The Extra is a Hero?-Chapter 322: ESCAPE ROUTE

Chapter 318: Escape Route

"We have to stop him," Leon said, reaching for his sword. "We take him now. We force him to confess."

"No," I stopped him. "If we attack Valen here, the Silver Guard will swarm us. We’re deep in enemy territory, and we have the proof we need."

I tapped my [Nova AI]. "Recording saved."

"We take this to the Trial," I said. "We play this for the whole city. Valen can’t spin his way out of a confession to a Demon Lord."

"Logic Error," Selena interrupted. Her head snapped toward the center of the room. Her nostrils flared. "Atmospheric pressure dropping. Mana signature spiking."

HUMMMMMM.

The black mirror in the center of the room didn’t vanish completely. The purple eyes reappeared.

They weren’t looking at Valen anymore.

They were looking directly at us.

"I smell you..." the voice rumbled, shaking the foundations of the root chamber. "The Anomaly.

The Blood-Witch. And... the Hero."

Valen spun around, looking up at our hiding spot. "Intruders?!"

"Kill them," the Entity commanded. "Collapse the chamber. Bury them with the secrets.

The facility screamed.

Red warning lights flared to life. The massive iron pumps began to overload, their engines whining as the pressure gauges spiked into the red.

"Self-Destruct Sequence Initiated," a mechanical voice blared. "Sanitization in 30 seconds."

"Run!" I roared.

We scrambled back from the edge just as the platform Valen was standing on began to retract behind a blast shield. He looked at us with pure hatred before he disappeared behind a wall of Nether-Iron.

"You will not leave this place!" Valen’s voice echoed over the intercom.

The roots around us began to thrash. The Corrupted Dryads we had bypassed earlier burst from the walls, screeching. But they weren’t the problem.

The problem was the pipes.

BOOM.

The first pipe burst. A torrent of Dark Mana Concentrate sprayed across the room like acid. Where it touched the wood, the roots dissolved instantly. Where it touched the metal walkways, they melted.

"The path is blocked!" Leon shouted, pointing to the exit archway. A massive root had smashed down, sealing the way we came in.

"Maria!" I looked at the Ice Mage.

"On it," she replied.

She didn’t panic. She looked at the spraying acid and the collapsing ceiling with bored irritation.

"Ice Wall: Rampart Configuration."

She slammed her staff down. A massive slide of ice erupted from beneath our feet, angling upward over the blockage.

"Slide," she ordered.

We jumped onto the ice slide. It was like riding a bobsled through hell. We careened over the collapsing machinery, dodging falling debris and sprays of purple sludge.

"Selena! Incoming!" Leon yelled.

A Corrupted Dryad leaped from the ceiling, aiming for our makeshift sled.

Selena didn’t even stand up. She swung her scythe in a seated arc.

SNICK.

The Dryad was bisected mid-air, its halves falling harmlessly to either side of us.

"Obstacle cleared," Selena stated.

We crashed through the upper ventilation grate, tumbling out into the cool night air of the surface.

We landed in a heap on soft, manicured grass. We weren’t in the Plaza anymore. We had emerged through a hidden vent in the King’s Private Gardens, located at the base of the Guest Spire.

I gasped, gulping down fresh, clean air. My mana levels were critical, my lungs burning from the toxic fumes.

"We made it," Leon panted, rolling onto his back. "We have the recording. We have the proof."

"Alert," Selena said, standing up abruptly. "Mana tether severed."

She looked toward the Guest Spire.

Through the glass doors of the King’s balcony, we saw a commotion. Servants were rushing around. Healers were shouting spells.

And in the center of it all, King Elandor lay on the floor, convulsing.

"Father!" Selena’s composure cracked—just a hairline fracture in the logic.

We rushed into the room.

The King was thrashing, black foam spilling from his lips. His skin was turning grey, the rot spreading visibly across his face like a time-lapse video of decaying fruit.

"The Tree..." Elandor gasped, his eyes rolling back in his head. "It screams... the acid... it burns..."

He was linked to the World Tree. When the factory overloaded below, when the acid sprayed the roots... he felt it.

"He’s going into systemic shock," Maria diagnosed, placing a cold hand on his forehead. "His fever is 42^\circ\text{C}. His brain is cooking."

"Michael!" Leon grabbed my arm. "The trial is in two days! If he dies now, Valen becomes Regent. He’ll execute Lysandra immediately!"

I looked at the dying King, then at the recording on my wrist.

"He won’t die," I said, pulling a vial of High-Grade Elixir from my inventory—one of the last ones I had saved. "Not yet."

I poured the potion into Elandor’s mouth. It wouldn’t cure the Rot, but it would buy him hours.

"The timeline has accelerated," I said, wiping the black foam from the King’s chin. "Valen knows we know. He won’t wait two days."

I looked out at the city. The sun was rising. 𝒇𝓻𝓮𝓮𝙬𝙚𝒃𝒏𝓸𝙫𝒆𝙡.𝓬𝓸𝒎

"The Trial starts today," I said. "Get your armor. We’re going to court."

The sun over Sylvaren hadn’t even reached its zenith when the bells began to toll. It wasn’t the melodic chime of the morning call; it was the heavy, dissonant thud of the Iron-Root Drums.

"They moved it up," Leon gritted his teeth, fastening the last strap of his armor. "They aren’t waiting for the Eclipse."

"Valen is panicked," I said, checking my dagger. "The lab explosion spooked him. He needs Lysandra dead now to seal the narrative."

We stood at the doors of the Guest Spire. The guards who were supposed to keep us in were currently encased in blocks of ice, courtesy of Maria.

"Selena," I asked. "What’s the quickest route to the Hall of Verdicts?"

"Direct vector through the Hanging Gardens," Selena replied, pointing out the window. "It requires a vertical drop of 200 meters. Survival probability without magic: 0\%. With Maria’s ice slide: 94\%."

"Let’s go," I ordered.

(To be Continued)