Under the pressure of Gravity Magic, running was much more tiring than usual. Every step Elena and Dred took felt like a thousand steps. While they were running, Audrey and Jake were testing their new specializations. Jake stopped in front of Audrey and said with a serious face, “Hit me.”

“Pardon?” she opened her eyes in surprise.

“Like I said, hit me.”

“Eh? But I was trying to use those spirits. Why do I have to hit you? Are you… into that?” she covered her mouth.

“...”

“God, damn. No. What the hell are you thinking? I want to test my Blink ability-” he started explaining himself but was interrupted by a slap in the face. Pulling back her hand, Audrey covered her mouth, “I- I’m sorry! But you said that-”

Raising his hand, rubbing his face, he stopped her. “It’s fine… I just didn’t think that you’d suddenly change your mind, in the middle of my sentence. Did you want to hit me after all?”

“No, I was just-”

“Ah, you surely wanted to. I’m really hurt now. How will you make up for it?” Jake pressed on, cornering Audrey.

“You are taking advantage of me. I didn’t know that you are such a bad guy. But fine. I’ll do something simple,” she replied, crossing her arms in front of her chest.

“Then kiss me. Your lips felt good last time,” he said with a smirk on his face.

Seeing Audrey’s hand flying towards his head, he leaned back. Seeing that he wouldn’t be able to dodge it completely, he closed his eyes and felt space around him. A black outline of his body extended backwards by one centimeter. With his control over the Void element, he easily escaped her slap. The void was a part of space. Everything was empty yet full. The void was emptiness.

Jake got the idea of Void from his emotions when he was a soldier. The emptiness he felt every time a comrade of his died. The void was everywhere, just like how those memories always loomed over his head. He was quite surprised when he realized that he was able to create small voids. After practising it behind Elena’s back, he was able to create bigger and bigger Void Zones.

As his ability to create bigger and bigger Void Zones grew, the range of his Blink would increase too. If there were matters at his destination, he could easily replace them with his body. Of course, teleporting into a wall or a mountain would be risky. The void wasn’t a destructive element. It was something similar to Devour.

It was able to swallow everything, but unlike Devour, it didn’t destroy anything it swallowed. The void element just stored it.

“I was sure that I’d be able to hit you from this close,” Audrey muttered as she stomped on the ground.

“Hehe, this skill will be a lifesaver in the future. But at the moment, space turns unstable after my blink, thanks to my shitty control over it. It takes three hundred seconds for space to be stable again. If I tried using it before that, I could easily lose a limb. The least would be a finger or an eye,” Jake got into explaining his skill with great excitement.

He knew that both of them had a common interest in Magic and just experiencing her attention made him feel happy. “That’s a great skill. You know what? I’ll learn it by drinking your blood when I fulfil your wish, but you will have to make me fall for you. I won’t kiss you otherwise,” she said with a wink. “And don’t try what you did last time. I was caught off guard. That’s all.”

Leaning closer, his forehead almost touching hers, he asked, “Is that so?”

Looking into his eyes without blinking, she said, “Yes.”

“You are getting better at it. It’s Elena’s fault… argh! Now I don’t know where I stand! I thought that I was closer to you!” he squatted down, holding the sides of his head.

“Haha, who knows. You might be~” she hummed.

Looking up, Jake muttered, “Don’t push me or I’ll take the lead! You are getting too much into playing around with me:”

“You don’t have even a single card against me. How could you dominate me?” she asked, raising a brow.

Sighing loudly, Jake stood up, “You see, this is your problem. I’m trying to build a relationship with you. This isn’t a card game. I don’t want winning and losing sides. I just want to be with you as we are.” Turning around, he walked away and sat down under a tree. Closing his eyes, he started meditating.

Audrey was left with her eyes opened wide. “Now, that got my heart beating a bit quicker. Stupid,” she pouted. Looking at his unmoving posture under the tree, a smile formed on her face without her knowledge. Realizing it, she touched her face. “What’s up?” she mumbled as she tried to pull her face back to its normal position.

“... He must have done something to me,” she grumbled, sitting down in the same position as Jake, her face flushed.

She didn’t notice two pairs of eyes looking at her and Jake. Both Elena and Dred sat down on the other side of the lake to take a rest. They were surprised to see Jake getting so close to her and being as rude as she was, Elena used Ekilsta to spread her bacteria and spy on them. When Elena heard Audrey’s last words, “Hahaha, that was great. She is so cute, don’t you think? She doesn’t even understand what’s happening to her.”

“Don’t you think that you should leave them with some privacy?” Dred asked, raising his brows, resting his feet in the water. Sitting down beside him, Elena pulled off her boots and tuck up her leggings.

“Hiii, it’s a bit cold, but it’s autumn, so it’s no wonder. It will be winter soon, huh. I wonder what snow is like. I know about it only from the books I had read on Kriton. What do you think?” she asked, soaking her legs up to her knees in the cold water.

“It must look good, but you didn’t answer my question,” Dred leaned forward and looked into her downcast eyes.

“Muh, you move less in your monster form. But fine. I know that it’s bad, but I don’t look at them as if I was seeing something private. I don’t judge them when I do this. It’s just a way of entertainment for me. I like to see how they react, how their emotions and faces change. I know that it’s bad to spy on them, but… that’s what’s helping me in growing. I don’t intend to give up on this, which you might dislike,” she confessed how she felt.

“Haha, I didn’t say that I had any problems with it. I just asked why were you doing it. I asked because I was curious, like you,” Dred replied.

“You damned beast! Why is it always me who has to talk about herself? What about you?” Elena leaned on his shoulder and questioned him.

“What about me? Nothing you don’t know, I guess. I have the same burdens as you, but I have fewer emotions. It might be because of my race as a Devouring Panther-”

“Or you just haven’t learned it. But you have to do it because emotions are important factors when it comes to decisions and reactions. You can’t make good plans without taking those into account. That’s why I’m trying to experience and learn as many of them as possible. I can’t act without them either. I can’t show something I don’t know, can I?” Elena interrupted him.

“Wise words from a little girl,” Dred elbowed her with a chuckle.

“Haha, your ass is little, not me,” she returned the favour.

Standing on all fours, Dred shook his bottom, “What? Look at this. It’s not small! It’s round and big like yours.”

“Haa? Are you saying that my ass is big?” Elena made an offended face.

“I don’t know, is it? It looks good, I guess,” he chuckled.

“Haha, that’s good to hear,” she hummed, resting her head on his shoulder. After staying like that for a few minutes without saying anything, Elena stood up. Holding out her right hand, she helped up Dred as she said “Let’s work hard. We should go towards the capital city. It would be bad to travel if winter hit us. The scrolls stated that winters were really cold and dangerous.”

“Alright.”

---

Meanwhile, Audrey…

It took a few minutes for her to finally clear her mind. Breathing out long, her eyes closed, she felt those colourful dots in the dark space, all around her body. A few meters further, she saw many dark purple dots, which were Void elements. They were gathering at one place. Opening her eyes, she saw Jake.

“...”

Focusing on the normal elements, she started collecting them. Elena told her earlier that the first two hundred levels were only the foundation of their future power. They were supposed to build the elements into their bodies, but that required a strong vessel. Although she didn’t reach the two-hundredth level, twenty levels weren’t that big of a difference with their powerful bodies.

But after pulling a few dots of elementals into her body, she felt filled up. Any more than this and I’d blow up… I better stop, she thought. Collecting a huge amount of Nature Element into one spot, it took the shape of a round ball. Its bottom became longer, making it look like a ghost. Opening her eyes, she saw the same creature in front of her. It was see-through and light green.

“Was it a success?” she asked the creature. It flew towards her and made a few circles around her body to show its intimacy and happiness. With her specialization, as long as she collected a big amount of an element in one place, it would come to life as a spirit. Inspect.

Allegiance: Audrey Frost

Race: Nature Spirit

Level: 168

Class: Nature Magician

“Can you understand me, little one?” she asked, poking its ethereal body. It flew up and down after hearing her question, to show its agreement.

“Then, could you show me what you can do?”

The spirit flew around her body once more before stopping. Four vines, as thick as Dred’s waist grew out of the ground in front of Audrey. Turning towards Jake, she planned to play a prank, but seeing his serious face and his lack of reaction to the sound the growing vines made, she decided to let him concentrate.

“Elena… Although it was late, I noticed your bacteria. Do you think I don’t know what kind of person you are? Hehe, I’ll surprise you this time! Spirit, could you use your vines to tie her up? Don’t hurt her, just tie her up!” she commanded the spirit. It spun in the air once before disappearing. Closing her eyes, Audrey felt a mass of Nature Element going towards Elena’s location on the other side of the lake.

Just as she stood up and helped up Dred from the shore, four thick vines shot out of the ground and almost coiled around her body. But she reacted quickly enough to jump back with a somersault and evade the vines, leaving her boots on the shore of the lake. Under Audrey’s control, the vines thinned and coiled around her boots. Seeing how they were going towards Audrey, Elena furrowed her brows.

“You can’t spy on me since I know your methods!” Audrey shouted from the other side of the three hundred meters wide lake. Raising her hand, Elena showed her middle finger. The vines leaned back and then shot Elena’s boots towards her head. Leaning to the side, they hit Dred’s face.

“I’m sorry!” Audrey shouted while Elena started laughing, only to feel the left of the pair hitting the back of her head.

“...”

“Haha, you shouldn’t laugh at other people’s misfortune,” Dred said with a chuckle, patting her head. Without saying anything, she picked up her boots and wore them. Seeing her smiling face, Dred turned around and started running. An hour later, both of them stopped. Audrey was still experimenting with the spirits on the other side.

She tried creating more types at the same time, but when she created counterparts, both spirits disappeared. She wasn’t able to have both Fire and Water spirits beside her. When she summoned a spirit, her status window showed plus ten percent beside the kind of spirit element she created.

“Let’s have a bath. Although my armour is really great since my sweat doesn’t even bother me, I still know that it’s there and I’d rather be clean than dirty,” Elena said as she started to take off her armour.

“...”

“What are you looking at? Jake has his eyes closed and I don’t mind Audrey either and you… oh. I forgot about it, hehe. Well, it doesn’t matter anymore,” Elena questioned Dred, only to realize that she was standing stark naked in front of him.

“You are like a brother to me anyway, so get on with it!” she added.

“Okay,” he replied. You might think of me as a brother, but this body reacts differently. You’ve got a really nice body… Wait. I shouldn’t stare. But now that I think about it, they wanted me to wear clothes, but now she is asking me to take them off? Their rule makes no sense to me! Dred stormed in his mind.

“What are you waiting for?” Elena asked as she turned around, the water reaching her thighs. As she was walking backwards, the water slowly reached her crotch, her stomach, her chest, her neck. Shudders ran through her body each time the cold water touched sensitive spots.

“Haah- it’s good that I can use Fire Magic. This water would be way too cold otherwise,” she said with a smile before ducking her head under the water.

Ah! She wants me to get in the water while wearing clothes! That must be it, Dred had a sudden epiphany. Without thinking any further, he walked into the water. By the time Elena decided to swim up, he was beside her. Her black hair floated atop the blue water of the lake, creating a nice contrast.

“Why are you wearing clothes?”

“You girls told me to. Isn’t this what you wanted?” he asked, tilting his head to the side.

“Haha, we did, but if you are going to wash your body or go swimming, you should take them off,” she chuckled. In the next moment, she saw his clothes dissolving like patches of shadows.

“Good. Shall we find out what’s in the middle of this lake?” she winked.

“Mhm. Let’s go,” Dred agreed with her. Going under the water, they swam towards the center. But the closer they got, the darker the lake became. With the strength they had, it took only a few seconds to reach the center. Going towards the bottom, they felt a powerful suction. Using light Magic, they lit up the bottom of the lake.

There was a circular hole in it, reaching a diameter of seven meters. Looking at Dred, she raised her brows. He nodded his head and got into the hole, his left hand touching the wall the whole time. The stream was so powerful that they had to swim backwards instead. When they saw a sharp turn in the tunnel, a horizontal green light shone, and everything turned upside down.

They swam ‘up’ towards the sharp turn in the tunnel and down on the other side. It took only three meters, which was nothing. But when they came to the surface, the fell down at least seventy meters with a speed that shouldn’t be possible on the planet they came from. Elena’s left leg fell on a protruding stone. But in the next second, Dred fell on it.

“Ouch!” she shouted, her voice resounding in the cavern.

“Damn it, I’m sorry,” Dred jumped up. “Are you alright?”

“Ehm… I think that it broke. But the stone wasn’t pointy, so it will be fine,” she replied through gritted teeth. Burying his face in his palms, Dred started muttering how it was his fault and kept apologising.

“Haha, why the long face? You couldn’t have known and the same is true when it comes to me. Accidents happen. Pick me up instead,” she said with a chuckle, waving her hand.

“Shouldn’t you wear something before?” Dred asked, pointing downward.

“Oh, you are right,” following his fingers, Elena agreed with him. Her shadows crept up on her body and formed a black dress around her. Dred grabbed her waist and put her in his neck.

“It’s hot,” he mumbled.

“Did you say something?” Elena asked.

“No… Now hold onto my horns,” he answered as he thought, I can’t tell her that her crotch and thighs feel hot. Let’s put her leg in a splint.

A stick grew in his right hand. After placing it beside her shin, he used vines to fasten the stick to her leg. “Is it alright?” he asked, showing his concern.

“Haha, it’s fine. I told you not to mind it. Let’s go instead. I want to see what’s at the end of this cave. This place feels strange,” she laughed upon seeing him worrying so much.

“Fine. I’ll use Healing Magic on it in the meantime,” he muttered, grabbing her left leg.

“Ah~ It feels good. Even my pain subsided,” she felt relieved upon feeling Dred’s Healing Magic, which was a combination of Water, Light, and Nature elements.

“That’s good to hear,” he said, looking around in the cavern. It wasn’t dark inside, thanks to many tiny holes on the ground. The walls of the cavern were made up of dark grey coloured rocks.

“Smooth,” Dred muttered.

“For how long do you plan to caress my thighs?” Elena interrupted him.

“Oh, sorry. It felt good to touch. I guess you didn’t like it,” he apologised.

Rubbing her eyes, sighing loudly, she replied, “No. It did feel good, but it’s a sensitive spot. It’s rather suggestive in that way.”

“Is it? I didn’t know. I’m sorry about that. Duck down.”

“I can see it~” she hummed.

A few minutes later, he stopped walking because in front of him was a hole… “What the hell is this?” Elena asked with an excited voice, leaning forward on Dred’s head. They are soft as always, he thought, feeling her breasts.

“I don’t know. Should I put you down?” he asked.

“Of course! I want to look around!” she shouted, seeing that there was a whole world below them. The hole had a diameter of at least fifty meters. When Dred placed Elena on the edge of it, she leaned forward and put her head through the huge hole in the floor of the cavern. The world was covered in a dim, yellow sunlight. There was a forest right under them and the trees had yellowish and brownish colours.

But what was stranger was the flying ships and huge explosions in the area. She saw a round object with small protrusions on it crashing into the ground, a kilometer under them. The forest she saw before turned into nothing but ashes. On both sides were trenches, filled to the brim with people. Many of them were wearing strange looking armours and guns in their hands.

If not for being born on Kriton, she wouldn’t have had any idea about what those things were. Closing her eyes for a moment, her shadows spread out, turning the dark grey stone black. It went further and further until finally stopping.

“Captain, they are breaking through the left side! We have to kill those snipers!”

“Damn it! We can’t lose this mining field too. This damned Sliton Empire is too powerful! Reorganize! Withdraw one group from our right flank and send them to the left front! The forest was a good cover before, now it’s gone. We must defend this place until reinforcements come,” the captain replied to the report of the soldier.

“My shadow bacteria are really useful, hehe,” Elena chuckled, her face suddenly turning serious. “But I didn’t understand even a single word… they are using another language, which is strange,” she furrowed her brows. The area looked like a mountain, with a long canyon in place of its basement.

Only the two sides of the mountain were still there. On the two sides, there were holes carved into the rock of the mountain where snipers laid on the ground. Elena was surprised to see a flickering white light, blinding her.

Holding out her hand, she blocked the light. “What’s that?” she asked when she felt a pair of hands grabbing the back of her dress and pulling her up.

“That must have been the reflecting light of their rifles. I’m sure that they covered them, but from this angle, we can see them. Stay up here. It wouldn’t do any good if they noticed you,” Dred warned her, dusting off her sides.

“This place is dangerous, let’s go back. That tunnel is likely to be connected to another planet, which is none other than this place under us,” Dred advised.

“We could do that or we could gather some intelligence. Please, just a bit! Let’s capture one soldier and get some info out of him!” Elena begged as she made a sudden move, forgetting that she had only one leg to support her. Stumbling on a rock, she almost fell through the hole, but Dred caught her waist and pulled her back.

“You are terribly helpless when you have only one leg… Be more careful,” he warned her as he put her in his neck.

Puffing out her cheeks, she mumbled, “Thanks and I can’t help it. I’m used to using two legs, not one. I forgot that I can’t use the other.”

“That’s my fault…”

“Nah, stop being a sore spot. I told you that it wasn’t your fault,” she rebuked him for saying the same thing all the time.

“Okay, but we won’t visit them. It would be dangerous. Let’s go!” he accepted her feelings. Turning around, he ran towards the tunnel.

“But I wanted to! You are no fun…” she hit the back of his head playfully.

The left wall of the cavern started trembling. Stopping for a moment, both of them looked at the same spot. A metal grey pointy tip came through the hard stone, followed by five men. “Woohoo! We finally reached this place! The commander will be happy. We can easily snipe every soldier in the trenches from this spot!”A blond haired, muscular guy looked around the cavern and shouted with an excited voice, placing his sniper rifle on his back.

“Shut up. Do your job. People are dying while you are talking,” a scar-faced man shouted at the blonde guy.

“I’m sorry,” he apologized as he took his weapon back into his hands and laid down on the edge of the hole, Elena used to look down. Elena and Dred were using their Shadow Forms to hide.

“Hahaha, look, we can see their snipers too! So that’s where you have been hiding! One, two!” the scar-faced man laughed, shooting twice before reloading. “Damn it, I didn’t have the time to reload,” he muttered before taking out a black box. After pressing a button, he said, “Captain, we secured the dark zone! I repeat, we secured the dark zone. Our people can start advancing after five minutes.”

“Roger that,” a creaky voice responded.

“They are using another language. That’s strange since the whole universe has a common language,” Elena whispered, her strange language catching the guys’ attention.

“Who is there?!” the blonde haired guy jumped up, his weapon in hand.

Haha, I wanna play with him! Elena thought before going to the other side of the hole, getting behind everyone. “I’m here,” she whispered. Everyone turned around and looked at her. A small droid flew through the hole and looked around.

“Damn it! We have been spotted!” the scar-faced man shouted, seeing the unfamiliar drone. A bolt of lightning flew out of his palm and struck the drone. It blew up and fell to the ground in pieces. But the group was sad to see another three entering the hole. Now that they left their original sniping positions, the drones easily entered this place.

“Elena… just what are you doing again?” Dred asked as he appeared behind the soldiers. She too appeared in a sitting position on the other side of the cave.

“What the hell is going on here?!” the scar-faced man shouted, pointing his rifle at Dred’s head. “Are you with the Drung Kingdom or the Sliton Empire?” he questioned. Dred pointed downward. The scar-faced man couldn’t help but look down for a moment, only to see shady hands creeping up on his body, catching his gun and taking it from him.

“Huh?” he made a surprised face. “Magicians! Kill them, quickly!” he shouted at his comrades, but they were tied up by Elena’s shadows.

“They won’t move,” she hummed, but the real problem was that neither of the two sides understood even a single word.

“It’s no good this way. I know that it’s bad, but let me devour one of them,” Elena said, sending Ekilsta into the blonde haired guy’s body.

“No, you don’t,” Dred stopped her as he put her on his shoulder.

“What? But we need information!” she raised a brow and grabbed his horn.

“Yes, but not this way. I told you not to devour their minds. I won’t allow it before you learn how to use Ekilsta to give you only selected memories. If you live his life, your personality will change again. It was dangerous enough last time, we don’t need another one. I think that you should focus more on Devour. We know how to use it. We are masters of the skill, but it’s something that has a life of its own. We don’t know how Devour works.”

“Once we learn its true secrets, we might be able to drain selected information from anyone. Our control over Devour isn’t around level sixty for nothing. I won’t let you devour their minds. Absolutely not,” Dred rebuked her.

Seeing his seriousness and knowing the risk herself, she stayed silent for a few seconds before saying, “Fine. I will never try doing it again. I swear and not as an oath. I swear it as a friend, a sister, or whatever I am to you.”

Looking downward, Dred whispered in a barely audible voice, “You are everything.” Her ears caught his words. Her hands loosened around his horns. Caressing the top of his head, she leaned forward and closed her eyes.

“That felt strange,” she whispered with a chuckle.

“Haha, is that so?” Dred laughed upon hearing her reply.

“Yep. Now could you put me on the ground?” she asked.

“No. You will do something stupid if I do. We have no idea what these people are here for or who is the ‘good’ or ‘bad’ side if there is anything of the sort. We don’t know anything about these people. If you made a decision, then keep to it,” he said as he started walking towards the tunnel.

“But… but it’s hard! And this blondie has been ogling my body,” she pointed at the blonde haired guy, who laid on the ground and tried to look up her dress.

“... You can kick him,” he grabbed her at her armpits and held her in front of the blonde haired guy, not letting Elena’s feet touch the ground.

“Are you for real?” she questioned Dred, still kicking the guy’s face, breaking his nose.

In the next second, a ball flew up through the hole and exploded in front of them. Reacting quickly, Dred made a wall of earth in front of them. The explosion blasted the snipers into pieces, along with Dred’s earth wall. But thanks to their powerful bodies, they just landed on their butts a few meters away. Picking up Elena, he ran towards the tunnel.

She held onto Dred’s shoulders as he swam back up through the tunnel. After the turn, he started swimming downward, but upon reaching a spot, the world turned upside down once again. Swimming up to the surface of the lake, they looked around.

Both Audrey and Jake were sitting on the ground, meditating. Dred swam to the shore and got out of the water. While they explained everything to them, saying one surprising thing after the other, a soldier at another place finished drilling through a wall…

---

The right wall of the cavern trembled and one person came out of the new hole. Throwing the high-tech driller to the side, he looked around. “It’s good that I prepared with a surveillance system here,” he muttered.

“Haha, those bastards from the Sliton Empire screwed up. I have no idea who those two were, but they did great. If not for them, we would have lost this battle and got enslaved by these bastards. You like young girls, right? You bastard paedophile,” he kicked the remnants of the blonde haired guy.

Squatting down on the edge of the hole, he looked at the snipers of the enemy empire. After reloading his gun, he laid on the ground and took aim.

“One... two... three... four... five... six!” One group is done! He started picking off the snipers one after the other. His teammates reached the cave a moment later. One person covered the hole the enemy made and started picking off those who tried to get into their position.

“Captain Acton, did you find those two?” one of them asked as he laid down beside him, preparing to shoot.

“No. They are nowhere to see and they left nothing behind. It seems like they lived through the explosion without any wounds, which is amazing. It was the General’s decision. I’m just hoping that those two won’t hold a grudge against us. I don’t want Magicians to turn against us in such dire times. They are rare in the world and the powerful ones even more so. These two seemed to be the latter,” he replied, starting to unload his second round into the enemy snipers.

The killing continued the whole day. Some of Acton’s comrades were shot, but more than half of their group of fifteen stayed alive. Since the sky turned dark, both sides ceased fire and took a rest. Acton leaned on the wall behind him and closed his eyes to sleep a few hours, but a soldier rushed through the tunnel he made before.

“Captain! I have a message to relay from the General! The king approved of this too, here, see the message,” he shouted, pushing a metal rod into his hand.

“Acton. I have a mission for you. Go after the Mages you saw this afternoon and try to recruit them. Don’t be forceful or aggressive by any means. These are the orders of the king. Return next morning. After taking a short rest, you will lead your group once again. Be quick! Remember, don’t anger the Mages!” Giving back the metal rod, he stood up from the ground, pulling his Ghillie Suit behind him.

Saying goodbye, Acton left through the hole. With the help of his equipment, he managed to swim through the tunnel without drowning. He happened to come ashore in front of the cave. Thanks to his Ghillie Suit, he looked like a patch of grass on the ground. With slow and careful movements, he got out the water and went into the forest, his gun in hand. Squatting down in a bush, he looked around.

“There is a house. Let’s see what kind of place this is. That tunnel was really strange, though… Whatever, I’ll finish my mission with success!” he encouraged himself.

Looking once more at the star-covered black sky, he mumbled, “I should get closer.”

But nobody noticed that the blood of the deceased soldiers didn’t dry in the cavern. It was still as fluent as before and their blood was slowly filling up… a formation

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