Senva protected his head with his hands as the person, bald one, had a beard and mustache but was messy and not in a good way. It was like he forgot he even got it. It was growing out everywhere all at once. He kept kicking Senva until he couldn't anymore, then stopped. He took deep breaths before taking a long one, while admiring his art, and nodded with satisfaction. Bruises and cuts were all over Senva's body as he coughed up blood. His organs seemed to be injured as well because his mouth was doing the job of bringing them outside his body, in bits and pieces.
"Should've greeted the big boss." The bald guy said while pointing at himself. After which, he spit on him and turned around, walked back to his gang crew. They welcomed him back like he was some war hero, all save one, brown hair, brown eyes and fair features, but his age gave him some wrinkles, maybe they were from all the frowning he was doing, taking everything too seriously.
"You were too hard on him." He said and received an annoyed look from everyone. They didn't know why their boss had kept him. They would've disposed of him if the boss hadn't stopped them.
"Relax, Rehlem. He's no trouble."
Rehlem scrunched his eyebrows together. That's why his forehead was all liney. He felt something different about Senva, a weird vibe, his guts were telling him to be careful and he very much trusted his guts. It was the reason they were very much alive till this date, otherwise the band of bandits had only one end in Avaloria: death. He bargained for their freedom from the Alliance and didn't want anything or anyone to screw it up.
Upon seeing the frowning Rehlem made the bald guy raise an eyebrow, he turned toward Senva, who was in the same position as before, like he was kicked to unconsciousness. He could believe himself to be able to do that. He then turned to a person next to him, sharp nose and a crooked smile over it as he played with the blade. Who knew how he smuggled it inside?
"Nilfen, finish him," the bald one said, to which Nilfen replied, "With pleasure."
He walked toward Senva, still playing with the knife. He even yawned, maybe trying to tell everyone how bored he was from all this or maybe something. Who knows? Upon arriving next to Senva, he sat with his knees bent, his foot carrying his entire weight. He used the knife to nudge Senva, and could hear a sound coming from his mouth, but too faint to discern what he was saying.
"What?"
Nilfen got closer to him, but even then he couldn't hear him. He leaned in even closer and when his ears were a few inches away from his mouth; it happened. Senva bit his ear, almost tearing it from his body.
Ahh*
Nilfen screamed as he tried to get away from Senva, but his mouth was holding tightly onto his ear. If he yanked it a little more, it might come off. He bled profusely.
"Don't… Ahhh*"
He didn't get to complete his wonders when Senva used his other hand and grabbed the knife that Nilfen dropped during this chaos and slashed at him, how can he make such a decision with such damaged mind was unknown but he succeeded in giving him a deep cut over his chest, wanting to pierce it but the boss had broken his bones.
Nilfen screamed in pain and flailed, and became successful in freeing his ear, or what remained of it, from Senva. He tumbled back and used his hand to stop the blood. But unknown to him, something invaded his body, using the wound as a gateway.
While this was taking place, everyone else present was shocked. They looked at this scene playing on in a daze. A moment ago, Senva was laying there, almost dead, but then suddenly, he got up, full of life, and attacked with such viciousness.
The bald guy, Kolfel, was in the same boat. He didn't expect the matter to escalate to such a degree. But he came out of his astonishment the next instant and said, his voice filled with coldness, "Kill that bastard."
He also followed along and rushed toward him. Ghedan let out a long breath. He knew something was up, but Senva, being this suicidal, was out of his expectation, well they were going to kill him so it might not be that unexpected. He followed others, although unwillingly, he still had to play a part if he did not want to end up like Senva.
Everyone in the camp hurriedly circled Senva. No one wanted to miss this, and soon Senva was surrounded by everyone.
The crew punished Senva, someone successfully grabbed his knife and handed it to Kolfel, who, upon receiving it, plunged it into his heart. Everyone stopped when they saw that. Kolfel was not done as he twisted the knife a couple of times, making sure he did not survive before getting it out. Blood flowed out of the hole and Senva fell to his knees.
For a moment, clarity returned to his eyes, and he saw Kolfel and others looking at him, their mouth corners crooked up, sneering. He just stared at Kolfel for a while before closing his eyes and but this time he said something different, "It's watching you…"
Kolfel goaded, thinking that he was rallying him, and said, "We haven't even…."
Boom*
The tent was blasted to oblivion. The soldiers outside and those in the 20-meter vicinity got hit by the shockwave. They staggered, but other than receiving minor cuts, like a sharp blade passing by them, they were okay.
The same was not true for the people who were inside the tent. Many groaned in pain, while some wailed when they saw themselves critically injured. Surprisingly, no one was dead. Even Kolfel, who was standing next to the bomb, i.e., Senva. How did he do that when he was a non-practitioner, it was completely unknown.
Kolfel looked down, he was missing an arm and grimaced in pain. He was their boss for a reason. It took him a moment to suppress it, but when he did; he looked at where Senva was. A small crater had been formed, but not a single piece of Senva remained.
"What's going on?"
"What happened?"
Many questions could be heard coming from the vicinity, but he couldn't answer even one. He felt his vision turn blurry and before he could do anything about it, his eyes rolled back and so was his fall.
Thud*
Was the answer to all the questions that were being asked. Soon the epicenter was surrounded by soldiers, who took care of everything, sent the injured to the infirmary and inquired what had happened from those who were not.
The two guards, who were at the entrance of this camp, gulped when they heard it was because of Senva and heaved a sigh of relief. Good thing they didn't mess with him.
"I told you, Orinthalian are madmen."
"Thank goodness you didn't stop him."
"Yeah."
They felt like they had dodged a bullet and were saved from this horror, but little did they know it was just the beginning.
.....
'What is this?' Erik mumbled as he looked at the red thread. It was not a thread anymore and had become a rope with multiple ends to it. He observed the tendrils coming out of this rope-like thread and could tell that something had happened to Senva.
'Did I mess up?'
He used mana to connect to one, but his control over it was not good enough and with the tendrils moving around; he ended up connecting to multiple.
"What.."
"Wha…."
"...was"
.
.
.
Erik hurriedly let go, as he felt a little dizzy. Too many visions and voices had made his head spin. Valcroy, who was almost about to doze off, felt something amiss and his eyes opened.
"Young master," he said, but didn't continue as Erik motioned for him to stop talking. He did so and sat next to him, observing him. Clearly worried that something had happened to him. He thought for a moment before standing up and was about to call Collum when he heard his voice telling him, "Don't call anyone."
He could only comply and turned back, saw Erik shaking his head like he was getting rid of the dizziness, didn't work for him when he tried that. Upon regaining clarity, the first thing Erik saw was Valcroy's face looking at him curiously.
'What happened?'
He thought, completely ignoring Valcroy, who observed him for a moment before walking back to his position and closing his eyes, time to doze off once again. He knew Erik was alright.
Erik turned his vision inside and he was back, standing at the edge of the black mist lake, looking at the tendrils of red thread that moved around like they were alive. He knew he touched too many simultaneously, which resulted in that headache. Nevertheless, where did these tendrils come from?
He wanted to know, but who would answer? He looked at Valcroy and decided not to ask. Val didn't even have access to inner vision, and he was sitting here, sleeping the whole time.
He thought for a moment before calling Collum.
"Young master?" Callum looked at Erik and found that he was a little different, something about him seemed a little off. He couldn't put his finger on what it was. The same was true for Valcroy, but Collum didn't pay attention to him. Neither Erik nor Valcroy knew about this.
"Take him to the Crucible of Endurance." Erik said, pointing toward the "meditating" Valcroy.
Collum's eyes narrowed when he heard the name and turned toward Valcroy, who was oblivious to it all and was almost on the brink of the dream realm. Collum wanted to dissuade Erik. He could tell that Valcroy wouldn't last an hour inside, much less a day, which was the minimum amount one needed to stay in. And without Kendrick's help, they couldn't even open it once it was closed. His mentality wasn't strong enough for that place.
"You don't need to worry about him." Erik said when he said the skeptical expression on Collum's face. From what Valcroy told him, the world he was in before was a lot scarier than the chamber of endurance he was sending him to. If one can overcome the mental challenge, they'll be able to train their body to extreme inside and in a few days, they might even reach their extreme limit.
Erik woke Valcroy up and told him about it, which made him look at Erik with wide eyes. Collum thought he was doing it because it sounded cruel, but swallowed whatever consolation he was about to give him when he heard him say, "There's such a good place?"
He looked at Valcroy's starry eyes, almost blinded him, and missed Erik's smirk. He looked at this duo and could only put the common sense aside when dealing with them. He then brought Valcroy away while Erik sat down and trained his mana control.
He really felt he was lacking it when he saw how much precision one needed to control those people. He also got buffer time, as he was told by Mallory that she needed time to tally everything that the "nobles" had. So everything was delayed by a day, but the "nobles" were now under strict supervision and it would remain that way until they leave Iron'Heits.
The enemy lines had the same situation, as he received the report of the explosion behind enemy rank, which was covered up as a magic experiment gone wrong. He cared no more, as he trained his mana control. At first he looked at the giant hand made up of all the mana around the black mist, surrounding it from all sides. This mana was used to temper the inner organ, but Erik was using it to learn how to control it precisely, which knights only learn to do when they were in the advance knight realm (Advanced Practitioner/Artist)
So one could see that he was already very, very ahead of his peers when it come to mana control, but he didn't want that, he wanted to have the same control that Valcroy had over those people. Call it a competitive nature or obsession. He didn't care, as he was determined to achieve that.
Valcroy, meanwhile, was also busy tempering his body. Which was going too smoothly, making him feel if this was really the way it should be.