Chapter 177: Where Is My Hand?
'W-what the hell just happened?'
Kael had been standing a few steps away from the teleportation circle, since his party had been tasked with returning the survivor to the people outside who were responsible for checking the dungeon's condition, but Mistwalker's unexpected arrival halted the process before anyone could react properly.
But who could've thought a mere moment would change this many things at once?
He couldn't believe his own eyes even.
One moment, Seraphina's sword had sliced through the creature's chest and the next both of them had disappeared entirely, followed by a loud crashing sound that came from somewhere behind him.
At the same time, the light of the dungeon reappeared once again, illuminating the hall with its pale unnatural glow.
When he turned toward the source of the sound, his eyes immediately landed on his wife laying there while leaning weakly against the wall. A beautiful jian that seemed to be carved from white bone had pressed against her neck as it cut deeper into her flesh to sever it.
Everything had happened too fast for him to properly process what he was seeing, let alone think about what he should do or even how he should feel.
Despite that, his hand still rose instinctively and started forming several wind blades around him. Unfortunately, even if he released them now, they would never reach the monster in time.
'Damn it! I am too slow.'
Just when the blade was about to cut deep enough to finish her off, countless javelins made out of water shot toward the creature from all sides, surrounding it while threatening to tear straight through its body.
The speed of those javelins was nothing short of astonishing, enough to interrupt the creature in the middle of its finishing strike and force it to focus on protecting itself first at least. As such, the jian halted midway through the attack before the creature turned its face toward the caster without even checking whether it was truly safe yet. Malicious crimson flames danced violently inside its empty sockets.
Since Kael was standing somewhere near Valentina, he felt that terrifying killing intent instantly, the overwhelming pressure sending chills down his spine.
His eyes widened.
'Fu...'
He had expected the creature to either dodge those javelins or deflect them effortlessly, but it did neither of those things. Instead, its claw-like fingers wrapped tightly around Valentina's face before smashing her head directly onto the floor in one swift motion, causing cracks to spread across the ground beneath her.
'...ck.'
His eyes narrowed unconsciously.
'What's up with this creature? I can't track down its movements, let alone predict its next attacks. It even traveled half of the hall in the blink of an eye. What should I do now?'
The best choice would probably be to do nothing and remain perfectly still as though he had frozen from fear. That was because the creature seemed to attack those who either interrupted it or attacked it first, meaning there was still a chance it would ignore him temporarily, allowing him enough time to think of some sort of plan while taking advantage of that behavior.
But then again, the monster was supposedly fond of eating human flesh, or at least that was what they had assumed. However, after witnessing its behavior toward humans yet, he could no longer tell whether this thing was truly the same monster responsible for the massacre.
Troubled by indecision, he noticed that the wind blades around him had fully formed. As such, without even thinking about the consequences, he immediately shot them toward the kneeling creature nearby.
That was because the creature had once again raised its claws toward Valentina, clearly intending to finish her off, and he couldn't allow that to happen. If she died here, the chances of his own survival would become even thinner afterward.
The wind blades struck the creature's neck with several soft sounds, but they failed to cut through its flesh, assuming it even possessed flesh to begin with.
Regardless, he had still managed to catch its attention and force it to halt once more.
The creature stared at him, crimson flames dancing fiercely within its empty eyes.
'Oh no... I've done it now.'
Soon afterward, Kael felt an overwhelming amount of killing intent crash down upon him like a heavy wave. Its immense pressure threatened to force him onto his knees or rob him of consciousness entirely, but of course, he was accustomed to this kind of oppressive feeling due to being an assassin and all, so, he politely refused to bow down no matter how suffocating the pressure became.
Noticing that its killing intent had failed to subdue him, the creature immediately abandoned its prey before slowly standing up and walking toward him without the slightest hesitation.
It was almost as though the monster was studying him while approaching.
Kael swallowed hard as sweat rolled down his face.
'Creepy.'
By then, the other adventurers had finally managed to understand the severity of the situation they were trapped in, so, several of them launched different kinds of spells in hopes of stopping it somehow.
However, the creature neither avoided nor deflected any of them. In fact, it took every spell head-on without showing any concern. Despite that, it remained completely unharmed and the worst part was that the attacks hadn't even left a scratch on it.
"W-what the—"
"Nothing's working against it..."
"Damn, its resilience is far too strong to break through with basic spells, so focus on its joints and prepare high-level magic."
"That would require some time, though the problem is that it won't give us that choice."
"We will buy you some then."
"Let's attack, men."
With that, the adventurers who specialized in short-range combat jumped straight toward the creature from all sides, their weapons cutting through the air as they aimed to bring it down before it could move any further, but even then, the creature didn't shift its gaze toward any of them, not even for a single moment.
Instead, it continued walking forward one step at a time while the adventurers who approached it were thrown backward at terrifying speed, their bodies crashing against the floor and walls before collapsing motionless from the impact.
The sight left the mages far more shocked than they had originally anticipated, since their companions had only managed to stall it for a few seconds and nothing more.
In fact, that was nearly the same amount of time it had wasted walking only a meter or two, making their desperate assault resemble sparring more than an actual attempt to stop it, though.
'What a strange creature!'
Just as Kael thought that, the creature halted right in front of him before lowering its empty sockets toward him. Then, it tilted its head once, then again a few moments later, as though confused by something or perhaps trying to determine something about him, though he had no idea what could possibly be going through its mind, assuming it even had one to begin with.
The corner of his mouth twitched at the sight.
'Why are you staring at me for, bastard?'
Almost as though it had heard his thoughts, the creature grabbed him by the neck before lifting him straight into the air with ease.
But instead of immediately struggling or attempting to pry its claw away from his throat, Kael forced himself to remain still as though the grip around his neck wasn't affecting him in the slightest.
Of course, that was nothing more than an act.
In truth, its grip was so tight that the pain shooting through his neck felt unbearable.
Suddenly, the creature raised its free hand before aiming it toward his chest as though it intended to crush straight through him.
Though just before it could strike, he moved his right hand and thrust it forward with every bit of strength he could muster.
At the same time, a sword formed from compressed wind took shape within his grasp, invisible to the naked eye as it pierced toward the creature's neck at incredible speed, or at least it was supposed to.
But the creature seemed to notice the attack before it reached it and tilted its body slightly to the side, avoiding the invisible blade with surprising ease.
A violent gust of wind burst across the hall after the attack missed its target, the pressure sweeping across the surroundings before gradually fading away.
Despite the failure, Kael smirked darkly.
'Got you.'
He had expected the attack to fail from the beginning, since he hadn't been given enough time to sharpen the wind blade to its proper state, yet that had never been the true purpose of the attack in the first place.
It had done what he needed it to do.
Just then, Asphy, who was kneeling several meters away, released her knocking arrow.
The arrow tore through the air at terrifying speed as it headed straight toward the creature's skull, though just before it could strike, the creature caught it within its hand.
'Shit!'
But instead of throwing the arrow away, the creature drove it straight into Kael's shoulder. Only after the sharp pain exploded through his body did he finally understand what it had done.
By then, he was struggling for breath, his throat felt painfully dry, his lungs burned with every desperate attempt to inhale and the pain spreading from his shoulder only worsened his condition further.
'Damn it! If... this keeps going any longer, this damn thing will crush my throat into rubble. I can't let that happen...'
The creature tightened its grip around his neck once again, enough for its clawed fingers to bite into his skin as blood dripped down from the wounds.
Eventually, his vision gradually started becoming blurry.
'I have to do something. Now.'
He tried his best to remain conscious, though every passing second made it harder than the last, but despite that, he still forced his fingers to move.
Even if it was only slightly, it was enough.
He narrowed his eyes faintly.
'Huh?'
Through hazy vision, he saw a thick blade descending from the side at incredible speed, aiming to sever the creature's neck from behind in a mere strike. At the same time, tendrils of water burst upward from the ground before coiling tightly around the creature's body in an attempt to restrain its movements completely.
Even then, whether the attack would succeed or fail still depended entirely on how the creature reacted to it.
But despite both attacks approaching simultaneously, the creature made no attempt to interrupt either of them.
'Wait... what's going on? Why isn't it doing anything to stop it? Does it believe it can withstand Valric's attack? No way!'
A deafening sound of steel clashing against something solid erupted through the hall, accompanied by a powerful shockwave as the greatsword smashed against its neck.
However, despite the incredible strength behind the attack, it didn't even manage to leave behind a faint scratch, let alone force the creature to move from its place.
Kael thought in clear surprise, 'That's crazy... it actually did it.'
...
Valric found himself completely speechless.
He didn't even know how he was supposed to feel about this anymore. After all, his enemy had just blocked one of his strongest attacks using nothing but its neck... and the worst part was that it looked so natural while doing so.
But he couldn't allow those thoughts to linger in his mind much longer, because the man trapped in the creature's grasp would die if he hesitated even for a moment.
So, without wasting another second, he continued attacking the creature's back relentlessly, swinging his greatsword from every angle he could possibly reach, even though none of the attacks managed to accomplish anything at all.
Still, that was fine.
His intention had never been to injure the creature directly in the first place, instead, he only wanted to draw its attention toward himself so that it would release the weak man from its grip. But the creature simply refused to acknowledge him no matter what he did. Regardless of how fiercely he attacked or how much strength he poured into his strikes, the creature didn't spare him even a single glance. It was as though he wasn't even worth noticing... and neither was anyone else present in the hall.
What Valric failed to understand, however, was why exactly the creature was so fixated on that man alone, to the point that it behaved completely differently toward him compared to every other person it had tried to take down. What exactly had that man done to attract its interest so deeply?
Unfortunately, he had no time to think about it any further.
'It left me with no other choice, it seems.'
With that thought, Valric immediately stopped attacking before leaping backward several times, creating a considerable distance between himself and the creature.
Meanwhile, the adventurers in the rear had managed to create several massive fireballs and enormous spheres of ice high above the air by combining their magic together, but none of them dared to release the spells carelessly, not when their enemy had a hostage.
So, they simply waited for an opening.
To their surprise, that opening arrived much sooner than any of them had expected.
But... it wasn't a good one, though.
...
Without warning, the creature slammed Kael into the ground with tremendous force, causing cracks to spread across the floor while dust and debris burst outward from the impact.
He had been dangerously close to losing consciousness, though, luckily, the creature's grip around his neck had loosened beforehand, allowing him to breathe properly once again.
He immediately began coughing violently while struggling to pull air into his lungs, his breathing eventually turning ragged before stabilizing slightly, though he could still taste the salty flavor of blood lingering inside his mouth.
Sadly, he wasn't given even a moment to recover.
The creature stepped directly onto his shoulder, forcing a painful groan to rise up his throat, though he somehow managed to endure it without crying out loud.
Through his hazy vision, Kael watched the creature lean forward before grabbing hold of his left arm and raising it high into the air. In the next moment, it violently jerked his arm sideways with enough force to tear it clean off from his shoulder... just like that.
Everything happened so quickly that his mind couldn't even process what had just occurred at first.
But when his eyes finally drifted toward the side of his body where blood was now pouring endlessly from the ruined shoulder, his expression froze completely.
His pupils began trembling uncontrollably.
'M-my... my hand! Where's my hand?'
An unbearable pain exploded throughout his entire body, so intense that he instinctively bit down against his own lips in a desperate attempt to suppress his screams, though the agony was simply too overwhelming for him to endure any longer.
Even as blood dripped down from his torn lips due to the force of his bite, while tears slipped uncontrollably from the corners of his eyes, a deafening scream still escaped from his mouth and echoed throughout the hall, instantly silencing everyone present.
"AGRRHHH!"
The creature then raised the severed arm as high as its hand could reach before casually throwing it aside.
The arm crashed onto the floor several meters away before rolling repeatedly across the ground, eventually coming to a stop in front of a group of adventurers whose expressions immediately filled with shock and horror.
Some instinctively covered their mouths while others stared at the creature with obvious hostility, though not a single one of them dared to move forward.
The creature, however, still wasn't finished.
No one noticed the exact moment it unsheathed its jian, though once the blade appeared, it was descending toward Kael's neck at a terrifying speed, threatening to kill him in a single strike.
"Is this it?"
However, just as the sword was about to slice into his skin, a beautiful katana intercepted the tip of the jian mid-strike, completely halting its movement.
With a quiet sigh, Mistwalker pushed her blade upward with overwhelming force, forcing the creature to take a step backward in order to pull its jian away.
Purple flames danced behind the visor of her helm as she said:
"Enough."
---
(Chapter Ended)
To be continued...