"Yes, the date was postponed for young master's recovery since the entire family was supposed to be present." The guard replied while recalling the fact told just three days earlier. "Everyone was frustrated at first, but it was later promised to the public that the date would be sooner then expected, so...now that you are awake, the date might be reselected by morning."
Aefia's ears rang as she glanced at her pocket watch's ticking surface. This is exactly...what I had feared. Simply put, my tasks list is longer than it seems. Containing my intermissions and my palace duties, I need to find a way out of this situation as soon as possible. Although, I think I already have a close idea to what I need to do.
"Alright, then will I be able to meet you again in the morning?" She spoke after a short while with stress that seemed to have settled on her face by now. Seeing this, the guard hesitantly raised his voice. "Look kid, you are still a young person and not the owner of the household just yet, you don't have to overwork yourself if it is too much to finish and catch up on. There are still more hours left in the day, so I have a believe that you will be able to finish it some other time."
With this, a smile popped up in her face. "You don't need to worry like a father for it, I will be fine. The work is not the thing that added stress into my brain, I just recalled a few other things that needed to be done besides this. Once I get emerged into the documents, I won't raise my gaze until I complete it." A soft reply with a gentle tone was sent back despite the harsh comment that had been sent. "Besides, you will need to rest too. As you already know, my health is still hanging off a cliff."
Did she already know that without having to say so? A question hung high in his mind as he yawned. "Yes, sure. As your commend young master. Then we will be able to continue this conversation the next morning." He exited the room with a doubt in his mind, as if the surrounding atmosphere had changed once again, she seemed like a child that almost no one could tell what she was thinking.
His footsteps kept echoing, even when walking slowly. Irritated by that, he soon realized that her hand didn't have the catheter and thought about going back. But also, what if it were empty and she plucked it out knowing it were a burden if it stayed on? To confirm it, I will just have to check the doctor's chamber on my way.
He creaked open the door, only to see a maid soundly sleeping and the empty catheter just hanging in a rolling wheeled pole. A sigh of relief and he turned towards where his room was inside the castle. Every servants and guards had to stay within the castle's barriers and within the unseen spaces of the palace. There was actually a huge difference between a palace and a castle. One was the earlier building with tall towers while the other is the new and highly stable structure with a few levels at maximum.
It was a small room upon entering, but not overwhelming. It was peaceful, and that was enough. Sometimes it would be filled with small insects or it may have a few rats running around, but it was alright as long as he had a decent amount paid over a long period of time. As a guard, the most he had ever earned was a hundred angcles in three months, which was barely enough when it came to thinking about his daughter's education and his son's suffering family, including his half-dead wife.
Money was a problem everyone faced, that could even lead an elderly man who was supposed to be retired, back to work. The duchess was generous enough to give some extra amounts to help feed his family, but most were just spent on medicines. He worked day and night, with almost eighteen hours of labour and barely enough food, where he could have been sitting back home and watching his kid's happy faces.
The small door, with termites eating off the wood, opened to reveal a tight space filled with a rotting cabinet and a damaged bed. Instead of this, sleeping during work was much better, but he had to please the duchess with his performance to get paid at the end of the month.
In the neighbouring rooms, the others slept soundly as the last remnants of sleep extinguised from his eyes and he flopped down on his bed with his hands covering his eyes. It was uncertain when he had accidentally fallen asleep, but when he had checked the time, it was already eleven in the morning. Remembering the girl's words, he rushed out of his chamber and climbed up the stairs with rapid movements.
***
Right after when the guard had left for his room, Aefia pushed the unfinished documents far from her sight and stood up while slamming her hands on the desk, hard. Anger and confusion nagivated through her veins as she glanced at the small pocket watch, still exactly three hours were left and she could just check out the surroundings outside the palace. It was a difficult choice, but there was no other options. If it were really the next day, then persumably, the destruction had already started.
Based on the stories she had read about the outer worlds, there was a knowledge found by her where a pattern formed around how or when the destruction happened and lasted. Knowing that Nikoan indeed had five empires, it would take around a hundred years for the first stage to end, and another thousand for the remaining to happen unless, like many other worlds, they were left to rot. One example of those worlds were Hellas and the one the others from her team were staying.
The first stage itself consisted of an apocalypse, where beasts would emerge among the population and had the capacity to turn surrounding beings into one of them. That was exactly how their colony was formed back at the missions of the outer worlds she had gone to. Now it was definitely uncertain what sort of them would appear. Somehow, in Hellas, she only faced demons but it were said that there were also sightings of humans with fungus growing out of their backs.
In the world of mission two, it was mostly colourful lion hybrids and some other mixed varients. She just hoped nothing like those gigantic first stage beasts would happen to be summoned and stayed worried about it for another five minutes or so. While raking her brain multiple times, she indecisively chose to check out for some dungeon entrances that might have appeared.
If it really just happened to be the first hour of its arrival, then it was possible that just portals had been summoned at this point. Being as dumb as they are, the beast's usually take another thirty minutes to navigate towards the exit. If she managed to find the first within that time, then she could stop the first week from being an aggressive start to a week filled with preparations instead.
While walking towards her sofa area, she held out her hand and a drastic amount of energy capacitated the air around the entire space. Suddenly, stepping out and in front of the mirror was the same person wearing the clothes that she had worn before leaving Earth. She reached out for a mask that was hanging out of the corner and wore the loops around her ears while dusting off dust from the sleeves of her hoodie.
She opened the window of her room while glancing down. Exactly in the second floor, she was facing the sides of the palace which was densely packed with the sight of trees. One of the taller trees were her target and she glanced at the next tree beside it, while hoping off the barrier and landing with her sneakers touching wood. And not calculating the last moment, she indecisively jumped down from the thick branch and landed on grass.
She could just use her skills, like the one that allowed her to shift between spaces, but her health was depleting for every second she could cast it. Eventually giving up all aspects, she used her feet and stayed against the bushy walls to stay hidden as much as she could. At this point, it was suspicious how sometimes they knew what Aefia was doing even with complete silence, especially George. Knowing how they all had magic, she let that information be and escaped the palace walls.
By now, ten minutes had passed and she hurried across the streets while trying to find the abandoned alley that had the portal opened. The way she had known this, was all thanks to the notifications she was currently receiving. Thankfully, it were the only one working, also the most functional one.
[Nearby Dungeon detected: 23m distance remaining. Location: near an abandoned alley.]
The atmosphere behind her masks felt suffocating, as she caught sight of the light bluish-green hue behind a short wall between two buildings. While taking off the face mask, Aefia took a step towards the portal as her notifications flashed again and again, as if it were an error message on a desktop.
[Warning: Entering a powerful dungeon with weak health will lead to significant downcast on the player.]
[Alert: Health is likely to deplete after entering the apocalyptic dungeon. Current health count: 250/600]
[Error: Failed to deploy skill (Cursed Fate). Retry?]
[Error: Failed to encrypt data of the current dungeon. Retry?]
[Notification: New Message from another system. Read?]
An eye-catching system alert had blocked the area of her view as she hesitantly opened the message that had arrived. It was said to be from another system, so was it possible that some other familiar magic user had been curious about her illness? Although, she had multiple message boxes with the similiar name, but with different designs on the edges and corners, so it was definitely hard to know who it was even with the layout they had.
While reading the written text on the screen, her eyes widened, which if the guard were here, would think because she had lost a memory or something. "If you are confident enough, then I will wait until you come out. It would be a shame if I didn't get to witness what this powerful being could do." The message meant someone had been following her activities until now, so it was almost close to say this was a stalker.
Immediately, as a reply, Aefia typed on mid-air rapidly as her fingers seemed to hit many buttons at once. A keyboard could be seen if it were her vision and with a straight face, she waited for the next reply.
(If you are confident enough, then I will wait until you come out. It would be a shame if I didn't get to witness what this so-called powerful being could do. 1 min ago.)
(Yes, let's meet after I seal this entrance. I would also like to know who my biggest fan, who likes to stalk me, looks like. Sent Now.)
(Typing...)
A reply came after a long waiting time, by then, she was already inside the dungeon and was exploring. "Don't worry, when you meet me, you will not be surprised because I am someone you know already." Seeing this response, Aefia felt like it were a waste of time to keep the conversation flowing and shut it all down. Thinking about the response she had already wanted to send, her mind angrily jumped up and down. Whoever it was, they just have nothing else to do and prank people then.
It was an obvious thing for her now given that she was from an age where if anyone were an influencer with only five hundred followers, they would think the entire world was below them. She had already knew that three or four other students from the competition were previously influencers. Even when they only had fifty people following them, they went around flexing like it were a popularity unreachable in this world too.
Psychos...they really believe the world revolves around them. I would like to really know if it were who I had expected it to be, the one who was flapping around the competition acting like a model who was extremely well-paid. Spoilt brat now chases power, that's a brilliant thing. Because now that I am related to the royal family too, they think, they can just steal it like they want.
By the time she was absorbed by her multiple thoughts, multiple small dinosaur hybrids surrounded her, but they were all too weak compared to what level Aefia was. Due to the cost of entering it, her health was now down to two hundred and fifteen, which was still enough to end the battle in a swift. During the beginning stages, it was a very visible thing that the enemies started weak. And with progression, the beast could grow in power up to Phase three within the next month.
She flashed a smile as she closed the system windows that told her to be cautious of opponents, and her fingers slid to her overall health bar. Silently, the small dinosaur hybrids creeped up behind her and hoped into the air with full strength to plunge down on her with claws that could ripe her apart in seconds if she stood in place.
Suddenly, to the beast's eyes, Aefia dissapeared and her hand was weapon-free as she held out her palm with blooming fire at the centre of her hand. With a smooth movement, she flung her hand sideways like a sword and the ground immediately raptured as stones with sharp burning ends collided, while emptying the entire dungeon.
The small space only had one stage and it was extremely easy as she noticed one singular live beast remaining sitted with a broken leg. She walked over with her now expressionless face. "I have grown tired of using sharp tools to kill your type, so...solving the equation between fire and its element...lava is also a form of fire, is it not? I controlled it, making that my weapon, and placed my strike against your friends."
Her index finger was the only in flames as she was close enough to the medium-sized beast and stabbed through its soul with a single movement. In truth, during the times she had been unconscious, she was just wondering in another dimension, practicing for this specific occasion.