"DIE!"
I did my best to move my body, frozen as the huge mace fell on . I pushed myself hard, pumped mana into my legs.
And, sohow, I managed to throw myself aside.
The mace landed with a loud thud where I had stood only a second before. I felt the trembling of the ground all the way through my body.
But I couldn’t stop yet.
I quickly regained my balance and started running.
"DON’T RUN! CO HERE! CO BACK! DON’T GO!"
My eyes widened when I noticed the shadow that suddenly fell on from behind. I could see the swing of the mace through this shadow, but I had no chance this ti.
I gritted my teeth, turned around out of the corner of my eye, looked directly into the brown eyes of the gigantic man, put as much mana as I could into my voice, and shouted at the top of my lungs.
"Stop!"
This man... was several tis stronger than . At least he must have been, because the only thing my voice did was to slow his movent a little, to make him seem like he was hesitating.
Still, it was an opportunity for to avoid his attack once more. And I took that opportunity.
There was no way to escape from the factory.
Despite his mass, he was fast enough that if I ran in a straight line, he would be right behind in an instant.
So... sohow, I had to make him stand still, even for a short ti.
I glanced around, and as the huge man started to move again, a pencil-sized piece of iron caught my eye.
I grabbed it and whispered in a low voice.
"Sharpen, get stronger, heavier, faster."
I felt a large part of my mana being drained, but I didn’t care. I grabbed the piece of iron as if I were throwing a stone, stretched my arm to its fullest, and then threw it at the man.
The man didn’t seem to care about the piece of iron. But, even if I hadn’t used much force, he was unable to react when the piece suddenly shot out at trendous speed.
The piece of iron hit the man’s fat belly. It pierced his skin, tore through his flesh... but it didn’t pierce through.
"UGH-! AAAAGHHHH! IT HURTS, IT HURTS!"
The man pulled the piece out of his stomach and threw it aside. Blood slowly trickled down his abdon, and his eyes were filled with bloodlust.
"DIE! DIE! DIE!"
When he started running full speed at , I picked up a few more pieces from the ground and did the sa.
The second piece hit the right side of his chest, but he didn’t care.
The third piece hit his shoulder, and managed to make a wound that reached the bone.
But the man didn’t even stagger.
When I realized that there was only one ter between us, that his mace was about to co down on again, fear gripped my whole body. My thoughts raced, I didn’t know what to do.
Why was I here?
Why... was he targeting ?
It was absurd... so ridiculous.
I didn’t want to die in a place like this... for sothing I didn’t even know why.
Wasn’t it unfair... to die here... when I had managed to get out of that dungeon, when I was just beginning to recognize my power and move forward?
It... was.
I bit my tongue, sinking my teeth into it in a particularly painful way. The tallic taste of blood filled my mouth, the pain spreading sharply throughout my body.
My first target...
Was .
"Get faster, lighter, stronger..."
Then I jumped as high as I could.
Suddenly, I found myself on the man’s mace. I tried to calculate my remaining mana, I looked around for things I could use... then paused as I saw sothing at the other end of the factory, above. I thought of sothing, sothing risky, but... sothing that might work.
So, I fixed my eyes on the man’s mace.
"Get heavier!"
Suddenly I saw the color drain from the man’s fingers holding the mace. Then his expression changed.
Out of his control, the mace collapsed with trendous weight and speed where I had just stood. The factory shook, the mace even made a small dent where it fell.
But I didn’t stop.
I kept my eyes on him as I tried to back away quickly.
"Slow down, get heavier."
I had enough mana left to use two, maximum three words more effectively.
But I didn’t need any more.
I ran faster than the man to the other end of the factory, not even bothering to look back.
And where I ran was... a dead end. It was where one of the thick walls of the factory was.
I had to go there for what I had in mind. I had to be able to do it, after stalling him so long...
I could have made it.
"ENOUGH!"
But then... the usual huge shadow lood behind .
My eyes widened to their fullest, and I reflexively looked behind out of the corner of my eye.
And what I saw... was that the man’s brown eyes were now shimring with a purple glow. His oily skin was suddenly covered with swollen veins. He was lifting the mace that I had just weighed down a lot.
"DIE!"
I quickly removed the effect that weighed the mace down, then gave myself stamina and speed.
Still, I felt the barbs of the mace, every inch of it, every bit of its cold tal on my back. A trendous pain spread through my body, my mouth was completely filled with the tallic taste of blood and my eyes felt like they were going to burst.
The next second, I was swept off my feet. I found myself hurtling forward even faster than I was already going. It didn’t take a second to find the wall I was aiming for right in front of my eyes.
And then... I slamd into the thick wall of the factory as hard as I could.
*******
I felt rust and dust raining down on .
The pain was sharp.
No, it wasn’t just sharp...
It was so much that it was clouding my mind, getting in the way of my thoughts. My vision was completely blurred, sotis darkening and barely returning to only ’blurred’.
There was a strange ringing in my ears. It made unable to hear anything. There was nothing else except the ringing.
But... strangely, the pain was not all over my body.
It was only... in my stomach and above.
My legs didn’t hurt in any way.
I saw the huge figure of the man coming in front of in a blur. His steps must have been slow, because the blur was growing quite slowly.
He must have been saying sothing. Even though I couldn’t see his face or hear his voice... I was sure he was shouting and screaming.
Die, you deserved it, you’re going to die... sothing like that was probably coming out of his mouth.
For a mont, I felt the taste of blood seeping between my lips. My throat suddenly tightened and I had to cough painfully and bloody.
I tried to raise my hands but... I realized I couldn’t, my body was rejecting .
My eyes glazed over for a mont, the whole world seed to go dark, but... then it ca back again.
I involuntarily squinted my eyes which were about to close. For no reason... I thought of the day I fell from the pit in Attracta’s dungeon.
That fall... was much more painful.
That fall... was much worse than this.
Yes, I may have survived only because of Attracta...
But didn’t I have her power now?
Couldn’t I live a little longer... even if it cost my ’life’?
Just like those who run out of mana can use their lifespan to use skills.
I tried to move my lips, trying to say the first letter. But even trying to say the first letter, let alone the word, made my whole body convulse so much that I had to vomit blood once more.
And yet...
In spite of everything...
"H... He- a... He... al."
I felt a sharp pain in my heart. No, not the normal pain... much sharper, a pain I could feel inside .
But with this pain, my vision gradually began to improve, the constant ringing in my ears slowly subsided. I was also able to hear what the huge man, who was only three ters away from , was saying.
"I told you to co out of hiding! It wouldn’t hurt this much...! You got what you deserved!"
I don’t know why, my lips curled upward.
"Now... you will die!"
When the man raised his mace once more, ready to swing it at ...
I thought it was funny.
Or rather... this situation.
"Slow down, slow down, slow down."
Suddenly, the man’s movents slowed down one after another, almost to a standstill.
The pain in my heart beca sharper. I felt as if soone had grabbed it in their hands and started squeezing it.
Yet I didn’t stop.
"Beco weak, vulnerable, fragile."
It squeezed my heart even tighter, and once again, blood and vomit rose from my throat.
But I... couldn’t stop.
I turned my eyes upward, toward what was standing right above the man... a compressed ball of iron suspended by the chains of a crane. It hadn’t been ford into a complete sphere, so it was full of iron that looked like sharp thorns.
"Get heavier... heavier, heavier."
I started coughing, and with each cough, my heart felt like it was going to explode, and with each one, my vision, which had only recently recovered, began to blur again.
Colors faded, sounds blurred together. A strange... coldness enveloped my body.
"Get sharper... stronger... heavier."
The chain of the crane suddenly snapped. The ball of iron, weighing tens, maybe hundreds of tons with my words, also sharpening and strengthening, fell right on top of the huge man weakened several tis by my skill.
The shadow of the man disappeared from in an instant. Hot blood splashed over , covering my clothes, my face.
With difficulty, I lowered my head and looked at the... ’mash’ under the iron ball.
I had won.
I had... beaten him.
I had succeeded.
With difficulty, weakly, I reached into the pocket of my dress. I took out Paul’s jewel with this hand while holding the necklace Aiden had given with the other.
I wanted to hold them in my hand... for the last ti. Nothing more, nothing less.
But... the mont the jewel ca into contact with my own blood that ran down my hand from my dress, it did sothing it had never done before.
Its transparent surface suddenly turned blood red, absorbing so of the blood on my hand. For a brief mont, it emitted the sa glow around it, then gradually faded, and... returned to normal.
The only difference... it was no longer transparent. It was red.
I had no idea what it was. And yet... I didn’t care. I gripped the jewel and my necklace tightly.
I threw my head back. As I leaned against the wall, thinking how... cold it was getting every second, I saw the sky through a hole in the roof of the factory.
"The sky..."
A feeling appeared inside , a feeling that enveloped my whole body.
I...
Wanted to see the stars.
I gritted my teeth, with the last shreds of strength I had left, I dropped myself to the ground. Maybe I couldn’t feel my legs, yes... but it didn’t matter.
I didn’t use my legs at the bottom of that pit anyway.
I just... needed a little strength...
"He...al..."
I vomited even more blood, the pressure on my heart beca even more intense.
But... I could probably do it one last ti.
"Get... stronger..."
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