Matt POV

"Wait... did I actually say it?" I asked, sweating.

My inner thoughts weren’t safe for work.

Cwal stared at me with the cold, dead eyes of a man looking at a fresh corpse.

"Calm down, calm down!" I shouted, flailing my arms in a panic. "I was just half-joking!"

"Half?" Cwal’s voice was like ice.

....

He took a big sigh

"I’m getting more and more weird the more time I spend with you. Anyway, since you’re awake, we’re in phase two."

He tossed back my storage ring at my chest.

I almost failed to catch it.

I looked toward the entrance, where the muffled rumbles of battle that were shaking the walls.

"I’m guessing you already know what’s happening?" Cwal asked.

I wore the ring, pulled out a fresh set of clothes, and started dressing as fast as I could.

"Long story short? Yes. A naggy lady has been dumping info into my head while I was out. But which route are we on? According to the script, I mean." I asked.

"There you go with that weird way of talking again," Cwal muttered.

"We’re in Route D in your guide, and we’ve got..... setbacks. Kent and Finster are..."

The tone of his voice told me everything I didn’t want to hear. They were either gravely injured or... dead.

"A bad end..." I muttered, my heart sinking.

"What a disgrace. Keep your chin up and uphold the pride of being one of the primordial colors, Schwartz."

The voice nagged at the back of my head.

"Verde?"

"I can trace anyone I’ve blessed" she replied

"And for the record, Finster—the boy you’re so worried about—is not dead. His life force is actually recovering."

My breath hitched.

"Even if he were dead, you have to move," Verde nagged. "You said it yourself, didn’t you? That you were ready to face your despair."

I took a long, deep breath, steadying my shaking hands.

I nodded to Cwal, and he returned the gesture.

He brought out his daggers before vanishing into the shadows, preparing for the next phase.

I sprinted toward the entrance, praying to a god I barely believed in.

"I hope it’s not too late."

_________________________________

Shelter Underground Entrance

Volley after volley of ice spears and arrows rained down, but Abalam moved through them like a ghost through mist.

Suddenly, she flinched and felt something familiar.

Fanna took advantage of this opportunity, and an arrow pierced Abalam ’s neck.

"....."

Abalam did not even register what was going on and seemed to be in a trance.

Her eyes, wide and wild, darted away from the girls.

"Found you," she whispered with a terrifying grin.

A second arrow sank into her chest.

She stared at it, reached up, and snapped the arrow shafts like bothersome thorns.

"Tsk, too shallow," Fanna grunted, ready to fire more.

"Hide and seek is over," Abalam said, her voice dripping with malice.

"Since it clearly isn’t either of you I’m looking for, your leverage is gone. You are no longer useful to me."

Abalam radiated a pressure so thick it felt like drowning.

Gulp...

Fanna tried to notch another arrow, her fingers trembling, but before she could draw the string and aim at her target, the target itself was gone.

Abalam crushed the bow in one hand like dry kindling.

Fanna reacted instantly, trying to drive the loose arrow into Abalam’s throat, but the power gap was astronomical.

Abalam caught Fanna’s wrist, pivoted, and slammed her into the stone floor with bone-breaking force.

Abalam’s tail whipped out, coiling around Fanna’s neck like a cold, muscular snake.

She lifted the girl, inspecting her.

"Physical enhancement at the moment of impact. Impressive. You would have been a strong weaver. A shame that the future ends here."

Twack!

An ice spear shattered against the back of Abalam’s head and dissipated.

She turned her head slowly, looking at the pale, trembling Solaris.

"Wait your turn, little girl," Abalam hissed.

"Death matters not to ants after all."

Solaris didn’t stop.

She unleashed another volley.

Thack... pshhhh

Thack... pshhhh

Thack... pshhhh

Thack... pshhhh

Plop.

Abalam dropped Fanna’s limp body to the ground.

"If you are rushing toward your grave, then be my guest."

In a blur of motion, Abalam vanished.

Solaris didn’t even have time to blink before the aberrant appeared in front of her.

A hand clasped together, shaped like a blade, is driving straight for Solaris’s heart.

CLANG!

The sound of metal on metal echoed through the hall.

Abalam’s eyes widened. The ice shield hadn’t dissipated this time. It was dark, murky, and reinforced with Solaris’s own blood.

"immense creativity and control," Abalam praised, caught off guard.

"But ultimately useless."

With pure physical strength, Abalam’s hand punched through the blood-ice.

Solaris reacted instantly, detonating a shard of ice against her own chest to blast herself backward toward the stairs.

She was mid-air, retreating, but Abalam was faster.

A cold hand clamped onto Solaris’s outstretched arm, halting her momentum mid-flight.

"Don’t run away," Abalam sneered, pulling her back closer to her face.

"You asked for this."

Solaris didn’t look afraid.

Instead, she smiled, a bloody, confident grin that made Abalam her question for a moment the your girl’s sanity.

Solaris opened her clenched palm.

She had been clutching a concentrated and compressed pool of her own blood the entire time.

"Perfect," Solaris whispered.

The blood in her hand solidified into a needle-thin spike of crimson ice instantly.

With the leverage from Abalam’s momentum holding her arm, Solaris drove the spike directly into Abalam’s left eye.

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGH!"

A horrifying, guttural scream ripped through the entrance as Abalam recoiled, clutching her face, dark blood leaking between her fingers.

"You... you insignificant, crawling vermin!" Abalam roared.

"How dare you? How dare you defile a property of lord Paimon! I am a chosen servant of the future Prince of Sinners! My form is a temple built for his noble satiation, and you have defiled it with your filthy blood!"

Fanna was slowly walking up to the ranting noises of the aberrant. She had no choice but to watch in horror as Abalam began to systematically torture Solaris.

The Aberrant wasn’t trying to kill her anymore. She was trying to keep her alive and inflict pain as much as possible.

Every time Solaris was slowly fainting, the Aberrant would chip ice in her knee

Abalam held her in place with her tail and slapped Solaris’s face repeatedly, strong enough to peel the skin in her face and bulge in welts.

Every time the girl began to lose consciousness, Abalam would drive a shard of ice into the open wounds on Solaris’s knees.

Driven by a desperate survival reflex, Solaris would freeze the wound to stop the bleeding, prolonging her own agony.

"Good! Stay alive!"

"Stay awake so you can feel every ounce of the pain you’ve inflicted upon me!" Abalam maniacally giggled, while her one remaining eye was wide and bloodshot.

Abalam’s tail uncoiled, letting Solaris’s limp body drop.

As Solaris fell, Abalam lunged, her tail whipping forward to pierce the girl’s eye and repay the debt in blood.

...

"Huh? This... This conceptual prowess.... Impossibile.."

Just as the jagged tip was about to puncture the iris, it was jerked aside, held back by an unseen sideway force.

I stepped into the fight, grabbing Solaris by the hip before she could fall and catching her with both my hands.

She looked at me and smiled in pure relief.

"Too late, idiot..."

"I’m sorry..."

Both my hair highlights and pupil glowed with a blinding intensity.

I was pushing my conceptual ability to its limit, forcing a constant leftward directional pressure against the Aberrant.

Not even ten seconds and my mind stat is already drained and just right on queue blood was dripping down my eyes, ears and nose already.

"Cwal... take care of her."

Cwal appeared instantly.

He coated Solaris in his thrum, and the two of them began to dissipate.

"I’ll bring Fanna to the rendezvous point as well. Time for your final phase, leave this wretched place." Cwal’s voice echoed, but he was already gone.

"Yeah... t-thanks." I struggled to answer.

I stood alone, looking down at the aftermath of Solaris’s fight.

I grabbed a piece of the red ice and asked Verde in my head.

This will do, right?

Yes, she replied. It will do.

I broke a piece of the frozen crimson blood and crunched it within my mouth, swallowing it whole.

_________________________________

Authority: Verde’s Curse.

Origin: Verde

Status: Passive

Effect: Reduces Mind Stat by 5 stages unless the user consumes the required nourishment.

Required Nourishment:[Solaris’s Blood]

[COMPLETE]

Lifting reduced mind status

[COMPLETE]

Next Required Nourishment:[Clematis’s Blood]

_________________________________

System notification kept ringing in my mind.

My hair highlights flared even more, bleeding into the rest of my dark hair. My pupils shifted too, turning from a soft blue-teal to a piercing, neon green.

I manipulated the space around her, snapping the leftward force into a crushing downward pressure.

Crack!

The stone floor gave way instantly, forming a crater beneath her.

Abalam struggled to even stay upright under the weight, but her focus wasn’t on her shattered surroundings.

She was shivering, staring at my transformation in pure, utter disbelief.

"How..."

"How is a human wielding a conceptual power of Space? That authority was left behind only for us... by His Highness!"

The power was intoxicating, but the price was brutal.

My eyesight turned extremely blurry as blood began to overflow from my eyes, hot and thick against my cheeks.

I stretched out a hand, and with a thought, I manifested a single ice spear.

Abalam’s expression relaxed slightly.

"Make it quick, Schwartz." Verde’s voice hissed in my mind

"You have unlocked the full capabilities of your conceptual ability, but you are still limited by a human body. You are on the verge of breaking."

"I know," I whispered.

I released the spear.

Thuck.

It drove straight through her chest, piercing her heart. Abalam coughed, a spray of black blood coating her pink lips as she stared down at the frozen spike impaling her.

"How...?"

"You should have let Paimon educate you better."

Turning on my heel, I sprinted toward the stairs to begin my escape, ignoring the searing burn in my eyes and the constant drip of blood from my face.