Chapter 208: Battle for Salvation (II)

Filch’s body blurred forward, crossing through the fallen house in a single breath. Beyond the building he finally saw the withering beast that looked like a large octopus with hundreds of limbs that swayed in all directions.

It was hideous looking with golden blood flowing out of many wounds that the players who had already fought it gave.

Its upper body was translucent and under the silver moon’s illuminance… anyone could clearly see three human figures floating inside its head. They were the corpses of players this beast had devoured.

The beast noticed Filch and attacked with a few tendrils… Filch instantly bent down and touched the ground.

His other hand came up, fingers splayed wide, and a wall of compressed earth erupted in front of him just as a massive tendril whipped through the space his head had occupied a second before.

The tendril hit the wall with enough force to crack it, but the barrier held.

’Good enough.’

He rolled to the side as another Withering Beast, a quadruped with a human face stretched grotesquely over a wolf’s skull—lunged at him with jaws that dripped black ichor.

Filch’s foot hit the ground.

And spikes irrupted from the ground. Filch had leveled up during the last two hours finally reaching Level 20. His control over his skill had increased many fold and he was now much stronger than before.

The beast impaled itself on three crystalline pillars that erupted from the street, its momentum carrying it forward even as its internal organs were pulped. It died with a sound like wet leather tearing.

[You Have slain a Rank 2, Infested…]

[You have Received 500 Data Fragments]

Twenty meters away, another player screamed.

Filch’s head snapped toward the sound. It was a woman who was being dragged into an alley by something with too many arms. She had nothing left but terror.

“Tch.”

Filch launched himself toward her, his boots hitting the ground in a rhythm… behind him the octopus like beast with many arms devoured the body of the dead beast and in process impaled itself on the spikes.

But he did not die.

The Withering Beast who dragged the woman sensed him coming. It dropped the woman and turned, revealing a torso that had split open vertically to expose a mouth lined with human teeth.

His hand touched a nearby wall as he passed, and the stone rippled like disturbed water. A section of the building’s facade detached itself and flew forward with the speed of a crossbow bolt.

The makeshift projectile punched through the beast’s center mass, obliterating the vertical mouth and most of its torso in a spray of corrupted tissue.

It collapsed without ceremony.

Filch grabbed the woman by her collar and hauled her to her feet with one hand. “Inner Ring. Now… and don’t look back.”

She nodded mutely, too shocked to speak, and ran.

Filch turned back to survey the chaos that had claimed the Secondary Ring.

It was getting worse with each passing second.

’SHIT! SHIT! SHIT! WHY THE FUCK IS EVERYTHING HAPPENING ALL OF A SUDDEN!! ’

He cursed inwardly… but he was careless. The beast behind him wasn’t yet dead and it attacked with its tendrils in anger.

Filch turned around and his eyes widened… he would not dodge the almost 20 tendrils coming towards him.

He jumped back and touched the white marble at the ground but it was too late. He raised his arms up and embraced for impact.

Swish! Swish!

He felt cold wind pass by him and then the ghastly scream of the withering beast. Filch lowered his hands to find out that most of the beast’s tendrils were pilled to the ground or nearby building by Ice shards.

It was the moment. he didn’t waste a single second and conjured a large rock spear from the wall of a nearby building and then hurled it into the Beast’s head.

[You have Slain a Rank 3, Feral Deucs]

[You have Received 1000 Data Fragments]

Having seen the notification… he heaved a sigh of relief and looked around. But he didn’t find Yuki. She had already moved to a different area.

The Silver Moon cast its cold light over streets that had become abattoirs. Bodies—both human and beast littered the cobblestones. Golden and crimson blood mixed with rain that had started falling again, creating rivers of diluted liquid that flowed and collected to form oppressive lakes.

The players had been fortunate that there were no guards on the fates of the Inner rings and they were open.

Filch gritted his teeth. ’This can’t go on for longer… we have to close the gates or these beasts will reach the Inner Ring as well.’

It didn’t matter if the Dragon awaited inside. They could at least try there… but here they would die meaninglessly.

A roar split the air—deeper than anything a Withering Beast could produce.

Filch’s eyes narrowed.

That’s new.

The roar came from the direction of the fallen gates, from the breach itself. It carried a quality that made his teeth ache, like fingernails on a chalkboard translated into pure sound.

Then his eyes widened.

He was forgetting that the Withering beasts weren’t even the main threat. It was the figures that he had saved Ishiki from after the breach in the outer ring.

The demons.

His heart beat quickened as he imagined the worst that could happen.

Without thinking… Filch ran towards the gates. Not actually the gates… but some place from where he could see what exactly was happening at the gates.

But he didn’t need to go too far… midway he felt a weird sensation as if his intuitions were warning him. He hid behind a building and peeked out.

Then he saw them.

Three figures moved through the swarm of Withering Beasts with casual arrogance, and the creatures parted before them like water before a ship’s prow.

Not running away. Just… moving aside and acknowledging something higher in the hierarchy of corruption.

The figures were massive—each one easily three meters tall. Even from a distance, Filch could see the intricate script-patterns that covered their skin. And there was no way he would forget them.

The three demons that he had run away from back then.

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