He had wanted to conserve what little time he had left in Eric’s body, to avoid taxing it further. But there was no choice. If he didn’t act now, Alina would die.

Adam moved.

He disappeared from his spot, a blur too fast for the eye to follow. In the infinitesimal fraction of a second before the First Prince’s blade could complete its deadly descent, Adam materialized beside Alina. His left arm shot out, encircled her waist, and he launched himself backwards, pulling her with him.

The First Prince’s sword sliced through empty air, the edge passing mere millimeters from where Alina’s throat had been.

Alina felt a sudden, powerful gust of wind, a disorienting sensation, and then her surroundings shifted abruptly. One moment she was facing the golden-masked attacker, the next she was several feet away, held securely against Adam. It had happened so fast she hadn’t even had time to scream or fully register the danger.

The First Prince completed his swing, his blade meeting only air. He looked, and saw his target had vanished. A quick glance revealed her a short distance away, now in the intruder’s grasp. He stared, a flicker of genuine surprise crossing his masked features. Was he... holding back his power against me until now?

The thought, the implication of being underestimated, ignited a spark of humiliation that quickly blazed into fury. The First Prince’s voice, when he spoke, was no longer calm but a sharp, enraged shout. "Do you take me for some weakling?! Why don’t you use your full power against me? Did you think I was just another one of these thugs you so easily dispatched?!"

Adam paid no attention to the outburst. He was looking down at Alina, who was now in his arms, her eyes wide with a mixture of shock and confusion as she stared up at him.

"Alina," Adam said, his voice calm despite the urgency, "stay back. This opponent is more powerful than the others. And I don’t have much time."

He gently but quickly set Alina down on her feet, then turned to face the First Prince. Neither Adam nor Alina knew the identity of their opponent. Adam, with his enhanced senses, could perceive the features beneath the golden mask, but the face meant nothing to him; neither he nor Eric had ever laid eyes on the First Prince of the Roland Kingdom.

Adam raised his sword, leveling the point towards the golden-masked prince. "If that’s what you truly wish," he stated, his voice flat, "then so be it."

He drew his sword arm back, channeling his energy. A brilliant white light began to emanate from the blade, growing in intensity, making the metal itself seem to hum with power. Adam shifted his stance slightly, twisting his torso, and then, with a powerful, controlled movement, he swung his sword forward.

A colossal slash of pure, blinding white energy erupted from the blade. It was far larger, far more condensed, and moved with significantly greater speed than any of the First Prince’s previous attacks. It blazed down the corridor, illuminating everything in its fierce glow.

The First Prince, seeing the sheer scale and intensity of Adam’s attack, reacted instantly. He, too, launched a counter-slash, pouring his own energy into a white arc aimed to intercept Adam’s.

The two energy waves met.

The First Prince’s slash, formidable in its own right, was annihilated on contact. It shattered into nothingness, stray sparks of its dissipated energy scorching the corridor walls. Adam’s slash, however, continued onward, seemingly undiminished, straight towards the First Prince.

A look of genuine shock, visible even past the impassive gold of his mask, crossed the First Prince’s face. He tried to bring his sword up into a defensive posture, to block the incoming cataclysm, but it was far too late. The speed was overwhelming.

The brilliant white slash slammed into him.

The impact was tremendous. The First Prince was bodily lifted from his feet and flung backwards down the corridor as if struck by an invisible locomotive.

The slash didn’t dissipate; it carried him with it, a torrent of destructive energy. It blasted through the end wall of the corridor, then upward, tearing through a dozen feet of earth and stone.

The First Prince, still encased in the fiercely burning energy of the slash, erupted from the ground above, bursting into the dense Whisperwood Forest that concealed the Syndicate’s headquarters.

He crashed through several massive trees, their trunks snapping like twigs, still propelled by the relentless force. His sword, held desperately before him, was glowing cherry-red from the friction and absorbing some of the impact, likely saving him from being instantly bisected.

Even so, he could not stop the momentum. He was carried a considerable distance through the air, high above the forest canopy, before the white energy of Adam’s slash finally exhausted itself and vanished. frёeωebɳovel.com

The First Prince of Roland, battered and smoking, arced through the sky and then plummeted down, crashing heavily into the distant forest floor.