Walking through the hallways of the bottom floor of the safe room, they all could feel that there was sothing in the air.
Sothing evil and ancient.
"Did the new recruits get infected by the disease by walking over this place?" Lionel asked and pointed at the ceiling.
"That's what we thought so as well." Mikael pointed at the ceiling. "The cafeteria is directly above us, so you can tell why it has been such a wide-spread problem."
"The sickness seeps through the ceiling and infects everyone that happens to walk directly above the door."
With the lantern in hand, Mikael looked ahead and saw that their destination was just up ahead. At the sa ti, the air turned heavy, like all the oxygen had been sucked out of the
room.
"We've arrived."
Up ahead, they saw a rusty, old door that had been standing since the beginning of ti. It looked like it had survived through the destruction and rebirth of the world.
It also had four chains-three of them were wrapped tightly around the door handles, while the last one was dangling by the side, nearly broken and rusted.
It looked like the chain would break at any mont.
"Nerezza, do your thing." Mikael said.
Nerezza rolled her eyes, and as her hair started floating like gravity had flipped upside down, she gently spread her arms around and gave a certain buff to everyone present.
They all could feel that their resistance against the sickness' corrupting force had increased. "How do we open the door?" Oldman asked. "If we touch it, don't we automatically get sick?" "While the weak may not be able to open it..." Mikael stepped towards the door and slamd his hands against it. "...We can!"
With a strong push, the door slowly creaked open, and even though it was quite a heavy door, Mikael was still able to open it like it was just any ordinary door.
As soon as the door opened, a strange view opened right in front of them.
Steps led deep into the mist, and those steps seed to be hovering in the air, as if defying gravity. Those led sowhere very deep.
'Wait, mist?' Adam's eyes turned serious. 'Don't tell we're going to the world of the mist!'
"Co on, everyone, enter quick!" Mikael shouted. "If I don't close the door soon, the entire safe room will be infected in a matter of seconds!"
Everyone quickly ran through the opening, and Mikael slamd the door shut behind them.
The First Sister leaned over the steps to look at the mist-covered ground below. She couldn't tell whether it was actual ground below them or whether they would just fall down into an endless misty abyss.
"This is now unknown territory." Mikael said. "No one has traversed beyond these steps before."
"Why not?" Akuji asked. "I thought King Moriarty was investigating this place. Wasn't he curious enough to check what is on the other side?"
"We thought it would be better to keep this place locked." Mikael said. "There are legends of a powerful entity that dwells there, and we did not want to risk awakening it."
"But we're taking all the risks, fucking great!" Akuji scratched the back of his head in frustration. "This sounds more like a suicidal mission with each passing mont."
"That's what rcenaries are for." Mikael said and waved his hand. "Let's move. The longer we stay, the more certain we are to be infected by the powers of the sickness."
With that, they started moving through the mist, and after a short while, the lantern on Mikael's hands died.
It beca suddenly dark, and it beca quite difficult to follow the steps, but then Lionel took the front, and using his Kiryoku, he was able to move seamlessly through the world.
Others followed closely after him.
Kyikaa...
Kyikaa...
Adam stopped moving and perked up his ears.
Behind him, Sepheron accidentally collided into him and asked. "Why did you stop?"
"Didn't you hear that? There is sothing making noise." Adam said.
Hearing their discussion, the people at the front also stopped.
"I can't sense anything with my Kiryoku." Lionel said. "You must be mistaken."
"It sounded like 'kiyaak' or sothing." Adam said. "It was very quiet, but I definitely heard
it."
"Oldman," Mikael said. "Make the mist disappear for a mont."
"I'll try." Oldman picked up his banjo and started strumming a soft lody.
As the soundwaves collided with the mist, it slowly started to dissipate more and more. However, after two hundred ters of clearing the mist, there was still nothing but mist
ahead.
Oldman stopped playing the banjo and shrugged his shoulders. "There is nothing."
The mist started to gather in front of them again, even thicker than before.
'Weird, I swear I heard sothing...' Adam frowned.
"Let's continue then." Mikael said.
However, after taking a single step, his ears perked up as he heard the sound of wings flapping.
With his right arm, he drew his Sword of the Morning Sun, and slashed through the air above
them.
"Sky Splitter!"
With his masterful control and strength, the sword cut through the mist, splitting it in two, and even slicing through the dark clouds above.
Through the cut between the mists, they were all able to see misty creatures flapping their wings, and they were looking straight at them, as if they were preparing to attack!
"Vultures!" Oldman exclaid. "However, they're made out of mist?"
"A new breed of creatures." Mikael said. "We shall call them Mist Vultures. This is already a groundbreaking discovery. I wonder what else we will find here!"
Kyikaa!
With a loud scream, the Mist Vultures descended upon them with ferocious speed. There were
around four of them.
"Sun Slasher!" Mikael swung his sword through the air.
Within the slash, the power of the sun radiated outwards, incinerating one of the Mist
Vultures in an instant.
The other three Mist Vultures managed to barely evade the slash, but they were still
descending upon them.
"Ice Mortuary!" Sepheron summoned a chilling storm that encased one of the Mist Vultures in a block of ice.
With his clenched fist, he jumped towards the block of ice and punched straight through. The Mist Vulture let out a deafening screech as its frozen body shattered into a million pieces.
Akuji summoned a simple dagger to his left hand and threw it at the Mist Vulture. It landed directly at the center of its chest, but it didn't look like it was in pain as it kept descending
down.
"Dagaheru." Akuji snapped his fingers.
The daggers multiplied a hundred tis, and the Mist Vulture was quickly shredded into a cloud of feathers and blood. It looked like a porcupine, but instead of quills, it was covered in
sharp blades.
Only one Mist Vulture was left, and it was heading straight to Nerezza, its eyes filled with rage
and hunger.
"Reverse Healing..." Nerezza grinned, showing her sharpened teeth.
The Mist Vulture started bleeding from its eyes, nose, and ears, writhing in pain as it
plumted to the ground.
It got infected with the corrupting sickness!
The Mist Vulture was clearly in imnse pain, but the pain just got worse and worse. Its screams sounded like soone was dragging their nails across a chalkboard. However, Nerezza enjoyed listening to these screams, and her smile kept getting bigger.
But, at that mont, a greatsword smashed through the Mist Vulture's head, ending its
misery.
"What did you do that for?" Nerezza turned her angry gaze at Adam.
"I was getting headaches," Adam said with a frown. "You think it is fun to keep hearing the sounds of torture? Give a break."
"Oh, you can't handle so screams?" Nerezza said with a sneer. "What a baby."
"If he didn't do that, I would've!" Akuji scread. "It felt like soone was stuffing needles
into my fucking ears!"
"Hmph." Nerezza rolled her eyes.
"Enough." Mikael said. "Let's keep moving. I don't think we're that far from land."
"Why do you think there is land?" Sepheron asked with his cold tone.
"These steps must be going sowhere." Mikael said and started walking behind Lionel.
"I've learned one thing about this ga-if there are stairs, they will always lead
sowhere!"
...
In the safe room's auditorium.
On one of the chairs, Dakota sat with her legs crossed, looking at the information of the
current tutorial-takers.
Unfortunately, another couple of tutorial-takers got infected by the sickness. It was never nice to see such things happening because they would be in quite a lot of pain for the next couple of days before dying.
They couldn't log out to escape the pain either, so they had to suffer through the sickness
phase.
"Sigh... I hope they find out what the hell is causing it." Dakota pinched on her glabella.
At that mont, the auditorium's door opened, and a sweet-looking woman entered with a
stack of papers in her arms, snuggled close to her chest.
"Miss Dakota, you requested these?" Muriel asked.
"Yes, thank you, Muriel." Dakota said with a smile.
Muriel handed them over, bowed, and was about to leave, but then heard Dakota's voice
behind her.
"By the way, did you see him?"
"See who?" Muriel turned around.
"Adam." Dakota looked at her and saw her eyes widen in surprise. "He is here, part of the
mission."
"He is... here?" Muriel looked genuinely surprised. "Hasn't it only been one year? Isn't it risky for him to take part in the mission?"
"I thought the sa, but he..." Dakota laughed. "He is truly S-ranker; what a monster. He has
already surpassed in every way. I am sure he is more than strong enough to take care of himself now."
"I see..." Muriel turned around and walked away, a small smile playing on her lips.
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