"I see the light!"
Nathan's face brightened as the golden sun's rays bathed his tired features. The warmth was a welcome contrast to the cave's oppressive darkness. With Anya still unconscious on his back, he pushed forward.
Nathan and Dante emerged from the cave, their bodies weary. The sight of the waiting security guards brought a brief but comforting relief.
The guards quickly took Anya from Nathan, ensuring she was carefully carried to the medical tents. Nathan and Dante were escorted to another area, where their minor injuries were treated promptly.
Anya's treatment took longer, but the doctors reassured them she would recover in time.
But for now, their thoughts lingered on something else. They couldn't shake what Anya had told them before they left the cave.
On their way back to the surface, Anya had told them of the dreadful fate that had befallen her and Avril.
It turned out the two girls had taken the [Bounty for Dreglord] quest as their final task to advance to the next floor.
But, unfortunately for them, the dreglord had outmatched them in every possible way.
At first, everything had gone well, thanks to the guards from the Manalight and Starlight families, who served as shields.
Every noble house sent their well-trained unawakened guards to act as meat shields for their children.
These guards would either team up with the noble or work with each other, following their master and ensuring they safely completed the advancement conditions.
In this case, Anya and Avril had formed a party and had two additional parties of guards following them.
But as they ventured deeper into the mines, the dregmites grew more ferocious and numerous.
However, that wasn't even the scariest part.
The sheer number of these monsters forced the group to flee constantly.
As they were chased, they had to change routes and paths repeatedly, as every fork seemed to lead to a new group of dregmites ready to ambush them.
Before they knew it, they were baited into a carefully set trap by the dreglord as they found themselves at a dead end.
With no choice but to fight for survival, the two parties of guards took the vanguard, holding off the horde of dregmites.
However, the overwhelming numbers soon began to take their toll. The four guards were losing their footing, sustaining more injuries with each passing moment. Despite their efforts, a few dregmites always managed to dig past them and reach the girls.
This forced the two nobles to engage the monsters themselves.
Avril stood at the front, her rapier a blur as she stabbed the dregmites that leaped from the dirt. Her aim was precise, the blade driving straight into their heads with a single thrust.
She had practiced the art of fencing since childhood, and it showed in the way her movements were fluid and efficient. The rapier pierced their large oval heads effortlessly, each strike a testament to her years of training.
Anya, on the other hand, wielded her polearm staff with deadly precision, keeping the dregmites at bay. She swung it with power, pushing back the growing tide of monsters that threatened to overwhelm them.
The two girls worked in perfect harmony, their coordination a result of years of friendship and trust. Anya controlled the crowd, holding them off, while Avril reduced their numbers with swift, calculated strikes.
For a time, it seemed like they might actually make it through this. But as the minutes passed, the constant battles began to take their toll.
'SPURT'
The first guard fell. A dregmite had jumped onto his back, its sharp claws sinking into his nape before he could react. Blood spilled onto the ground, and panic began to spread among the remaining guards.
Just when all hope seemed lost, Avril's voice rang out.
"Don't give up!!"
She stepped forward, taking the place of the fallen guard. With a swift strike, she killed the dregmite that had taken him down, her rapier driving deep into its skull.
"We can make it through this, just a bit more!" she shouted, dodging a charging dregmite.
"You're right, My Lady!" one of the guards called out.
"Let's do this!" another shouted.
"C'mon!!!" they all cheered in unison.
With Avril at the front, the group regained their morale. Their renewed vigor pushed them forward, and after what felt like an eternity, the last of the dregmites were slain.
Exhausted, they collapsed to the ground, a collective sigh of relief escaping their lips as they finally found a moment of peace.
To their misery, the peace didn't last more than half a minute. The ground trembled beneath their feet.
"Something is coming!" one of the guards shouted, his voice filled with dread.
"Oh no... no... no..." another muttered, his eyes wide with terror.
"More are coming!" the third guard cried, his hand gripping his weapon tightly.
The three remaining guards gulped in fear. The lamps and torches around them had already been broken, leaving only the faint light from their helmets to illuminate the dark, narrow path ahead.
As they stared into the dimly lit distance, something slowly began to take shape.
A trail of dirt flew up from the ground as a massive mole, nearly two and a half meters long, erupted from the earth. Its monstrous fangs and claws glinted in the dim light, and its demonic face twisted into a maddened, sinister smirk.
"Ahhhhhhh!" one of the guards cried in terror.
"Kyaa!" Anya gasped as she dropped her staff, her hands trembling in fear.
Everyone froze as the dreglord slowly crawled toward them, its monstrous form moving with terrifying precision through the narrow path.
What followed was a brutal massacre. The guards tried to fight, to shake off the monster, but they were no match for the dreglord's overwhelming strength.
One by one, the guards were torn apart as the dreglord chewed through their flesh with its shark-like teeth. Their cries were drowned out by the horrifying sound of the creature's claws tearing through bone and sinew.
Anya, on the brink of losing her sanity, felt her stomach churn. She was about to vomit when Avril snapped her out of it.
"Listen to me carefully, Anya..."
Though Anya wanted to argue, she couldn't. A sharp slap from Avril silenced her. It was enough to crush any thoughts of heroism she had left.
Avril knew her best friend couldn't stand against such a beast. It was only a matter of time before both of them would be consumed. Her plan was simple—Anya would use her blessing to blind the dreglord, and Avril would face it from then on.
As the blinding flare of light erupted from Anya, the dreglord staggered, momentarily stunned. Seizing the opportunity, Avril activated her inherited blessing,
With swift and agile movements, Avril deflected the madly struck blows from the frenzied monster, each strike narrowly missing her. She maneuvered carefully toward one of its slanted legs. Focusing the light-imbued chakra at the tip of her blade, she thrust it into the monster's foot. The blade sank in by an inch, piercing the tough skin with ease.
Normally, infusing chakra into a weapon requires at least the third stage of chakra mastery. But with her blessing, Avril was able to create an aura blade, though its power was limited by her current chakra level, making it less refined than the advanced versions.
The dreglord howled in pain, kicking her away along with her blade. It lunged forward, but Avril rolled to the side just in time, narrowly evading the strike. The fierce exchange began as she continued to dodge and strike, her every move calculated, her focus unwavering.
She fended off the dreglord's vicious strikes, keeping its full attention on her. This gave Anya the opening she needed to escape as she crawled silently, her heart heavy with the weight of what she was leaving behind.
But the
Anya, driven by desperate instinct, lunged forward, flipping from her crawling position to avoid the strike. Her reaction was too slow and the tail grazed her leg, blood oozing from the wound.
"Eyes on me, sharky!" Avril shouted, her voice fierce. She swung her rapier in an uppercut, the chakra-infused blade tearing through the monster's skin as it struck the beast's jaws.
The dreglord flinched, momentarily distracted, before it roared in fury and turned its attention back to Avril. This gave Anya the opening she needed. She ran, her heart heavy and tears streaming as she cried out for Avril's bravery.
But the horror of the massacre haunted her. Despite the bleeding wound and the pain, she ran as her heart raced in fear, the images of her fallen comrades forever seared into her mind.
That was all Anya could recount before she collapsed, overwhelmed by exhaustion and the mental toll of recalling the traumatic memory.
In the corridors outside Anya's resting room, Nathan and Dante exchanged grim looks. They were trying to figure out a way to hunt down the dreglord.
Nathan couldn't help but reflect on how wrong he had been to underestimate the dreglord. The misfortune of the two noble girls had become a cruel reminder to him. If he took these challenges lightly, his fate would be no different—if not worse—than theirs.
"I still think we need to stick to our plan," Dante said, breaking the silence between them.
Nathan's frustration boiled over. "Are you crazy?" he snapped, his eyes wide in disbelief. "You want to charge straight into the Dreglord's lair? After everything we've seen? Haven't you learned how it hunts?"
Dante didn't flinch. His gaze remained steady. "That's exactly why we need to act now. If the Dreglord throws a horde at us, it's better to take them out quickly. We've already wiped out a good number of them. The rest, including the ones the nobles killed, won't be able to repopulate for months."
Nathan's fists tightened as he listened. Dante's reasoning was simple but undeniable. If they didn't strike soon, the Dreglord would rebuild its forces. It wouldn't hesitate to use their lives as a means to wear them down.
Nathan then realized something else—Zhong Han's time limit for this quest wasn't just an urgency. It was a warning. A warning that the Dreglord's power and influence wouldn't wait for them to regroup.
'That must be why he made this quest a free-for-all,' Nathan thought, finally grasping the harsh logic behind the chairman's plan. There was no room for complaints, and he knew it. With a resigned sigh, he spoke,
"All right. But instead of waiting until the quest's final day, we will have to take down that monster within the next three days, at most."
"The two of us won't be enough," Dante said, scratching his chin, his gaze fixed on the room.
"NO!" Nathan snapped, understanding the unspoken message, but the idea felt cruel to him.
"Sometimes the only way to recover from a trauma is to face the source of it once again."
Dante got up and walked toward the glass frame of the door. His gaze settled on the small girl, peacefully asleep. Her steady breathing seemed to contrast with the tension that hung in the air.