Everyone turned their eyes to the Captain, even the horde of Mutants.
In his hands, the Twin Sister Revolvers shone with a mystical white light, and from this beautiful white light, strands of red began mixing in.
The red, however, wasn't a source of energy.
It was the Captain's blood.
Mixing and merging, the Twin Sister Revolvers were soon surrounded by a tainted, reddish-white light.
The Captain smirked at that moment, staring into the soul of the frozen Mutant.
"Simmering Lotus, Bloom."
Crack...
The resplendent layers of light cracked apart.
Bit by bit, the pieces of light floated into the sky as a vast volume of fragments bellowed endlessly from the Twin Sister Revolvers.
These fragments broke the endless rain showering upon The Adler, even the deafening noise of crackling lightning retreated before the light.
Finally, the light began to fuse.
Section by section, petal by petal.
Until, in the middle of it all...
An irresistible reddish-white lotus swayed at the centre of The Adler, its petals gracing the mortals below it with elegant charm.
While everyone believed it was over, the Mutant understood otherwise.
Blood doused the Captain's long coat as it poured from every orifice on his face. His shivering teeth clattered together as he spat out loud:
"Raise the sails when it's over!"
Then, the man looked fondly at his revolvers, smirked at the Mutant, and turned the revolvers to his head.
Opening his mouth, the Captain mouthed:
'See you in hell, devil's spawn.'
Bang...
---
Syllian dragged his body through the corridor with a grey cloth tied beneath the sleeve of his right arm.
Pulling himself through, he listened to the noises that came both from in front of him and behind him.
The battle below had gone quiet a long time ago, but that was the battle and not the indiscriminate slaughter of dozens of logistics men that started minutes after.
He could hear the cries of horror oozing from the innards of The Adler.
Soon, those cries would catch up to him, and he was powerless to do anything about it.
'So weak, so useless.'
It only reiterated to him how vile of a sin powerlessness was.
"Help-"
Splat.
The sound of crunching bones echoed from behind.
Luckily, he was already close enough to the broken door.
And in front of him, he witnessed the consequences that came with both his failures;
And his weakness.
---
A second flower blossomed within his brain, dousing the radiating light with a layer of petrifying, dark beauty.
Then, the Twin Sister Revolvers proceeded to shatter into fragments of azure and black light. This light soared through the sky and then returned back to the lotus like a child returning to the embrace of their mother.
The crimson lotus bloomed with merciless rays of dark, scarlet light.
And the target of this murky crimson light...
Illan stood still with frozen dark, swirling eyes. And in those eyes, he witnessed the birth of a lotus that would soon pluck his life.
The Mutant tried raising its sword, it tried opening its mouth, and it tried taking a step.
Unfortunately for it, or fortunately for the others, it couldn't.
The pistils at the centre of the Simmering Lotus fluttered sensually and slowly rose into the air, performing a dreaded dance of inevitable death as they reached the Mutant.
'No! Cursed humans!'
Splurt-! Splurt-! Splurt-!
The pistils repeatedly shot through the infected Illan's body, wrapping around him ceaselessly till not 1 inch of his skin could be seen.
Swoosh...
The pistils pulled back, bringing the entombed Mutant into the core of the despairingly alluring lotus.
And at the centre-
CRUNCH-!
-the Simmering Lotus curled in on itself, bursting apart everything within it with one resounding thunderclap.
Drip...
Black blood filtered through the petals, dripping down its skin entrancingly.
Flutter-
The petals reopened, but this time, they began to wither.
And wither rapidly at that.
Every surviving crewmate looked at the scene in shock, awe, and most desperately...
Horror.
The Captain was gone.
The powerful Mutant was gone.
But.
The horde wasn't.
And only 13 people remained.
The survivors simultaneously locked gazes as the restrictions locking them all in place were lifted.
SCREEE-!
A torrent of arms, obsidian claws, and thousands of scarlet-eyed faces bellowed their constricted hearts into the sky.
As for the survivors, they simultaneously rushed toward the door.
"Run!"
"In!"
"Shields!"
One order after another spurt out of the mouth of the man in the lead, he was too exhausted to let out full sentences. But he understood what had to be done.
That man was Crude.
He wasn't the only one who understood either, it was painfully obvious that they couldn't hold off the Mutants with the men they had left.
The only real option was to bunker down and hope for the grace of the gods that they would survive.
Rushing into the corridor, every crewmate made sure to pick up a weapon and shield.
Bang! Bang!
The horde smashed into the two people guarding the entrance.
Almost falling over, the men behind them drew their weapons and stabbed through the gaps while simultaneously blocking any other Mutants from attempting to squeeze through.
Their lungs were burnt, their hands in severe pain, and their muscles were on the verge of falling apart.
But they held.
"Hold!"
Crude thrust his sword in between their shoulders and tore apart a Mutant's head.
Allen knelt in between the gaps and hammered their feet.
The two men at the front repeatedly stabbed their weapons into the Mutant horde.
"Ugh..." A voice suddenly arrived from behind.
One of the men at the back turned around, terrified but prepared to fight whatever had appeared.
Instead, a singular human crawled over with his torso open for all to look at.
The blood drenching his body was a sight to see in normal times, but the surviving members had grown numb long ago.
Allen, who stood in a relatively safe location, turned and saw the approaching boy.
"Finch?!"
Syllian, however, had no time to care about their bloody reunion.
Pushing himself to the wall, he slowly eased his body up and took in a few deep breaths.
Meanwhile, in those few precious seconds-
"AH-!"
-a claw reaped away one of the lives of the men at the front.
Crude wasted no time and replaced him by charging forth with his shield hoisted high.
With a few breaths to spare, Syllian pulled on one of the nearby men, raised his shaky finger, and pointed to the depths of The Adler.
"What?!"
The man could only let out a tired scream, he couldn't even formulate a sentence.
"They're coming!"
It was too late.
Thud...
Thud.
Thud- Thud- Thud-
The sound of creaking wood came from the other end of the corridor.
Then-
Crack-!
A figure shot around the corner, dressed in a bloodied sailor uniform, a youthful young man slipped around the corner.
"RUN!" He screamed to himself.
Planting his hands on the ground, he crawled, picked himself back up, and began sprinting down the corridor at them.
Behind him was-
SCREEE-!
-an endless horde of ferocious mutants.
Each Mutant swung around the corner, some turning into mush as over a dozen Mutants slammed into the opposing wall.
The noise of bursting flesh and breaking wood hung like a guillotine over the heads of the surviving men.
Crude heard the incoming horde of death.
Felt the incoming horde of death.
"BRACE!"
2 men of the remaining 12 from the upper deck shot past Syllian and raised their shields.
As for the young man running from the Mutants...
Swish!
...he shot by the shieldmen, surviving by the literal skin of his teeth.
Tripping over his feet, the young man rolled to a stop beside Syllian. Gasping for air, the young man looked at Syllian and the blood drowning him.
"Hey?"
"Hey."
Syllian spared him no time.
'This is bad.'
'Beyond bad.'
Surrounded by both sides with just 14 of them, including him and the logistics worker who just arrived, things were not looking good.
Splash!
Droplets of black blood splattered over the two of them, dripping down them into the mixture of water and blood that now flooded the interior of The Adler.
For a time, a cacophony of steel, assault, and endless murder sang through the corridor.
The men fighting for their lives were already at the end of their lines.
To Syllian's right, one of the shieldmen suddenly lost grip of his sword.
A claw cut through the air, slicing into the man's throat.
Fountains of blood sprayed out of the man's throat as he raised his free hand to clamp it down as he drowned in blood.
Slash!
A second claw slashed down, then a third, a fourth...
Until his body was no longer visible beneath the horde.
Another man had already replaced his position, his shield and sword swinging and standing steady as the siege continued.
13 remained.
"AH-!"
The man standing beside Crude on the other end missed an incoming claw by pure miscalculation, but that miscalculation cost him his life.
Splurt...
His mushed eye leaked with brain matter as the claw ripped his head in two, and from beneath another Mutant pulled the body into the horde.
For a moment the delighted sound of feasting Mutants screeched into the ears of the survivors.
12 remained.
Replacing the dead man was the next person in line.
Their morale dropped fast.
An endless tide of demented, horrid Mutants were feasting on them; killing them.
Their Captain was dead.
Less than 15 people remained.
And if you stood at the front, you died.
If you didn't, you will soon die anyway.
Exhausted, broken, and battered.
Clatter...
A shield dropped in front of Syllian with a arm still connected to it, the fingers twitching and curling near the handle. The spot where the forearm was connected to the handle of the shield was a dark blue, bruised beyond comprehension.
Blood still leaked from the end of the arm.
To his right...
Another had died.
11 remained.
Syllian looked at the shield.
'Is it over? Just like that?'
He felt empty.
Unlike the first night when his body rushed with adrenaline and the fact that he had been thrown into a new environment, he was tired now.
'Too tired.'
...But.
His hand still moved.
Grasping the arm connected to the shield in front of the young man's frightened gaze-
Fwip-!
-he threw the arm out.
Slipping his right arm into it, Syllian gradually picked himself up.
He knew that he was too weak to handle a single blow.
He knew that the first impact with a Mutant would kill him.
However...
'Everything's gone wrong since I came here, this Trial of Ruin is more treacherous than anything I've been through.'
...he wasn't willing to just accept his death.
Not that easily.
Right then, when his hand slipped into the shield; when he pulled together his determination.
It spoke to him.
With its dangerously sweet voice; with its devilish tone.
It whispered...
[Second Trial Complete]
Right then, his body-!
Felt nothing.
Nothing changed.
It went silent.
As if it had never spoken in the first place.
A dismal grin rose on his face.
"Ah... So cruel."