Page 173

Erynthea grinned. The air seemed to quiver and whimper. She snickered and the air rippled faintly to her fancy. She weakly reached out her hand a pale blue of glowing snow enveloped her arm. She wriggled her arm and the pale bluish glitter dispersed. She twisted her arm, not enough to hurt, and the glowing motes whirled with it. She clenched her hand into a fist and the gleaming slivers converged at her hand.

“S-she… she wills the Exalted Spirits!” a voice exclaimed.

“Exalted Spirits?” Erin mumbled in her heart. “Is that why these Spirits were so heedless of my call?” Another pile of questions brimmed in her mind but no answers to meet them.

“Impossible!”

“Unacceptable!”

“This must be a ruse. She’s not even half a millennial old. This is absurd!”

The voice began clamouring at one another. Their confusion and grievance bounced across and between the four walls that marked the confines of the hall. The voices were mostly expressing their disbelief over Erin’s control of the so-called Exalted Spirits. She herself couldn’t understand the gravity of the absurdity and she couldn’t care less. She wanted to rest. She wanted to rid herself of this place. Everything else was secondary.

Erin splayed open her palm as the voices continued with their debate and discord. The Exalted Spirits gathered at her palm and shaped themselves into a sword that greatly resembled the silver steel sabre Erin had lost but only in its outline. The sword was as white as the snow with a few sprinkles of pale blue. The blade and hilt were moulded of magic but it felt steel through and through to her touch. She sliced the air around her, testing its weight and balance. Everything felt attuned to her instincts and mastery.

“So this is Bespoke,” she mused. Truly a bespoke, the finest. The cost was even negligible but not non-existent. As long as there were Spirits, she could use Bespoke. She tried conjuring an armour but only her head ached and her nerves throbbed all for naught.

Erin braced her body and mind as she cast Spatial Sense and Life Sense at the same instance. Both of the spells went off. She shuddered from the influx of information but she withstood it by bitting down her lips and gripping her sword tightly. She felt the most at ease with a sword in hand, especially one that she was familiar with. The sword may be spell-forged but it felt as if she had held it for her whole life. The pillars that were aligned abreast and parallel to one another reacted to her Life Sense.

“Nowhere left to hide,” she muttered and threw an Aura Shot at the pillar closest to her. The pillar ruptured and a burst of light exploded from within, leaving nought in its destruction. She heard a brief gag that resembled a throe of death and then there was silence after a heap of gasps. “Let me out now or I will destroy every last one of you.”

“Unleash them all…” said a voice.

“What? If we do that and she kills them all, the vault will be left unguarded!”

“We will perish if we don’t unleash them all!” the voice began to shout.

Erin chuckled and threw another Aura Shot. Another pillar exploded and crumbled into a pile of debris. “Bicker later.”

“Destroy us all and you’ll never find your way out!” a voice screamed.

Erin stared at one of the pillars and cut it down with Aura Shot. Another pillar came falling apart into two and into eight upon hitting the solid ground underneath the snow. “I’ll take my chances. Better than leaving the bunch of you ancient farts alive. Well, I don’t even know if you lot can be counted as the living.”

“Impudent. Such impudence from a Fae!”

“Are there no end to hypocrites?” Erin laughed. “I supposed I’m not one to criticize.”

“This vixen…! Brothers, unleash them all!”

“Unleash them all,” all the voices shouted in unison.

This time, ten circles of incantation were conjured but Erin did not let the spells take their course as they were. She augmented her feet with Fleet Foot and amplified her speed further with Lightning Clad. She cut the pillars within the reach of her spell sword. Aura Shots destroyed those that were beyond the point of her sword. When the circles had invoked their champions, there were only three; a Frost Golem, a Dire Serk, and a Ruinous Troll. The Troll stood over ten feet but appeared to be the least threatening of all. It was level forty, three levels below its peers. Its height was its sole imposing factor but it lugged in its movement. It was too heavy to even lift its own limbs.

“You shall be the first to fall,” Erin declared in a low voice and charged, raising her sword in one hand and preparing a spell in the other.

The Golem lunged first and the Serk followed. The Ruinous Troll tottered behind. The Frost Golem wielded a mace with the ball as big as its head. The Dire Serk quickly surpassed the Golem’s speed and took the charge. It snarled with its jaws spanned. Its eyes spoke its ferocity and hunger. The Golem readied its mace. Erin smirked and greeted the two with Lightning Barrage. A flurry of thunder strikes beset the Golem and the Serk, and Erin leapt over them as the lightning kept them occupied. She headed towards the lumbering Troll.

The Ruinous Troll’s eyes turned red and in a flicker, it disappeared. In actuality, it didn’t. It simply moved too fast, leaving an empty shadow for those who were too slow to perceive. Erin saw an empty shadow but her Sixth Sense had told her of the danger. She surrounded herself in Storm Shell and clad her sword in Arcane Edge and lightning. Her world spun as the Ruinous Troll rammed itself into her spell barrier. She tumbled head over heels in the shell but she held her stance and waited. The Thunder Shell repelled the force back onto the Troll. She heard it stumbling and roaring from the counter. She slashed without sight of the Troll. Her blade caught flesh and she smelled the waft of blood. She spun to land on her feet, assessing the damage she inflicted. Her sword cut the Troll’s left shoulder and it went beyond its flesh. Blood was spurting. The Troll groaned and glared. It huffed and puffed with white painting its breath. Its veins plunged through its skin. The Troll was in a lot of pain but the summoner’s commands took precedence. It growled and lunged with its wound gushing red.

Erin hung her sword low and horizontally as the Troll disappeared from her sight. Lightning crackled. The breeze split. A streak of white screeched in flesh and metal. Blood splattered and a shattering cry erupted. The Troll tumbled to the ground but its feet were left planted on the snowy ground. The Ruinous Troll crawled as it growled in agony but Erin gave it mercy and ended its misery with a thrust through its head.

[Experience gained +25% - Level Progression: 70%]

She managed a snort as her exhaustion once again beckoned for her to resign herself to her fate. Adrenaline could only do so much and her will, while strong, wasn’t unbreakable. Sooner or later, her body would give and she remained vulnerable to her foes and the elements. Fatigue tangled her body with its vines and tugged at her every move.

“Finish her!” a voice roared. “She’s weak! End her now!”

Erin was already preparing another spell.

The Dire Serk and the Frost Golem spurred into action as the lightning strikes faded. The Dire Serk reached Erin first and she parried its fangs and claws. She electrocuted herself to dissipate the numbing aftershock of the clash. She then threw a Lightning Spear at the approaching Frost Golem. It held up its mace to guard against the spell but it was thrown off its feet and flew across the hall. Erin spun around and repelled a swipe from the Serk. The Dire Serk pounced and Erin slid under. She dispelled her sword to make room for the narrow manoeuvring. She placed her hand on the underside of the Serk and summoned her sword back into her hand.

A deafening shriek resounded from the Dire Serk as Erin open it up from its throat to its loins. Guts and blood spilt like a rushing river reaching the end of its flow. She was showered in the pungent gruel but as it was warm, she didn’t mind it too much.

[Experience gained +30% - Level Progression: 100%]

[Erynthea: Level 39 increased to Level 40]

[Skill Points gained +2 | 4]

[Ability Points gained +2 | 4]

[Level Progression: 0%]

Erin allowed herself a passing moment of respite but it ended quicker than she expected. She spun around just in time to parried the mace aiming for her head. She stumbled but the Frost Golem didn’t. It brought around the mace and threw another swing at Erin. She hopped away as the mace dug into the ground like a streak of thunder descended. She retaliated but the Golem hefted its mace up from the ground without drawing a breath. Erin slanted her sword but she was still sent soaring. Her feet found the ceiling before her head. Kicking off the ceiling, she landed near-gracefully back on the ground. The Frost Golem was already on her, its mace swerving in an arc. She twisted aside and let the mace whip past under her arms. She mended her bearings and brought her sword down from overhead. The Golem hauled itself back but Erin kept herself close. The Golem snapped back its mace but Erin trampled on the macehead, wedging it into the ground and snow. Silver and blue streaked across the air. The Golem’s right arm came tumbling off its shoulder. The Frost Golem shrilled in absolute terror and scuttled away from Erin.

She scoffed and laughed derisively at her foe. The distinction between her sane state and her Lust Deviant state was narrowing. Lust Deviant was still sitting idly by but she moved and whirled as if she was taken by a lust for blood and glory. For every cut she drew, her exhaustion was forgotten for a cursory instance. To think she had struggled so much for these last two months. How could she ever hope to reclaim her title if she couldn’t withstand this kind of trial?

“I am weak,” she said to herself. “I am bloody weak.” She pointed at the Golem with her sword. “But you are weaker… Disappointingly so.”

The Frost Golem held its remaining arm up as a sign of surrender but Erin chortled out loud at its pleas. She laughed and laughed until the Golem lunged with a contorted expression that was filled with indignation. Erin went low and sprang to the air in a flip. She spun over the lunging Frost Golem and landed on her toes of a single foot. Her other feet hung low in the air. The Golem split apart from the head to the loins and crumbled just as fragile as the pillars.

[Experience gained +30% - Level Progression: 30%]

Erin turned her glared to the remaining pillars. There were three.

“W-wait! Wait!” one of the voices entreated. “We’ll tell you the way out. Just leave us be!”

The other two voices assented with hums as if they were nodding.

Erin eyed the pillars for a while before dispelling her sword but she conjured lightning in her other hand. “Talk,” she said. The lightning in her hand grew with a searing screech.

“It’s at the end of the hall. The doors lead to the vault. At the far end of the vault, there’s another door, the stairs within lead to the surface.”

“Do they now?” she questioned. The lightning swallowed her hand and continued to grow.

“They do!” a voice answered hastily.

Erin shrugged and threw the lightning in her hand at one of the pillars. The pillar exploded into pieces and clouds of smoke. “Liar,” she uttered. Of course, she couldn’t if they were lying from their non-existent heartbeat but she didn’t doubt their foolish attempt at fooling her.

“We’re sorry!” cried a voice. “The exit is in the vault but it’s under a red carpet embroidered with silver fringes.”

“Why would a carpet have silver fringes?”

“I don’t know! But it’s the truth! There’s a trapdoor underneath, a tunnel leading to a cliff on the mountainside. I swear on the good name of Lady Sephrodia.”

“Good name…” Erin spat.

“Please, leave us alone. We don’t want trouble.”

“Neither did I but you didn’t care, not until you’re at your wits’ end.”

“P-please, let us—”

Erin pierced the pillars with her glare and sent two Aura Shots at the remaining pillars, slicing them apart and they collapse into debris.

The hall lost its light and dimmed but Erin bore no worries for it as she didn’t even realize the hall was brightened with a spell as her Night Vision did not distinguish the difference well.

[Experience gained +10% - Level Progression: 40%]

She simpered at the experience gained. It was as meagre as they were. Wiping herself of the guts hanging on to her and cleansing herself with Spirit Mend as much as she could, she ambled with a limp towards the doors at the end of the hall.