Chapter 94
"Who are you?" the three of them asked at the same time, then slowly stepped back while observing the five people standing in the middle of the intersection.
The Devil is here.
The night air blew freezing cold, but it was no ordinary cold as the oxygen around them seemed to harden, ice crystals forming out of nowhere and turning into hundreds of snowflakes that filled the air, accompanied by the indifferent gazes of those five people as they stared at the three of them, making Rose and her two companions freeze in fear.
Then, one of the five people, Hagi, raised his hand and unleashed a horrifying attack with terrifying speed in the form of snow capable of erasing half of both their bodies, and only Celina survived that sudden strike.
She broke free from the freezing mist and fled while trembling after witnessing her left arm severed cleanly without spilling even a drop of blood, as though something cold had frozen the wound from within.
It was truly horrifying. The attack left Rose and Asivise dead in gruesome fashion, with the lower halves of their bodies gone, their left arms missing, and white smoke pouring from their heads amidst the frozen air.
Receivers of Empyrean Crimson, at its first level, Cold Mystic.
Watching Hagi's merciless act of killing those two without the slightest hesitation made Narissa, who stood behind him, freeze in fear as terror slowly took over her mind.
Ren, who witnessed the scene, immediately turned his gaze toward the main road on his right before stepping forward into the two stone pathways of Zen University lined with shady trees and towering canopies.
The others quickly followed, leaving Narissa standing there in silence, lost in Hagi's earlier actions. She understood that ordinary people could never exist in a place like this, and both she and her companions already knew that they came from a group called Intersection Society, the organization responsible for killing hundreds or even thousands of people and turning Moran City into a dead city.
She clicked her tongue as she stepped forward, her expression turning grim.
From ahead, Elmer glanced back as he slowly reduced his pace until he walked side by side with Narissa, who slightly lowered her gaze.
"Do you feel guilty toward her?" Elmer asked, worried about the relationship between the two of them.
"That's not it." Narissa wanted to deny it, but stopped when her steps suddenly halted after seeing orange flames soaring upward not far ahead, still within the university grounds.
The five of them instinctively stopped moving as they realized the battle was not over and was only getting worse with time.
Elmer quickly approached them and said with a serious expression and restrained voice, "You three go there first. The two of us will follow later because there's something I need to take care of."
With an almost expressionless face, Ren replied, "Alright."
"Don't die... Veranica," Elmer added, his face filled with pressure.
Veranica, who was usually quiet, now smiled cynically after realizing that Elmer and Michelle were showing concern for her, bringing a strange calmness to her heart as she replied full of confidence, "Unfortunately, that's never going to happen."
She spoke those words with absolute confidence.
Then the three of them hurried toward the place where the orange flames towered into the sky, causing the dark university to light up for several seconds because of it.
After seeing them leave, Elmer immediately approached Narissa with heavy steps, as though something weighed heavily on his mind, making him think about revealing something he had hidden all this time.
"What is it, Michelle?" Narissa asked with an eager expression.
Elmer immediately realized it, then calmly said,
"It seems you've forgotten about that matter. But let me tell you everything I know." He fell silent as though checking Narissa's reaction upon hearing those words.
Narissa's ears felt hot as if she could hardly wait to hear it. She played with the edge of her shirt as though uncomfortable with the atmosphere that had suddenly frozen over, while her heartbeat pounded much faster than before.
'What is he trying to say?' Narissa thought anxiously.
"Just say it," Narissa said, her breath catching as the cold air pierced the back of her neck.
The night wind grew colder with every passing second, making the atmosphere unbearably tense before the moonlight that had been hidden behind black clouds slowly shifted, its gentle glow beginning to illuminate Elmer's serious face.
"It's about your younger sister, who stands at the boundary between life and death. I'm not even sure what I should say, but she... suddenly appeared in this place."
Elmer paused for a moment to observe Narissa's shocked reaction before hurriedly adding;
"At Zen University."
However, Narissa had already realized it about a month ago, and she knew that her younger sister was the mastermind behind Moran City's destruction.
With a heavy heart, as though unable to accept this reality, she nodded reluctantly under immense pressure, her face turning gloomy.
"Let me handle her," she said while walking past Elmer before stopping, giving a bitter smile, then continuing, "As for the others, please make sure they don't interfere with the two of us."
'A request, huh?' Elmer thought with his calm expression as he stared at Narissa's back.
"Do whatever you want." Elmer immediately stepped forward and followed the other three to find out who was capable of creating such enormous flames.
Worse yet, he had no idea that something terrible was rampaging in that place.
When Ren, Veranica, and Hagi arrived at the center of the university, it was decorated with a fountain and long curved benches positioned directly at the four-way intersection. Beside the roundabout was a small garden filled with various ornamental plants, and the most striking among them were the jasmine flowers.
Several meters away from the massive flames erupting upward from below, the three of them arrived once more, but this time waves of hot wind struck their faces and sent dust flying everywhere, sticking to their clothes and blurring their vision for several seconds.
They immediately hurried forward again, and a few moments later, Elmer and Narissa arrived at the same place, standing there while catching their breath as they observed the surroundings until both of them noticed something strange disturbing their minds.
"Michelle," Narissa said between heavy breaths. "There it is!" She was utterly shocked as she lifted her head, her index finger pointing toward two tiny creatures that looked like babies, yet not babies, fighting so violently that the battle was cracking the building beneath them.
'Is there an owner somewhere around there?' Elmer thought with certainty.
He let out a short sigh before replying, "I know."
Then he quickly continued walking, his thoughts moving faster than before because the situation around them had changed far beyond what he had imagined.
Several minutes later, his pace slowed when he realized there were silhouettes of three people standing motionless as though staring at something ahead of them, right in front of the small gate, leaving him captivated.
As the two of them drew closer, those three figures turned out to be Ren, Veranica, and Hagi, observing the condition of a horrifying creature that had already died, yet its body still burned while its blood flowed like a river of lava.
The demonic horse had died with its legs missing, its stomach torn open, its tail charred black, and its skull shattered.
Instantly, Hagi raised his hand as the oxygen around them hardened, ice crystals forming in an instant and turning into millions of snowflakes that flew toward the demonic horse and froze its body before it slowly began eroding on its own.
The world seemed to spin as Hagi started massaging his temples, his breathing growing heavy as though oxygen itself carried weight, distorting his perception of the surroundings as he began losing track of where he was.
Yet as time passed, the phenomenon slowly faded away like a sheet of paper burned into ash and swept away by the wind.
"Are you alright?" Veranica asked with slight concern after hearing Hagi groan several times.
"I'm fine," Hagi replied, his lips trembling.
Only then did he realize that Elmer and Narissa had caught up and had been observing their actions unnoticed the entire time.
Elmer glanced at Hagi, who looked deathly pale while staring back at him, then shifted his gaze toward Ren and Veranica before speaking in a calculating tone.
"There's a Recipestele in this place." He smiled after realizing something rather shocking. "And it seems we have uninvited guests." His gaze fixed on the seven people still standing on the stone sidewalk, one of them holding the gate opener while slipping a hand through the gaps of the gate.
All of them immediately turned their gazes, and one of the women among those seven, partially hidden behind the iron fence, wore a disgusted expression after realizing someone she knew was standing beyond the gate.
"So you're there after all, useless big sister," muttered the woman named Niva Herana while glaring sharply at her.
The moment Narissa realized her younger sister was there, her jaw instantly tightened. Contrary to her earlier words, she immediately looked away upon seeing how much her younger sister had changed, staring at her under immense pressure.
With a swift motion, Ren pulled a pistol from inside his coat pocket, then pulled the trigger with deep calmness.
Bang! Bang! Bang!
Unfortunately, the bullets did not hit any of them and instead embedded themselves into the wall beside the iron gate, which stood two meters tall and about one and a half meters wide, partially left open.
"Ren, what are you doing?" Narissa asked in a hurried tone as though worried about her sister's condition.
Elmer's eyes widened after realizing that Narissa's earlier words had been nothing but empty talk, though he knew Narissa simply could not bear to see her younger sister in such a state.
"Searching for that information with passion, diligence, and careful calculation to reach the day you finally found her. Yet now you're ignoring it?" Elmer said in a calm tone laced with disgust after realizing this.
"But," Narissa said hesitantly. "Can I really do it?" she asked with hope and conviction.
Now that his physical condition had improved, Hagi smiled cynically while looking at Narissa's foolishness.
"My advice? Go back to school so your stupidity disappears," Hagi said mockingly.
Narissa frowned. "What did you say?"
Then, while the five of them were focused on that conversation, the seven people had already escaped down the same road they had used earlier.
Ren immediately moved forward without waiting for their orders because this was his only way of obtaining information regarding his younger sister's whereabouts from the underworld group that might know something about the wanted fugitive.
Elmer smacked his forehead when he saw Ren pull the gate open with swift yet measured movements; the bullets previously embedded in the concrete fence began moving after Ren as he started running along the stone sidewalk.
Realizing that, all of them immediately chased after Ren, intending to do what they were supposed to do to all of them. Kill them.
Ren ran incredibly fast as though unwilling to let this opportunity slip away, and once his targets entered the Controller's range, he aimed his pistol at them before firing and adding magnetic pressure to every bullet.
The moment the trigger was pulled, a barrage of gunshots echoed across the stone-paved road, the sound spreading in all directions from several hundred meters away.
The bullets tore through the air and struck directly into the leg of a man named Mizofra Mivoras, obliterating it instantly.
"ARGHHH... Kharensya...." The scream of agony rang out so sharply that the five of them instinctively slowed down.
With his left leg destroyed, Mizofra's balance immediately collapsed, yet he still managed to move until he finally fell onto Kharensya's shoulder and received regeneration through the wound exchange technique she performed.
She was not particularly worried while using the technique and had long grown accustomed to it, even though she knew it would burden the way she ran, though it could still save her companion's life.
Ren clicked his tongue while observing that, allowing his bullets to return into the pistol magazine before slowly reducing his running speed when he saw them start running again.
Black smoke began pouring out around his body as it spread in every direction.
From where the seven of them were running, they remained on the same path, with the vast university buildings stretching along their left side.
"Zorca," Mizofra said in a booming voice. "Thank you." He gave her his usual sincere smile.
"Don't think too much about it," she replied flatly, almost sounding indifferent.
Then from ahead, a mass of black smoke appeared, and from within it Ren emerged with a sharp and serious expression while aiming his pistol at one of them. Vabian Roca.
"Get down!" shouted a woman named Febrica.
Bang! Bang! Bang!
The bullets shot out once more, but Ren transformed his body into black smoke before instantly reappearing behind a woman named Niva Herana, who had been wary of his presence.
Ren raised the pistol, and just as he was about to pull the trigger, Niva seemed to realize it and with swift movements forced Ren's pistol out of his grasp, sending it scraping across the stone road before landing four meters away from their current position.
He smiled the moment he realized that, then dispersed his body once again after noticing that one of them, a Receivers, had started analyzing his movements and was preparing to attack him.