Silence.
The battlefield suddenly turned strangely and eerily silent to her.
She looked around and found the battles were still happening, yet, she couldn't even hear the commotion of those nearest her.
She forcefully put it behind her as an enemy wolf was preparing to strike her!
Instantly, white runes surfaced from her neck like a collar. The white runes emitted a pure white light as it silently enveloped her entire body in a slight film.
Most areas of her body were only lightly coated in its protective light armor, but there were other places of interest.
Particularly, the forearms and hands were more reinforced than the chest, head, and shoulders. The gauntlet-like structure ensured a greater leverage of strength and the claws that covered the fingers shone with a pure white light; in fact, the whole thing was shining!
Furthermore, the legs and more specifically, the calves ankles and feet, were especially reinforced. More than that, the white runes that were barely visible through all the light seemed to be attracted to this area. They swarmed the legs like moths to a flame as the light armor began extending itself.
The runes continued their march until they reached the ankles. From there, they embedded themselves into the armor again before it suddenly grew wings! Both of her ankles sprouted a pair of small white, light, wings that fluttered before spreading themselves fully. The runes resurfaced and became a permanent design.
Seeing the wolf who was about to strike, she immediately attacked.
With a sound of wings fluttering, she disappeared from the wolf's eyesight.
Boom! With a strike from his sword, a groove over fifteen feet long and five feet deep appeared within the sand. He missed!
If we're judging by normal standards, and considering this was not a full power slash, then this wolf must be at least rank-6!
Yet, the wolf's eyes turned blank after striking a miss. He looked down and found that a huge, gaping hole had formed where his heart would normally be.
Worst yet, no blood seeped out and a smell permeated from the scorched and cauterized hole; why does it smell so good!?
Thud. He fell to the sand, wondering why his own flesh smelled so enticing to him. And behind him stood a lone figure who had her fist thrust outwards.
She took back her shining arm and wondered why she still couldn't hear anything. She frowned. From the wolf's strike to her own attack, all the way to him flopping onto the sand… she heard none of it.
Suddenly, a noise did register in her ears. It was faint at first, but gradually became clearer and clearer.
It was the sound of her heart beating.
As it became clearer and clearer, it also gained in volume.
The more she focused on it, the more It came back. Soon, it grew too loud for her.
It pounded into her ears and shook her brain, making her dizzy. It grew louder and louder until she couldn't take it anymore and covered her head with her hands, desperate to claw at her brain to get it out!
She gritted her teeth and grunted a couple of times, but she NEVER screamed. Nor did she cry for help.
Even with her heroic performance, it broke past her limits and thoroughly broke her.
Now… there, on the sand, shivering, was a girl who seemed completely defenseless and powerless to her own illness. The beating still grew louder and even a trickle of blood seeped from her ears. Her spasmodic shivering grew more intense with the beating of her own heart, drumming the end of her.
Bathump!
Yet again, her heart was relentless and continued to forsake her as she began foaming at the mouth and her eyes rolled to the back of her head.
Suddenly, it became quiet again. The beating was still there, just that it had become a part of her.
Then again, for as long as she can remember, it always was. The silence resumed and now the newly added darkness ate away at her sanity, gnawing at whatever little sanity she had left from when she was little.
Of course, such a "treat" wouldn't be passed up by the nearby wolves. One such wolf, who was rank-7, walked up to the pitiful girl before summoning her spear.
Its tooth-like tip radiated a dangerous feeling, yet when she struck full force at the pitiful girl, it immediately succumbed to the purest light she had ever seen. The light armor lashed out and not only the spear, even the wolf lady was scorched black; she died then and there.
After all, throughout her life, her purpose was completely dedicated to her strength; so much so, that, even without any concentration at all, her various abilities were all still fully functioning.
A red light flashed from within the light armor, but it disappeared soon after by the radiance of the slightly shaky armor.
Just then, the pitiful girl came to a realization. It was irrelevant to the attack just now and she couldn't even feel it.
She realized the reason for her suffering. In fact, she always did. And she could fix it too….
Then, another person approached her hastily. He wore a black robe that completely covered his figure and behind him, a small army of ten, crazed, wolves massacred their brethren while completely ignoring him; yet they were drawn to him without their knowledge of him even existing.
He ran up to her with a worried look. He vigorously shook her body while shouting, "sister! Ann, wake up! Hey!!!"
Bob continued trying to snap her out of it, but nothing worked, not even his sigil. He even felt he was automatically rejected, as if something was already there.
"F**k…" Bob frowned as he looked at Ann's pitiful figure.
"Damn, where's Ran? He was around here just a minute ago; he should know what to do… right?" He observed his surroundings, but his bad eyesight did not see the person he was looking for. Nor did his ears pick up anything.
It was just… silent. Something… and someone was missing.
"Eh?" Suddenly, Ann's voice broke that silence as her rolled back eyes rolled back, though the blood-filled eyes spoke of a horrible suffering. Her voice was weak and the froth impaired her from speaking normally.
However, with her regained clarity came the heartbeat. It resounded within her skull once again and she clutched her head tightly like a vice, ripping some hair out by accident.
Her eyes cried tears mixed with blood as she spoke, "Ran… he… h-he's gone."
"Gone."
…
Back at the dorm, a certain large feline was bored out of her mind.
Ah… she had already eaten all of the fish within the first half-hour and now, hours had passed by uneventfully. Luckily, her feline genes ensured that whenever she was bored, she could just
Sleep!
Sleep. And so she did. She slept and slept until suddenly, she felt pain.
She looked around, her big black eyes searching for whoever dared to trick the almighty Fluffy! But… she found no such traitor. Then, she saw something. At the corner of her eye, she saw a glow.
When she turned to it, it moved along with her. She kept turning and turning, but it kept turning with her! Thus, an eerily similar scene played out as she tried to find the source of the white-pink glow.
Eventually, her neck started hurting and she reluctantly gave up, vowing to find that wretched glow even if she had to cut her head off!
She rested her head on the familiar pillowy mattress when a jolt of pain shot up her head again. She clutched her head with her paws slightly as she felt a headache coming on.
Then, she noticed that her hands glowed when it was near her head.
Aha! Ba***rd, so you were on my head this whole time! Watch how I beat you up! Thus, she directly slammed her head against the wall.
Ouch! Still glowing huh, I'll see how long you can last when I ram MY head against the WALL.
Yikes, looks like a certain someone was rubbing off too much on Fluffy here.
She continued, but the newly formed headache just kept growing stronger and the glow grew more intense. Finally dumbstruck, she went to the bathroom to see what this damn glow was.
She went to the bathroom and in it, some polished metal stood tall enough to see a person's whole figure.
When she saw herself, the first thing she noticed was the big*ss bump that grew from ramming her head against the wall.
Then she noticed something else. The glow, which had started this whole mess, was coming from this damn scar!
Aaah, Scar-San, how could you do this to her!?
The white-pink scar that went from her nose to her forehead had begun to glow! What was this nonsense!?
As she looked at it, the headache jolted and gained in strength. It was more than an annoyance now and worst yet, it seemed to come from the scar and the glow!
S**t! What am I supposed to do about this? Her eyes watered a little from the sheer amount of pain she was feeling and it only kept growing. And only one person would know about this.
Ran, you ba***rd! See how I deal with you… I just have to find you!
Like this, an almighty roar shook the whole dormitory as she directly broke through the door (yeah, who needs doorknobs anyways) and headed outside.
She noticed that the pain would lessen in certain directions and grow stronger in another. If this ba***rd of a companion had anything to do with it, then he would be where the pain gets stronger! How she came to this conclusion, however, is unknown as her methods are too advanced for a puny human mind to conceptualize.
Using the pain as a kind of signal, she ran towards Rans presumed location.