Chapter 189: Stagebreaker
Shrouded in drifting fogs and mists, a young man with a battered body and tattered clothes lay against the uneven ash-like ground, his sleepy eyes staring up ahead with a hint of inexplicable emotion burning in them.
'Ah! It feels awful!'
Now that he had defeated the creature, he felt relieved, as if all the worry in the world had vanished, but the peace didn't last that long, though, because all the agony he had been ignoring up until now was beginning to catch up to him again like a tidal wave.
It felt excruciating.
Before falling into this floor, his body was already in terrible shape, but encountering the creature had made it even worse. During this battle, his only remaining hand had been injured, he had lost an ear and a portion of his shoulder, and there was also a severe wound across his chest. Drops of blood kept sliding down from them like leaking water from a broken fountain. To make matters worse, the bleeding from his old wounds hadn't stopped either.
With such a severe amount of blood loss, it was still surprising that he was even breathing at this point.
But it wouldn't stay that way for long.
Because, soon, he was going to die.
Still, if he reserved the little amount of mana he had regained during those passing moments, he should have been able to stop some of the bleeding or at least slow it down. But back then, his own life had been in danger. So, even after knowing what would happen next, he didn't hesitate to use up all of his mana.
If any other person had done precisely that, they would have had to suffer from severe mana exhaustion without a doubt, falling into unconsciousness that would gradually lead them to their death in a similar state.
But for some reason, ever since he entered the dungeon today, he wasn't suffering from it like he usually did. At first, he assumed it was some kind of fluke or something that didn't make any sense, but having experienced it twice in a row and in less than three hours even made it obvious that his mana core was acting differently.
Both Seraphina and Valentina had suffered from mana exhaustion as soon as their mana was depleted, despite possessing S-Rank mana cores and being far superior to him, while he was only a mere C-Rank. So, wouldn't it make sense for him to suffer far more than they did? Not that he wanted it himself, but still, what was causing this unusual discrepancy between them?
Could this be one of the reasons for him teleporting into this unexplored floor?
He wasn't sure about either of them. Though he knew that there had to be some connection between them.
As blood dripped from the corner of his lips, his head felt dizzy, and his vision blurred.
'Ah... why should I be worried about that? I am going to die anyway, aren't I?'
Ba-dum! Ba-dum! Ba-dum!
His heartbeat was rapidly increasing, its sound ringing loudly in his ears. The veins and blood vessels beneath his skin began to bulge as though the blood rushing through them wanted to tear its way out.
'Damn it! It hurts!'
Just then, a soft ray of light caught his eyes.
The area around him was shrouded in fog, so everything around him was dimly lit, but that was enough to see through the surroundings only.
So, where was this light coming from?
He narrowed his eyes, only to find that inside the corpse's abdomen, there was a radiant light glowing from within.
His eyes widened.
'It can't be, can it?'
He swallowed hard, but his dried throat made the simple act somewhat painful.
'What are the chances?'
Without wasting any second, he relied on his only hand to crawl toward its abdomen and forced himself into a sitting position.
His gray eyes reflected the faint light.
'I need to check first before coming to any delusional inference.'
At that moment, his left hand began to shimmer with yellow light as a transparent glove gradually revealed itself over his hand. He thrust his hand onto the ground, but instead of being blocked by it, his hand slipped past the surface with a ripple.
It was, of course, Liquid Chest.
Since he usually wore it on his left hand, he had lost it alongside his hand back on the second floor, but later, he once again made brief physical contact with that severed limb of his in order to halt the skull creature. Considering that this relic relied on a tether rather than its actual physical appearance in order to activate or work, Kael had felt that connection between them and transferred the tether to his right hand back then.
Still, even if he hadn't done that, it would've come to him on its own either way.
...After carefully searching through the piles of rubble inside the chest for a while, he finally found the thing he wanted. It was the dark dagger that had been given to him by none other than his wife.
'It should work...'
Gripping its leather hilt tightly, he kept thrusting its tip exactly where the flash of light had appeared from.
It took him more than a couple of strikes to break through the skin. Once he finally did, he sliced through the disgusting flesh and found a palm-sized white stone that seemed rather uneven in shape hidden inside it.
'Huh?'
Setting the dagger aside, he clutched the stone and tore it out of its flesh. Afterwards, he studied it with clear puzzlement, his pupils constricting a little.
'No way! It's the Stagebreaker. But how? How can something like that possibly exist here?'
Now that the dungeon's ecosystem was broken, no matter what kind of monster he killed or what rank it was, it wouldn't dissipate into ash, which meant that it wouldn't leave behind any magic stones. Unlike outside monsters, where after defeating them, adventurers had to retrieve the monster core from inside their bodies, they wouldn't find anything useful inside these dungeon monsters' corpses since they were just empty vessels now.
By that logic, he shouldn't have been able to find one either... so, how had he?
'A dungeon creature possessing a monster core, never heard of it in my whole damned life before. It's beyond my understanding.'
No matter what he tried to come up with, it didn't make any sense, unless, of course, he assumed he wasn't inside a dungeon at all, and maybe he was in a dream instead.
Sadly, the constant pain coursing through his veins made it absolutely clear that he was wide awake.
He let out a dissatisfied sigh.
'Judging by its strange shape, it seems it hasn't fully bloomed yet. Does that mean White Scyther hasn't learned how to activate its ability as of now? In other words, it's just a newborn monster... an E-Rank.'
Why did that last thought sting a little?
Regardless, the magic stone he had found was a rare type which was mostly found on the western side of the town. Though there were various necessities or uses for such a valuable item, it was sometimes used to forcefully break through one's mana core stages. It stored a certain amount of mana depending on the creature, which could be absorbed by any human at a pace several times faster than normal.
With an incredible amount of mana appearing at a rapid pace through the flowlines and being poured into the mana core, it was forced to expand to contain it, thus allowing one to ascend to a new rank.
As easy as it sounded, though, it was rather difficult to achieve since, without a certain pace or proper control over the absorption, the flowlines could be obstructed or the body could suffer from unnatural curses.
Besides, this kind of advancement could become the cause of core stabilization, meaning there was a chance that the user couldn't ascend ranks ever again until a certain amount of time had passed. Sometimes, they constantly had to suffer from mana exhaustion since it disrupted the natural flow of mana accumulation.
That was exactly why Arwyn had refused to use this method to break through his C-Rank core, since it would put him through quite a lot of limitations, not that it would've worked even if she had tried.
Though he was not the least bit worried about using this method, only because he was going to absorb the necessary amount of mana needed for him rather than trying to break through his core rank.
Even if he had to suffer from some side effects as a result, he believed that they would be somewhat bearable.
They had to be.
Right?
'Well, let's see... how it goes.'
Closing his eyes for a moment, he clenched the core in his palm and began absorbing the mana residing deep inside it.
Soon, a torrent of mana surged through his flowlines and was guided into his core, steadily filling it.
After a while, however, the magic stone itself was crushed into countless pieces of light before disappearing into nothingness.
He stared at his empty palm with a bleak expression.
'So disappointing. Then again, what did I expect from a nascent monster core anyway? I should be glad that it was enough to barely fill two-thirds of mana, even.'
Using the healing magic, he regenerated the deeper portions of the flesh on his remaining hand, abdomen, waist and neck, where most of the severed wounds were located, while blocking the blood that was leaking out in the process. Then he restored his ear fully, making sure that his hearing wouldn't be affected at all. It was one of the most crucial things in battle, so he could not afford to leave it damaged.
After all of this was done, he glanced down at his broken legs sprawled across the ground, his eyes beaming with a light of hope as he extended his hand above them.
He took a deep breath first.
'Finally!'
Soft green light enveloped both of his legs like miniature suns as the shredded muscles twitched and knitted back together, while the shattered fragments of bone within them rapidly restored themselves.
When the healing was over, he checked the movements of his knees and toes first, carefully moving them to make sure they were working properly.
'Ah, it feels so refreshing being able to move these legs again.'
His gaze shifted to the side of his broken shoulder where his left hand was missing.
Just as he was about to touch it, however, he sensed something whistling down through the air.
He quickly turned his head forward, only to find a blood-stained, scythe-like green weapon about to slice his chest apart.
His expression went blank.
"..."
He had just recovered. Shouldn't he be resting peacefully for a while? So, why was another monster attacking him already?
Using his newly restored legs, he moved to the side while barely avoiding the attack, causing the scythe to strike the ground with a loud clang that echoed through the mist.
Before he could get the chance to stand up properly, Green Scyther had descended its other limb, aiming at his shoulder. However, Kael managed to divert it using the dagger he had picked up from the ground.
'Obviously, it would attack me as soon as it got the chance to do so. After all, it had been trailing us since the beginning. It's my fault for not realising it sooner.'
It seemed this creature was the exact same one that had injured White Scyther first, then sliced its two scythe limbs off before following the two of them down through this strange slide.
All this time, while both of them were struggling, it had probably been hiding in the fog, waiting for them to finish each other first before finally making its move.
'Wretched bastard!'
Pushing his palm against the black ash, Kael stood up and immediately dashed backward, creating a safe amount of distance between them. Its scythe-like limb struck the empty space where he had been a moment ago.
This creature had almost succeeded in killing White Scyther while sustaining no severe injuries during the battle, which meant that it was several times stronger than its prey.
So, he was not going to take it lightly.
Tightening his grip on the hilt, he examined the creature as it lunged toward him with its four thick, segmented legs.
Kael blinked twice, staring at its body.
'Huh? Its legs are so different. No, not just the legs... it also has antennae on its head. Is it because of evolution? So, it's a D-Rank.'
Charging forward, Kael evaded its scythe and passed by the limb in order to attack its leg, but its other scythe almost severed his remaining hand before he could reach it. Though he was barely able to deflect it, his body was still hurled back into the air.
'Damn! It's on a whole different level. Now I know for a fact that if White Scyther had both of its limbs intact... I would've been dead meat since the moment we met.'
Landing safely on the ground, his body began swaying a little, but he forced himself to remain still in his position.
'This dizziness... when will it fade?'
At that moment, the creature let out a bone-chilling shriek that whizzed through his ears. It felt as though countless needles were being throbbed into his head, nose and ears simultaneously. But the sensation was somewhat different from what he had experienced from White Scyther earlier.
'Ah!'
His body froze for a moment as drops of blood dripped from the corners of his eyes.
'It's an ability?'
In that brief moment of hesitation, the creature was already upon him, its scythe threatening to severe through his throat.
Unfortunately, he hadn't recovered enough to move his body yet, which meant that he wouldn't be able to dodge the attack.
'Curse it all!'
Kael grimaced helplessly as the sharp tip of the scythe pierced through his neck, drops of blood sliding down from his skin.
Yet, at the same time, Kael noticed a giant shadow appearing behind Green Scyther.
Shrouded in mist, the figure lowered its head and enveloped the mantis's head before swallowing it whole. Drops of green blood fell onto the ground beneath them, disappearing into black ash.
Kael didn't know when, but the scythe had halted before it could pierce deep enough, leaving its headless body swaying in the air.
His eyes widened.
'Huh?'
When the corpse was about to fall to the ground, however, the creature in the fog grabbed its body in its maw before chewing it. The grisly sounds of metal being crushed and flesh being mangled reverberated through his ears.
A cold shiver ran down his spine.
That was because he felt as though he was being watched by something all this time.
He cautiously shifted his gaze, but what he saw made sweat trickle down his skin.
'Fuck!'
There, in the boundless gray fog in front of him, countless compound eyes could be seen glowing all around, glaring at him with malicious fury.
Fifty?
No, hundreds of creatures had surrounded him at some point in time without him realising anything.
He swallowed.
'Where did they come from? No, it's not the time to think about that. What to do?'
At that moment, he did what he believed any sane person would do in this situation.
He turned tail and ran away like a coward.
'No but seriously... what else can I do?'
Of course, the creatures were chasing him down without a second thought.
'Damn it all!'
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(Chapter Ended)
To be continued...