Chapter 130: Assistance!

~WHOOSH!~

The mist churned like a living shroud as the Ashen Waters heaved around the narrow ridge. Albedo’s whispered words hung in the air for only a second before the roar of the river drowned out all the sounds.

~BANG~BANG~BANG!~

He continued to unleash shot after shot from Havoc & Ruin, the twin graviton slugs ripping into the oncoming tendril and crushing the watery limb into a collapsing vortex that screamed like a tortured soul before detonating in a plume of acidic spray.

The shockwave tore jagged fissures across the ridge, forcing everyone to steady themselves or risk slipping into the writhing abyss below.

But the river wasn’t finished.

The moment the shattered tendril dissolved into mist, another surge rose behind it, followed by dozens more. The column of black water convulsed like a wounded leviathan, birthing new monstrosities with every beat of the unseen, abyssal heart below.

“Wave two!” Zeus barked, swinging his blood-soaked axe into a ready stance. Golden light flared across the weapon’s edge, forming a protective corona against the creeping fog. “Here we go again!”

The Ashen Waters answered with violence. From the churning depths erupted a pack of crimson-eyed crocodilian beasts, their obsidian scales slick with corrosive slime.

Behind them came eel-bodied serpents armored in jagged crystal, spined insects the size of carriages, and skeletal hulks whose exposed bones pulsed with violet mana. All Gold Rank.

All hungry!

Albedo stepped forward before anyone else could react.

~FOOOOOSH~

The air rippled as a bloom of crimson light erupted from his body, a heat so intense it warped the mist into twisting halos. His eyes flared like twin dying stars.

Crimson Apocalypse Flames licked outward, their power so devastating the very stones beneath him immediately cracked and smoked from the intense heat.

As soon as the first wave of creatures leapt towards the group, Albedo’s flames answered.

A searing arc of fire swept across the ridge, exploding outward in a vortex of annihilation. The crocodilian beasts didn’t even have time to scream; their bodies dissolved into molten slag mid-air, their acidic blood vaporized before it could hit the stone.

Behind him, Morgana extended both arms, her shadow spears launching upward in a fan of onyx light to impale the serpents before they reached the group.

Veronica snapped her fingers, amplifying gravity around a cluster of spined insects until their armored shells buckled inward with a wet crunch.

However, during all of this, Albedo continued moving like a force of nature throughout the battlefield.

Every step he took sent ripples of heat across the battlefield. He ducked beneath a clawed strike, Havoc and Ruin spitting round after round into the thrashing chaos.

Each bullet was a miniature singularity, space folded, pressure imploded, and the corrupted monsters collapsed in on themselves like stars dying in silence.

A winged wraith lunged from the mist, claws outstretched for Elara. Albedo pivoted mid-stride, his right pistol flashing in a blur.

Ruin’s graviton round punched through the creature’s chest, leaving a gaping void where its heart had been. A heartbeat later, Crimson Apocalypse Flames followed, devouring the remains in a column of blood-red fire.

Zeus laughed like a madman as he joined the slaughter. His golden axe carved radiant crescents through the air, splitting two hulking brutes in a single strike.

Lucian fought at his flank, blade a streak of emerald light, his Transcendence Gift allowing him to adapt to every movement, every angle of attack.

Miranda raised her staff high, her voice ringing with divine resonance. Time slowed as her Eternity magic bent the battlefield just enough for her allies to dodge incoming strikes with perfect precision. Still, even with her support, the onslaught never ended.

Wave after wave crashed against them. Spined crabs clawed over the rocks, spraying jets of acid that hissed and spat against their barriers.

Insectoid horrors clung to the cliff walls, leaping down in coordinated strikes. The river itself surged and writhed, birthing monstrosities faster than they could be killed.

But Albedo never slowed down slaughtering these beasts, his flames roaring higher and higher, a swirling inferno of crimson and violet. The air itself seemed to bleed as he advanced, each shot from Havoc and Ruin detonating with gravitational fury.

Every beast that dared approach was incinerated, crushed, or simply erased from existence by the sheer overwhelming force of his magic.

The others found themselves unconsciously falling into his rhythm, since he was such a good leader.

Zeus began timing his strikes to the beat of Albedo’s gunfire while Morgana wove her shadows to fill the gaps left by his movements and Veronica anchored the gravitational fields that kept their footing secure on the trembling ridge.

Minutes stretched into an eternity. The air became a furnace, thick with the stench of scorched flesh and evaporating acid. The basalt ridge glowed faintly from the heat of Albedo’s flames, cracks spider-webbing beneath their boots. And still the river sent more.

Finally, mercifully, the last of the creatures fell. The black waters hissed in retreat, the mist thinning just enough to reveal the battered group standing amid a battlefield of steaming corpses and fractured crystal.

Zeus planted his axe into the stone and let out a long, triumphant roar, “Almost done, can’t wait to leave this place,”

“Agreed,” Miranda said, her breathing sharp but controlled, “Even a drop of this river water on my skin rapidly devours my mana and tries to worm its way deeper,”

Albedo didn’t answer. His pistols still glowed faintly as he scanned the shifting waters with narrowed eyes, Source Code flickering purple in his gaze. Something tugged at his senses, a distant vibration, faint but distinct.

Then it came.

“AAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHH!”

An extremely high-pitched scream with a distinctly Elven tone to it.

Another scream followed, ragged and desperate, echoing through the mist. The sound carried down a narrow channel branching off from the main ridge, barely visible through the shifting fog.

Veronica’s eyes widened. “Elves.”

“They’re in trouble,” Lucian said grimly, already adjusting his grip on his sword.

“Let’s check it out,” Miranda immediately said, and the group all ran off, their footsteps echoing off the wet stone as the mist closed in around them. The air grew colder with every stride, the screams sharpening into frantic cries for aid.

The channel widened abruptly into a fractured basin half-submerged in black water.

At its center, a group of Elven students stood in a desperate formation, their emerald cloaks torn and stained with blood. Two of them lay sprawled on the rocks, grievously injured, one missing an arm, the other coughing crimson foam as he struggled to breathe.

Before them, Princess Fade of the Elven delegation stood as the final wall between her people and annihilation.

Her silver hair clung to her sweat-damp face, her mana flickering like a candle in a storm. Her emerald eyes blazed with defiance as she swung her crescent blade in wide, luminous arcs, each slash sending bursts of green fire into the oncoming monsters.

But her movements were slowing. The glow of her magic dimmed with every strike.

More of the river’s creatures surged from the black water, skeletal wraiths, spined serpents, and crystal-armored beasts whose shrieks tore through the mist. Fade struck one down with a desperate burst of power, only to stagger as her knees threatened to buckle.

“Hold!” she shouted to her wounded comrades, though her voice cracked with exhaustion.

The monsters didn’t hold.

They came forward in a tide of black and violet, but the mist split apart in a roar of crimson flame.

~BOOOOOOM!~

A shockwave of heat and gravitational force ripped through the basin, scattering the first rank of monsters like leaves in a hurricane.

The black waters boiled where Albedo landed, the basalt beneath his boots cracking and glowing red-hot. Crimson Apocalypse Flames surged outward in a violent halo, painting the mist in blood-red light.

Fade staggered back, eyes wide as the sudden blast of heat seared the air around her. The massive serpent lunging for her throat froze mid-strike, its jagged crystal armor already beginning to sag under the impossible heat.

~BANG~

Havoc’s violet slug pierced the serpent’s core, the gravitational round imploding its body with a wet crunch before it could even scream. The force of the shot collapsed the creature inward, leaving nothing but a mist of acid and shattered crystal.

Albedo moved before the shards hit the ground. One moment he was across the basin, the next he was between Fade and a clawed wraith diving from the side. Ruin flared silver in his right hand, the muzzle flashing once.

~CRACK~

The wraith’s head snapped back and disintegrated into black vapor, its screech dying in a strangled hiss.

“Stay behind me,” Albedo said without looking at her, his voice like steel wrapped in flame.

Fade blinked, startled by the sheer dominance in his tone, and the way the heat from his flames felt strangely protective rather than suffocating.

Behind him, the rest of his group descended like a second storm.

Zeus hit the stone ridge with a thunderous leap, golden axe swinging in a radiant arc that cleaved two skeletal hulks clean in half. The impact sent molten sparks cascading across the rocks.

Lucian followed in his wake, emerald blade flashing in a blur of calculated strikes. Each swing of his sword was perfectly timed to the heartbeat of the battlefield, cutting down serpents before they could even lunge.

Morgana’s shadows writhed outward like a living tide, forming a coiling wall of black spears that intercepted a wave of spined insects mid-leap. Their bodies disintegrated against the writhing barrier with ear-splitting shrieks.

Veronica raised her hand, gravity folding and snapping around a crystal-armored brute that threatened the injured elves. The beast buckled inward, its armor collapsing until it crumpled into a dense orb of compressed matter that sank into the black water.

“Pull the wounded back!” Miranda’s voice rang with divine resonance as she extended a shimmering barrier of silver light over the fallen elves. The corrosive mist hissed and slid off the shield harmlessly.

Another serpent erupted from the water behind Fade, fangs dripping acid.

~WHOOSH~

A streak of crimson fire blurred past her shoulder, colliding with the creature mid-air. The blast turned the monster into a shower of molten shards, the heat so intense the black water beneath it steamed into clouds.

Fade turned to find Albedo already reloading, Havoc and Ruin spinning effortlessly in his hands. The faint violet glow of Source Code burned in his eyes, every movement impossibly precise, every shot fatal.

“You….” she began, voice trembling with both exhaustion and disbelief.

Albedo cut her off with a curt nod. “Save your strength. I’ve got you.”

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