"But what are you saying? Who are they coming?" Skyler's voice would not come out.
Her mind let out a terrified yelp. She was shaken beyond what she could call her innards, to the very core of her being. The unease was pulling her apart. Her brain was frayed, twisting, falling apart. She was being slashed into pieces, unable to remember what a logical thought felt like.
Then she blinked heavily, dumbfounded by everything.
"–Oi Skyler, are you alright?"
Skyler heard a familiar voice calling her name. Her vision returned to normal, everything around her began to move. Elijah's hand was on her shoulder, shaking her body repeatedly.
His brow was furrowed and his ears were perked up. It was as if he had smelled danger. It could be said his attitude was very much like that of a dog.
Skyler seemed to stop holding her breath when she was sure her fingers were moving as she intended. She gingerly touched her own chest, confirming from the outside that her heart was making quiet beats.
She could move her body, she could talk, she could hear her gasps. But the unease remained.
"Erm, ah… E-Elijah?..." Skyler muttered, voice faint.
Elijah looked at Skyler, his tone was serious. "Get ready, it looks like those monsters still want to play with us."
In the midst of terror, Elijah cast his frowning gaze to the hall behind Skyler.
Skyler slowly turned her head, the sudden chill running up her spine made her gasp and narrow her eyes.
In the dimly lit corridor, monsters with four thick tentacles instead of legs and unnaturally bent arms were crawling towards them. Skyler had no doubts, they were the same monsters they had fought on the bridge!
They were glaring at Skyler and Elijah with a bloodthirsty look. It was predictable that they were ready to attack them with their long tentacles.
"You're, huh… really annoying. You don't give us a break, eh, you damned ones." Elijah laughed dryly as he smiled.
The monsters shrieked shrilly. They were so deafening that they fueled Skyler's anger. It was like they wanted to sabotage their mission to defeat the Cursed Beast in every way possible.
"Tch… damn you, if you wanted to die you just had to ask!" Elijah yelled.
As he vented, he drew his sword from his robe, dashing rapidly towards their direction.
In a direct confrontation with bloodthirsty monsters, the first thing you had to do was sharpen your senses and observe their moves. Having trained for years in boxing with Benson, Skyler knew full well that the moment you let your ego or distractions get the better of you, you are doomed.
So, she struck a pugilistic pose with parchment and the dagger in both hands.
Meantime, the monsters stretched out their tentacles towards Elijah ready to pierce him, but he parried their attacks with his sword. The way he was handling it could only be described as a beast.
He would spin around, duck down so low it looked like he was crawling on the ground, and at times he would step on the stone walls to evade their tentacles as though he was completely ignoring gravity.
"It's absurd, I didn't think he could be so skilled." Skyler was fascinated.
As Elijah laughed proudly, he fended off the monsters with his sword. Most of the slashed monsters crawled to the ground in agony. Their deafening screams echoed along the hallway.
"Let's see who among you'll be next to die." Elijah mocked the monsters.
Just as he was laughing heartily, the monsters began to crawl rhythmically into every corner of the hallway. They stretched out their slimy tentacles simultaneously aiming at Elijah, but he coldly cut them all down by swinging his sword.
In response to their attack, Elijah threw the torch to the ground and leapt into the air, holding the sword in both hands. With a clean and precise movement, he drove the sword deep into the rib cage of the monster on the ceiling, causing the dark, nauseating liquid to drip onto the floor.
However, just when he was about to land on the floor like a feather, one of the severed tentacles on the floor generated a reddish sting from the spilled liquid that rapidly shot out of him aiming for Elijah's back.
Skyler immediately threw the dagger horizontally, which collided with the sting and sent it off course.
"Thank goodness I pulled it in time…" Skyler breathed a sigh of relief.
Then she knelt on the ground and unrolled the parchment in mid-air. Looking at it carefully, she noticed that the spell she had cast on the bridge had vanished. The realization shocked her tremendously.
In other words, she had a limited number of spells she could cast with the parchment.
She shook her head violently. Though her body was shaking with despair, she could not afford to waste any precious time.
"Thanks a lot, you saved me from a very bad situation." Elijah muttered to Skyler.
After he landed on the ground and jumped back, Skyler unrolled the parchment halfway, glimpsing a new spell written in ancient Creria.
"Oh, God of Beasts, purge the eternal abyss with your mighty walls of ice. Grant me the will to fight with your beastly spirit. In your name I command evil to die." Skyler's voice was firm and soft at the same time.
Upon casting the spell, bluish balls came out of the parchment, which gently fell on the monsters. From the corners of the corridor, sheets of ice formed on the giant tentacles of the monsters, which were gradually engulfed in ice.
Elijah seized the opportunity, and with a quick sprint, began slicing through the remaining monsters with his sword.
Oof! Oof! Oof!
A pool of blood was forming on the ground as Elijah continued to kill the monsters without restraint. Skyler picked up the torch. A sense of urgency to puke was growing stronger, making her look away with her lips twisted.
※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※
The tentacled monsters were finally exterminated.
Albeit they defeated them with little effort, the fight still took a long time. Even if they didn't have a pocket watch with them, they were sure that about half an hour had passed since they met. For that reason, there was no need for them to rest after the fight.
On the other hand, there was still the Cursed Beast that they had yet to defeat, and neither Skyler nor Elijah knew how long it would take them to take it down.
"I think we can continue on our way. I don't feel their presence, so there's no need to worry." Elijah stated, picking up the dagger from the ground.
Skyler's lips twitched. "...I want to go home. I… don't think I… could take it anymore."
Her head suddenly felt heavy, her legs went numb as she leaned against the wall. Her adrenaline had completely vanished from her body and in its place was exhaustion and shaking.
Compared to her, Elijah looked as fresh as a daisy. Sure, his white robe was stained with the dark blood of monsters, but he did not seem to be exhausted from the battle although he fought more than her.
One thing was certain for her, demihumans had more stamina than the average human.
Elijah took the torch from Skyler's hand, "Come on, we're almost there. You don't want to give up now when we still have the Cursed Beast to find."
"You sure are a very brave person, Elijah."
"Eeeeeeh, don't just stand there with that sad expression. Get up and fight, otherwise how am I going to do it without someone to cover my back?"
Elijah had a warm expression. He didn't seem arrogant, on the contrary, it seemed a genuine look, as if he cared a lot about her well-being.
Skyler stared at Elijah with pursed lips and moved her back away from the wall. She kept her smile as strange pangs hit her every part of her body, however, Elijah's smile slightly reassured her. They were two opposite emotions that clashed strenuously with each other.
"Damn everything. This place is the worst of all…" Skyler expressed.
"Oh, you can say that loudly. You had great reflexes before, though, you have my respect."
"Well, I... thank you very much, even if I didn't do much…"
"What are you talking about? You're very good at reciting the Beast God's spells for a witch. I'm almost surprised."
Both Elijah's voice and expression were tinged with sympathy for Skyler who was overwhelmed by her emotions. Nevertheless, as his sympathetic attitude intensified the odd emotions inside her, she had to say that they needed to hurry up.
"We'd better keep walking, we cannot waste any more time." Skyler said.
Elijah nodded spontaneously, and began walking with her.
As they walked side by side, the putrid, metallic smell of blood grew stronger. Skyler swallowed hard, trying to resist the temptations in her stomach. She knew full well that if she gave in, she would be deprived of her strength. Hence, giving in in a dangerous situation was literally out of the question.
"This is the second time you've used the spell, so there are three more left on the parchment. Man, will that be enough?" Elijah wondered to himself.
"Er, that's what I r-really hope for. And besides, you d-don't have m-much time, so we'll make do with w-what we have."
"There's no need to be nervous. With my strength and your reflexes we'll complete this Trial. Haah, I'll have to take a hot bath when I get home."
"You sure are out of the ordinary."
Skyler was stunned as she said those words.
Elijah's acrobatic movements, cunning and agility were almost similar to those of the Sword Saints of the New Testament Century. Sure, he was a bit too reckless at times, but for a boy younger than her, that was already out of the ordinary.
She could only be grateful to have someone like that to help her complete the Trial. But, whilst continuing walking, there was one thing that was bothering her.
"Ehm… ah, do you think we're on the right path? Wouldn't it be b-better if we went b-back and went d-down to ground f-floor?" Skyler glanced at Elijah.
"Just trust me. My father always told me that in any respectable tower there can be secret passages that can lead to specific places. My instinct tells me that there's a passage nearby, so this is the right path."
"I hope it's as you say… um, you know, people tell me that you demihumans are bloodthirsty beasts, but… I actually disagree."
"Mhph… I can understand a bit. We brought slaughter to your homeland during the War of the Daemon God of Abyss, so it's natural to be angry…"
Elijah spoke in a sorrowful tone with his gaze lowered. He kept his cheerful expression while staring at Skyler's eyes. From this eye contact, it was evident that their relationship was slowly growing although they were two completely different people from different continents.
Skyler laughed wryly as she looked forward with a wistful look. She wanted to say something, but the words wouldn't come out. As she clutched her necklace with her hand, Elijah held out the torch to look forward. Then, the illuminated hallway ended abruptly.
In front of their eyes–
"A mural!?" Elijah exclaimed with his jaw dropped.
Using the light of the torch, Skyler took a few steps and stared intently at the mural.
It was colorful. It depicted a white, half-ruined sanctuary shrouded in moss and vines with a dense forest behind it. On the sanctuary's roof was a cross with a radiant layer that made it look holy. In front of it, there was the figure of a woman with long bluish hair and soft features. Her face was covered by a black tunic that reached her heels with a purple cloak, though it could be seen that her full lips were dark purple. The woman was kneeling with her ear resting on a woman's womb.
The other woman who was on the right, had long, wavy blonde hair that reached her knees and clear blue eyes that made her appear pure. She had white flowers in her hair, and was wearing a long white dress that completely revealed her slender shoulders. She was looking happily at the other woman who had her ear resting on her swollen womb as though she was mesmerized.
"The Lady of Nature…" Skyler murmured, glancing at the blonde woman.
"The other one is the Sovereign Mother of Heaven and Earth. It's the first time I've seen them together…"
"Ehm… yea, for me too... then it's queer, w-why is Lady of Nature pregnant? She hadn't had children at that time."
"Incredible, amazing. If I'm not mistaken that should be her sanctuary. Eeeh, I remember that it was created in the Divine Kingdom during the Old Testament Century."
Elijah's eyes were completely wide open whilst admiring the mural. His furry ears perked up as if he were in ecstasy.
Skyler, on the other hand, frowned, completely lost in thought. From Elijah's words, she gathered that the Divine Kingdom he had mentioned was the place where the Ancient Sovereigns resided before the First Disaster.
However, while myths and legends arose about them, there were some unresolved aspects draped in mystery.
"By the way, I agree with you. The fact that the she was pregnant is really new to me." Elijah recalled, narrowing his eyes.
"So you find it queer too?" Skyler asked.
Elijah nodded. "Eeeh, they made me study it to the point of exhaustion. The Lady of Nature was defined by believers as the Goddess of Purity because of her virginity. And for that reason she didn't want to have sexual relations. Uh-oh, now that I remember it seems she was so beautiful that they compared her to the Goddess of Wisdom and Conjuration."
"If she was called the Goddess of Purity because she was a virgin, how come she was pregnant?..." Skyler was lost in thought.
From the legends her father told her, the Lady of Nature was a goddess highly respected by the worlds, especially the Human World which she protected from extinction during the First Disaster along with Mother Sovereign of Heaven and Earth and the Dragon God of Miracle and Concealment.
It was said that until her death, the Lady of Nature had no love interest with other gods, but the mural in front of Skyler changed everything.
"Whoa, now that I've seen her I can see why she was so revered by the Sword Saints. She was surely a goddess in her own right." Elijah said curiously.
"You are right. I wonder who she fell in love with to lose her purity."
"Who knows. In fact, I really don't think we even need to know—" Elijah trailed off.
His tail straightened and his brow furrowed suddenly. He quickly approached the mural, putting his ear close to it as if he wanted to hear something.
Elijah peered at Skyler with a serious gaze. "Here we're, I feel the wind beyond the mural."
"So that means there is a secret passage? But that's very good."
"See, I told you there would be a secret passage, but you don't listen to me. Well, now all that's missing is a way to open it, eh…"
"I apologize… if I doubted you… for a moment."
As soon as Skyler offered her sincere apologies in a soft voice, Elijah removed his ear and began inspecting the wall. Skyler wasted no time and decided to inspect the wall along with him, looking for a mechanism to open the secret passage.
Eyeing at it in practical terms, she remembered hearing that people tended to unconsciously touch the symbols on the walls in order to open a secret passage. Perhaps it had to do with dominance, such as the dominant hand; that was said to be one way of thinking about it.
For that reason, Skyler began to touch the various points of the mural with her hand, trying to follow the same theory. Her eyes then turned to the cross on the roof of the sanctuary. It was so mesmerizing that she touched it unconsciously with her slender fingers.
The moment she touched it, the right side of the wall crumbled, turning into pieces of stone fragments that landed on the ground. In its place, there was a rectangular opening about two meters high and draped in darkness.
"Absurd, you were terrific... eh, now that we've found the mechanism we can move into the passage." Elijah said in amazement.
Ignoring Elijah's enthusiastic statement, Skyler swallowed hard, her legs shaking. She stared tensely at the passage, ready to venture into the undergrounds of the central tower at any cost.
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East Mennork.
Taking advantage of her uncle's absence, Evelyn Throne hid in her chemistry laboratory together with her maidservant Agnes.
After a lot of hard work of preparation, she fixed a pentagram of red below her. That pentagram for her represented an immense and great opportunity that would change her life forever.
"My mistress, are you certain you wish to proceed with this? Your aunt is most opposed to the idea." Agnes said, lowering her eyebrows.
Evelyn's heart pounded loudly while she stared at Agnes. Her maidservant's voice was filled with sorrow and melancholy as if she had given up in her attempt to dissuade her.
She didn't blame her. After all, anyone in Agnes' position would have worried about what she was about to do. Even Skyler, a dear friend she cares about deeply, would have worried if she was in Agnes' position. In fact, she was sure that she would stop her at all costs.
Whilst the lanterns lit up the laboratory, Evelyn placed her eyes on the candle she was holding and then glanced at the other candles placed on the table next to her.
"I'm ready to proceed. Of course I know what risks I'm taking, I dare say. But I'm ready to accept that risk, Agnes." Evelyn's voice rang like a melodic bell as she curved the corners of her lips.
She looked at the grimoire that was on the table. Albeit once it was done there was no turning back, she was ready for the consequences.
Evelyn narrowed her eyes, voice serious. "I'm ready to become a Daredevil."