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40.4% TBATE - A More Experienced Hero / Chapter 38: Chapter 38 - The Dire Tombs III: Survivors

Chương 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.

.---------.---------.

[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.


Chương 39: Chapter 39 - From one battle to another

[Luz Leywin POV]

"Argh... Guys... Ta hell... What happened?" I said when I finally woke up, feeling a strong pain in the area of ​​my mana core.

In my line of sight, there were only Elijah, Art and Jasmine, I was slowly sitting up, with the help of my brother, to soon see that we were in the hallway before the boss arena, and with the only light there being a fire nearby.

"You passed out after using the second phase." Arthur answered me directly, and I just shook my head, with one hand still on the area of ​​my torso where my core was.

"Are you okay?" Jasmine asked a little worried.

"I think so... The energy was so much that even now I'm feeling the pain of multiple currents of mana entering my body... Argh... It was weird..." I said with a slight cough, realizing now that I was still wearing my mask, which was strange as it had fallen off my face in my transformation.

"Weird in which way?" Elijah asked this time.

"If I compare it to what would normally happen... Imagine that flowing mana through the body is the same as making water go through a tube... Now imagine that instead of water, it's a super thick honey... That's what I felt." Everyone looked at me with a look of surprise, but they seemed to have understood my analogy.

"Well... Now the ultimate question... Where are the people? I thought they had all survived..." I said, taking my hand off my stomach and facing the trio in front of me.

"Well, about that... Brald was the only one who didn't survive the attack, the rest are alive, but they decided to get out of here before you woke up, because they wanted to take Lucas soon to report him... And because They were afraid of you." Arthur said with a sigh and I soon noticed him taking off his mask.

I was looking at him oddly as to what he did now, but Elijah soon heaved a sigh as well. "Relax. I've already seen your faces and Arthur has talked to me for a bit about the two of you... Don't worry."

"Oh.. Alright..." I said taking off my mask, I must have had some bloodstains in my mouth and near my eyes, by the way it was smeared on the back of the mask.

"But.. Can you return to this topic? What do you mean they were scared of me?" When I asked that, both Jasmine and Arthur's faces became serious, while Elijah looked uncomfortable.

"Well... There was a moment when you just had a rage attack and started attacking Lucas.. And me. I mean, you made Lucas humiliated and then you pressed me to the floor asking me weird things... until you passed out again." Elijah said, scratching his own cheek.

"What the fuck? Is this serious?" I asked confused and they agreed.

"Guys, is this for real?" This time I asked inside my mind.

"Yep, completely, you put on a show and made that blond brat throw up and pee all over himself." Zalgnity said with a laugh at the end.

"Weirdly, the part where you went to Elijah... For some reason I heard your voice like it was a high pitched noise, not words... But since he's saying you said something, maybe we just couldn't hear it at all by some mental block." Sylvia was super confused by that, and I was too.

"What about Sirius?" I asked mentally, but no one answered. "Hi...? Hello?"

"What's the problem now?" Zalgnity replied.

"I asked a question, guys. What about Sirius? He told me that you guys knew about him and you didn't tell me." I thought a little confused still with everything going on.

"Huh? Did you ask a question? I honestly didn't listen." Zalgnity was answering me again, as if he had only heard the first part of what I said.

"Wait, are you really not listening when I asked?" I mentally spoke to them and only received a psychic confirmation from both of them.

"It seems that every time I try to say something about Sirius they don't listen? Geez boy, what kind of thing are you up to... Really, when you told me not to ask the others about you, you didn't were you kidding...? Right, Mr.Sirius?" I thought to myself, giving a little cough and returning to the conversation with my dungeon team.

"Well... I see... We'd better see this situation later in a safer place... Oh and my name is Luz, Luz Leywin." I said extending my hand to Elijah.

"So you really are brothers? I thought you call each other like that because you are a duo." he said while we shook our hands.

"Not exactly." I said laughing a little.

"He was adopted." Art would say and I would give a light little cough.

"I see, since you're awake now, we can get out of here without any problem. Shall we?" Elijah said getting up and Jasmine followed him.

"Wait... Where is the Elderwood Guardian's mana core?" I asked and they looked at me confused.

"Must be in the boss room.... And like, the place collapsed, so..." Elijah said scratching the back of his head.

I gave a big sigh and got up towards the boss room, where there was a hole that possibly was where we exited. In it there were several stones thrown, which supported the fact that the place had collapsed.

"Are we going to do that?" Zalgnity questioned, curious.

"I can feel the corrupted energy of the mana core... And we're less than a kilometer away from it... So yes. Doing that is possible." I spoke to Zalgnity while reaching my hand towards the hole in the wall.

The trio that was waiting for me was confused, but soon I could hear a noise from something there. My right hand begins to be surrounded by a black and red color.

"Come to me.... Oh... Corrupted one... I am your real god... I am your real leader... Obey me and don't run away.... Your escape is the same as refusing your own existence."

I was reciting in a low voice and the aura in my hand gets much denser, suddenly a loud noise occurs and something goes flying out from under all those rocks, at high speed, landing on my hand. It was a smooth and beautiful sphere with a greenish color like a moss, but with a black layer around it, it was the mana core of the mana beast we faced.

"How did you do it?!?!" Elijah exclaimed, while Art and Jasmine were impressed but not saying anything.

"The mana beast we faced.. It's been altered, its mana core is modified to make it more powerful and aggressive... That extra layer of power was easy to manipulate from here." I said keeping the mana core in my dimensional ring.

"That didn't quite explain it, but... Are you saying that it was STRONGER than usual????" Elijah exclaimed again.

"Yes... I would say it was actually 5 times more powerful..." I replied and approached them, putting my mask back on. "Are we going to get out of here or not?"

"Of course. Take your sword, Luz." Jasmine warned me.

"Actualy, we won't need to take our weapon, will we Arthur?" I said looking at my brother.

"How... How did you know?" he said confused

"How did he know what?" Elijah said shifting his gaze between Arthur and I repeatedly.

A tremor erupts from the ground we were standing on, causing Elijah to hold on tight to his staff while Jasmine grabbed the two daggers.

"Sylvie is here..." I said smiling and the tremor increased.

"Who is Sylvie?" our four-eyes questioned.

"My bond..." Arthur said and soon the tremors became more intense with some stalactites from the ceiling falling to the floor.

I could see what looked like a beautiful dragon for about 8 meters, its scales were obsidian-black that divinely reflected the glow that was coming from our nearby fire. Two horns in the head area that were very sharp, somewhat reminiscent of the horns I had in my Second Phase: Corrupt Trigger, but while mine had color, hers were completely onyx-black. The wings vaguely resembled Sylvia's in dragon form, but were very dark, following the black style of the rest of her body. On her back were blood-red spikes, down her spine. Even though her essence demonstrates the true nature of a pure and gentle dragon, the aura she passed on to others could be pure terror. Her face was very elegant and sharp, her black scales and yellow irises was like a type of topaz..? No... This reminded me the eyes that Sirius had when we were talking before.

Sylvie's powerful limbs, armored with jagged spikes at the elbows and knees, lifted as she approached Arthur with a graceful pose, despite her large size. It was funny to see when she lowered her head that was as larger as his torso, bringing her snout close to him.

Suddenly, her snake-like tongue shot out as she licked my brother's face with the force to lift him from the ground.

"My God, your breath is foul, Sylv." Art said while I started to laugh at this whole scene.

"I-is that a wyvern? But it has four limbs... I-it can't be right? Is that a d-d-d—"

"I'm pretty sure that this goood girl here, is a dragon." I finished for the dumbfounded Elijah, while I patted one of Sylvie's limbs, as her tail swung a little.

Our four-eyes stared up at the sight of the fearsome beast, his face filled with more horror than when he had seen the elderwood guardian. Jasmine, who had already known about our little dragon, was still trembling at the sight of my brother's juvenile bond.

"As I said before, Elijah, this is my bond, Sylvie." Art stretched his hand out to rub the dragon's snout, causing her hind leg to thump the ground in pleasure.

"You really didn't change that much." I said, while seeing that Sylvie still act like before.

Turning to face Elijah, Arthur put on a grim face. "Jasmine and my brother knew about this, but I want you to promise to keep this a secret as well. Dragons have been tought to have been extinct for centuries now, so if anyone were to suddenly see Sylvie... Well, you know what greed can do to someone." Elijah nodded frantically in response, his glasses hanging loose on his crooked nose.

"Okay... Art, it looks like you're still not walking right around using Dawn's Ballad as a cane. Stand on Sylvie's back. I'll go ahead to see if any adventurers show up. As the guys left earlier, there's a chance that they sent a backup team here." I said while feeling a little pain in the area near my mana core and a little in my legs, with my feet being surrounded by a small wind as I walk towards the exit.

Arthur was in Sylvie's back to follow me, while Elijah and Jasmine would follow close behind. The jorney back up only took a few hours compared to the full day we needed when we had travelled down.

When we reached the surface, my hair was lightly colored as I touched the grass, using a plant magic technique Alea had taught me in childhood, I could feel horses and a small carriage approaching.

"A rescue team really came. Sylvie, can you still transform?" I said looking at the dragon behind me and soon she turned into something that looked like a black cat, however, as my brother was still on her back, he fell to the ground in a comical way, with Jasmine helping him up.

"Kyuuu~" Sylvie made that classic noise of hers and jumped on top of Arthur's head.

Art and I adjusted our masks on our faces as we witnessed what came to "save" us. I was surprised to see Kaspian and Claire on top of the horse that was ahead of the others, I waved at them as they came to a stop next to us. Behind them, a carriage appeared with a medical symbol stamped on one side.

Claire was the first to get off the horse, in an extremely hurried way, she ran towards me and hugged me tightly, while my only way to react to that was to caress her shoulder.

"M-master Diamond! Oh my god! You're fine!" That's what she said as she buried her face in my shoulder, my robe still a little dirty.

"Oh my, are you guys okay? Your Party went to the nearest guild post and asked for a rescue, luckily I was there solving some problems." Kaspian said looking at everyone, getting a face of astonishment, since Jasmine had a bandage on her head and torso, Elijah had a broken nose, Arthur had a bruise on his torso, and I had wounds on my arms.

"We're fine, getting out of the Dungeon right now. It's been a long time since I was knocked out and.. Due to the dangers we went through in Dire Tombs when we went down there. We thought we'd better start coming to the surface when I woke up." I replied, as I felt Claire hugging me even tighter. "And why are you here? Shouldn't you be in Xyrus Academy for what I know?"

"Today I had decided to spend a day with my uncle... So I came here with him." Claire said, her voice muffled by the position she was in.

I looked back a little, I saw Sylvie doing a smirk, while Elijah and Jasmine had a surprised face, and Arthur, with the mask on, was probably making some expression, but I didn't see it.

"Anyway, we need to take you to safety, how is the situation with your bodies?"

"I just broke the Nose." Elijah said.

"Jasmine received a fire attack on the head and torso, while I received the same attack on the torso. I have a little pain all over my body and my legs are so hard to move." Arthur replied, the fact that it involved 'fire' made Kaspian's face go into disgust, apparently the denunciation of Lucas' betrayal was made.

"I'm already all treated, but still feeling a lot of pain...." I said and soon Claire let go of me apologizing, I just gave a weak laugh.

Two mages, probably emitters, got out of the carriage and walked towards us, they tried to take everyone to their carriages, but I was the only one to refuse, but I didn't refuse them to use a basic healing spell on me. So I feel a little better, even though there is still pain.

"Is it okay for me to go with you?" I said to Kaspian and Claire as the rest of the group was already leaving along with the carriage.

"But how are you going to do that? We just have a horse and we both ride it." Claire asked confused.

"Do you think I've spent these 2 whole years moving around on horseback? Nah. I really use magic." I said giving a smirk under my mask.

"You're all worn out already, mostly from what we've been told, an elderwood guardian... You and Note beat this and you still have the energy to use magic and move with us?" Kaspian said in disbelief.

"Yep. But what I'm looking forward to more is taking the opportunity to talk about it." I said taking the mana core out of my dimensional ring and giving it to Kaspian's hand.

"Wait... This here.. Is this Elderwood Guardian's mana core?!" He asked and I nodded in agreement.

"Oh my... And being covered by that dark layer..." He continued talking.

"Yes, according to what our dead Party leader, Brald, commented as we walked through the dungeon, it looked pretty modified compared to when he was here before. And with a mana core like that.. That means the Dark Guild behind from Sunshine Maze, was also here at Dire Tombs..." As I said that, Kaspian's gaze went from surprised to serious.

"By the way there were broken traps and the boss room was locked by a cracked door full of incapacitated runes. I'd say Dire Tombs was attacked or abandoned by this strange Dark Guild. The only traces of their presence there were the runes and the boss itself." I continued to tell my story, while Kaspian returned the mana core.

"I see, can we go?" the guild leader said getting on his horse.

"Of course." I said, absorbing some of the dark and plant mana that was inside the corrupted mana core. This filled up my mana pool so fast.

I put my hand on the ground and create a kind of vine board, it had a very slippery moss underneath, so to speak, it was a surfboard that worked out of water. "Wow... Can I go with you?" Claire said with light in her eyes as I climbed onto the plank. Looking at Kaspian to see his approval of the idea, he didn't seem to care too much.

"You can, but after this you'll go in your uncle's horse." I answered her, while she climbed on the board and kept holding on to my shoulders.

With that done, Kaspian started to leave the area using the horse, while I directed my palms back and started releasing gusts of controlled winds, serving to propel the board.

The strong wind caused by the high speed I was, made my hood go back, revealing my multicolored hair that was floating. I could feel Claire gripping my shoulders tighter as she gave a "WOAAH!" of happiness, it seems she liked the different idea I had.

I released gusts of propelling wind so I never advanced in front of Kaspian, always staying side by side with him.

"Diamond! Taking advantage of the fact that we are still apart from the others, I wanted to warn you in advance of something." Kaspian said, even with the strong wind, his voice didn't fade.

"What would it be???" I asked, getting very close to him to hear better.

"You and Note have become quite famous among adventurers and nobles. Even though you are listed as an elf due to your plant magic, most nobles of Sapin and Darv are looking to have you two as bodyguards."

"Any news on this, Kaspian?" I asked, after all, I already knew about these situations that Arthur and I would refuse, luckily until now it only happened very few times, because we were always away from the guild posts. With the exception of Guild Hall which was where we met with our parents every 2 months at least.

"Well, the latest proposal came from two royal families you know." When Kaspian said that, my eyes widened.

"The Glayders and The Eraliths???? What do they want with me?"

"With you two, actually. They've heard of the reports and rumours, and are wanting both of you as special guards working for their realms at the same time. I'm not sure about the internal arrangements, but possibly it's related to the process of uniting the three realms."

"I see, but why are you talking about this now and not when my partner and I are together?" I said confused, while Claire behind me seemed to get tired of being on her feet, so I got close enough to Kaspian's horse for her to be with her uncle now.

"That's why there was the report of Lucas Wykes' betrayal in the group of you two. So at least one of you needs to be prepared to know all the strong consequences of accepting or refusing the deal. From the way I know the Wykes, they will bribe or threaten anyone who learns of this betrayal, lest it be spread further. You need more influential contacts than the Wykes family to survive their possible attacks. And having at least one of the royal families is a good idea." Kaspian was telling me about the situation Arthur and I could be in.

"But... Kaspian, I've shown you before, I already have contact with both royal families." I spoke confused.

"Yes, you said who you are behind the mask has those contacts... But you as an adventurer don't. And from the way we know our king of Sapin, if you ask him for protection, being yourself, he will associate and try to have you just for him. So you better get support with your adventurer name too."

What Kaspian said was true, while I, as Luz, had contact with all of the two royal families. Me as Diamond was another story, only Tessia knew I was Diamond among them. But the real problem was if Blaine knew I was Diamond, besides what I'd done saving his daughter, my achievements as an adventurer would be used to make that greedy bastard get more reasons to have me even more... And I know well how people that kind worked when they dont get what they want...

"Fine, I'll check on the situation when we get there. I have to talk to Note about this." I said taking a long breath.

"Wait. If he becomes a special guard, won't he be able to mentor me anymore?" Claire asked.

"Well, I probably wouldn't mentor you anymore because of lack of time and freedom. But like I said, we'll still think about it." I answered her.

"You say it as if you have the alternative of refusing." Kaspian spoke, accelerating the horse.

"There is, but what Note and I need to talk about is whether it's really worth it to be frowned upon by Wykes without protection, or to be recognized by the royals as special guards." I answered him while also accelerating my board, with an OmegaFlame now being the spell that took me forward.

"Are you serious?!?" Kaspian asked, his voice showing that he was not believing what he was hearing.

"You know what I'm capable of magically speaking. And you know a little about my intellectual capacity to talk and get deals. So yes, I'm serious." I said with a laugh and finally accelerated, going in front of them.

.---------.----------.---------.

It took about one to two hours, but we arrived at the Guild Hall, at the entrance I saw Jasmine and Elijah sitting on a bench, I approached them, with Claire still next to me while Kaspian separated from us to sort out some things.

"Guys, where's Note? I need to talk to him about some things." I asked looking at both, until my answer came, when Sylvie came jumping on my shoulder from behind, when I looked to the side, I saw my brother approaching, with several bandages covering his entire torso, he was no longer wearing that shirt of his, but still had the cloak over everything.

"I hope you're feeling better, Adventurer Note." Claire spoke looking at Arthur.

"Hm... Thank you very much, and would you be...?" he asked with a curious look, remembering earlier when she'd hugged me and called me master.

"Oh! I'm sorry but I never told them about you because.. I didn't see the need... Guys, this is Kaspian's niece Claire Bladeheart. I've been giving her some magic and swordplay lessons." I announced to my group.

"Wait, so she's your disciple or something??... When did this start?" Elijah said adjusting his glasses.

"Remember the last time you saw me? So, I was going to see her. Before my family trip I had a year and a half ago, I had already met her and made the deal with Kaspian." I replied to Elijah, who seemed strangely pleased with the situation, after all he knew about me, he...

Should he be easily accepting things like that...?

We talked a little more around there, Claire didn't seem to be so focused at all, she looked more at me and Note due to our last dungeon. But soon our conversation was interrupted by Kaspian's secretary, Mary.

"Adventurers Note and Diamond. I have to inform you that we have special guests here and they want to have a chat with you both." Mary said with a voice a little shaky for the situation.

"Okay, can you tell them we're heading there, what's the room?" I asked Mary while the others, including Arthur, were confused. With Claire, the only one who knew about the situation, saying goodbye to us as she left the reception.

"Fifth room on the left in the main hall, it has two guards, you can't miss it. Please don't take too long." Mary said bowing and then walked away from us.

"Um... what is this about?" Art asked me.

"Well.. One more group of nobles wants us.. This time it's both royal families we know." I spoke softly using sound magic so only he could hear, my brother's eyes widened behind the mask.

"I think we better go. See you later, guys." He told our two companions who waved as we walked towards that room.

As told by Secretary Mary, it was a big door and had two guards guarding the place. They looked strangely when they saw us, my brother and I showed them our ID cards.

"I'm Note, Fire Augmenter AA-Class." my brother spoke.

"I'm Diamond, Wind Augmenter S-Class. I hear people inside this room want to talk to us, can we come in?" I asked politely after introducing myself, both guards still stared at us strangely, maybe because it was more common for someone to want to talk to royalty than the other way around, until they opened the doors for us to go.

We entered that room together, and we saw an interesting scene. That area was a large room with some rectangular tables, it seemed to be a meeting place for internal discussions between important adventurers. But the place was pretty empty, with the exception of two tables that were set back from the entrance.

At the table on the left, there were 3 people sitting on chairs, facing the entrance, these were the king and queen of the elven realm, along with my old mentor beside them. Tessia was sitting on a chair behind her parents, with her back to the wall.

At the table on the right, there were 2 people seated, also facing towards the entrance. They were the king and queen of the human realm. Curtis and Kathyln were there too, sitting in chairs behind their parents.

Besides them, there were 3 more familiar faces there, standing next to the elven royalty, were Alea and Aya. On the human royalty side was the person I knew as Kathyln's mentor, I don't remember her name now, but her codename is something I can easily remember, Zero.

I was kind of surprised by the fact that until now, I only knew that both royal families had two special guards each, one of the guards was currently missing from the royal family's side of Sapin... Where was Thunderlord?

Anyway, after a quick look of the room, we bowed for the two families there.

"Welcome, dear adventurers." Blaine was saying this as the guards behind us closed the doors to the room.

"You can sit down." Merial said sweetly and kindly, Arthur and I decided to do what was asked of us.

We sat on two chairs that were behind another rectangular table that was positioned so that we were all in a 'V' shape. The two tables in front of us, one on the left and one on the right, while there was the table in the center in front of them, which was where we were. Sylvie was with us, in that miniature form of her natural appearance, she decided to lie on my brother's lap, luckly, no one seemed to notice her.

"Phantasm, Can you please make our meeting a little more.. Secret?" Virion ordered Aya, which soon created a dense layer of Sound Barrier around the room.

"So Aya's codename is Phantasm...? It matches a lot..." I thought.

"It looks like the situation here is going to be too serious." Zalgnity took a long breath, he was bored.

"Relax, Zalg. After all, I'm a sage and my 'little brother' was a king in his past life... We both know how to behave in such situation." I thought, with a wide smirk under my mask.


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