A giant mouth was wearing the face of a person as a hat in front of me. The hat was similar to my classmate, Blaine Sothsfield. I had to give it to the maker, it looked what she would look like if she were surprised.

{It's her! It's that one girl that always stays behind that other girl!}

The system's careless remark snapped me back to reality. So it was her after all! Though she didn't say a word, it was clear from her reaction that Blaine Sothsfield had seen everything, and judging from how she had been all along as the brains of Seraphina Exise's gang, she would never think that my current performance was only a result of Isabella.

I was fucked.

Before I could say anything, Blaine Sothsfield regained her composure. Her brows furrowed and her eyes narrowed, showing off a blend of flight and fight. She suddenly reached into her pockets. She pulled out a small black rod of metal and held it in front of her face.

Unsure of what she was doing, I took a step back, but that was all the time she needed. In the blink of an eye, the metal rod extended from both ends and formed an enormous black bow. Blaine's free hand grazed over the space behind the bow, she pinched the air with her fingers and swept her hand back. Almost instantly, an arrow of bluish-white mana formed in her hands as she locked her aim on me.

“Y-You…” she muttered.

I kept stepping back with my hands raised in submission, my eyes sweeping the place for any chance to get away.

“You must die!!“

“What?! Why ME?!“

Blaine released the arrow and it zapped toward me. I dived to the right and rolled on the ground, narrowly avoiding the arrow.

{No matter how you look at it, shouldn't you be the one saying that!?}

“I should! I should be saying that!“ I screamed and looked back over my shoulders. She was already loading up another arrow. I ran ahead and Blaine followed right behind.

“Before you kill me…” Blaine said, clearly having heard my gripes. “I'll kill you!“

“What the fuck is wrong with you!?“ I dived again and dodged the second arrow, I couldn't even get up and rolled on the side to dodge the next one.

{Just how many novels has this crazy bitch read?!}

“Exactly! Just how many novels have you read?“ I landed on my knees and turned toward her. Blaine had frozen completely solid. Her hand pulling back another magic arrow stopped midway and her eyes had snapped open. A tint of red climbed her neck, all the way to her cheeks, and then filled her entire face.

“Y-Y-You… Novels? I don't read those stupid things! How did you know I like billionaire romance stories? Huh? I don't have any trash like that! Did you break into my room, you creep?!“

“Just decide on one!!“

Blaine screamed an incomprehensible scream as she started pulling another arrow back. I felt a rumbling in the ground and ignored her instead. My head snapped back to see the Rhino slowly approaching.

Nothing else was around it.

The rumbling intensified.

I shifted my sight toward Blaine, who was just a couple of feet away from me. My head titled to the side, dodging the arrow that came my way in a cinch. I stretched my hands out and grabbed a confused Blaine before jumping up from the ground.

A ghastly row of teeth emerged from where we stood mere seconds ago, the sand around dripped down as the body of the deathworm shot up from the ground.

I landed back on the ground with Blaine and looked at the worm. Black blood dripped from the dozens of scratches on its face while parts of its body seemed to have been dented in.

{That rhino did a number huh? You kicked this one's ass without kicking it.}

See, experience.

Blaine that was trembling red from embarrassment just a few seconds ago now had the hardened face of a soldier as she took on a stance and aimed her bow at the Worm.

I sighed in relief and said. “Finally, aiming at the ri—”

Seven streaks of light zapped out of the bow. They curved around the monster and impaled into its body.

“[Archer Awakening: Resonance-7 (D)]”

Sound.

A subtle, high-pitched sound spread in the air.

I clicked my tongue and covered my ears, stepping back.

With each of my steps, the sound grew louder and louder. All subtlety in the sound faded away within seconds as low-pitched humming started making my bones tremble. The waves of sound started shaking the very air, softly at first, I could see the wind wave up and down and the dust on the ground float away in sinusoidal waves.

An infernal scream rang out from the deathworm, but I could barely hear it over the sound permeating every inch of the air around me.

I took a few more steps back, and the sound stopped.

{It stopped?}

“Nope,” I said, taking in a deep breath. The monster up ahead was still trembling in pain and the waves of sound still ushered out of its body, though, they disappeared before they could reach me. “We're just out of its range.“

A chuckle escaped me as the deathworm fell limp to the ground. The drops of blood streaming down the few injuries flooded out like a broken dam as its internal organs were completely crushed by the sound.

{What is it?} the system asked.

“Just…” I said, my gaze stuck at Blaine moving toward the worm. “Maybe I overestimated myself a little…”