“Please be a little gentler, I’m quite sensitive right now”

“Xu Xu”

“No no don’t go down there!”

“Xu Xu Xu”

“Is this revenge for how I treated you before? I’ll be more considerate in the future so-OUCH!”

“Xu Xuu”

“You! Wait till I get my hands o-AHH”

An ambiguous conversation could be heard in the silent room, the scene though is actually quite innoc… no it’s a bit traumatic to be honest but the underlying meaning held within the words was not as you would think, its bit worse

A few bodies laid within the room, two of them were near the Core, one had a knife would on its neck and looked quite old, it was also slightly burnt but not to a large degree it appeared to be the corpse of the deceased Rekak Ravi

The other one was lying face down, figuratively speaking, as it had no face, in fact it was missing a whole head, it suffered major burns on many parts of its body, while its cloths indicated it to be a member of the Shenai family

“Hunter family my ass how the hell did you believe my clever trap so easily”

The one talking though was the actual owner of the cloths, Yu, who was currently being wrapped up in a half cocoon by a small spider running its eight feet around his body, the spider had a creepy half smile on its face as it tightened the threads on its victims… owner’s body, while it was instructed to do it like a bandage it seemed to enjoy the process more than it should

Back to Yu though, he was the one who devised such a sinister trap, he had dressed up the headless Kore as his dead body and made the scene look like he had stabbed Ravi when he had his guard down and then his beast ate Yu’s head and proceeded to scamper away, this would lead the visitor to think the owner had died thus they would just collect the Castle Core, and be on their way, after all who would think that Yu would go through the trouble of dressing up dead bodies for a trap, and even have the time to go collect some Unites to booby trap his Core? None that how many, unless they saw something suspicious about the body the possibility would not even graze their mind

‘I don’t want to do something like this again’

He was talking about both dressing up dead bodies, and fighting with such suicidal techniques

He turned his head to look at the fourth human corpse in this room, it belonged to none other than Houk Mous, apparently the “genius” had an ill gotten reputation for his cunningness

“Why did you have to go die like that huh? You could have been a little more carefull you know! Now I’m definitely gonna be killed as soon as the truth is out!”

Yu was not worried about killing the other noble houses kids, but the Houk family was once one of the top four, killing their last successor only spelled death for him, the trash of the Shenai family

Yu’s mind kept looking for explanations he could fabricate, stories he could make up, schemes he could put into place, but all of them seemed to crumble before the wrath of the Houk family, even without experiencing it he could tell how futile his lies would be

‘I should brood about this later, I need to focus on the now, getting out of here takes priority, lest someone else comes looking for trouble with me’

In his current state he couldn’t tussle a chicken much less fight, and with his only combatant summon out of commission he could only make camp at the edge of the Cores field to avoid death

“Ugh even moving is a drag”

He pushed on the ground as he weakly got up, the cocoon ensured everything remained in its place until he got to the medicine in his makeshift bag, but as he made his way to the entrance he suddenly looked back at the dead body of Mous, and after deliberating for a few short seconds, as his body couldn’t afford him many more, he decided to painfully make his way back and pocket the two arrows, then after patting his burnt leather backpack he found eleven cores within, not such a big surprise since this guy was one of the cream of the crop, after pocketing those too and a few items form the backpack, Yu head out once again with slow steps, trudging his way to his small camp

********************

On the other side of the Battlefield, in a dark raven, a figure could be seen lightly stepping on the heavy dark miasma, it made one wonder if they were still in the Bronze limited Dimension, as such a skill could only be showcased by the powerful few of the Golden Rank

‘I did it! I made it! I succeeded in advancing my rank in the Could Surfing technique’

The figure in question was that of a boy, his jubilant face was one of quite a young age, the second youngest in the Battlefield, his baby face had a heroic and righteous feel to it, his wide eyes expressed determination that didn’t quite suite his age, his small figure had a mix between masculine and femininity, overall his appearance ensured his popularity among the other gender, that combined with his heroic nature made him quite the women killer

All that was irrelevant to the current situation though, as the most surprising thing was still the fact that the young boy was stepping on semi clouds, his mastery in the technique passed down by his family had indeed reached an outstanding degree

‘I have achieved the Light Steps On Heavy Clouds stage; this means that as long as there are clouds with good density I could actually use them as a stepping stone! Though that only works if I’m going down not up’

This suited his current situation greatly, it’s as if it was tailored for getting him out of this tricky situation, which made one wonder if it was pure luck, or fate guiding him along

This raven had existed since the olden times, way before the current families had risen into fame, it had existed since the time a thousand people could fight in this Dimension without overexerting its capacity, at those blessed times warriors had high attainment in the various techniques known through the ages the decent and ascent of this raven was but a simple task to the weakest of them

Skip a few thousand years later to the current generation, and you would find it an impassable task to go down such a raven much less climb back up, it proved difficult to even the most prestigious of the geniuses, as even flying beasts would fall to their death upon entering this deep darkness, for the gravity was so heavy even the clouds were sucked in

But that phenomenon was exactly the reason this young man could go down in such a dashing way, making one once again envy his unprecedented luck

‘But if I don’t reach the bottom soon I will run out of energy’

Indeed, no matter how much attainment he had in the technique he was still a Bronze Rank through and through, the mind is willing but the flesh is weak, without sufficient energy to operate this technique he would start plummeting in due time

‘How deep is this raven, it can’t be as endless as it seems’

But the raven continued to go further and further down, as if to mock him, and soon he faced the problem he been hoping to avoid, as his energy got depleted he was thrust into a freefall toward the bottom his speed increasing with every second, if he continued at this speed it would be certain that he was going to be smashed into peace’s

“No I can’t give up! not after coming this far I need to make it”

The boy yelled into the darkness as he mustered his last bit of energy into making another step, but how could light steps be formed when he was plummeting at such a speed? The only result he got was the burst of the cloud and the exhaust of his energy

‘Am I going to die like this? Will I let down Grandpa and little sis? Am I really useless like those nobles mad me out to be?’

Regrets, remorse, sorrow, they burrowed into his mind, throwing his emotions into turmoil

‘No I won’t fail, not after coming this far not after everything they did for me!’

The emotions that plagued his mind turned into fuel for his determination, he couldn’t accept such an end, so he faced the darkness with renewed vigor as he gathered his energy into his feet once again

‘The ground!’

Within sight was the ground that he longed to see, it was illuminated by a soft light that kept the darkness at bay, this gave him more confidence as he squeezed his body dry of energy to thrust into his next step

Unknown to him the three Cores that he had snatched form the nobles grasp suddenly lit up, this unheard of as they supposedly only reacted to other Cores after which they turned into Units, but the logic defying miracle had happened none the less, and it didn’t seem to stop there

The Cores energy soon started seeping out gradually as they started to flow into the boy’s body, this highly concentrated energy that baffled the human race were absorbed into his blood like fish falling into water, it circled his entire blood system three times before it ended in his feet, adding to the accumulating energy whatever it had left after its journey

“I can make it; I will make it! For everyone I love I WILL SURVIVE”

As the final shout rang in the darkness the boy stepped onto nothingness as if he was willing earth to form under his feet, but what formed were clouds, clouds so white they seemed to come from heaven itself, this was the Each Step a Holy Decent stage of the Cloud Surfing technique, his pure energy pushed him temporarily two stages above his current mastery, stopping his plummet just as he was about to reach the ground

‘Yes! Grandpa, Little sis, Adrian did not disappoint…’

With those final thought the boy’s mind shuts down as he falls lightly onto the soft light situated within the darkness, a smile adorned his sweet face