Annan-Kle leaned against a crumbling wall. A jagged shard had sliced away a portion of his face, leaving his pale gums exposed to the open air.
He was drenched in blood. It poured from a puncture wound in his abdomen, streaking down the wall like thick, crimson lacquer before pooling at the base in a dark, shimmering mess.
Not far away, a Phantom Crow stood poised, radiating pure malice. Shadows birthed from its spite swallowed the entire street, turning the cobblestones into a mirror of the abyss.
The Candle-Bearer coughed violently. Each spasm sprayed a mist of bloody froth from his throat. His life force had long since run dry; only the support of the stone at his back kept him upright.
Though his hands still gripped his blades, he lacked the strength to swing them. His only hope of victory was a joke—that the enemy would charge blindly and impale itself on his swords.
Damn it…
Is this where I die?
The Lighthouse is shining…
Thank goodness…
I’m so thirsty…
I really wanted one last drink at the tavern…
As his vision began to blur, a massive silhouette plummeted from the sky with a thunderous crash!
A fog as thick as ink billowed outward, sweeping through the street. Black robes fluttered violently in the sudden gale before settling gracefully.
A woman’s voice whispered in his ear.
“You look pathetic, Annan-Kle.”
The man managed a weak smile, his eyes swollen shut with a mixture of blood and sweat. Through the slits of his eyelids, he saw a hauntingly beautiful, translucent face.
It seemed… death would have to wait.
“Forgive me for the unsightly display… Decaying Aminata…”
“I arrived just in time, didn’t I? Are you falling in love with me yet?”
The woman gripped his shoulders with hands like the talons of a bird of prey. She tilted her head close to his, her voice sultry and laden with a hidden lure. However, it was impossible to tell where the sound originated; she had no visible vocal organs on her face.
“Don’t tease me… You’re far more terrifying than that thing behind you…”
Annan-Kle couldn’t even finish his chuckle before a fresh convulsion wracked his body, forcing up more blood and fragments of internal organs.
At that moment, glimmering spores drifted from the black-robed woman, sinking into his open wounds. Immediately, clusters of plump, rounded fungi sprouted from his flesh. They were as clear as jade and pulsed with a soft light, looking like delicate bedside lamps.
Mycelium spread rapidly, sealing the wounds and reaching deep into his body to stitch together ruptured organs and vessels, pumping life-sustaining nutrients back into his system.
Ignored by the newcomers, the Phantom Crow let out a scream of pure rage!
The air trembled as black light warped around it. It lunged forward, extending its massive talons toward the woman in black.
Though she stood nearly three meters tall—looming over the monster—her speed was entirely disproportionate to her size. She turned in a blur, flickering across the distance to meet the monster head-on. With a lightning-fast strike, she seized the creature by the throat and slammed it into the wall with bone-shattering force!
A shockwave rippled through the air, and the wall disintegrated. She proceeded to slam the crow’s head into the ground repeatedly, black fragments of its form spraying in every direction.
“Oh ho ho… I’ve been cooped up for so long. It feels good to finally stretch my limbs…”
Thud!
A heavy alloy supply crate detached from Wright’s waist and slammed into the ground, its sides unfolding mechanically.
Wright reached inside and drew a bladeless hilt. It was crafted from a material that sat somewhere between silver and stone, etched with obscure, labyrinthine symbols.
Special Grade Relic: The Sword of Authority.
He thrust the hilt forward. The air itself seemed to shatter like a pane of glass as a high-frequency sonic wave, far beyond the range of human hearing, tore through the silence.
The Iron-Flow Giant Stag flinched as if struck by primal terror. It twisted its massive frame, attempting to flee.
But the disintegration had already irreversibly begun.
Chunks of black debris sloughed off its body as the laws of reality unraveled around it. Its supernatural properties failed; a torrent of raw information surged backward, converging like a hundred rivers toward the hilt of the Sword of Authority. There, the data intertwined, condensing into a ghostly, dark-red crystal.
As the stag’s massive form collapsed into nothingness, Wright moved like a flash of light. He sliced through the crystal consciousness within the stag’s chest. A geyser of Crimson Phantom Light erupted, looking like a firework launched into the heavens. It dyed the sky above the town a brilliant, haunting red for a fleeting second before vanishing into the wind.
The returned Light-Seekers fanned out through the town, beginning the orderly process of rescuing the wounded and purging the remaining monsters.
With a flick of his wrist, Wright dispersed the fragments of “Incinerating” rules gathered on the Sword of Authority and returned it to the crate.
He turned and walked toward the young woman and the little girl waiting anxiously at the Lighthouse entrance. He knelt down to meet their gaze and offered them his praise once more.
“Well done. You saved everyone.”
Talitha shook her head, her expression solemn. “It was Mr. Ed-Bear who saved us. Without him, we never would have reached the Lighthouse.”
“Ed-Bear?” Wright asked, his brow furrowing.
Talitha looked around, her voice trailing off. “Where did he go?”
Helen stood on her tiptoes and whispered into the older girl’s ear. “Mister isn’t human. He can’t be near the Lantern-Bearers.”
A realization clicked in Talitha’s mind. She leaned down and whispered back, “Isn’t that unfair? He’s the one who saved everyone, but we’re the ones getting the praise.”
“We can’t,” Helen insisted. “Ed-Bear said not to tell anyone who he is, or there will be trouble.”
“Fine… but where is he?”
“He probably saw the Lantern-Bearers coming and ran away.”
“Then let’s go back and wait for him.”
“Mhm!”
As the girls walked away, Wright reached down and picked up a strange, sea-cucumber-like creature from the ground. It was limp and covered in fine cracks, leaking a steady stream of black fluid. Most of the tiny eyes covering its body were squeezed shut.
Balor Academy, Dormitory 202.
Wang Yue suddenly gasped, her mouth falling open as she took a long, sharp breath. She fell backward onto her bed, her entire body stiffening.
She remained frozen for half a minute before her muscles finally went slack.
Ed-Bear was gone.
She didn’t quite know how to feel. The emotions were… complicated.
The information sync from her avatar had cut off just before the Lighthouse. At the time, she hadn’t known if the light had truly been lit.
However, the Blackrock Lighthouse was constructed from transcendent materials and imbued with the rule of “Rejection.” The Invaders could guard the entrance, but they couldn’t easily destroy the structure itself. Therefore, once Talitha and Helen were inside, they were perfectly safe.
Two days later, rumors reached her: monsters had attacked Fishmouth Town, and two young girls had stepped forward to save the day.
You did well, Ed-Bear.
Wang Yue sat up straight, assuming a formal, meditative posture. She spoke a quiet eulogy:
“Farewell, Ed-Bear. You possessed the body of a monster, but the heart of a man.”
“Power could not shake your convictions; death could not sway your will.”
“In the darkest hour, you made the right choice and transcended yourself.”
“You saved those you loved and those who loved you. You saved the innocent from the brink of death.”
“Though you were born a monster, you were more human than anyone I have ever known.”
Wang Yue felt no resentment toward her avatar’s betrayal. Ed-Bear’s personality had been born from her own perceptions and ideals. Had she been in his place, she would have made the exact same choice.
Furthermore, the Gaze Worm hadn’t been killed by the “Incinerating” power. If a Special Grade Relic were that fragile, there wouldn’t be many left in the world.
It had committed suicide.
The moment it chose to betray its master, it had chosen death. Everything it did afterward was merely the final act of a dying soul.
Wang Yue sighed, the sound heavy with a lingering melancholy.
