As Kai completely threw himself to his left side in hopes of not dying, he was suddenly struck with a realization that what he had done just now instinctively had already marked an end to his life.
It was true that he had gotten away from the trajectory of the incoming blurred creature—most probably the griffin, in this case—he had jumped from a height of 10 meters, which was enough to break several of his bones and render him immovable, if not straight up death.
His eyes quickly darted right, locking onto the griffin gliding past him at an astonishing speed while he barely dodged the extended span of its wings.
Realizing that the first death had been dodged, he extended his hands and legs downwards, straightening them up as much as he could at a slanting angle.
At that point, Kai had only one thing on his mind.
'Better to lose my hands than my spine' he thought as he adjusted his arms to form a down-sliding angle.
As reckless as it sounded, it was the most sane decision he could've made in such a situation.
With the momentum and angle he had jumped from, it was only a matter of seconds before his head kissed the ground, and the only way to stop it would be to use his limbs to intercept, avoiding the risk of instant death.
The 10-meter-long fall felt like an instant as he fell to the ground in a mere fraction of a second.
And just like he had planned, Kai landed on his Hands. For a moment, he felt as though his arms had disappeared completely, but the very next second, as if his numbed senses had begun to return, he felt a sharp pain surging from the very tips of his fingers like a turbulent waterfall ascending backwards.
Next, his body hit the ground with a crackling sound as his ribs rattled frantically. And at last, with a rather soft thud, his feet landed onto the ground safe and sound.
"Keukk..!" A low painful groan escaped the nearly shut prison of his mouth as he quickly straightened himself and began to stand up almost immediately.
Without a doubt, He was in pain as his expressions reflected it all, and yet, he chose to get up and run rather than to mourn over it like a child.
Not like he had any other choice to begin with.
'That griffin... If it's the same one I know about, then it's probably already thinking about attacking me...' He took in a deep breath as he steadily and quickly rose and stood up while his numbed hands helplessly dangled around his body.
'No way in hell that prideful fuck is gonna let this slide...' he narrowed his brows and looked straight ahead.
It wasn't the time to think about useless things as such, because if the griffin was truly as prideful as Kai had heard him to be, then no doubt, his survival rates had hit rock bottom.
Barely holding onto the thread of his life, he sprinted ahead with all his might.
'Even just standing there won't do me any good... The time won't flow any differently for me'
It was, but yet another problem he couldn't dare to forget about. As much as he wanted to do so, the system only seemed to shove it more into his face.
---
[Current Time - 40 minutes]
---
To Kai, the flow of time only seemed to have gotten faster while he was yet to even get a gist of the final destination of his never-ending marathon.
It hadn't even been long before he noticed a strange light appear behind him, slowly illuminating the path in the dead darkness of the night.
He turned his head sharply right and tried to look at what was behind with the side of his eye.
The next moment, he was stunned to his bones as a sharp, cold sensation ran through his spine.
It wasn't exactly a grave reaction that he'd display over the sight of the potential death, but even THAT was by no means less of a threat.
Just as he had expected, the griffin hovered in the air at a height with its beak wide open.
Around him, small fine particles of golden glow shimmered in a divine light, converging around its body as though it were under its control.
Its beak was wide open with a small sphere of the same divine light hovering in its beak while convulsing as if it were alive.
More and more of the same light converged into that sphere, making its light grow brighter as its size only seemed to grow smaller.
Its eyes glistened in a bright golden light, pulsating outside as though it were creating snake-like waves of energy coming out of its eyes.
For a moment, Kai couldn't help but look at the mesmerizing warmth of the golden light that reminded him of someone he had only seen for a few minutes which felt like countless lifetimes.
But then again, he was in no position to gaze at such things. Almost instantly, he pounced all the way to the left and hit the wall brutally.
His eyes, though, didn't let go of the sight of Griffin even once. Just as he had jumped, the griffin retracted its body with a slight shock as it extended its head ahead and opened its beak wider than before.
Within the split of a second, the compressed sphere of golden light shook violently before finally unleashing its wrath—creating a giant ray of light that extended forward from ahead of its beak.
*Bang!*
A loud, ear-deafening bang reverberated in the vicinity, as a subtle but advent dust storm had arisen from the ground that had become the target of the griffins' attack.
Kai, too, was affected by the sudden noise, but he couldn't let go of the sight of the griffin. One of his eyes rebelled completely while the other shut tight, trying to absorb the shock that had been inflicted on his mind.
Swayed by curiosity, his eye rolled back to quickly take a look at the area of effect.
However, as soon as his gaze locked onto the ground that had just been struck with the Griffin's attack, his pupils shrank without any delay, and his eyes widened.