At the exact moment the Bishop screamed the Order, the cultists descended from their seats and the battle began.
The Priest started doing a special combination of hand signs and incantations for a wave of darkness to wash over the approaching crowd.
Soon their sizes doubled, and in a moment they were eight-foot-tall beasts rivaling the Sergeant Strong in sheer mass.
"Mere humans no longer, you are now monsters fit for battle!" The Priest said, sitting down to meditate. "Now you will enforce Umbra's will on these heathens!"
"Not if I kill them first," The Executioner said as he lunged for the team, holding his battleaxe with a smile.
"Aw, no fair," The Nun mused.
Zack aimed his enlarged fist at the approaching group, but Executioner dashed forward and intercepted it.
Zack tried to shake his fist off but it ended up being grabbed and thrown to the opposite end of the arena. Once Zack landed, he was swarmed by a plethora of mutated cultists thirsty for his blood.
"Hold down the fort here, guys. Zack needs me,"
"Don't worry, Paulina, we'll be fine here."
"Codename only, Sharkwoman," Paulina said as she gave her a pat and activated her rocket boots.
On her way, she saw the Executioner had joined about 30 cultists and changed his trajectory towards Zack while the Nun focused on Stacya and the kids.
Before him, Zack was smacking away the cultists with his enlarged fists. Despite their size, they weren't as strong as she thought.
"Thank goodness for that." She muttered to herself as she flew closer to him.
They were still five times stronger than the average human, though. Taking down waves of them will get taxing if they aren't careful.
Some tried to grab him from different sides, but he merely shrunk himself to escape their grasp and enlarged right after to punch them away. He had focused on his training way more ever since the gang bust, and it was really showing.
After Zack slammed two cultists together with his giant fists, the Executioner was right in front of him, backed up by two even larger cultists.
Suddenly the cultists were incinerated by beams of plasma from above. The Executioner would've met the same fate had he not rolled away in time.
Once he got back on his feet, he saw Paulina landing right in front of Zack, blocking his path.
"You dare stand between me and my prey?" He said in a bloodthirsty voice as he pulled out his giant black axe.
"Yeah, I do." She said.
His use of "prey" really stung, and it showed.
"And my boyfriend is not your prey, freak,"
She followed up with while clapping her arms together and morphing them into one giant blaster.
"Then you shall be the first to taste my axe," He said, licking his lip under his skull-faced mask.
He lunged at her, and she responded by firing her blaster. He blocked the incoming beam with his axe and ran right at her, planning for a clean swing at her neck.
Just as he got close enough for the kill, he felt a large presence above him. That's when he looked up to see a gigantic Zack grabbing him with his enlarged hand.
In confusion, the Executioner tried to slice Zack's hand but he shrunk it to the size of a small cat in seconds and grew it back to grab him.
As he was lifted into the air, he tried to struggle, and for a moment it looked like he was free. He lifted his axe for another attack.
"Oh no, you don't!" The giant said and threw the Executioner at the very same window he came from, sending him flying far away from the arena.
Zack and Paulina didn't get a moment to even say a word as they were swarmed by another group of bloodthirsty cultists.
Zack crushed and stomped on the mutants while Paulina incinerated any that escaped his grasp. He wasn't a fan of her killing them, but now wasn't the time to complain.
Meanwhile, the kids were beating down the cultists with mild difficulty. Ted smashed as many as he could with his overwhelming strength.
Omniboy morphed his arms into blades made of highly pressurized liquid and began slicing them apart.
Rift merely stood in place while her tentacles did all the work, cutting through the cultists like butter.
They had fought gangs of mumans before. Dangerous gangs. Surrounded at all sides wirh kittle hipe of escape?
This was par for the course for them.
Stacya, on the other hand, did her best to keep the Nun away from them.
"I guess they weren't lying about you Atlanteans being hard to kill," The Nun said playfully as she tried to cut Stacya in half with her claws.
"What the hell is this all about? Why do you want Jake? Who is that person your leader is absorbing?" Stacya questioned angrily.
She then evaded three of the Nun's oncoming attacks and tried to stab her head with her spear. The Nun simply raised her arm to block.
"Sorry, that's... oh, what the hell, you'll all be dead soon, so why not? Your idiotic friend came here in hopes of getting his mutated girlfriend back as long as he gave us the Baron of the Shadowclan," The Nun replied as she pushed Stacya's spear away and aimed her claws at her soft underbelly.
Stacya jumped out of the way and rolled to the side. If she wasn't so focused on the fight, she would've stopped to process the new info.
"Our master, the Bishop, is absorbing the Baron since he didn't want to help us with our plans,"
Stacya sent three attacks at her, but she front-flipped behind her and sliced her back. Stacya let out a scream and tried to slice through the Nun from behind.
No luck.
"Pl... plans?" Stacya asked, realizing she was losing a lot of blood from the attack.
"Calling our god, Umbra, to this world. With her invasion force on our side, we're sure to conquer this accursed world," The Nun said as she noticed Stacya falling to her knees.
"The Baron is the only one with the power to do that," The Nun said as she focused her attention back on the kids. " I've fought the Super Soceity you know? I'm well beyond your league Atlantean."
She then made a beeline for them with her claws outstretched. Ted was holding down a cultist while Omniboy was cutting one in two. Rift was the first to notice her approach and sent three tentacles her way.
She jumped over the first, ducked under the second, and sliced the third apart. In mere seconds she was right above Ted and aiming her claw at his metallic neck.
And just a second after, Stacya jumped out of the ground and clashed with that claw.
"H... how? I left you in the dust! Don't tell me you're..."
"A muman as well? Yeah. But that isn't what you should be scared of,"
Stacya then unleashed the full power of her spear, covering the Nun in pure lightning. After several seconds of electrocution, she was sent flying, completely unconscious.
"You may have fought the super Society, but we clearly arent them."
Stacya fell to her knees. Still recuperating from the blast, ten mutant cultists descended on her in an attempt to finish her off.
Seven were slapped to the side by Zack, and the remaining three were obliterated by Paulina's cannon.
As the trio reunited, the kids were about done with the wave of cultists. Most of them were either dead or unconscious, and the rest were retreating.
"You kids okay?" Zack asked. Ted and Omniboy gave a loud "Yeah," while Rift nodded in agreement.
"What is going on?" Paulina said, still shaking her head in confusion. "I'm the one who usually knows what's going on,"
"It's Jake..." Stacya started and explained the situation. While she did that, the Priest was on the opposite end of the arena, drawing something on the wall with the blood of a cultist he killed himself. After a few seconds, he was done.
"Fools!" He shouted with childlike glee. "You think you won? That you're stopping me? Stopping the Baron? That you're getting out of here? Please. You may have defeated the Nun and Executioner, but you stand no chance against what comes next,"
"What the hell are you doing?" Zack said as the team tensed for battle.
"Opening a portal. Behind it is a creature of my own design. An amalgamation of multiple mumans I captured. This beast will be your undoing, mortals! No one steps into our temple and lives to tell the tale!" He screamed as a creature appeared out of the wall.
It was a giant blob of flesh with pitch-black lines and threads spread throughout its body. It was covered head to toe in eyes, noses, mouths, legs, and arms. It let out several screams and moans as it forced itself inside.
The team got ready for another battle.
Zack grew even bigger than before, now reaching 30 feet tall.
Paulina morphed both her fists into blasters and made a special rocket launcher from her shoulder.
Stacya got ready to use another lightning strike.
Ted got into a boxing stance while Omniboy turned his left arm into a giant block of titanium and his right into a giant saw. Rift spawned 10 more tentacles.
Just as the 49-foot-tall creature wormed its way into the arena, just as the Priest jumped in sheer astonishment at his creation, a giant ball of blue energy flew at it and exploded in what appeared to be its face.
It collapsed on the ground and died at that moment. The Priest, still processing what happened, let out a scream of pure anger. He turned to view the culprit but felt a hand grab the back of his head and slam it on the ground.
He hit it with enough force to crack his skull and splatter his brain across the cold concrete floor, killing him instantly
Then, standing right above his corpse, was Jake, looking even more monstrous than ever before.
Hos claws were sharper, his ears longer, his horns longer as well. This time his blue energy didnt take the form of vapour.
This time he emitted pure blue flames.
All the others could do was stare in silence as he let out a bloodcurdling scream.
Some of them stared in awe of his power. Others in fear. Zack was the latter. Soon he got the courage to call out to him.
"Jake! Jake! Get over here," Zack shouted as he shrunk down to his regular size.
"Yeah?" Jake said, his terrifying demeanor wiped away in an instant.
Right after that, Jake ran to them with his super speed. There was a lomg solecne that lasted a few seconds.
Reunited, the kids leapt at him for a group hug. Well, Omniboy and Ted did. Rift merely held his arm tightly.
Stacya wasn't far behind on the hug.
"You guys... how did you find me?" Jake asked, pulling them away. Stacya refused to let go.
"Stacya came back to base. She told us Max was tracking you. Soon after we got a call from him, you were here," Paulina said with a rare smile.
"I see. Well, I guess I can always count on Stacya to be stubborn," Jake replied as he smirked at Stacya.
She returned the favor with a wide-eyed grin. "It was nothing."
Zack, on the other hand, wasn't smiling.
"What the f-ck, Jake,"
"Zack, I..."
"You've essentially doomed the world," Zack spat angrily. "You really thought giving away the Baron was a good idea? You didn't even think to tell us what you were doing! Your recklessness could've gotten us killed, just like with Mr. E. Hell, even worse, you could've gotten the kids killed,"
"We're fine, Zack. No need for..."
Before Omniboy could finish, Zack gave him a death glare so intense it made him freeze in fear.
Paulina was the first to notice it. She had never seen him so angry at anyone before. Only at himself.
"I... I think you kids need to go. Thanks for coming to my aid, but things are gonna get really bad from here on out," Jake said, tapping Ted's shoulder and giving him a genuine smile.
"Oh no! We came here for you, and we ain't leaving without you. We may not be supers, but that doesn't mean we're leaving you behind here. Isn't that right, guys?" Ted said, turning to face Omniboy who gave a salute and Rift who nodded again.
"That's good to hear," Jake said, facing everyone. Zack was still not smiling. "'Cuz the hard part starts here,"
Everyone turned to face the Bishop. He was still absorbing the Baron, who looked worse than a tied-up corpse at that point.
"Remember, guys. He knocked me out with a casual swing, and I outmatch all of you. Don't pull your punches. Beating him can wait, but right now, what we need to do..."
The Bishop turned to look at them.
He was smiling.
"... is get him away from the Baron,"
Just as he gave the order, the entire team rushed him...
To be continued...