The maid squad is too strong, what use is there for me, the Demon King?

Inside the circular hall, the battle continued, but the pace had changed.

The men in black robes, like a well-trained pack of wolves, no longer rushed to kill. Instead, they used their tacit cooperation and a barrage of ranged attacks to continuously compress Phoenix's space and deplete his precious magic power.

The spatial barrier flickered and hummed under the onslaught of dense elemental magic, dark rays, and treacherous arrows.

Phoenix's face was even paler than before, and fine beads of sweat appeared on his forehead.

He not only had to maintain a wide-ranging defense, but also had to constantly deal with the sudden, sharp slashes from the sword-wielding gray-robed man (Alpha), which were enough to tear through ordinary defenses, as well as the swift and fierce bites from the most ferocious one (Zeta).

On a mental level, the annoying interference (Kappa) was like background noise, constantly trying to undermine his concentration.

He was like a moth caught in a spider's web, finding it extremely difficult to flap his wings (cast spatial magic).

If he weren't a ninth-tier powerhouse whose understanding and control of space had reached a state of perfection, allowing him to use his power in the most exquisite and economical way, he would probably have already exhausted his magic power and been swallowed up by this endless wave of attacks. But even so, he knew that this was by no means a long-term solution.

Just then, Sophia, who had been floating to the side by Phoenix's gentle magic and had been unconscious for a long time, let out a soft groan, her long eyelashes fluttered a few times, and she slowly opened her eyes.

After a brief moment of confusion, the unfamiliar, magnificent yet deadly environment that came into view, and Phoenix, who was clearly at a disadvantage in a fierce battle with several mysterious men in black robes not far away, instantly brought Sophia back to her senses!

"Ah—!" She instinctively let out a short scream, trying to struggle, but found herself being held up by a gentle force, unable to move on her own. "W-Where am I?! What happened?! Your Majesty Phoenix!" Her voice was hoarse from just waking up and filled with immense panic.

"Sophia! You're awake!" Taric, who was struggling to catch his breath and trying to regain his strength in the small safe area designated by Phoenix, shouted urgently. His voice was hoarse from his injuries and anxiety. "We were teleported to this godforsaken place by some unknown force! These black-robed men suddenly appeared and attacked us! His Majesty Phoenix is ​​fighting a fierce battle!"

"Teleportation? A man in black robes?" Sophia's mind raced, trying to comprehend this unbelievable situation. She suddenly remembered the most important person to her and urgently asked, "Where is Philippa?! Where is Her Highness the Princess?!"

Taric's face instantly turned even more grim. He gritted his teeth and replied heavily, "Your Highness... she's gone! She separated from us the moment the teleportation was complete! We don't know where she is now, or if she's safe..."

The news struck like a bolt from the blue, instantly draining all color from Sophia's already pale face. "How could this be..." she murmured, her heart feeling as if it were being gripped tightly by an invisible hand. The princess was alone, her whereabouts unknown, her fate uncertain...

She immediately tried to mobilize the magic within her body, wanting to do something—whether it was to help Phoenix or to find Philippa.

However, as soon as she activated her magic, an extreme feeling of exhaustion and a faint stinging pain in her meridians suddenly came over her, causing her vision to go black and almost making her faint again.

In order to withstand the deadly charge of the Rock Armored Giant Lizard, she had exhausted all her magic power and even damaged her very essence. At this moment, her magic power was completely depleted, and she could not even cast a basic illumination spell.

The harsh reality filled her with despair.

She woke up, but still couldn't do anything. In fact, her heightened awareness made her more acutely aware of her own powerlessness and the danger of her situation.

She looked at the old man in front of her, who was struggling to hold up the defensive line by himself, his back already showing signs of exhaustion; she looked at Tariq beside her, who was seriously injured and could barely protect himself; and she thought of Philippa, who was missing and whose fate was unknown...

A deep sense of powerlessness and anxiety almost consumed her. Her presence at this moment was not an asset, but rather a potential burden that Phoenix needed to protect.

“I’m sorry… I…” Sofia’s voice was choked with sobs and self-reproach.

"Don't speak, conserve your energy." Phoenix didn't turn his head, his voice still steady, but beneath that steadiness lay an undisguised gravity. How could he not know that Sophia's awakening wouldn't make much difference? But right now, he had to concentrate all his energy on dealing with this seemingly endless war of attrition and searching for that almost non-existent opportunity to turn the tide.

The battle in the hall did not turn around with Sophia's awakening; on the contrary, her realization of the desperate situation after regaining consciousness added to the oppressive atmosphere.

The black-robed figures' encirclement remained tight, Phoenix's magic continued to wane, and Philippa, in the distance, was still nowhere to be found.

Hope seems to be slipping away little by little with time.

The battle continued in a suffocating repetition. Spatial barriers lit up again and again, only to dim under the relentless onslaught. Phoenix's mind was like a bowstring stretched to its limit, requiring him not only to calculate the allocation of magical power but also to precisely control every spatial cut to intercept or deflect the attacks.

However, in this intense confrontation, his intuition, honed over many years and belonging to the top experts, began to capture some subtle details that had been obscured by the life-or-death crisis.

Apart from the black-robed man (Zeta) whose attacks were the wildest and whose every move was driven by pure destructive desire, he keenly sensed from the attacks of the other seven black-robed men that they lacked any real killing intent.

The sword-wielding leader (Alpha) wielded a sword with unparalleled ferocity, each strike aimed directly at the weakest point of the spatial barrier, forcing him to fight with all his might. However, the sword's edge contained more "suppression" and "control" than "destruction."

Those dense elemental magics (Epsilon) and dark rays (Sita), though powerful in energy, cleverly avoided vital points that could cause fatal wounds, and were more like area-of-effect blockades and energy depletion.

The strange arrow (Beta) had a tricky trajectory, but it always deviated slightly at the last moment, as if it were a warning rather than a death sentence.

Even the annoying mental interference (Kappa) remained at a level that disturbed him but was not enough to cause mental trauma.

They don't seem to have any intention of killing their own people on the spot...

This discovery was like a bucket of ice water poured over Phoenix's head, instantly sobering him up, but also plunging his heart into an even deeper abyss.

Their objective is to capture him alive!