Aura ran.
No conscious thought. No strategy. No hesitation.
Pure, primal terror consumed her tiny body, overriding every instinct, every learned behavior. The moment she had felt the weight of that thing's awareness—the Abyssal being slumbering inside the coffin—her mind had snapped. Not with reason, not with logic, but with the inescapable certainty of death.
Aura had encountered many powerful beings before. Nadia, a 7-star beast-tamer, the indigo-grade Abyssal creatures they'd seen in the other chamber, even the horrifying process of the breeding pit.
But this? She had never faced anything that made her feel so certain of her impending doom before.
It had barely done anything—hadn't moved, hadn't stirred, hadn't even acknowledged her.
Yet that presence had completely overwhelmed her mind with terror.
