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- Eve Altera ~
"But before we tinue.. if I may... Who is this woman to you, Queen Altera?"
Smiling wide as I reized what Evren was doing, I pridefully stepped to the side before motioning toward her. "She is my Mother's closest fr-" But before I could finish my sentence, an indescribable sou my ears, the sensation of falling flooded my body, and... *Vwoop* "-iend!" In an instant so short that a neuron couldn't even fire, the dark, ntern-lit opy of the treaood in was sed with an endless field of yellow grass, and a vast, bright sky. "WHAT THE HELL?!"
pletely caught off guard, I didn't even have a ce to react. *Thump-Rustle* I simply fell on my ass, uo even give the prig pain c my legs, and palms any thought before I looked over at a figure casting a shadow oh wide, fused eyes.
It was Evren, but while she was typically a bastion of fide that moment, her gaze was the same as mine. -W..what...-
*Beep* "Error detected." Hearing my system ping and speak to me, I quickly looked over, only to find an ominous red panel floating in front of the wall of grass o me. "eg to Local Server to begin debugging."
But it didn't stay there for long.
*Beep*
Transportation from this world is temporarily unavaible.
Please SURVIVE until a server manager address the error or plete the following quest in order to access the transportatiowork.
-: Quest :-
Assassination
Mission Rank: ERROR
Target Location: UnknownTarget Cssification: UnknownTarget Description:
Estimated Css: Upper Demigod
Rewards for pletion: Calcution Error
-W..what.. the...- When it first popped up, my mind was in such chaos that I only maister o of every few words I read.
However, the farther my eyes passed down the pahe more my mind pictured the figure of a bck-cloaked spirit standing behind it... The more it felt like death was breathing down my neck...
Without warning, I had been transported to a world where I did not belong.. instantly desding from the peak of the food to the absolute bottom...
*Rustle* Pig my hand up off the grass as a deceptively gentle breeze blew by, I shakily tur over to see the tless cuts in my palm and along my fingers, allowing a bright crimson liquid to flow out.
In that world, I couldn't even call myself the bott... I was weaker than grass...
But as I aimlessly stared at the blood dripping off my palm, I ulled bato reality. *VWOOM* In an instant, the surrounding grass, almost a meter tall, was ftteo reveal that were at the ter of a herd of creatures grazing on the grass.
"Eve?! Are you alright?!" Grabbing my bloody hand without a hint of hesitation, she forced me up to my feet and gripped my face to look into my eyes finally ripping my mind out of its daze.
"H-Huh?!" Instantly erupting into panic, my eyes started darting around while my senses heightened and my body was flooded with an addig amount of adrenaline.
But Evren wasn't giving me a ce to sort any thoughts. "Hey, idiot! Use magiake the air more breathable!" Grabbing my wrist so hard I thought it'd break, she yanked me off my feet and threw me into her back, tightly grippih so much aura I felt like I was getting crushed before yelling. "And hold on tight!"
"FO-" Before I could even process what she said, we blew through the sound barrier several times over, ripping the air from my lungs before, in a moment of lightheadedness, I threw up tless barriers to give myself a ce to breathe ahe psma-indug wiane. *VWOOM*
The barriers took so much mana it was almost siing, but as I went to take another breath, feeling an almost acid-like burn rip through my lungs, such worries became meaningless. -The air.. isn't breathable!- Spping Evren's back to try a her attention, to no avail, I was quick to foy mana, attempting to maintain the tless barriers in front of us before using wind magic to vibrate the air directly in her ear. "Slow down! I 't cast a spell I o breathe when moving this fast!"
But just as I said that, a massive shadow was cast over us.
And as I looked back over my shoulder to see what it was, I found an absolutely mountainous creature blotting out the early m sun; a drake pletely covered in spines like a pore with two colossal horns the size of buildings standing right where we just were, staring at us.
"NEVERMIND, RUN!" Spping Evren's back to get her to go faster, I lowered my head behio shield myself from the wind before dissipating the barriers I put up. -I figure something out! I'm a pioneer of magic! I just o think!-
Dedig every ounce of scious thought to digging through magic theories, I began pieg together pieces of seemingly ued puzzles before throwing my hand up o my head.
To make the air breathable, I o first figure out what the air was made of, so in a moment of adrenaline-fueled panic, I stuck my hand up in the air o me, using several yers of glowing ruo split the atoms in the air before turning them into psma, and disseg the air via colors.
At first, it was like a rainbow, a huge mess of color, with everything from red and e to purple and blue.
But as I split the beams of psma, I found a dim pale blue streak.
It was the glow of oxygen. -Then...- Trag its path back through the runes like solving a maze, I figured out the sequence I o isote it. -el 1, 4, 7, 6...-
However, that was a sequehat relied pletely on the energy states of the air entering the first rune, so as I felt Evren being to slow down, I spped her back. "Don't slow down!"
But that was the moment she threw me off her back, rapidly slowing me down with her aura before stopping on a dime and turning around with her axe in hand.
Having been so focused on my magic that I didn't know what was happening around me, I looked up at her back with a mix of fusion and irritation. If she didn't slow down, I could've gotten some air.
But before I could even pull my focus off her, a bck wall ripped over the horizon and before I could blink, the wall of quills blew past us with a deafening bang. *CRRRRACKKK*
It was like the air was screaming, pletely uo get out of the way as the quills ripped past us faster than my eyes could follow. *WOOSH* And the bst of wind that followed was so inte felt like my whole body u once, poundio the immovable wall of Evren's aura behind me.
But while it hurt, feeling how solid it was gave me faith that Evren was fine, letting me hastily throw up my hand with several runes, find the new sequence, and holding the e of glowing runes up to my mouth.
"HAH.. HAH.. HAH..." Immediately gasping for a breath, I flooded my lungs with enough oxygen to dilute the uhable air still lingering iaking several breaths before the sensation of suffocatio my brain.
But even as Evre her hand on my shoulder, yelling something at me, I couldn't hear over the deafening ring.
"I-I'm.. okay!" At the time, I thought I spoke normally, but I was pletely dazed, slurring my words as I barely mao maintain the flow of oxygen to my lungs.
Between suffog, accelerating so fast it was siing, and slowing on a dime, my brain was at its limit, but by some miracle, I mao keep myself awake.
Mently pig me up, Evren was quick to get moving again, this time accelerating less aggressively before, after less than a minute, we made our way into a dense forest with a opy well over a kilometer over our heads, and up a tree b the pins.
*Pat* Gently setting me down at the base of a massive branch, looking out over the seemingly endless pin rustling in the breeze, she opened her system and tapped around before suddenly, Bel fell out of the air o her, letting them speak for a moment before Bel ran up to me.
-H..huh.. what is she...- But rather than looking at me, Bel walked up and started iing the series of runes in front of my mouth. -Is she.. wanting to replicate them?-
It was an impossible task, but feeling my sciousness starting to slip, I brightehe bit of light magi them to better see the circuit's intricacies.
But it wasn't for her. Regardless of her having a mana core, trolling mana wasn't something so simple, especially to form things as intricate as runes using nothing but mana. "Evren..."
Speaking somewhat lethargically as an irresistible exhaustiohrough me, I mustered every bit of energy I had to stay awake. I wao try and tell her to copy the runes into yers of something thin, whether sheets of metal or yers of wood, effectively creating an artifact that could supply me with oxygen as long mana was moving through it.
But as I opened my mouth, my vision started to blur, and after moving my lips, unsure whether I even said anything, everything finally went dark, and my sciousness went silent.
-----
- Evreir ~
"Eve!" *Pat* Lunging over and catg her unscious head as it slumped to the side, my mind raced.
She was still breathing, and her heart umping, but her brain was swelling more with every sed, and the runes h in front of her mouth were rapidly losing their crity.
I was on the clock to save her life. -FUCK!- "Bel, how I reduce the swelling in her brain?!" If it kept swelling at the rate it was, it would kill her before she would have the ce to suffocate.
"Without special equipment, there is no way to reduce it!" Turning to me in a rush, Bel spoke with a slight ess, losing herself in thought. "If it doesn't kill her, it will go down on its own after some time. For now, we o focus on finding a way to get her oxygen!"
But as I fell into thought, Bel's advice went in one ear and out the other. -Her brain is swelling too much.. if it keeps growing, it'll crush itself against the inside of her skull...- If that happened, she would either go braindead or die.
But there was only one solution I had in mind for it...
*Pat* Quickly straightening her head, I set my palm oop of her head, and flooded her skull with as much aura as I could manage. "Hooh..." Letting out a cold breath, my gaze sharpened, fog entirely on the image my aura painted in my mind before... *CrACkLe* Jolting my hand up, just off her head, a series of cracks ripped out, auro me in a panic.
"W-What did you just do?!"
"I shattered her skull." Speaking somewhat emotionlessly, I kept a close eye on her skull to make sure her brain could take advantage of the extra space to relieve the pressure without cutting itself on the jagged edges of bone.
And it worked fwlessly. Almost instantly, the trolled cracks I created with my aura started widening, and the intense pressure on her brain was eased, letting it swell as much as it o.
-But I 't rex yet...- L my gaze to her chest, rushing breaths as her supply of oxygen thinned, I set my palm oomach, quickly findily where her reserve was.
"Hooh.. okay..." I had an idea, but I wasn't sure if it would work.
The issue was that there was no alternative.
"Alright, Eve..." *Vwoop* Pulling the colossal wyvern mana core out of my iory, I set it behind me and looked at Eve's strained, hyperventiting face before closing my eyes. "I'm sorry, but.. this is really going to hurt..."
*Vwoom* Using some aura to try and strehe base of her spine, I pulled back my hand and smmed it into her stomach. *WHAAAMMM* In an instant, her reserve ruptured and exploded, shredding and dissolving the surrounding ans, muscle, and tissue.
But it was all to raise her ce of survival.
Even if it was just from zero to one.
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