Chapter 122 The Destruction

Over a week later, awoke groaning into a facemask providing vaporized mana. What happened? Why do I feel like I ran several marathons only to have a bunch of lead weights dropped on me? It’s like something is constricting my entire body.

Upon noticing her host’s awakening, Kya appeared in Evernya’s vision bowing deeply as she apologized, “I’m so sorry, my lady, I tried to reason with the dumb humans, but the pitiful human you killed was a valued member of their society.”

For a moment, confusion reigned before blurry memories of the duel surfaced, but aside from momentary shock, Evernya had little reaction. “Whoops, but I can’t say I regret my actions. Someone like him will only hurt society. What I want to know is why I feel like crap.”

Evernya’s question caused tears to form in Kya’s eyes as she explained, “despite my numerous attempts, the humans decided you are too dangerous, forcing your elf to implement several layers of limits.”

Kya mirrored her host’s rapidly growing anger. “But I highly doubt their decision had anything to do with fear. Instead, the humans didn’t like a nonhuman mage outperforming them. So they sealed your capability of using magic outside your body and limited your mana grade down to awakened grade 7. From what I’ve put together, their original goal was to cripple you, but they couldn’t since by their laws you’re standing is higher than the teen you killed, giving you death penalty immunity. Of course, another reason they probably decided against crippling you is the fact of your talent possibly being useful in the future.”

Unable to hold in her rage any longer, mana rushed through her body, but aside from a glowing-eyed glare at the ceiling, nothing escaped. Pissed Evernya tried to use stronger mana but found the pressure on her mana system prevented her from using more than a grade 7. No matter what she did, her mana hit a roadblock anywhere she attempted to release mana outside of her body.

After several minutes of struggle, her already weakened body gave out with her teary-eyed panting into the facemask, barely keeping her body functioning. Why won’t they leave me be? All I’ve ever wanted was to explore this world. Evernya turned her desperately hopeful attention to her AI asking, “please tell me there’s some way to break these limits.”

Kya pushed down her emotions to do her duty, replying to her host. “I’m sorry, my lady, but they were thorough. Even Meira can’t undo the seals since they had a telepath remove the key from her mind, leaving only high-ranking Sespina council members with the knowledge.”

Kya displayed an image of several humans wearing lab coats with a teary-eyed Meira staring down at her unconscious kitten. The image showed a black suit encompassing her entire body up to her neck, including her hands and feet with silver bands fitted to her horns, wrists, and ankles. “I took this image just before the activated the seals cutting off my connection to the outside world. From what I researched before the activation, the suit is a reinforced prisoner suit with dual function mana sealing and mana isolation functions capable of holding beings in peak arisen stage sealed. The reason you probably have as much power remaining as you do is your assessable mana grade is well into the ascended stage. As for the bands on your horns, that’s where Meira came in, as she had to custom enchant them. I don’t know how they found out your psionic magic releases from your horns, but whatever enchantment Meira used seems to be effective and irremovable without the key.”

While trying to keep her emotions under control, Evernya descended into thought. Why can’t they leave me alone? If they had left me alone, none of this would’ve happened. Sure, I killed someone, but if they hadn’t chased me to DIOM, I wouldn’t have been as stressed. With my current lack of emotional control, I doubt I would’ve taken the loss well, but I probably wouldn’t have killed him, since missing out on attending DIOM wouldn’t have been a big deal.

A thought came to Evernya, causing her to ask, “How did it come to this? I thought they were independent of Sespina.

“In most scenarios, yes, they are independent, but when a murder of a noble mage, though low noble happens, Sespina can take custody of the suspect. DIOM doesn’t have enough power to resist Sespina if they decide to take action.”

“Custody? I’m not in DIOM anymore?” Evernya questioned, dreading the answer.

Kya winced before explaining her current situation. “Unfortunately, no, you’re being held in a mana isolation indefinite holding cell under Druth’s council building, awaiting trial for the murder of Marcus Bolt and all other charges they stuck on during your escape to DIOM. With your status as a registered bloodline holder, they can’t implement the death penalty, but they can enforce slavery or life in prison. But either verdict is a death sentence since, as you probably can tell from the mask, your body can no longer process Sespina’s mana. Fortunately, I directed Meira towards Aya, who withdrew all your current stock of liquid mana, buying you a few months at your current rate of consumption, but I don’t know what we will do when you run out.”

I would rather die than become a slave. What’s the point of even trying to fight at a trial? I’m sure I’m already ruled guilty of anything they want to throw at me. Evernya thought in despair as her consciousness faded.

An unknown time later, several explosions shook her small windowless concrete cell, but still exhausted from lack of mana and despair, Evernya’s consciousness faded once again, uncaring of the world around her.

Unfortunately, soon after electric current administered by her suit shocked her awake. Her sunken eyes to cracked open to reveal the sneering face of Head Magister of Druth Arthur Elliott looking down at her.

“Stand up, prisoner 45356!” Arthur ordered.

Half-awake, malnourished from mana rationing, Evernya was slow to respond, eliciting another much more powerful shock, causing her eyes to spring open.

“Stand up, prisoner 45356!” Arthur repeated.

Evernya attempted to move, but her rail-thin body was far too weak even to sit up, let alone stand.

Arthur turned to one of his subordinates to order, “increase her mana supply by 300%.”

The man in his late 20s wearing a dark blue suit turns approached the several hundred-liter tank taking up a majority of the prisoner’s cell. He pressed his palm to the reader before ramping the mana release rate.

Almost instantly, as if pumping up a tire, Evernya’s rail-thin body filled out, nourished by the pure mana sent into the mask adhered to her face. Within a minute, her once sunken, unfocused eyes regained clarity, prompting Arthur to order again, “Stand up, prisoner 45356!”

Evernya glared at Arthur while remaining still, “what’s the point? I’m sure all I have to look forward to is slavery or life in prison.” Her comment earned herself an electric induced seizure.

Refusing to give in, Evernya maintained defiant eye contact with Arthur as her body twitched from the after-effects of the electric shock.

Without breaking eye contact with his unruly prisoner, Arthur ordered, “disconnect.”

The same man who ramped up her mana supply pressed a button cutting said supply. Instantly, Evernya’s breathing strained as her body absorbed the last molecules of mana vapor. She held her breath, but after a few minutes, darkness encroached at the edges of her vision, forcing her to give in.

Reluctantly, Evernya struggled upright, earning a restart to her mana supply. The mana gave enough strength to stand up off the hard cot.

“Any further disobeyed orders shall earn you less mana.” Arthur threatened before ordering, “now standstill with your hands behind your back and feet shoulder-width apart until I say otherwise.”

While glaring at Arthur, Evernya complied. Silver tethers shot out from the silver bands locked around her wrists and ankles. The wrist tethers wrapped around her hips before connecting each wrist, welding them near the base of her tail. The ankle tether fettered her ankles together, limiting her stride to a mere thirty centimeters.

With his prisoner restrained, Arthur nodded to another subordinate carrying an eight liter tank with straps. The subordinate, a middle-aged man, also wearing a dark blue suit, approached Evernya. He strapped the tank to Evernya’s back with straps running over her shoulders and around her waist, pulling them as tight as possible before locking them with a click. Next, the man controlling Evernya’s mana flow pressed a button disengaging the tube, causing Evernya to gasp for breath before the tube automatically shortened and locked to the top of the tank strapped to her back.

Evernya took a deep breath, sucking in the vaporized mana while continuing to glare at Arthur, but otherwise remained still, terrified of losing her supply of mana.

Unbothered by his prisoner’s glare, Arthur ordered, “prisoner 45356 follow.”

Arthur spun on his heels before exiting the cell, followed by Evernya shuffling forward, gimped by her fetters. Surrounded by the half a dozen subordinates, Evernya followed Arthur down the hall to the elevator, leading them to another hallway on the ground floor of the Council building. Evernya shuffled out of the elevator and down the hall leading toward the Council building lobby while surveying her surroundings with confusion. Where is everyone? Last time I was here, dozens of people walked these halls at all times. Her confusion grew as a few minutes later, they arrived in an empty lobby, usually filled with hundreds of people.

Arthur continued out the wide-open doors leading outside. As soon as Evernya passed through the threshold, she stopped dead in shock. Unlike the empty but intact council building, the streets outside looked as if hundreds of bombs went off. Few buildings in sight remained intact, most missing chunks of walls if not completely collapsed. Craters littered the street, making transversal with cars impossible. One thing surprisingly missing was bodies. Even Evernya’s sensitive nose couldn’t pick up the scent of blood or decay.

“What happened?” Evernya asked, unable to resist her curiosity.

“How could you ask that when you’re the one who caused the fall of Druth?” Arthur stated with a smile.

“Caused?” Evernya questioned.

“At least you’re the official suspect of this. As for the real culprit, well, let’s just say they are long gone.” Replied Arthur as he materialized a tablet and showed a video to his prisoner with a widening grin.

The video displayed surveillance camera footage of Evernya carrying a large red egg as big as her torso, planting it in a familiar room under the Druth magical’s hospital just outside the mana isolation cell. After planting the egg, she looked up at the camera, giving a full view of her smiling face before destroying the camera.

The next part of the video showed a giant 50 meters long red Dragon descending on the already evacuated Druth, easily destroying the mana barrier. The Dragon flew over Druth, searching for its egg while unleashing fireball after fireball onto the city below. The video fast forwarded until the Dragon completely leveled the hospital, scooping up its egg before flying westward back to its nest, leaving the leveled and burning city behind.

Evernya stood frozen with wide eyes as Arthur continued with a proud stance, “the heroic Arthur Elliott noticed a powerful mana signature approaching the city, prompting him to announce a citywide evacuation. Under his leadership, hundreds of mages supplied with mana supplements managed to teleport away the entire population of Druth in less than a half-hour, achieving zero casualties.”

Arthur fast forwarded the video further, showing Evernya running through the forest at a pace much slower than she typically ran. Suddenly the Evernya lookalike stopped as dozens of uniformed men and women led by Arthur surrounded and captured her. “Even managing to catch the culprit as she tried to escape into the wilds.” Arthur finished before storing away the tablet.

Just as Arthur finished speaking, a portal generated by one of his subordinates formed behind him as he walked through, followed by his stunned prisoner, shoved forward another subordinate.

A moment later, they appeared deep in the wilds near the base of the dusk mountain range.

Evernya skidded to a stop, just barely keeping her balance in her restrained state. Unable to take deep breaths with the overly tight straps holding the mana tank to her back, Evernya took small rapid breaths to suck in enough mana to stabilize her breathing.

After overcoming her surprise, she glared at Arthur, who still had his infuriating smirk. If only the stupid humans didn’t limit me! I would tear him apart!

Without missing a beat, Arthur continued, “of course I can’t have you go to trial to prove your innocence, so I planned for a little accident to happen where you attempted to escape, forcing me to put you down.”

Evernya shuffled backward only for muscular hands to grab her from behind, forcing her to her knees on the hard, stony ground. She buffed her body with the meager mana available to her, but in her restrained state, she failed to gain enough leverage to escape the hands holding her down.

Arthur summoned a glowing silver long sword as he approached his incapacitated prisoner. Evernya maintained her defiant glare, refusing to show any fear as Arthur swung his sword toward her neck.

Just before the razor-sharp sword reached Evernya’s neck, Arthur looked up at something behind his prisoner, halting the swing.

Blocked from Evernya’s view, Aya stood wearing an elegant red kimono, staring down at Arthur as if he was an insect. Something unspoken passed between them, causing Arthur to bow his head in respect and dematerialize his sword, halting the execution.

Aya emotionless gaze landed on her mate as she pulled out an elegant platinum choker with a large rose cut ruby at the throat and rubies running along the band. As she brought the choker to her own neck, Aya opened their telepathic connection for the first time in weeks.

“Goodbye Nya. Aya loves you,” Aya spoke as tears escaped her otherwise emotionless eyes.

Before Evernya could respond, Aya gave the choker one last push, locking it closed, forming a seamless seal over her black band. A moment later, the ruby at her throat glowed, severing their bond. Before the effects became pronounced, Aya wiped away her tears, regaining her emotionless facade and teleported away.

As soon as Aya teleported away, a brutal backlash assaulted Evernya’s soul. A blood-curdling scream ripped through the air as she collapsed face-first onto the rocky ground. Her half of the bond shot back like a high tension rubber band, causing a shock wave within her body. The seals holding her turbulent mana at bay rippled under the disturbance.

A few seconds later, her powerful soul recovered, but the damage to the seals caused irreversible effects. At first, everything seemed calm as Evernya’s screaming silenced, but a few seconds later, cracks formed on the bodysuit.

Upon sensing a change, Arthur ordered, “back away five meters! She’s about to blow!”

Inside Evernya’s body, the structural integrity of the seals placed by the ancient man broke down, releasing spurts of mana exceeding the ascended stage. Unable to take the bursts of mana, the enchantments locking her bonds broke apart, causing the silver bands on her limbs and horns to fall off.

No longer smothered by the horn bands, Evernya’s telekinetic magic went haywire, blasting back several of the subordinates too slow to react to Arthur’s order. Fortunately for them, the suit holding her under awakened grade 7 softened the blow, sparing their lives upon impact with her range limit. However, the suit fried a moment later, incapable of handling the assault of mana far exceeding its designed limit. The tank followed a moment later, yanking off the mask adhered to her face.

Seemingly unbothered by the lack of breathable mana, Evernya’s body floated upward, revealing an expression of pure anguish with tears streaming down her eyes. Her body levitated into the air, arms hanging limply at her sides, head bowed as if she was a puppet hoisted up by invisible strings. Her telekinetic magic gashed the hard rocky ground under her hanging feet as more and more mana leaked out of the weakening seals.

Out of nowhere, Evernya’s back painfully arched as a scream, half in pain and anguish, burst out of her throat.

A moment later, an explosion of force dwarfing all previous exploded of the petite girl’s body. The torrent of magic impacted her range limit, prompting Arthur and his subordinates to retreat.

Her seals hung on by a thread as mana exceeding the Ascended stage burned its way through her body, frying everything in its path as it escaped her body.

“Calm down, Evernya! You’re going to die if you don’t stop!” Screamed Kya, but her pained cries fell on deaf ears as Evernya’s mind had long since retreated.

A few seconds later, the seals holding her from going nuclear lost their valiant fight. They broke apart, allowing the full force of mana unseen since the mythic era. Force lightning whipped around the floating Draecath as the terrified humans formed a portal and dived through. Arthur took one last look at the floating girl with a frown before he too walked through as the portal winked out of existence.

The first wave burned through her body up to her head, destroying everything in its path, including a defenseless AI curled up in her virtual corner as if taking shelter from a tornado barreling down on her home. Unable to withstand the pain, Kya screamed as her hardware disintegrated. The mana continued on rushing Evernya’s eyes as if directed by an unseen force.

Unexpectedly, unlike everything else in its path, her eyes didn’t burn away. Instead, they turned black as sapphire blue lights formed in the inky black space that was her eyes. Blue lights formed in each eye in tracing out a flower like pattern with a scaley texture. After finishing with her eyes, the mana exploded outward, pulverizing everything in her surroundings, including the air itself. The mana impacted her range limit with the ferocity of an asteroid stretching the invisible wall outward over twenty meters before snapping back at twice the force, only to meet the second wave exploding out of her body, turning her ashen skin black.

An ancient-looking man appeared in front of Evernya. He coated himself and his charge in a force barrier just before the collision of her mana and the range limit rebounded. His shield distorted, sending him and the burn out husk of his charge flying into the mountain. The force pushed them several hundred meters deep into the mountain, causing an earthquake to assault the mountain range.

As he sensed another wave of mana threatening to escape, he teleported them out of the hole before laying down the crusty body of the once beautiful young woman.

He invaded Evernya’s body with his mana encircling her mana core just before the third wave escaped. With visible strain on his paling wrinkled face, he inspected the damage to his charge.

First, he attempted to reseal her mana, but no matter what he tried, the mana instantly ate away the seal. Next, he siphoned the mana out, but found the mana too potent to handle.

Left with no other choice, a saddened expression form as he brought his palm to Evernya’s unrecognizable charred chest. With a shot of his mana, he pierced Evernya’s mana core, causing all her remaining mana to shoot out the hole. The beam of pure mana cleaved the mountain unimpeded by Evernya’s no longer existent range limit, only stopping upon impact with the barrier holding Sespina’s corrupted mana at bay.

After confirming the complete destruction of Evernya’s mana core, he opened a portal to an unknown location.

With care, the ancient man levitated Evernya’s charred body in front of him as he walked through the portal, leaving behind the devastation just as dozens of humans portal in to investigate the disturbance.

They appeared in a cave deep underground, lit by a kilometer wide underground lake with brightly glowing blue water practically radiating pure mana. Wasting no time, the ancient man levitated what remained of Evernya’s body into the lake.

While watching the blackened corpse sink to the bottom of the lake, the ancient man looked upward as his features morphed into that of a lean twenty-something Draecath of light green coloring. “Forgive me, my lady. I failed in my duty.”

His expression turned far away as if receiving a mental message, causing him to shoot his attention to his charred charge with an astonished expression before teleporting away.