Chapter 130 Volume III - Chapter 51: Hunters Before, Now Toys
In the midst of the commotion, I saw two thin needles flying past me, piercing the heads of two of the spiders behind me.
On my leg, which had already been bitten, I felt a pain similar to the one in my arm and I quickly shook my leg. The spider that had wounded my foot jumped forward, and without waiting for it to get up, I crushed it with my bitten foot.
I realized that my foot was literally burning, that it was difficult to step on the ground properly, but I didn't have time to think about it.
The area on my back rippled slightly from the wind around me. I swung my sword behind me, even though I hadn't heard anything, and another one of the spiders split in two. I quickly pulled the barrier over me and a few more of the thrown webs got caught in it. With that, I realized how worn the barrier was.
Even though I hadn't been coy about the mana I poured into it, it could withstand a few more attacks at most.
"Aiden!"
At the sound of Alex's voice, I saw the rest of the spiders all rush at me at the same time.
They're all like fearless robots, really... They don't care about dying, but somehow I don't feel a shred of anxiety.
On the contrary, I feel strangely... happy.
I released the layer of wind that surrounded me. A wave centered on my body spread in all directions, and the spiders thrown at me were thrown backward before they could fight the wind. Some were killed by the force of the impact, others somehow survived, but Alex threw arrows and needles at them without letting them get up.
Despite all this, the last three spiders survived. My smile grew wider.
I quickly lunged at one and the spider fearlessly swung its forelegs at me, but slowly.
I grabbed its foot, not caring how disgusting the spider was, and then I pulled its leg hard to the side, separating it from its body. The spider prepared to scream at my feet, but without letting it, I plunged my sword into its body.
I slowly turned to the other spiders.
They couldn't move, and the reason they couldn't attack me was simple. Their legs were damaged when they were thrown backward, crushed even. They could only crawl, that was all they could do. Just like... like a pathetic weakling.
I approached them, leaned over them as they crawled, defenseless, and smiled.
"Were you going to kill me? You were hunters, right?"
I remembered how, when I came to the cave's blocked entrance, they had been waiting, seeing me as a toy.
"Now you are my toy, aren't you?"
My heart racing, I grabbed the spider's intact foot and pulled it hard away from its body.
The spider made a sound like a moan, but it didn't seem to be in pain.
Now that I think about it... why are they so fearless from the beginning?
Anyway, it doesn't really matter. It's just... it annoys me when spiders don't react.
I grabbed another leg of the spider, but just then a voice echoed in my mind.
'Aiden, snap out of it.'
My mind, my vision suddenly became clear. I looked at the spider's foot I was holding and quickly backed away.
"Ah... wait..."
Damn it...
I turned around and looked over to where Alex was. He didn't seem to notice what I was doing, he was looking at the corpse of a spider with a big smile on his face.
No... he is 'trying' to do it rather than looking at it. There is a certain disgust, revulsion on his face, but he forces himself to look at them anyway.
"Hahah..."
Alex started laughing not long after I turned to him.
"We did it!"
He was busy with the joy of victory. But I was not so happy, although I was glad to be alive.
"Sith, if I do something like this again, please ask me if I'm conscious."
Sith accepted my request without asking me anything.
'Okay.'
I took a deep breath, calmed myself down, and turned back to Alex, who had stopped laughing but was still smiling.
I took a step toward him but then paused because there was a sharp pain in my body.
I clicked my tongue and poured another healing potion down my throat. Even if the pain didn't go away completely, at least it subsided to the point where I could walk with the help of the Absolute Mind.
"Ale-"
"Kiiieeek!"
My eyes widened at the sudden scream, no, the screams.
I saw Alex's shocked expression, his smile instantly fading, and then two pieces of web and two spiders flying at him from the bushes.
One of the webs stuck right on Alex's chest, the other on his waist.
Both of the spiders that had been thrown at him attacked his legs and immediately sank their fangs into him.
"Aaaaaahh!"
Alex collapsed screaming before he could even react properly. The spiders tried to damage Alex's leg with their forelegs, their fangs, anything they had that could hurt him.
"Hang on!"
I rushed at him, attacking the spiders on his feet with my sword.
It wasn't hard to cut them down, they acted as if their only purpose was to gnaw on Alex's leg, but I didn't care. As soon as I was sure I had killed them both, I turned back to Alex.
"Are you okay?!"
I shook him slightly but he didn't react. He just kept his eyes closed and then his body just let itself go, he had passed out.
At least his chest was rising and falling, he was still breathing. He was alive... I think, for now.
I clicked my tongue again and put him on my back. There were screams from the forest again, it wasn't hard to realize that an army of spiders was approaching. So I put Alex on my back and started running in the opposite direction to the sounds.
My mana was about to hit rock bottom and every muscle in my body ached like hell. I couldn't even call what I was doing running. I was limping and stumbling as I ran, but I kept running as long as I could for our lives.
Meanwhile, the sun was slowly rising in the dungeon.
*******
I laid Alex gently on the ground, on one of the spare sleeping bags I had taken out, forced one of the healing potions into his mouth, and then breathed a sigh of relief.
Our new hiding place was a small cavity I found in a rather large mountain. It was the perfect place as the entrance was small and easy for me to close.
Of course, I didn't let my guard down. I was especially careful after the last incident. Still, we seem to be okay for now...
I think I can relax a little, I've already done everything I can to make sure we're not found.
I sighed deeply and looked at my wounds. The potions were starting to work. The wounds were already scabbed over and they seemed to be healing.
I had really too many wounds, my whole body was aching like crazy. Even though the spiders were easy to kill, there were so many of them that they almost killed us. Still... I didn't have any wounds that wouldn't heal.
Other than that... I was a bit hungry.
I put my bag next to me, took out one of the buttons with the bread in it, broke it, and started to eat the bread that came out. It was quite tasteless, it was just ordinary bread, but it had a comforting effect because it was soft.
As I ate my bread I also looked at my watch. It was early morning, at least for this place.
We have no problem with time, but this... incident is going to slow us down a bit.
I took a deep breath, thinking about what had just happened, the thought that I had enjoyed tormenting the spiders even for a moment filled my mind, but I stopped myself from thinking about it.
Now is not the time. Whatever happens to me, there are one or two things I can do after this dungeon... The only thing I need to focus on right now is completing the dungeon, anything else I think about will only confuse me.
Yeah... what I need to think about is how to move forward in the dungeon.
I took another bite of my bread. Silence, an uncomfortable one, seemed to fill the cavity for a moment.
Just then a voice, a voice that didn't belong to Alex, echoed through the cavity as if to recognize and break the uncomfortable silence. It didn't come from my mind, it sounded like someone was standing right in front of me.
"Is it good?"
I swallowed, fear gripped my body but I tried to suppress it, slowly turning my head in the direction of the voice.
His violet eyes were fixed on me. 'Ethan', my wiera side, with his brown hair and skinny body was in front of me. Yet I didn't feel an intense, irrepressible fear like the previous times.
"Hmm? You're not scared this time."
Was it because I was already overtired? Because of the Absolute Mind? Or is there some other reason? It's just... he's not as scary as he used to be. I don't know.
I tore my eyes away from him, slowly turned around, and took another bite of my bread.
"Oh? You prefer not to be afraid of me anymore, to ignore me? Even when I'm standing here in front of you and you can hear my voice with your ears, not your mind?"
I thought for a moment of his previous appearance. At that time... it hadn't been pleasant, I had learned that he could control my body.
Yes, I have a genuine fear of him. I don't want to look at him, but it's not a reaction like before. Like my body is programmed for it.
Have I gotten used to caora's presence?
Although... do I really need to worry about him right now? He can't do anything to me for now anyway.
Not just to me, but to Alex too. Because if Alex dies, I die here.
It's not that I don't have a chance of surviving, I might even be able to fulfill my purpose in the dungeon, but the chances are really slim.
If I don't exist, he doesn't exist. So he can't take that risk.
"Heh, you're not wrong."
He straightened up from where he was leaning. He had his usual smile on his face, but this time without the madness. He looked no different from a human being right now, but I wasn't going to let myself get caught up in it.
"Why did you come?"
"I'm bored. And why shouldn't I come when I can?"
"So you can't come whenever you want?"
He didn't lower his smile, but he also didn't give me an answer.
"So I'm r-"
"You are talking too much."
He straightened up from where he was leaning, his violet eyes sparkled and the cavity was filled with a purple glow. He raised his hand, opened his palm, and then a small purple marble made of caora appeared in his hand.
"You're very weak, you know that, Ethan? or Aiden? Whatever you want to call yourself."
The marble shrank, hovering over his finger, but even so, the glow intensified.
"You can't even trust yourself, you doubt, you're afraid."
He began to twirl his finger, and the purple marble followed his finger.
"It almost makes me sad to think that you are me. I can't imagine that I could be so weak."
I felt the need to respond, not thinking about the consequences, but just wanting to do it.
"I may be weak, but I'm getting stronger. I'm sure I'm in better condition than most of my peers."
"Hah, that's funny."
The marble spinning on his finger suddenly flew into my face.
I didn't expect something like that, I reflexively raised my arm and closed my eyes. Then... the marble hit my arm.
"Huh? AAahh...!"
I felt my arm burning with tremendous pain. All my muscles contracted, I fell to the ground and it was hard not to scream. I gritted my teeth so hard that if I pushed any harder I would have broken a few of them.
"You're weak, Aiden."
He leaned down, closer to me. The smile was gone from his face, his expression cold.
"You need to exceed expectations, not meet them or fall short."
I couldn't think much because of the pain, but a question echoed in my mind.
What expectation? Expectations of who?
My vision blurred a little more. I dug my fingernails into the wall of the cavity. I could feel them breaking, but it felt better to focus on that instead of the pain in my arm.
The last thing I saw before my vision went completely black was my wiera side starting to smile again.
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