Capítulo 38: Chapter 38 - The Dire Tombs III: Survivors
[Elijah Knight POV]
I was still in shock from what had happened, Diamond and Note had fought at an insane speed against an Elderwood Guardian, an S-Class Mana Beast, and won!?
"This is insane.... It's over already?! It's an absurd silence!" Kriol said beside me, panting and with one hand glued to the protective dome I made out of metal, making the dome intensify with water protection.
I could see both masked heroes lying there in their own blood, I had to do something, but as soon as I heard a loud noise, it felt like the place was going to fall apart.
"Damn it!" I exclaimed as I exited the dome and ran towards them, gripping my staff firmly in my right hand.
"Earth WAVE!" I tried using a basic earth-moving spell, with the ground beneath them both moving towards the dome, where I could get them inside.
On the floor, I saw Note and Diamond's masks... They were without them.
I thought for a while, but then I took the masks and went to the two adventurers who had saved us, putting them seated leaning against the walls of the protective dome, that's when the tremors got stronger and then I closed the dome completely.
There I and Kriol were awake, Jasmine and Reginald were still unconscious, while Samantha was in a sleep state, feeling a lot of pain from the excessive use of mana. Also, there was the trash called Lucas, which I pinned to the floor using metal handcuffs that covered his wrists, legs, torso, and neck.
"Argh... I think I'll get some rest... I just want to think that all this chaos was a dream..." Kriol said as he was resting on the ground, lying on there with his shield on top like if it were a big blanket.
From the way he reacted, maybe he wasn't in the right angle to see their faces, or he was so tired he wasn't paying attention to anything. Anyway, after a few minutes, with Kriol already obviously asleep, I adjusted the clothes of the two adventurers there, so they were comfortable and I watched their faces...
They both looked to be about my age, which made my eyes widen as I adjusted my glasses. The two adventurers who were with me 2 years ago and now, the ones I thought were incredibly powerful... They were my age...
"If you think about it like that, Jasmine should be here just to be their guardian and nothing else..." I thought.
I adjusted my glasses and slowly covered their bodies better with their robes, which served as a blanket. Before I put the masks on them, I put them on myself.
"Hm...? How strange... I breathe as if I didn't even have the masks on my face...." My voice came out a little altered, I got scared by it and took off the mask looking at her, it was Note's mask and it had some light cracks and a small piece missing near the chin.
"And apparently that's how they changed their voices... Well... At least I know they can keep the masks on without having problems breathing... Better put that on them..." I said quietly to myself.
Carefully, I put the masks on both of them, it was necessary, since it wasn't just me there, but other unconscious adventurers... I've known those two for some time, I trust them and I want them to trust me too, but I don't know if others would be silent when they see the real faces of our saviors.
Finally, I noticed that after I completely closed our dome, everything was quite dark, and I could only see a little as my eyes were getting used to it. I remembered that Diamond had a kind of Fire Starter so I took some of the vines thrown on the ground inside, gathered them and went to look for the item in Diamond's pockets, soon finding and making a small fire, so we would have light and stay warm .
In that first feeling of heat after the insane battle that happened, I finally took a deep breath starting to rest a little, after a few hours I heard some noises, when I went to observe what it was, it was Note. He woke up with his eyes behind the mask shining brightly, in addition to seeming to have several groans of pain, I was surprised that he was the first of all to wake up.
"You're awake!" I said surprised, but he didn't answer me, he seemed to have a strong pain the way he tried to move and he was concentrating more on staying awake than on listening to someone.
It took some time, but soon he seemed to speak, his voice was extremely weak, followed by several coughs, with blood coming out from under the mask. "G-glove... My glove."
"What about your glove?" I said standing in front of him, a little confused, as I removed his glove, it seemed to have 2 pale yellow gems.
"B-break one... O-of the crystals on the glove.... And give me..." he seemed to almost fall to the ground as he said this, but I quickly grabbed him by the arm, taking one of the stones out of that glove, breaking it and putting the pieces in his palm.
A soft light the same color as the crystal surrounded him completely and seemed to enter him. He didn't say anything, he just tried to move, but without success, but I kept holding him so he wouldn't fall back on the floor again. He started to look around and seemed to have a sharp pain, having quickly put one of his hands in the area where his mana core would be.
"Where's Jasmine?" Apparently he wasn't able to see properly, even with the small fire I made.
"She's over there." I said as I pointed to where Jasmine was sitting with her back leaning against one of the dome walls.
"She and Reginald were hit a lot harder by Lucas's spell and her body wasn't fortified with mana... We can't use so much of.. The healing crystals... I had a medical kit that you can use... It's inside my brother's dimensional ring...." When he said that, I quickly went to Diamond taking his hand, I noticed that there were two rings, one of them was common with a blue jewel, the other had a reddish jewel that looked like it was glued to his skin. I took the blue one and tried to use my mana from it, ending up taking some survival items, until I found the Medical kit. I put the other things back in Diamond's ring and put it back on his finger.
With the medical kit in hand, I went to Jasmine and Reginald, treating their injuries, there was a lot of bandages in that equipment. "Reginald will be fine, but it looks like Jasmine has suffered some internal damage." I said looking at Note.
"Damn... Then use the other crystal from my glove on her..." He said and I did, with the soft yellow light covering Jasmine and entering her.
I breathed a sigh of relief and looked at him, sitting back down next to him. "I think they'll be fine in a few hours."
Note kept his hands on his forehead, whispering something very low but I couldn't hear, I gave a small laugh watching him. "I didn't think the legendary masked men, Note and Diamond, were the same age as me." I said to break the silence.
"My mask!" he said putting his hand on his own face, realizing he was still wearing his mask.
"I ended up seeing your faces, your masks were thrown on the floor and I put them back on you.... After all, I'm not the only one here..." I said getting up, thinking of a much better idea to what we were doing.
I put my hand on the floor and slowly I start to recite an incantation in a low way, gradually creating a small tunnel in one of the walls of the dome, which reached the outside of the boss room, as there were stones in the middle of the way. , meant that we would have died buried if it hadn't been for me.
"And my sword? Did you see that black staff I carried?" Note said as I was making our way into a larger room.
"It was one of the things I picked up while you were still fighting, you had knocked over after throwing yourself against the Elderwood Guardian. It's on Jasmine's side. From the way I saw you holding on to it while you thought about what to do... I could tell that it was something important to use as a last resort... Even if you did another 'last resort'." I said taking another deep breath.
"Want to help me get the guys out of the dome at least? Kriol and Samantha aren't passed out, just sleeping, so we won't have to carry them." I spoke, getting a laugh back from Note who accepted my idea.
We were taking everyone out of that part, arriving in the corridor we had passed before. I would have woken Kriol to help us. With Note carrying Diamond, Kriol carrying Jasmine and helping Samantha to walk, while I was using earth magic to take Reginald and Lucas, who was still handcuffed.
After we had moved everything to that area and verified that we had forgotten nothing, I undid that spell of mine while Kriol started to make a new fire for us, since for some reason the lights coming from the stalactites stopped coming on, as if the Elderwood Guardian was the heart of the dungeon, and now everything was "dead" there.
"Th-thank you for everything.... For saving Jasmine and the others and retrieving my sword, when you could have just escaped on your own... Thank you." I heard Note saying that looking my way, he sat back down while he had that black bat in his hand and... Opened it?
He should have been checking to see if the item was broken or not, but wow, that staff was actually a sword?! A sword with its own bluish light, which lit up a little more than our fire.
"Haha.. If I had let you guys die, I'd be on the same level as that bastard, Lucas, wouldn't I?" I said as he kept that luminous sword of his.
"Not really.. He's worse." He gave a painful little laugh.
Kriol seemed to chuckle too as he sat in his corner. "If I don't wake up after everyone has woken up, you can slap me and I'll get up right away!" He exclaimed, apparently he was still very tired, as he slept like a stone at the first opportunity.
After a few minutes I approached Note, sitting next to him. "By the way, why did you guys stay? I saw Jasmine pulling you two to escape, honestly when I created my stone wall at that moment, I thought you guys had already run away." I asked, curious about that.
Note paused a little at my question "A king never betrays the people who trust him." He winked, which made me scoff. "And... I promised someone very important to become a better person and to cherish the people around me."
"Pfft. You sound like an old man. We're pretty young... I wonder what kind of life you had until we had meet 2 years ago... To have promised someone that." I was relaxing because that the danger had been destroyed for now.
"I sometimes wonder myself, haha... How long have I been out for anyways?" he asked.
"I would say... About... 5 to 6 hours... I dunno... I'm not felling any hunger until that moment, but I know that had been more than 4 hours at least." I said.
"Hmm... And you've improved a lot... I mean... Before, all your spells involved earth... But now I feel like that dome you made for us was actually... Metal?... Y-you never told me you were a dwarf... And not only that, as far as I know, dwarves can only manipulate metal, not create or conjure. Could you explain to me?"
"Ooh well.. I can try to say some things I understand about me to see if this helps, but then I want you to tell me, what that was?!? Your hair turned all white and Diamond had something that resembled horns... And had those glowing runes all over your bodies!" I asked and he nodded.
"Okay, for the start, you never asked me before where I came from, apparently I look like a simple human Earth Conjurer, but I'm from the Darv Kingdom, however I wasn't really born there. I was left there and the people who take care of me always refuse to talk about my possible parents, so I don't even know my true race, they just consider me a half-dwarf. I have no memories of my childhood... Just flashes that make me feel pain, like someone has locked them in my mind. After one year, when I had awakened, I created a huge implosion that devoured my entire room... As you've seen before in our adventures during those 5 months, I'm good at using earth magic even though I was on the dark red stage. But one thing I never told you is that... somehow, according to the people who were left to take care of me, I have some kind of 'negative affinity' to the other elements... And for some reason... I don't need to meditate to purify my mana core." When I said that, I could see Note's eyes widen, but I kept going, it felt good to be talking about this with someone, even if it was just a way to be 'selfish'.
"The reason I've been in Sapin is to be a representative of Darv Kingdom and be able to become famous or great... But they never told me why I'm doing this... Now... Talking about my Metal itself.. It happened a few months after I left your team... When I hit the dark orange stage... I felt an intense energy rising in my body... And when I realized... I had conjured a whole field of metal spikes around me... Luckily I was walking alone in the middle of a Beast Gladers forest at that moment... I didn't hurt or kill anyone when it happened... Since then I've been careful... And scared... I'm scared of what I might be... Of what I might do... At first I just thought I was a half-dwaft... But now, I don't know what I am... A mage that can create metal from nowhere.... This... Is insane."
My hands started to shake as I squeezed them tightly, my mind was getting a little emotional while I was saying. Note was a person I had interacted with and had so much fun with before, and finally I was able to tell him about myself...
Before, all my answers about myself were too empty and simple, when he asked in those times, but now what I was saying is all I knew. He looked at me and squeezed my left hand tightly as if to calm me down. I remembered the feeling, the fear I had of myself in that first explosion of metal magic, and I started to cry a little.
"Relax... I can't say.. That I know how you feel completely... But I know what it's like.. This feeling of not knowing what you are... I've always had a feeling that I'm not even close to my limit... And when I reach that limit I'll be sure of who I am... And wow... to think our conversation would turn into a therapy session..." Note said with a slight laugh, his comment made me calm down and laughed along with him.
"You've told me a lot about yourself... You've opened up to me and you're trusting me to know about your life... I feel like... Now I can also open up to someone... Well... You said you access the Earth element in a very powerful way... And that has a 'negative affinity' to the other elements... Well... You know me as a Fire Augmenter.. But actually I'm a quadra-elemental augmenter with two deviances : Ice and lightning."
When Note said that, my eyes widened too much. "A quadra-elemental?!? But that's something that was never imagined! A tri-elemental is already too much! But this?!?" I thought and he continued talking.
"Diamond and I.. We are beast tamers. What you saw back there, were us releasing our beasts wills."
"Holy Shit!!! I thought I was a freak but I guess you win. W-wait how old are you two? And.. What elements your brother has?" I asked.
"My brother is just a duo-elemental, fire and wind... For some reason, his beast will made him unlock the deviant of plant and ice without he being a water mage or a elf." Note said.
"So is he a human..? God... I though he was a elf!"
"Yes, this was the idea of his desguise... And for your question about our ages... He is twelve, while I turned eleven a couple of months ago." he looked around to see if everyone there wasn't hearing our talk, and yeah, nobody was awake.
"No way! I'll be twelve in a few months! I don't know my exact birth date, but the dwaves just made my birthday the day they found me, January 10th. You already know my name, but now, I want to know yours." I asked while giving my hand to him.
"Arthur... My name is Arthur Leywin, but you can call me Art" Not-.. Art said while handshaking me, he was smiling but I could feel that he was still in a little pain. The backslash for his beast will was very powerfull for what I was seeing.
We started talking a bit, it was interesting that he spoke as if he were an adult, which didn't surprise me, because normally I never really talked to people our age. I talked about how I matured quickly, not having a real father or mother figure with me, as he talked about some of his adventures, like when he and Diamond fell off a cliff and managed to survive for months and years until they got back to Sapin.
He spoke without detail and in a vague way, but I think he talks that way because it must have been intense, and at the same time boring, without so many differences between the days. I even clapped my hands when he said that it happened between his 4th and 8th, which surprised me, at least I wasn't the only "abnormal" around.
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[Jasmine Flamesworth POV]
I was running trying to take Brald with me, until I heard a loud noise and I started to feel a sharp pain in my head, everything went black before I could fall to the ground.
Along with the darkness, whispers were rising around me. Whispers made by the voices of my family, everyone talking bad about me, calling me weak, stupid, calling me a mistake, some were even laughing at me.
Then I really remembered what happened before the darkness, I was running away from a great mana beast, a powerful one, and I had fallen, so that could only mean...
"Is this how death feels like?..." I wondered, hearing more whispers of disapproval from everyone in my family in the midst of that darkness.
After a few minutes, I started to cry, sitting in the void while hugging my legs, after what felt like hours of this, I felt a strange heat around me as the whispers started to get muffled.
"Arthur... Luz... I couldn't save you... T-this is all my fault... If I didn't talk about this dungeon... We..." I cryed more, without having the strengh to continue my sentence.
I didn't have the courage to face that dark abyss, but I could feel a light approaching so I faced it. "If I'm going to have the light at the end of the tunnel, at least I'm looking at it" I thought.
However what I saw was different from what I imagined, I saw Adam, Angela, Durden, Helen, Reynolds, Alice... and... Lensa. All formed by a pale yellow light that was getting closer to me while I couldn't stop crying, my old companions, all the original members of my group, were there.
I could feel an incredible warmth as they crouched down next to me and Alice hugged me tight. She started to patting my hair. "It's okay... You had done everything you could." Alice said in a sweet voice looking into my eyes. "You were amazing, even if you wanted to run away, you stayed there when you saw that my kids wanted to help everyone..."
"I-I promised y-you... That I would bring them safely into your arms... I couldn't do anything but always be with them... I would never want to dishonor that promise... You all... are the only thing... that I have left of a family..." I said starting to cry more as I returned Alice's hug.
All of the Twin Horns hugged me tightly as they slowly disappeared, with the light that formed them entering my body. For so, the darkness now becomes the pure color of pale yellow.
I felt the pain slowly disappearing, and a huge urge to close my eyes, but I didn't want to, I thought that, if I close my eyes now, it'll be my last moment...
Until I saw another figure in front of me, a man of approximately 30 years old, he had a beautiful armor, but all worn out, demonstrating the minimal experience he had, having a beautiful greatsword on his back, with multiple jewels on the handle, he had messy, long, dark hair.
The figure looked at me smiling. "You've been healed now Jasmine... Don't worry... Arthur and I didn't die... You can... Open... Your eyes."
When the man said that, I was confused, but suddenly I saw myself now lying on a slightly cold floor, I was in a dark place, with the only source of light being a possible fire. I slowly sat up, hearing voices next to me.
My eyes were adjusting and I soon realized, I was in the room before the arena the elderwood guardian was in. I looked around to see whose voices they were. Kriol and Samantha were talking a little away from the fire, Reginald was lying next to me, with bandages on his head and torso, he seemed unconscious. Lucas was there too, handcuffed to the floor and unconscious. But then I saw Elijah talking to someone... He was talking to Arthur, and next to them was Luz, apparently passed out.
I got up quickly and walked towards them, with Arthur being the first to notice that I was awake, followed by Elijah who was also looking in my direction.
"I'm glad you woke up, apparently the treatment I gave you worked like a 'glove'." Elijah said, but I wasn't so focused on him at the moment, I was focused on Arthur and Luz.
Both had their robes intact, but their shirts were completely torn, Arthur's mask seemed to be the only one damaged, as there was a small part missing in the chin area. As for injuries, a purple spot was visible on the right part of Arthur's torso while Luz had purple and red spots on his arms.
I soon hugged Art tightly as he returned my hug, I leaned my face on his shoulder, returning to crying like in that strange dream I'd been in. "I'm sorry I couldn't protect you..." was all I could manage to say as I was trying to hold back my tears.
"It's okay, Jasmine. We were the ones being stubborn. I'm sorry... We dragged you into this mess with us." Arthur patted my back.
I took a deep breath and then looked at Luz, putting gently my hand on one of his arms that was full of purple spots, maybe from a strong power. "What happened to him?..."
"Argh... He and I had to use our mana channels to the fullest to kill the Elderwood Guardian... His body couldn't resist the amount of magic he released at once." Arthur said also looking at his brother.
"True... From what I could understand, his arms literally disintegrated from so much mana and then reformed... Seriously, what insanity is this? Where did he get those spells from?" Elijah asked looking at Arthur.
I, on the other hand, left the boy lying down and tightly hugged one of his stained arms. Again he had that event of having a limb destroyed and glued... How long will he suffer more things like that....
After a few seconds, still hugging Luz, he began to release dense energy into the air, he was releasing his bloodlust. It was so strong that I ended up letting go of him and putting my hand over my mouth, trying to breathe, everyone there started to feel it too.
Samantha started crying in fear and hugging Kriol, who raised the shield without understanding what was happening. Reginald who was passed out ended up waking up due to intense energy, and was coughing a lot trying to breathe. Even Lucas had wake up and give a scream of fear, he was handcuffed to the floor, unable to move and trying to breathe too. Arthur was weak, but he seemed to be holding up better than all of us there and lastly, Elijah put his hand to his mouth, as did I, trying to draw air for himself.
"D-diamond!?" I said, concentrating with all my mind to not accidentally reveal his name.
Luz made a strange noise, it looked like a moan of pain and slowly got up, he carefully moved away from me and then started walking towards Lucas.
"A-Aaaah?!? W-what's going on?!? Why am I still with you, freaks!?! And why am I stuck?!!" the blond noble yelled in rage, extremely confused and seemed in agony at that strong presence.
Without saying anything, the boy in the cyan robe and torn clothes, ended up stopping in front of the blond noble, standing there, watching him, without doing anything else.
"What's wrong, you idiot?!? Do you think you're the biggest? Get me out of here, or when we leave, I'll say everyone that you're a lesser race of insec- !!!" before he could speak, Luz ended up concentrating more energy of his bloodlust to a single point, focusing everything on that traitor.
Lucas started to get suffocated with that dense energy on top of him, I could see him trying to scream without his voice coming out, while several tears came out of his eyes and his pants were getting quite stained in the area between his legs.
"aaah-g! A-a-aag! Aa-!" He tried to move, but all his limbs and neck were stuck to the ground, meanwhile, Luz put one of his feet on the noble's belly and pressed hard, as it ended up making Lucas vomit on his own face.
That scene was getting kind of disgusting, but everyone couldn't seem to look away from the fierce aura that Luz possessed.
"You... Traitor.... I will... Let this one go..... But if I know... That you did something like this... With any other team.... I'll hunt you... Take your mana core by force with my hands... And chew it in front of this bitchy face of yours..." His voice was different from the common voice or the voice that the mask emitted, the voice was more distorted seeming like a monster, and instead of the blue shining eyes behind the mask, the color was yellow.
Lucas seemed to piss himself more in his pants with that threat and soon Luz was moving away from him, but now... He was heading towards Elijah....?!
The boy ran towards Elijah, eventually getting him down and on top of him, doing nothing more than pinning him to the ground like that.
"You.. Nic-... Why did ... To me... frien-" that sinister voice continued, but it felt like the words were being cut off, as if a sound barrier was repeatedly appearing and disappearing around Elijah and Luz, without any control. Making impossible to understand what he was talking.
After that, he passed out on top of the boy with glasses and the dangerous presence disappeared instantly.
We all got back to breathing, catching our breath as it was water in the most hot day of our lifes, we were all wide-eyed, including Arthur. Elijah pushed Luz off him, leaving him lying on his back on the floor.
"What was this?!?!" Kriol said in a shaky voice.
"Aaah! T-that was more intense than an Elderwood Guardian.. HOW?!?!" Reginald finally spoke his first words after waking up.
"He was sleepwalking..." Arthur said as he asked me for help to get up, and so I was supporting him.
"Was he sleeping?! Really?!?!" Elijah spoke aloud in shock.
"Yes... The power he used when we fought the Elderwood guardian... From what he told me earlier... Chances are his backslash consists of rage out of nowhere... I think it also accounts for moments of fury while sleeping..." Arthur said while taking that strange sword from him, in the shape of a staff, using it as a cane.
"S-sorry... But I don't want to stay here anymore... I-I appreciate that you guys killed that monster... But I'm honestly.. afraid of all this right now..." Samantha said with a sigh, her voice trembles.
"Alright... No one here is forced to stay.... But it's true... It's not safe for a specific person to stay here, if Diamond has another rage while he's sleeping..." I said looking towards Lucas who had passed out again from the shock.
"I'll stay here with Note, Diamond and Jasmine. You guys can go out of the dungeon with Lucas if you want... Inform the guild about the betrayal he caused. If they ask why he is like this... What do you think of use the beast mana we face as an excuse?" Elijah asked, both I and the others agreed with that.
The young earth conjurer soon separated the metal handcuffs from the floor and seemed to create several more so that Lucas would be well secured while Reginald was willing to carry the noble.
"Stay well folks." Kriol said waving.
"Oh... I'll miss Brald... If he's not here, then he must have... Died... How was his last moments?" Reginald said as he was carrying Lucas and the others were moving away. I was also curious, as I was unconscious at the time.
"As far as I know... He was devoured by the vines while he was laughing at the total insanity of the battle..." Elijah and Arthur said together.
"Wait.. You mean... if it wasn't for Diamond, I would have been devoured too?" He asked with a look of fear, perhaps remembering when the tentacles of vines tried to caught him, until Luz used that plant spell.
"Apparently so..." Arthur answered him.
Reginald seemed to say a silent thanks to Luz and then he left with the others. Now it's just me, Elijah, Art and our unconscious boy.
"So.. what did he say to you?" Arthur asked Elijah.
"I don't really know.. I'm confused about this, Arthur... It's better if we talk with him."
"Wait, how he..." I was going to ask Elijah how he knew Note's name, but Arthur just shook his head... Apparently he ended up telling the glasses boy while I was passed out.
We stood there waiting for Luz to wake up, Arthur had said that Sylvie was on her way here, which made me confused but didn't decide to ask. As our cyan-cloaked companion had an aggressive sleepwalking moment, we decided it would be bad to try to carry him back out of the dungeon by ourselves. We never know if that giant mana beast or if the batrunners would become a problem, mainly because we were weak at the moment, we needed to rest more. So we camped there for a bit until we saw Luz have a few groans of pain and he was squeezing tightly in the stomach area.
We decided to try to wake him up, it took a few minutes to do that, but soon he woke up, looking confused. "Argh... Guys... Ta hell... What happened..?" was the first thing he said, being conscious, after that fight. I could feel the pain he was felling while saying that words.
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