"Lou, we wait any longer, and he'll die!"
Damn it, Lou!
Now wasn't the time for him to switch from a reckless idiot to this calm, composed strategist. We needed to act—NOW!
I opened my mouth to plead again—
But then, her words cut through the air like a blade.
"Ground below, rise with fury! —Stone Spikes!"
A blinding brown glow flared in her hands. The magic coalesced, twisting into a jagged spike of stone that spun unnaturally fast. Too fast.
The other slaves screamed.
I lunged forward—too late.
The spike ripped through the fallen man's chest.
A sickening crack. A hollow gasp.
A gaping hole where his heart should be.
His lifeless body slumped forward, unmoving.
No... No, no no no no…
My breath hitched, my entire body locking up. It felt like the world had blurred, like time had stopped just long enough for me to process the pure, burning rage flooding my veins.
Finally, Lou reacted.
His eyes widened, the breath catching in his throat. "What the… Where did that come from?"
His grip on me loosened.
That was all I needed.
I broke free, Flow surging into my Morphblade.
"Magic," I spat, the word almost foreign on my tongue.
"Magic??" Lou echoed, his voice laced with sheer disbelief. His shock wasn't unexpected, but I didn't have time to explain.
Not when—
"Earth beneath and stone around, form a prison, strong and sound—Stone Cell!"
The ground convulsed.
Jagged stone bars erupted from the earth, trapping the remaining seven slaves in a tomb of rock. Their desperate cries were muffled by the shifting stone, their fates sealed.
"What the… Damn it!" Lou cursed, his shock melting into a cold, deadly resolve. He unsheathed his sword in a flash, his voice now a low growl. "Stay back, Bug. I'll handle this."
The audacity.
As if those words could hold back the roaring storm inside me.
My past clawed its way to the surface.
I had waited so long for this moment—so many years spent actionless.
Never again.
I launched forward, the Morphblade twisting into a scythe in a flicker of silver light.
I only saw her.
The woman. The mage. The murderer.
Her crimson robe billowed as she lifted her head, a twisted, humorless laugh spilling from her lips.
"Oh?" she sneered, her expression dripping with amusement. "Did you truly think I didn't notice you?"
A pulse of brown energy crackled through her tattooed arms.
"You shouldn't be taking us C.O.M. so lightly!"
The woman's laughter rang through the clearing, sharp and manic.
Oh, so that's why she locked the slaves away. She didn't want distractions.
She wanted to deal with us first.
Her hands rose, the brown glow around her fingertips intensifying, Mana thrumming in the air like a second heartbeat. A new incantation slithered from her lips—
"Ground below, rise with fury! Stone Spikes, pierce and impale!"
The same spell—
No. Stronger.
Judging by the sheer weight of Mana gathering around her, she wasn't just summoning a few spikes—she was conjuring a storm of them.
"Lou!" I shouted. "Stone Spikes! LOTS of them!"
He snapped his gaze to me, brows furrowing. His eyes flickered with something unreadable—suspicion? Questions burned behind them, but there was no time for explanations.
The earth convulsed.
With a deafening crack, jagged spikes erupted from both thin air and the ground, a volley of death tearing toward us.
Move!
I lashed out, Flow surging into the Morphblade, shaping it into a whip.
Snap.
A precise flick of my wrist—the whip cracked through the air, deflecting the deadly projectiles before they could impale me.
What about Lou?
I shot a glance at him.
His sword danced like a silver blur, cutting through the spikes with clean, fluid strikes. But his eyes never left me, burning with unspoken words.
"You're hella suspicious, Bug."
I ignored him.
Instead, my focus zeroed in on her.
That sadistic grin. That overwhelming Mana. That murderous glee.
I crouched low. Then—I exploded forward.
A burst of speed, the world blurring around me. My Morphblade curved into a deadly arc, aimed straight at the woman's smug face.
Victory was a breath away—
Until the mud surged.
A wall of sludge erupted from the ground, thick and foul, blocking my path in a sickening squelch as my weapon sank in the mud.
My blade sank into the mud.
Tsk—I'd been too focused on attacking. Too focused on Lou, on closing the distance. I hadn't paid attention to her chanting.
Then—a tremor.
The mud wall shook.
Her voice rang clear—
"By the power of earth and stone, rise and strike with force unknown—Rock Pillar!"
The wall convulsed, pulsing with malevolent brown light.
Then, with a deafening crack—
A colossal stone pillar exploded from within, surging straight for me.
Damn it!
I wrenched the Flow from my Morphblade, sacrificing my attack in a desperate attempt to escape.
Too late.
The pillar slammed into me.
Like a warhammer. Like a charging beast. Like a meteor crashing into my ribs.
Pain detonated through my body.
The impact sent me hurtling through the air, the world tilting, twisting.
Before the ground could claim me, a strong arm snatched me from the air.
Lou.
He grunted with effort, staggering slightly before setting me down. His grip was firm, steady—annoyingly so.
"Listen to me, Bug!" he barked, eyes locked on the robed woman. "Magic, you say? That changes things. I thought this Mana stuff was just... extinct, after all."
Extinct?
MAGIC EXISTED IN THIS WORLD?!
Why the hell was he telling me now?!
I barely swallowed my rage, but the questions burned. Lou shook his head, not even sparing me a glance, his sword gleaming in the dim light.
"Forget that for now. You break the cage. I'll deal with her. If this plan goes to hell, we'll think of a plan B."
Tsk. I hated to admit it, but he was right.
I was a liability right now. My anger blinded me, made me reckless. Charging at a magic user head-on was a death wish.
"Got it," I gritted out, forcing myself to focus.
With a burst of speed, I darted toward the imprisoned slaves, shoving aside my frustration. The sting of humiliation warred with cold logic.
Lou, meanwhile, took a... different approach.
He sauntered toward the woman, an easy, almost lazy smile on his lips.
"Uh, hey there." He waved. "Listen, about this whole magic situation... I wasn't trying to be rude before, you understand, right? Didn't mean to call you old by saying it's extinct and all..."
Her laugh sent a chill down my spine.
Then—she vanished.
No—not vanished.
Materialized.
Inches from Lou's face.
Her breath ghosted against his skin as her fingers traced his cheek.
"No need for formalities, Lou Haventon," she purred, voice laced with honeyed malice.
Lou and I flinched.
She knew his name.
My grip tightened around the Morphblade. Who was she? What was her connection to Marloth—the entity she kept invoking?
What even was Marloth?
How did she know the incantations of Gloria's kingdom—a kingdom that belonged to my past life?
The questions piled up, but one thing was certain.
This woman—this moment—was the closest link to my past that I'd ever had.
Lou, to his credit, recovered fast.
"Looks like I'm more famous than I thought," he quipped, attempting a bravado that almost hid his unease.
Then—he lunged.
His fist blurred toward her face—
But she moved like liquid.
A ripple of movement—she was gone.
Lou's punch connected with the ground in a sickening thud.
And then—
The earth churned.
"Soil below, become fluid—Quicksand, ensnare and sink!"
The impact site shimmered brown.
I skidded to a stop, eyes widening.
"LOU! GET YOUR HAND OFF THE FREAKING GROUND AND JUMP!" I screamed.
Lou, like the absolute idiot he was, blinked at me—confused.
"Huh?"
The earth collapsed beneath him.
A swirling vortex of muck and sludge swallowed his legs first.
"What the…" He yelped in surprise as his arm sunk next, his free hand grappling for stability.
The woman's laughter rang out, sharp and cruel.
I groaned.
"I TOLD YOU TO FREAKING JUMP!"
Tsk—moron.
Unlike Lou, I wouldn't have been caught so flat-footed.
Years of battling mages had honed my instincts—trained me to anticipate spellcasting.
But this?
This was a stark reminder of Lou's limitations.
Sponsor or not, Flow Practitioners weren't built for abrupt shifts in reality.
They knew nothing about magic.
I shook my head. No time for Lou—I had to get to that cage before she pulled something worse.
My Morphblade hummed, shifting in my grip, its shimmering form twisting into a longsword—razor-sharp, ready to slice through the stone bars and free the trembling slaves.
But fate had a cruel sense of humor.
The instant Lou was no longer her primary focus, the woman's head snapped toward me.
No—not me.
The cage.
A slow, chilling smile stretched across her lips, her crimson tattoos pulsing.
"Stone and earth, heed my call! Encase in silence, entomb them all—Stone Coffin, seal and bind!"
The earth rumbled.
The bars twisted. Warped.
In the span of a heartbeat, jagged stone morphed into walls, closing in around the helpless slaves.
"NO!" I roared.
I lunged.
Too late.
The walls snapped shut with a sickening, bone-crushing finality.
The screams—raw, desperate—were cut off mid-cry. Muffled gurgles. Then… nothing.
Silence.
The metallic tang of blood hit my nostrils, sharp and suffocating. A slow, dark seep of crimson oozed from the cracks of the freshly formed coffin.
I staggered back.
A deep, unbearable cold spread through my chest—something heavier than rage, sharper than grief.
Powerless.
Speechless.
My hands trembled as I fell to my knees. The Morphblade, still gleaming, felt mockingly weightless in my grip.
They were gone.
Not just dead. Erased.
And I hadn't done a damn thing to stop it.
"Damn it!" Lou roared, his aura exploding to life.
Silver energy crackled around him, disrupting the quicksand's grip just enough for him to yank himself free. His foot found solid ground, and before the woman could react, he whipped his sword through the air, the gleaming blade spinning toward her like a silver comet.
She didn't even flinch.
Her lips curled into a sneer as she chanted, "Soil and water, mix and rise!"
The earth obeyed.
A thick wall of mud surged upward, swallowing Lou's blade mid-flight. It clattered harmlessly into the muck, its momentum lost.
"Is this all you've got, Sponsor of Experience?" she mocked, her voice a blend of amusement and disdain.
Lou rolled his shoulders, shaking off the last of the quicksand.
"Not really."
In the blink of an eye, he vanished.
A blur of movement—then a sickening crunch.
Lou's fist collided with her face, sending her hurtling backward like a ragdoll. She tumbled across the dirt, kicking up dust and blood.
But Lou was already on her again.
A second blur. A second impact.
This time, his grip latched onto her collar, wrenching her up like a lifeless doll.
"Spit it out, hag!" he snarled, shaking her as her face twisted in pain. "Who were those people? Why'd you kill them? Was that really magic? And what the hell is this Marloth nonsense?"
Her body trembled in his grasp.
Then—a sound.
A soft, weak chuckle.
That chuckle turned into a guttural laugh.
Lou froze.
The woman's head tilted back, her crimson tattoos suddenly blazing with light.
"Marloth, oh glorious Marloth!" she shrieked, "I have failed to gather the required souls... But I still offer you my own! Accept me! Take my life, for it is all I have left!"
Lou and I exchanged a look.
What. The. Hell.
I crept closer, torn between morbid curiosity and the overwhelming urge to run.
Then—her body convulsed.
A pulse of crimson light rippled from her tattoos, illuminating her crazed expression.
"Thank you, oh merciful Marloth..." she whispered, her breath ragged, her grin grotesque.
Then—her skin withered.
The color drained from her flesh as if something had sucked the life out of her in an instant. Her eyes sank into their sockets, her limbs shriveling into a grotesque, desiccated husk.
Lou's expression twisted in disgust.
With a grunt, he tossed the corpse aside, the once-living woman now nothing but a gray, mummified shell.
He clicked his tongue, wiping his hands on his pants like the mere touch of her remains left a stain.
"Damn it!" Lou cursed, frustration and something heavier—something like guilt—etched across his face.
But I ignored him.
Instead, my steps carried me forward, toward the horrifying stone coffin.
The Morphblade shimmered, shifting into a sword. With a single slash, the stone split open, revealing a gruesome mass of mangled flesh and shattered bone.
Blood. Limbs twisted at unnatural angles.
It had been a while since I'd seen a scene like this.
…Nostalgic.
But I wasn't here for the carnage.
I crouched, my gaze scanning the wreckage until I spotted what I was looking for—the collars.
Most were bent, buried beneath the bodies, but one had survived mostly intact. I reached for it. Cold, blood-slick metal met my fingertips. A single, gleaming purple shard was embedded in its surface.
Tsk.
Just as I thought.
Soul-Leeching Collars.
Tools made to suppress and consume. At first, they drained the Mana of the wearer. Then, once that was gone... they started devouring the soul.
A truly disgusting piece of magic.
Lou must've sensed something in my expression because he finally approached. His fingers brushed against the collar as he lifted it, his brow furrowed.
"What in the…?" He turned it over in his hands, examining the strange purple shard.
I exhaled sharply, standing. Enough of this.
"Soul-Leeching Collar," I said, my voice tight. "it drains that mana of the wearer then — once you're out of mana — it starts draining your very life force."
Lou stilled.
His grip on the collar tightened as he slowly lifted his gaze to me. His expression was unreadable—conflicted, maybe. Suspicious, again.
A nine-year-old girl had recognized an artifact that baffled a seasoned warrior like him.
Yeah. That was bound to raise some questions.
Lou exhaled sharply, sheathing his sword. His eyes locked onto mine—piercing, unwavering.
"What are you?"
I blinked. "Lina Lapis?"
"Tch." He clicked his tongue. "Quit dodging the damn question! How the hell did you know those incantations? You were throwing signals at me before she even finished chanting!"
I turned away, an awkward smile tugging at my lips. "Ahaha… That… Ehehe, I, uh, watched a lot of live-action shows with magic, so—"
Lou's brow arched.
"Didn't you say you grew up on nothing but violent, no-magic anime?"
…
…Crap.
Of all times, he had to start using his brain now?
"Bug… we need to talk, right?"
I met his stare for one second.
Then I looked away.
"Yeah," I muttered, the weight of my secret pressing down on me like a boulder.