Chapter 299 Volume V - Chapter 17: First Seal to Break
With an elbow in the back, my whole body contracted violently once more. The connection between me and the world seemed to be severed for a moment. Everything went haywire, all sounds became incomprehensible.
I leaned on my spear once more as the Guardian Radiance tried to keep my body upright. I spat blood but forced myself to stand up as the mana inside me spun and spun, supporting my body like an exoskeleton.
My eyes widened in an instant at that very moment.
I tried to defend myself, knowing very well that there was nothing I could do against the black fist I found right in front of my body, but it didn't reach me.
The man twisted his attack right in front of my eyes in a way I couldn't even imagine. He straightened his hand as he spread his fingers and struck the spear in my hand hard with the side of his hand.
He spun around briefly in a simple motion as my spear slipped from my grasp and flew aside. Then his kick landed right on the left side of my stomach.
Again, the whole world turned upside down.
Again, I found myself being thrown backward.
Again... I could do nothing but collapse weakly to the ground.
Everything was blurry, nothing was visible. Every sound became meaningless, echoing only in my mind.
I clenched my fist, not even trying to stand up anymore because I had lost my spear and there was nothing left to hold on to... I could do nothing but think.
How could I react? How could I do something back to someone so fast, so strong? It's... impossible. It's simply, basically impossible. The person in front of me is simply stronger than me.
So, even for a moment... I paused.
Stronger than me...
Am I... am I weak again? Am I incapable again?
This festival was supposed to relax me, to give me a rest... Why do I find myself face-to-face with my own powerlessness again? Just a few minutes ago I was walking with my friends smiling... why am I in this state now?
Why is my whole body covered in blood? Why is it so hard to even stand up? Why do I feel like all my bones are broken?
After all the time I spent in the Neutral, after getting so strong with Lithoa and Kari... why?
Is this... a dream?
'No, of course not. Snap out of it, idiot.'
Lithoa's voice echoed in my head and I paused, remembering again that I was in reality.
Then... I gritted my teeth, dug my nails into my palms.
My lungs barely contracted. I coughed up blood as every breath I inhaled was simply painful, but I took a deep breath anyway and lifted my head up.
Again, I heard the screams of people, people who were just trying to have fun but something like this had happened to them because of me, full of pain and terror... They were running away from me, or more precisely from the man in front of me in the flames... even if he didn't care about them in the slightest.
I saw an old man. He was running with a small child in his arms even though his own body was clearly giving him a hard time. I saw two of my peers, jumping into the flames, trying to make their way in the opposite direction. I saw a woman crouched over a man lying on the ground, covered in burns.
They were not close to me, but they were not far away. But if there was one thing they managed to do... it was to remind me again and again of what was happening right now.
Still, I got up on my knees, somehow managing to stand up with my whole body trembling, even if with difficulty. I looked around for my spear, which had been thrown who knows how far away from me, but I could not see straight in front of me and the chances of finding it were close to zero.
Just then... a voice echoed in my ears. The same calm, cold, and... disturbing voice.
"Do you still have the strength to fight, Adrian Caleo?"
I clenched my teeth even harder. I pierced my palm even harder, not caring about the blood seeping between my fingers.
I'm... I'm sick of this. I'm really tired of this.
Again, because of my weakness, someone is dying... suffering. My weakness aside, they're in the flames at a festival they should be enjoying because I'm here among them...
"Apparently not... Then let's end it here."
I'm sick of it... literally sick of it.
I've had enough.
I pushed my whole body once more, as I had been doing all along. I staggered backward, trying to stand up with difficulty, almost falling once more, but... I caught myself.
"Oh, do you still have willpower?"
I couldn't make out the man, his image was obscured by the blur of my eyes. But his voice and silhouette were clear.
After the blood and sweat dripping from my forehead, I took another deep breath. It was the deepest breath I had ever taken in my life, and the exhalation was just as heavy. But... it gave me some sense of relaxation.
With that breath, even for a moment... the world seemed much simpler than it was. I don't know why, but everything seemed... clearer.
And then... I understood.
"Well, then-"
"Pfft..."
The man's short step toward me and the word on his tongue were suddenly interrupted. The purple glow in his eyes, easily recognizable even in his blurred image, dimmed slightly. Everything became insignificant except the shouts of people and the crackling of the flame around us.
"Are you... laughing?"
I finally stopped holding back, my laughter echoing across the field. Tears followed, along with blood from my eyes.
"Ahahahahahahahahah!"
In the midst of my laughter, the man who was my opponent reacted with surprise to this momentary event. When all we could both hear was the sound of my laughter echoing in the area, I finally slowly calmed down. As I slowly ended my laughter, I spoke without lowering the smile on my face.
"I get it... I get it now."
I narrowed my eyes, released my clenched fist, and looked directly into the shining, purple eyes of the man in front of me... without any hesitation.
"I was fed up, you know? Every time I decided to be a good person and ran into an obstacle, or couldn't save anyone, or was directly responsible for what happened... I blamed myself over and over again. I was fed up. I was sick of being powerless."
The man's expressionless face tilted slightly to the side.
"So?"
"So... I was right!"
I slowly raised my hand as the blurred silhouette of the middle-aged wiera in front of me suddenly solidified his stance. I slowly reached for something under my shirt as he tried to comprehend what I was doing.
"I'm saying... it's my fault. It always has been, even now..."
I gripped my necklace tightly, my lips curling higher and higher as I finally grasped what I had to do. And this... strangely enough, brought with it a sense of relief. I felt happy.
With the burden of constantly worrying that I should avoid being exposed lifted from my shoulders, I felt more... relaxed than ever.
"So... I'm going to stop making mistakes."
As I felt the last thing I had left of my family, my necklace, warming up, officially responding to my emotions, something else slowly happened.
First, the mana in the atmosphere fluctuated, then it began to heat up, just like my necklace. The mana, which was colorless but made itself known through its intensity, began to envelop my body. But... then something happened that I didn't know. The mana was followed by a faint, comforting blue glow. But I didn't care.
"I won't hold back anymore, I won't care about the consequences, I will just... do what I want, what I have to do."
I reached out to the mana in the atmosphere, with my thoughts and desires, as if I were reaching out to a friend. So, as I was reaching out to it... it reached out to me. It responded to my feelings, to my desires. And not only that, it reached out for so much more.
I gripped my necklace tighter than ever, pulling it off my neck.
The mana in the space we were in, in this whole mini-town, even much further away... listened to my desires. However, it was not the only one who accepted my request... A blue glow accompanied it, slowly intensifying on me.
I felt my body slowly warming up. My ears were burning, I seemed to be growing taller... my skin felt strange. But I didn't care. I just squinted my eyes, smoothed my lips, and kept myself as calm as I could... as the smile disappeared from my face.
"Try not to die."
<>
With a violent shockwave, like a heartbeat, the whole world was illuminated with an intense glow. The blurring of my vision disappeared, the sounds, and everything else became much clearer. And then the face of the man, which until now I had only seen as a blur, was revealed to me.
It was different this time. It was still cold, calm, but... not disturbing. On the contrary, he was serious. More serious than ever.
And this seriousness... was also a sign that he was beginning to see me as a threat.
"Let's fight again, shall we?"
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