Upon emerging through the door, the Battle team soon found themselves in a dense forest shrouded by mist near a small lake.
"Is this the right location, I wonder?" Tetsu asked.
"Seems like it. But I don't see anything resembling a fortress." Aria said.
"Maybe because...its up there." Lan said pointing to the air to a large floating castle up in the air.
"Wow. How did we miss that?" Sonata asked.
"Whoa! Check that out! Its a floating castle!" Asta said.
"Hmm. With the amount of magical mist in this area, it certainly does make a perfect place to hide from the naked eye." Arthur said.
"Huh, that's strange… I thought the other Knights were supposed to be here like Igor said." Nora mentioned.
"It was about time you arrived, Asta." a voice said as they saw Yuno standing there with the rest of the Royal Knights.
"Yeah...sorry. Had a bit of trouble getting here." Asta said.
"So these are all the Royal Knights...I don't even need to look at them to tell their magic is incredibly powerful." Elementa said.
"So...the one who missed being picked up, just suddenly shows up with a bunch of strangers, huh?" a voice said as a woman with long red hair stood before them.
Captain of the Crimson Lions
Leader of the Royal Knights
Mereoleona Vermillion
"Gah! I'm sorry!" Asta said in fear.
"Well you're here now. But who are they?" she demanded.
"We're the Dimensional Heroes." Jexi said.
"And we're the Lost Thieves. Currently, we'll be acting allies of the Royal Knights." Arthur said.
"It doesn't matter who they are. As long as they are able and willing to fight, we'll allow them with us." said a man with white hair with a strange ornament hanging from the hair in the front.
Captain of the Silver Eagles
Nozel Silva
"But in the end, we don't have the time for idle chatter. We'll need to start the operation immediately. Siren, I believe your usual spell will be alright." Nozel said to a man with blond hair.
"Of course." he said.
Golden Dawn
Siren Tium
"Stone Creation Magic: Stone Model of the World!" he said as a stone replica of the fortress was created from the very earth itself and showing a diagram of the inside of the building.
"I see. This place is structured like an ant hill where we can enter at any angle. Should be pretty easy to invade." Mereoleona said.
"Hmm...from the looks of things, they have several powerful mages wielding some powerful magic with someone incredibly powerful in the center." Sci-Twi said.
"That has to be their leader." Jexi said.
"Yeah, Licht's at that point for sure." Asta nodded.
"He does know Licht isn't his real name right?" Rainbow whispered.
"Just let it go. We're still going for the leader all the same." Jexi said.
"Captain, what is our plan?" a black haired man asked Nozel
Silver Eagles
Nils Ragus
"I'm captain of the Silver Eagles, not the Royal Knights. Ask her." Nozel said.
"Normally, in a place like this, we would enter separately at many different points, however given how they likely know the inside, this just makes it easier for them to pick us off one by one." Mereoleona said. "Which means the most logical tactic is…"
"Oh, I know!" Asta raised his hand. "We just have to psych ourselves up so we can fight these guys even harder!"
"I can take care of them myself. No psyching up necessary." Yuno said.
"I'll fight them ruthlessly and crush their bones into powder." Luck said.
"I shall use my immaculate power and clear then out in one beautiful swoop." said a handsome man with short orange hair.
Vice Captain of the Coral Peacocks
Kirsch Vermillion
"Please just disappear already." said a young girl with long orange hair.
Golden Dawn
Mimosa Vermillion
"I'm surrounded by morons…." a young girl with silver hair in pigtails sighed.
Black Bulls
Noelle Silva
"If the idea is to break up their numbers while maintaining an advantage, balance is the key. So the idea would be to break up the Royal Knights into teams of four, is that right?" asked a man with short blue hair and glasses.
Golden Dawn
Klaus Lunettes
"That's right. The Royal Knights will disperse into five teams of four while those other two teams...they can do whatever they want. What they do shouldn't involve us." Mereoleona said.
"That's fine by me. I only got mixed up with their little Redux. Long as I'm not on a team with the Obnoxious Little Rugrat I was tasked to pick up and those heroes stay out of my way, I'm fine with this." Zora said.
"Hey, just cause your mask is cool, doesn't mean you can put us down like that. Although, you were facing those kingdom soldiers for awhile so you should be glad to team up with me." Asta said.
"You'll change your tune once I save your weak ass from certain death. Also, shouldn't you guys be thanking me because I did most of the work on those Pugilis soldiers back there?" Zora asked.
"If by work, you mean seriously injure them with your Trap Magic, then yes." Sunset said.
"Enough!" Mereoleona said as two flaming lion claws grabbed Asta and Zora's heads. "You two problem children will be on my team."
"At your service, lady royal. In fact, I hope you'll accept this rainbow stinkbug as a token of my appreciation." Zora said flicking it towards her only for a lion paw to grab it and shove it into his face as it released its stink.
"Such a feeble odor is not nearly enough to disarm me." Mereoleona said.
"Okay, but is it really alright for two commoners to be following you?" Zora asked.
"Commoner...noble...neither of these things matter in the least. All I care about is either you're strong or weak. You two made it here because you are strong, right?" Mereoleona said as the two looked serious and determined when hearing that. "The same goes for all of you! Now listen up, I've assigned your teams. Team 1 will attack the upper left, Team 2 will take the lower left, Team 3 will cover the upper right, then Team 4 will go for the lower right. And we three of Team 5 will attack head on. Our spacial mage, Kob, will reside outside as a quick escape."
"Then I guess for us...we'll attack from the right…" Jexi said.
"While we strike from the left." Arthur said.
"Give it everything you've got, knights. Here we go!" Mereoleona said as they quickly dispersed throughout the fortress with all sides of the attack force quickly laying siege to the inner workings of the fortress.
"Whoa...this is just crazy…" Asta said seeing a trail of flames left behind by Mereoleona's spell. "I don't think they even need our help."
Meanwhile elsewhere inside…
"AAAhhh. Ah man. I gotta take care of things here while Patri's gone. Oh well….guess it's all on me." a man with black hair with a white streak said as a third eye appeared on his forehead.
Eye of the Midnight Sun
Rhya
"Hopefully...they'll get the stones before too long." Rhya said.