Astraeus and his siblings descended to the ground of the foyer. Each had their weapons drawn and stared across the large room at the three intruders.

The foyer was made up of marble and had gorgeous paintings and art on the walls. Columns extended from the floors to the ceilings and supported the roof of the building.

Water flowed on the left side of the room out into the main river through a metal grate. The soft sound of water rushing echoed through the silent room.

Astraeus shattered the silence with no delicacy. "I see Crius failed his mission. Oh well, it doesn't matter anymore." The Guardian idly spun his staff in his hand. The Indigo Jewel rested on top of the staff and oozed energy.

Rose began to shimmer and stepped forward. The brightness of her Light Aura was blinding. "Leave." Her command boomed across the foyer. There wasn't even the slightest quiver in her voice.

Astraeus's beady purple eyes darted around in their sockets to look at the other Guardians and confirm what had been said before he started to cackle. "Please Roseanne, can we skip the formalities? You pathetic mortals aren't worth all this pontificating. You will die here and the isles will be ours to control just as our forefathers wanted!"

"Are you all stupid? How can you believe this?" Jacob shouted. "You've seen the prophecies on your islands! You have to know this isn't right! Why else would there be an Eighth Guardian?"

None of the Guardians gave any reaction. "Astraeus, they're boring me. Can we please kill them?" The Guardian with the bow and arrow, Clymene, asked.

Jacob started to stomp his foot in frustration. "How are you this negligent? Why are you ignoring realit-" The rebel was cut off by the sound of an arrow whizzing across the room which he promptly disintegrated. "So it's like that then? Fine, let's do this."

Rose held her staff out and charged up Lumis before turning her attention to the approaching enemies. "I'll take on Astraeus and try and provide as many recharges for Lumis as I can. Take down the other Guardians and then we can try and beat Astraeus."

Jacob nodded and started to run across the floor. Xavier already couldn't keep track of where all their foes were but decided that he'd do his best to give support to Jacob.

Rose ascended into the air where she fired magic at Astraeus who was able to deflect it with his new and improved staff.

Xavier was pulled away from watching the girl battle when he saw something lurking in the shadows. The pirate's fast reaction time came in handy because a trident came flying from that direction and Xavier was barely able to deflect it with his blade.

A large foe leaped from the shadows and caught the trident in midair. The Guardian seemed to be wearing rounded body armor that gave them an almost circular shape and had a helmet on their head. The armor was hard to distinguish from their actual body which Xavier assumed to mean that it was all aesthetic.

"Oi lad, can't I at least know which one you are before you go trying to impale me?" Xavier asked as he backed away.

The titan's eyes narrowed. "Shut up, fisherman."

"Hardly an insult. That's like calling a blacksmith a carpenter." Xavier replied before having to leap back to avoid another stabbing. "Fine then, let's do this!"

Xavier dashed in and engaged the large force in close quarters combat. His blade clashed against the trident and the pirate had to maneuver himself after each collision so that he wouldn't get stabbed.

He fired a few shots from the gun of his blade which had a minimal effect but were at least usable enough for a brief stun that he could land a few strikes on the belly of the beast.

Sadly, Xavier found that the armor wasn't just for show and repelled all of his strikes. The fighting was quickly growing exhausting so Xavier sought out a solution.

The captain started to back away and blast the giant Guardian with ice and then jumped in to kick him in the face.

Xavier's opponent tumbled backward and he followed up by striking the ghastly creature in the legs and then bombarding it with even more ice magic.

Despite the heavy amounts of ice magic being used, Xavier found that he was still not nearly as exhausted as he should have been and that the trident-wielding Guardian was still able to keep on fighting.

The Guardian started to circle Xavier for some sort of opening. Weaving in and out of the Shadows, he lunged at the pirate but each time Xavier was able to stop the approach in its tracks.

It was getting rather exhausting to be constantly turned around by his enemy but the pirate had no other ideas when he was suddenly graced by a cone of light from Rose.

The light struck all around Xavier but didn't touch the pirate which left him unscathed but his opponent in suddenly much worse shape.

There's no way I can kill him alone, but I might be able to incapacitate him. Xavier formed an idea and faced the now stunned Guardian.

Xavier sent force waves of ice and called on the ice in the air to bend to his will. Every ounce of water in the area conformed to his call and incased his enemy before freezing solid.

The layer of permafrost was thick enough that after a few seconds of no cracking, Xavier was able to take a relieved breath.

He turned his focus to Jacob who was seemingly having his way with three of the Guardians.

The rebel knocked away one of Clymene's arrows and then dove to strike the archer. She teleported out of the way but Jacob got right back to his feet so he could fight the Guardian with the glaive.

Jacob knocked the weapon away and then ducked as the Guardian with gauntlets took a swing at him. Fire swirled at Jacob's feet and flew into the faces of his two attackers.

Light then came from above and powered up his sword which he jammed into the gauntlet-wielder. The blow was clearly not the first and it seemed like Jacob was about to gain the upper hand.

The glaive-armed Guardian lunged to strike Jacob from behind but Xavier decided to offer some assistance from afar and put up a wall of ice between them.

Jacob gave him a thumbs up and then received another charge for his weapon. The boy wasted no time swinging his sword into his nearest target several times until they exploded with light.

Clymene began to pelt Jacob with arrows and at the same time, Xavier's ice wall broke into pieces forcing the blacksmith to go into a retreat.

Xavier rushed across the foyer to aid his crewmate. He slammed his sword into the Guardian with an unknown name from behind and Jacob jammed his flaming blade into the injured Guardian.

Clymene continued her barrage of arrows but this time, Xavier created an ice barrier in the air that stopped the arrows and sent it at the archer.

She used an arrow to cut right through it and get close to Xavier and Jacob which was just about the worst choice an archer could make. The two converged on her and began to strike several times.

Just as they were getting tired a blast of light came in which allowed Jacob to triumphantly finish the job. With two Guardians defeated, the duo turned their focus to the one they had stabbed but he was nowhere to be found.

The pirate realized at the same time that the one he had left frozen had vanished and his nerves went right back up. "They're waiting to strike us. Cowards." He grumbled.

Jacob chuckled. "Yeah, they're afraid of me after I took on three of them at once and won."

"Hey, I froze one of them after quite the tango," Xavier added in, which gave him an idea. "I'm going to try something."

The ice mage concentrated and sent out a small wave of ice all around them that suddenly stopped. He pointed his gun at the spot and fired.

Sure enough, the treacherous Guardian with the glaive suddenly turned visible out of nowhere. Jacob sped across the foyer and jammed Lumis into the target. He twisted the blade and started to pour fire magic into it.

The Guardian screamed in agony which seemed to notify Rose to send down a beacon because a blast of light soon consumed them.

The light was absorbed into Lumis which unleashed its power inside of the punctured Guardian and he was soon disintegrated as his sisters had been.

Xavier was slightly disturbed by how well the fight was going but chose not to let it psych him out when there were still two Guardians left to defeat.

The formerly frozen foe was still nowhere to be seen but Rose was doing battle with Astraeus up above them and the two seemed to be evenly matched.

Rose sped through the sky, using the power of her magic to propel herself and unleash giant beams of light that should have engulfed her target.

Astraeus instead was able to absorb the magic into his staff and into the Indigo Jewel. The combined protection they provided made him untouchable.

But Rose's magical expertise made her a force to be reckoned with even if she couldn't directly damage the opposing party.

Rose was no longer able to simply overwhelm Astraeus's magic now that it was powered up by the jewel but the girl was able to put her clever spell crafting to use and come up with dozens of new tricks to gain the upper hand.

Astraeus fired dozens of lasers from his staff that all rushed towards the young girl and she countered by spinning around and knocking each of the lasers away with her staff in an instant.

All of it was clearly making the Guardian ringleader impatient and he began to charge a larger spell. Rose saw the opportunity to get in an attack and sped through the sky.

She rammed into him and then unleashed the full force of her magic into the unprotected Guardian. The magical attack carried her enemy into the ground where she sped down to meet him.

Astraeus's skin steamed from the strike and if the monster could look any more dry and decrepit, he did.

The lone remaining Guardian appeared at his side and Astraeus realized that his brothers and sisters had been beaten.

"This ends now, Astraeus!" Rose shouted and Jacob started to run in to finish things.

Astraeus didn't seem all too concerned. "Oceanus, hold him off for a minute please." The Guardian rushed to meet Jacob head-on and their weapons collided.

Rose sent several light attacks onto the field as the two began close-quarters combat and Astraeus prepared some spell. "He's up to something. Trying to charge some move."

"Let him," Rose replied. "I can counter whatever he throws at us. And this'll be over." As she said this, Jacob cut down Oceanus and the Guardian dissipated.

The boy wasted no time celebrating and dashed across the marble floor to swing his weapon into the staff of Astraeus. The Guardian didn't react.

"I don't like this Xavier, there's no way he'd go down like this," Rose whispered.

Xavier nodded. "Now you see. He's up to something unconventional. We need to get in there before something terrible happens."

They were about to hurry to join Jacob but it was already too late. Purple light exploded from the Indigo Jewel and overwhelmed the pirate's vision.

Xavier forced his eyes open and saw that all four of the downed Guardians had reappeared. They were free of wounds as if none of the fighting had even happened.

"The power granted to me by the Indigo Jewel is beyond your mortal conception! Beyond what any of you could do! This world belongs to us! We have defeated death in all its forms! You mortals worshiped us, and we discarded you! Can't you see? You aren't meant to win!" Astraeus cackled.