The super-compressed air and the dense liquid inside the shell were propelled to extreme speeds towards the outside of the dungeon core. All of the remaining fraction of mana was turned into kinetic energy to form a blast wave in hopes of creating some confusion to allow the vessel to run. Ben hoped the empty vessel would somehow work. He would not see the results so this was his final gamble.
The shockwave quickly traveled outwards. Whatever it came in contact with turned into superheated, supersonic shrapnel that carried enough energy to pierce through steel plate armor like it was made of air. Even the extremely light and brittle shell of the dungeon core gained so much velocity it was more deadly than an anti-material sniper rifle.
Lucky were the ones who stood close to the source of the explosion. They died in an instant, being turned into red mist and a bunch of shredded, burning bones and metal scraps traveling faster than the speed of sound.
One of the monsters, the giant wolf with two heads was reduced to an abstract painting on the wall of the dome-shaped boss arena. Its large frame caused it to face the brunt of the shockwave. Its mangled, cooked corpse was pinned to a wall with several large objects carried alongside the explosion.
The second monster, the ice golem whose sturdiness made it impossible to defeat by the adventurers alone was now partially vaporized, and the remaining parts turned into a pile of rubble.
The metal sphere that served as Alzena's shield was hidden behind several meatshields at a considerable distance from the center of the explosion, even so, it was sent flying into a wall. Alzena, being a witch utilized all her mana to strengthen her body to withstand the impact.
The shield served its purpose. The only reason why Alzena managed to survive the second impact with the wall was because of the force dissipated by folding the thick metal sphere. The price of survival was, unfortunately, anything below Alzenas knees was cut off by the metal ball folding inwards. The metal also got scorchingly hot. The girl felt her body burn at the bisections on the legs, but was too stunned to move.
When she crawled out of the sizzling remnants of the shield, Alzena was covered in burns.
I fell down on the unscorched piece of ground where the dungeon core used to be. There was a small circle where the destruction did not occur. Everything outside it was obliterated.
I felt everything differently. All the senses I used to peek at the battle through the dungeon core felt heightened yet numb.
It felt heightened, because I saw, heard, felt everything to the extreme.
My eyes could see everything perfectly despite this place being entirely deprived of light and thus engrossed in darkness. I could also see through the mist that arose in the aftermath of the explosion.
Similarly, I could hear, no, feel the vibrations of the ground that indicated there were tunnels collapsing all around me.
All of that also felt numb because while I received the information, it was hard to comprehend.
My plan was to use the confusion around me to finish off these people before they finished me.
It's kill or be killed.
Then, I found a problem. My body feels foreign to me. If I want to move, I need to control every muscle individually. It was as if you were placed an intern on his first day at work in a control room and told to control a very complex machine. There were about 800 buttons, each to control a single muscle in that machine. Press the button and the muscle would contract. Mash them randomly and I'd get cramps.
No time to waste, I have to act, fast.
First, use hands to push myself off the ground-
SLAM! The ground shook and cracked. The singular piece of ground that wasn't destroyed in the explosion was just destroyed by my palm hitting it like a hammer and I fell face-first into the crater.
Ouch, that hurt. Okay, the situation is worse but not the worst. The previous control room with buttons became a control room with sliders, and each slider was made of countless other sliders that allowed me to move one cell at a time. On-demand cramps are possible.
While I was twitching and getting a hang of this body, Alzena struggled to crawl towards the center where I was. She was covered in blood from head to toes (now knees lol) as she left a bloody trail on the ground. She had strong internal bleeding and would soon die. I glanced around, and there were more people alive, but they could not even crawl because they were either unconscious or limbless.
By the time Alzena reached me, she nearly passed out from blood loss. I pitied the girl whom I did not even know. She was a slave and she was dragged into this place against her will. With my peerless vision, I was able to tell after a single glance that her injuries were fatal. Ruptured eyes drove her blind, her eardrums were blasted and she became deaf, and her burnt skin only brought pain when touching anything. Several organs were destroyed, stopped functioning, and were internally bleeding. Even her hand that managed to reach me was broken.
I slightly panicked and almost punched Alzena when she touched me. I managed to stop myself from doing that after remembering her conversation with Ben. She should be on my side.
*Clang*
Something poked at my stomach. It was a long dagger held by Alzena. There, great pain, but she overcame it. Desperation was written all over her face. Without any hesitation, she thrust the dagger towards my chest.
*Clang* The dagger bounced off again. Alzena bit her lip and aimed up. Her next spot was aimed at my neck, but it slid off my skin. She tried stabbing me a few more times, each strike was strong but fruitless as it was deflected by my skin time after time. I pondered why that is. I recalled the bickering between Ben and Aurora where there was revealed how I am closer to a weapon than a living bein- Ah that hurt like hell! Alzena struck right in the center of my throat and the blade dug deep into my flesh.
She stabbed me! Get off me you psycho, I don't want to die with you!
Then, if that wasn't enough, she used her remaining ounce of strength to twist the knife in my throat before finally collapsing.
Argh. The bleeding is serious. I pulled the dagger out of my throat and noticed something odd. Everyone has, (well, used to have, now it's everywhere but inside them) crimson red blood, even monsters. I however had black blood that looks different, smells different, and mmm… even tastes different. Their was slightly salty, a little sweet, and you could feel iron, mine was tasteless. When consuming blood I also noticed mine, unlike theirs, did not carry oxygen - hence no presence of iron. There was also something else in my blood. Some sort of energy - mine had slight traces of it but it was hard to sense as if it was dead. Alzena also had it, and it was a lot more alive.
I glanced at the dagger which was drenched in my black blood. The tip became dull from stabbing me. Argh, the more I thought how easily I got tricked, the angrier I became and stabbed Alzena in her throat. It went in without any trouble, so I didn't need to stab her multiple times.
As it entered, I perceived the blade avoiding most of the blood vessels. I was amazed at how bad of an attack it was. To think she is so lucky even to the last moment. Or maybe it's ill luck? She would end up dying slowly. The stab not killing her immediately was a good thing in the end. I thought, and she deserved all the extra pain.
I managed to stand up but it was super hard to keep my balance with the manual controls.
There was a pool of blood where I lied. Ah, I lost a lot of blood.
I took a step forward. The world spun.
I took another, but I didn't move from my spot.
Weird.
I took another and nothing happened.
I was already on the ground, and my vision started to blur. Now I am the one who is going to bleed out and die. Through the blurry eyes, I saw was Alzena's corpse convulsing.
I slowly blinked. When I reopened my eyes it took me a while to figure out how eye focus works. Alzena was in a different place. She still had the dagger in her throat, but desperately tried to stuff some snow soaked in my blood into her mouth.
I blinked again in confusion. Why is she not dead?
Alzena moved to another spot where she started convulsing and screaming without end. She ate more of my blood off the ground in between the screams. There was something odd going on. Her flesh was rapidly regrowing. The process looked extremely painful as bones sprouted from her scorched snubs, then new healthy soft tissues wrapped around the bones to reform her lost legs. At the same time, all the burns were disappearing, and her pale face was regaining its color. The more she ate, the faster the healing was.
In less than ten minutes, Alzena was standing again. She yanked the dagger out, and the neck wound rapidly closed.
I touched my neck, it was still bleeding just as profusely.
I glared at her. She was walking around with the dagger and everyone else to make sure they were dead. Her mouth was moving, I think she was saying something. When she finished, she went to the pile of gold and started stuffing a bag full of gold. When it was full, she flung it over her shoulder and cursed at its weight. She then grabbed an absurdly large greatsword which somehow remained intact after the explosion. It was a weird sword - it was made of black metal which felt dangerous. Its toughness did not make sense to me. The design was elaborate, it was adorned with engravings and ornaments. Most outstanding was its monomolecular edge that could cut anything.
Alzena walked up to me and asked.
"Are you a monster, or are you not? I feel that if I leave you alive, you will cause a lot of trouble... Very big trouble that can be avoided if I end you right here."
I tried to speak, but my consciousness was fading. Alzena turned around and started walking towards the only tunnel leading out of this place that did not collapse.
"Well, it's not like troubling the right people is a bad thing for me. To them, I was a monster too." Alzena laughed. Then she stopped, turned around and eerily smiled.
"Hey, failed second stage boss of the final boss... once you get out, can you not destroy the capital Argent Kingdom? It's my home."
I watched her walk away
'That is… my… money…'
Then, everything went dark.
A man was crouching at the edge of a large crater. He punched on the ice below his feet.
"Hard. Harder than iron."
He looked at the giant cavity in front and pondered how strong the explosion must have been to cause this.
"General. We counted the corpses. Ten are identifiable. Prince's among them. Sixty people died here. No survivors"
General nodded. His intel mentioned a 60-strong group raiding an impossible dungeon.
"This complicates things. We need to delay-"
"A survivor!" Someone shouted from afar.
The general walked up only to find a strange yet gorgeous girl lying on the ground. She was naked, and there wasn't a single wound on her body, not even a bruise despite surviving something no man was able to survive unscathed. He noticed countless things about her that indicated she was not a human. One of such things were two, large crystal horns protruding from her forehead.
He placed a hand on her body to feel the heartbeat.
There were five. The general pondered what to do with this for a long while.
"Take it to site 17. Dr. Miller will find it… useful."
The girl was carried out of the Frozen Abyss and loaded on a wagon where the mounds of treasure from the dungeon were moved to.
The day came to an end, and a heavily armored convoy departed on a long journey eastwards. Until they reached their destination - a place where villains, heretics and alike gathered. The place where everyone was unified under the symbol of a phoenix.
The Old World Order organization
An empire rising from ashes.