13.5

“How old do the ruins date back to?” the first the break the silence that fell upon Team Rectiser was Kirk. “Cacti, any ideas?”

“I-I…” Cacti stammered and looked around the ruins frantically. “I-it’s hard to d-determine, b-but it s-should be at least six h-hundred y-years old.”

Kirk placed a hand on his chin, then looked at Bran for his opinion.

“This is a big discovery… But, we should find the quickest way out of here before we all end up like them, the academy can deal with the exploration later,” Bran turned his gaze away from the nearest skeleton that was crushed under a giant rock. “Matilda, you said there was an exit on the west. Can you find the shortest route for us to get there?”

Without another word, Matilda powered the mission sphere and inspected the map that had already updated itself to display the ruins that they were in.

Sniff, sniff…

Aurelius’ nose twitched again.

“John… That scent from earlier, it’s getting stronger again.”

John inhaled as his beastkin friend would, but all he smelled were the light pungent ammonia that the ruins gave off because of the rotting that had once taken place.

“Are you sure you didn’t mistake the smell of those who died here to what you smelled earlier?”

Aurelius shook his head adamantly.

“No, that and this scent is different. This smell is benign. I know this scent from back when I was still with my sister, but I don’t remember why.”

John jerked his head backwards. “I thought it showed you danger based on how you behaved earlier. Am I wrong?”

Aurelius tilted his head upwards and squinted his eyes, “I don’t know for sure. But I know it feels like someone is watching us… A familiar presence, you know?”

“Like an angel or god? Or is it an evil being like shade stalkers?”

“I don’t think it is either of those, John. Ever since we traveled downwards from the eternal decays’ lair, this scent keeps appearing to me, getting stronger…”

John drew a line with his mouth.

Is Prishine using surveillance magic to keep track of me?

A shiver ran down John’s spine.

What if she was orchestrating everything the whole to force me to get closer to the mysterious door? Is she even capable of such magic? I know she has many people under her… But surveillance magic is unachievable. Even with ritual magic done to supply said mana to her, the raw amount of mana needed to watch over someone in a distance is far too inconceivable—

“Bran, I’ve got it!” Matilda declared triumphantly, interrupting John’s thoughts. “We are currently on the south side of the ruins. If we follow the skirts of the city to our left, we should be able to reach the exit on the west side of the cave in no time. However, there is just one thing…”

“And what would that would be?”

“At the end of the map, where the exit is, the mission sphere’s map keeps showing a blurry image,” Matilda frowned as she pointed to the virtual map before her. “It looks like a magic infused doorway…”

Bran inched his face closer to the map and watched the one part of the map projection buzzed and flickered as though the mission sphere itself was faulty.

Kirk simply shook his head, “It’s just a door that had residue mana imbued as reinforcements. The mission sphere probably can’t understand it since no one makes them anymore.”

“I-it should be fine. S-since mana powers the mission sphere, it might react d-differently according to the user.”

Cacti moved in front of Matilda and extended her two hands to hold the mission sphere. Sure enough, once Cacti used a small portion of her mana onto the mission sphere, that segment on the map no longer flickered and only showed a pair of tall doors.

Matilda looked though she wanted to say something but closed her mouth once Cacti deactivate and reactivated the mission sphere and show the same results.

“You might be close to reaching mana exhaustion, Mats. It’s alright, you did well subduing the eternal decay earlier." Bran gently placed his hands on Matilda’s back, then turned to everyone else and spoke, “Let’s make haste and get out of here. We’ll rest when we leave these…sinister ruins.”

There was no doubt bloodshed undoubtedly happened in these ruins prior to Team Rectiser’s arrival. Everyone reached an unspoken consensus to leave this place as soon as they could, dreading any unwanted company that the ruined city might offer.

Following the route that Matilda had proposed, the six of them traveled to the cave’s exit.

All the while they walked, John had a slightly unpleasant look on him.

His gut had still yet to stop churning from earlier.

Though the rest of his teammates had assumed the two tall doors that were by the exit of the cave were only the average magic reinforced doors, John, however, knew better.

So that’s what that succubus meant? I have to be the one who opens those damn doors.

He gritted his teeth, hoping that somehow, he might be wrong.

Having navigated themselves through the rubble filled path around the ruined city, Team Rectiser finally reached the exit of the cave.

What now stood before Team Rectiser were two tall stone doors that were etched with unusual drawings that had been carved against their surface. Though most of the marks had already faded with time, there were still a few vague images that depicted the lives of those who once lived in this now ruined city.

John couldn’t make it out much, but breathed a sigh of relief when the etched images on the doors did not move as they did in the illustration that Prishine showed him.

I was worried over nothing.

With most of his worries proven to be wrong, John spoke with great enthusiasm, “The doors are open, Bran. Should we just go, now?”

Bran shook his head then turned to the two girls, “Matilda, Cacti, kindly use detection magic to search for any hidden mechanisms, both magical and physical. We need to know if there are any traps laid before proceeding.”

“Cacti, ready your staff please,” Matilda said before placing her hands on Cacti’s wooden staff, inducing a pale pink glow to it. Cacti then applied her own magic to the staff at Matilda’s request. “Perception of the physical and the unseen, expand upon my senses, [Unmaking of the Unseen].”

A moment later, the pink glow of Cacti’s staff pulsed and emitted a wave of energy coating that made its way from across the ground and into the passages beyond the two grand doors that were left ajar. The pink energy waves gave a few more pulses and traveled through the exit passage a few more times before the spell finished.

“Well? Anything in there, sis?”

“I… No.” Matilda blinked in disbelief of what she saw when she recovered from her [Unmaking of the Unseen]. “In fact, I can’t sense anything at all, not a single trace of life, magic, or if someone had been through the passage… The exit passage is just...empty.”

“Empty?” Kirk raised a brow. “As in, empty, empty? Absolutely nothing?”

Matilda nodded her head.

Bran frowned, “That’s…almost impossible.”

“I a-amplified Matilda’s magic and sent it out a f-few times, s-she won’t make a mistake,” Cacti assured with a willful expression, even her thick short eyebrows had converged to the center of her head to show how earnest she was in her statement.

“I am not doubting Matilda, or your amplification of her magic, Cacti,” Bran quickly soothe the two girls who searched for any potential booby traps laid waiting for them.

“What’s wrong with not detecting anything, Bran? Doesn’t this mean it is definitely safe to enter?” Aurelius scratched his head at the three’s behavior.

“No, Aurelius. Even if it's a naturally formed cave, there should be microbes or mosses in there. But the passage that are beyond these two doors not only don’t show any signs of being used by anyone, they also have no magic signature either…” John explained to Aurelius in a manner the beastkin would best understand, “It means, the formation of the passage is unknown. No living things are there, and there are no traces of magic. It almost looks like the passage just came to...existence.”

!!!

A warm wind brushed against John’s shoulders when the word ‘existence’ left his mouth. Causing him to straighten his neck upwards as he looked around him for the source of such a warm breeze.

What the hell? Who’s doing that?

Though the air circulation in the cave systems they were in was not constricting their breath, it was by no means, warm at the slightest. In such a place that never saw the light of day, temperatures as cold as 5 degrees celsius in the morning was the norm even mid spring was not uncommon.

For a warm sensation as such brushing against John was something nothing short of eerie.

“What’s the matter?” noticing John’s lowered brows and darting eyes, Aurelius asked. “John—” Aurelius immediately stopped speaking when he saw John lifting a finger to his lips, signaling to Aurelius to be silent.

“I think you’re right, Aurelius,” darting his eyes to the empty distance behind them John said cautiously. “We might be watched…”

“Watched? By who?” Kirk, who overheard, asked.

“I don’t know… But this cave is making my skin crawl.” John looked at Bran and awaited for their leader’s response.

“…”

“I know we detected nothing from the exit passage, but if John, who fought undead, is weary, shouldn’t we do something, Bran?” Matilda tried convincing Bran but Bran was unwilling to budge.

“I do not doubt his instincts. In fact, I respect him a lot… But Matilda, I the unusual formation of this passage worries me. I just don’t want our team head blindly into an unknown—”

Splat, splat, splat!

From behind, they heard slimy sloppy footsteps, stemming from the dark corridors of the ruined city. Without question, all of Team Rectiser wasted no time and readied their weapons.

A figure exited the dark shadows of the ruined city. Bearing a humanoid body, its two arms and legs along with a head on its body.

Splat!

If looked from afar, one would easily mistake it for any other beastkin or even a human at that. But this figure that limped towards them was different. It had pale white skin, facial features were exactly that of a boar’s—unlike beastkin, who had almost all human features aside from their additional tail, horns or ears on different parts of their body—and its limbs, cloven shaped hooves identical to a boar’s.

“Bran…” Kirk took a step back, unable to stop his shaking. “T-that’s a-a—”

Seconds after the first figure had appeared from the shadows of the ruined city, a few more appeared behind the first. All of them had humanoid bodies, but their heads were all just like the first.

They did not have faces nor limbs of a boar, instead, they were different animals, animals that were deemed to be bred for farm use. There were cows, turkeys, ducks, chickens, turkeys, goats, horses, rabbits…all of which appeared to be abominations have sprouted long limbs and developed humanoid torsos.

And what was concerning was not the bizarre appearance of these unknown beings that came from the ruined city.

In front of where their mouths were located, two razor sharp fangs protruded from them.

“Blood-cullers…” John muttered, clutching his mythril sword in his hands.

Abominations that resulted from vampires who sought to temporarily satiate their hunger. Animals who survived a vampire’s assault and ended up receiving partial powers from the blood devouring monsters that gifted them humanoid bodies, infusing them with an insatiable desire for blood.

“B-blood…?” one of the blood-cullers repeated John’s words as it dashed from its group and ran towards Team Rectiser with its fangs bared. “Blood!!!”

As soon as the blood-culler came within his range, John swung his sword across the monster's neck, decapitating it, leaving a loud thud on the ground as black fluid spewed from the monster’s neck.

“Fuck…”

Upon seeing the first of their kin to go down, the other blood-cullers looked to each other and spoke amongst themselves, “Blood! Blood, blood, blood!?”

“E-eep!” Cacti jolted backwards when one of the blood-cullers locked eye with her.

“Blood!!!”

It took only a nanosecond for the blood-culler to bare its fangs at Cacti before it rushed towards her.

Shing!!!

This time, it was Aurelius who followed up with his twin scimitars, ending the blood-culler’s life before it reached Cacti.

“We leave now, Bran! Now!!!” Kirk yelled, yanking Cacti in his arms along with Team Rectiser to escape to the passages that laid beyond the exit doors.

“Blood, blood!!!” the remaining blood-cullers screeched as they pursued the six of them.

One foot after the other, everyone ran past the two doors with no hesitation, running into the blazing light that was in the distance to seek safety from the blood-cullers’ pursuit.

“Go, go, go! As long as we reach outside, the sun will protect us!!!” Bran instructed.

Pant, pant, pant, pant, pant, pant.

“We are halfway there. Keep going!”

Pant, pant, pant, pant, pant.

As soon as Team Rectiser exited from the cave and reached the grassy meadow on the outside, everyone stopped and turned to look at the blood-cullers who had been tailing them all the way from the two doors.

“Blood, blood, blood— Gaaaareeeeeee!!!!”

The band of blood-cullers who had mindlessly followed Team Rectiser were basking under the sun’s rays on their skins before they realized it.

Scorching flames immediately engulfed the blood-cullers, burning them into black crisps that crumbled at the slightest movement of air. They screeched and writhed on the ground, howling like the animals that they originally were.

But it was no use.

Like vampires who were vulnerable to the sun’s rays, they were all extinguished, vaporized without mercy.

“That was close.”

“This is why you listen to someone who’s been in dangerous situations, Bran!” Matilda flicked a finger at one of Bran’s temples. “When John tells us to leave, we leave.”

“Yeah, yeah, I know that now, John was right, okay?” grabbing Matilda by her wrist to stop her, Bran shook his head hopelessly at her then turned behind him, “Listen John, next time, I’ll let you take lead whenever we find ourselves in ominous situations like…”

Bran’s voice faded when John was nowhere to be found.

All he saw was Kirksten and Cacti who were checking each other for any wounds, and an Aurelius who was crouched to the ground, with his nose twitching vigorously.

“Where’s John, Matilda?” Bran looked around their surroundings once more for their black-haired healer.

“John? He and Aurelius were behind us as we ran. Did he go scouting again?”

“No, that’s…” looking around them, all that Bran could see were flat grassy meadows, even if John had gone on his own to scout their surroundings. There was no way someone of John's stature could disappear from his line of sight.

He was shorter than the average Dezarithian, but he was by no means skinny. In fact, John was a strongly built man who had a gallant posture shoulder to complement his stance.

Letting go of Matilda, Bran went to Aurelius, who was crouched by the exit of the cave.

“Do you know where John went?”

“John’s scent...I can’t trace him…” Aurelius got up and moved to the other side of the cave’s exit, his nose twitched as he desperately tried to get a trace of John’s scent, “It’s not here too… One moment we were running together, b-but when we got out of the cave, his scent disappeared.”

Aurelius’ body shook before he continued pacing around the cave’s exit to search for John’s scent. The wagging tail that he would usually have was now tucked stiffly behind him at John’s sudden disappearance.

“John can’t, he must have…” Bran tried to protest, but his voice faltered when the black-haired John was nowhere to be found.

“It’s my fault. I knew I should have kept a closer eye on him. There was this weird smell… I thought wrongly… Now, he is gone...”

“John is gone?” Bran’s eyes grew wide and grabbed the wolfkin by his shoulders.

“I don’t know.” Aurelius’ eyes became cloudy, “I clearly saw him stepping out into the grass with me, but after that I can’t see or smell him anymore.”

Tap, tap, tap, tap, tap…

John’s footsteps deliberated.

The last thing he remembered was that he and his team had stepped foot out of the cave’s exit,

But now, he ended up back at the two exit doors of the ruined city.

All the way back to where all of them had started their sprint to get away from the blood-cullers.

“This isn’t right… Bran, is there some gimmick that teleported us back to our starting point that Matilda failed to…detect?”

Behind him, the rest of Team Rectiser he had been running alongside with had completely vanished from his line of sight.

“…”

That was not just the only thing that had vanished from his view. Even the ominous ruined city that was supposed to be behind the two exit doors was nowhere to be seen.

Not even the blood-cullers that ran after him were anywhere to be found.

Just like the time he encountered the ethereal people and met Elijah Palter, aside from the small patch of rocky ground that connected his feet to the two large doors, everything else in this place he found himself in was utterly devoid of anything.

Empty.

He stumbled into a void that only hosted two large doors that were identical to the one he and Team Rectiser just entered.

“Not this bullshit again.”

John gritted his teeth in frustration.

“What the fuck? What is happening!?”

He seethed, his fingers curled into fists as his arms trembled.

Ever since the Harvests' massacre, John had found himself in multiple accounts of surreal situations that extended from the concrete reality he knew. Be it the meeting with Elijah Harvests, the voices that only he heard, the fragments of his old memories that bled into his perception of reality, John was up to the whims of the world to experience things he had no interest in partaking.

It was not that he regretted meeting Elijah Harvest, nor hated the fact that Team Rectiser’s first mission was completed because of such occurrences.

However, every time he least expected it, he would be flung into such a bizarre situations, situations that made absolutely no sense.

He knew dimensional magic existed. He knew powerful mages would occasionally create pocket spaces where the flow of time and other laws of nature would behave differently to live out their lives or conduct research.

“But those are just myths!!!!” he yelled into the space before him, face as red as a tomato from his unvented frustration. “No one has ever proven to be capable of such things, and those who can qualify to do such things….they are definitely not me…much less for why I am here.”

If it was Ephinelyth, he would have believed she could achieve such feats. If it were even Queen Veissa herself, John would not be surprised if they used dimensional magic on him.

After all, dimensional magic was said to be the predecessor of space magic.

But neither parties still hold ties with him.

Queen Veissa had banished him. He, himself pushed Evie away from his life, never to see each again.

John shook his head dejectedly, considering the coincidence with the ethereal people, the unknown man’s voice in the eternal decay’s lair from earlier, and whatever this current situation he found himself in now.

In just less than one full month, his encounters with the surreal world had totaled three times.

Three respective times.

If it were a series of freaky coincidences, he would have understood had the time span between these events took place across years of his lifespan, but that was not the case with him.

Things don’t happen without reason.

John was a firm believer of cause and effect. He understood the world had aspects where the conventional rationality could not be applied. However, even rules and patterns exists even for the unexplained, the only problem was that John was unaware of what enabled him to be subject to these dimensional hijinks.

“Now that I think about it… Everything happened right after the Harvests’ deaths.”

John place a hand underneath his chin as he lowered his brows in deep thought.

“Evie said Dezarith Empire was dangerous, to the degree where she thought I should Moxnet immediately… She’s all-powerful and has nothing to worry about, but she still wanted me to leave the Empire immediately…”

So could it mean that it would endanger me had she come back and took me away from the academy?

“She was worried that someone would overhear our conversation that she wanted me to meet somewhere far from Dezarith Empire…”

John's eyes widened.

“Was I watched?”

Sure enough, two days right after the Ephinelyth had left Moxnet academy, a girl named Sheila replaced Ephinelyth’s existence and everyone’s memories of her.

The chances of Sheila being an empire personnel assigned to the academy to replace Evie were within the range of possibilities.

Taking in a deep breath and slowly expelling it, John placed his hands before him and spoke to himself, “Okay, John, let’s break this down. If everyone’s memories of Evie is replace by this ‘Sheila’ girl, it means that Evie’s identity must have been exposed or the empire expelled her.”

He nodded to his own explanation and continued, “Apparently, my memories of Ephinelyth remain. So I can safely assume it is some type of soft memory wipe since Evie doesn’t interact with people much. Which means the only person who could clearly remember Evie would be me…is that why they are keeping tabs on me?”

The fact that Dezarith Empire would keep a keen eye on John caused his spine to shiver.

He shook his head, “No, no, no, that’s not it. It is impossible for any government to spend that many resources on someone insignificant like me. Besides, in the public’s opinion prior to be snapping at Scywell, I was only one of his merry party members—”

Dong!

A loud ringing came from the two doors that were before him, instantly stopping John from delving deeper into his thoughts. He planted his feet firmly on the ground as he watched the two doors, hand at the ready on his arming sword, ready to strike at a moment’s notice.

Then, the two large doors moved to spread itself to him, revealing a wall of white light that was similar to the teleportation devices that Moxnet had around its premises.

“I take this as proof that the academy is behind all of—"

A warm breeze brushed past his shoulders once more, just like how it did moments ago when he was with his teammates.

This time, however, the mellow warmth did not disappear. Instead, it lingered around his shoulder as though urging him to enter the two doors.

“H-hey!” John shook his body to wrangle the warm breeze away, but instead of dissipating into the air, the warm breeze flowed around his back to further convince him to enter the doors.

The harder he tried to shake away the warm breeze, the faster it spread around his body, with John getting more agitated by the second. The warm breeze wrapped all of John’s body in no time.

Hang on… This warm breeze, it feels oddly familiar…

As he bathed in the warm breeze’s embrace, bit by bit, he could feel the weariness and sores that had built up in his body and mind fade. The longer John let the warm breeze embrace him, the closer he felt though it was someone trying to comfort him.

It was not the same feeling that his heart would swell whenever he memories of Kahnira was in his childhood years came to him. It was not the same sensation he felt when Angeline or Evie placed their lips on him…

Rather, it was akin to a fire that burned solely for him.

Then it hit him.

It was the same sensation he felt that day. That very day where he had a headache where [Heal] had failed to alleviate him from. The painstaking migraine that he had from the agony of thinking that Ephinelyth had failed to uphold her promise and abandoned him just like everyone else, that very time he cursed the non-existent gods for his woes…

“It was you, wasn’t it? The [Rebirth] spell and flames on the day I thought of killing myself.”

Suddenly, the warm breeze disappeared on his back before quickly wrapping itself around his waist, squeezing him with a gentle pressure as acknowledging John’s words.

A small curve found itself on John’s lips, “This is not the work of the academy…but you?”

The warm breeze by his waist tugged at him three times.

“Ahahaha, I was worried for nothing.”

The warm breeze remained still, keenly listening to his monologue as it retained its hold around John.

“Well, in that case, I shall do what you ask of me and enter the doors, shouldn’t I?” John shook his head playfully, indulging the warm breeze as though it were a person as though he once did to Meli, back when she would constantly beg for him to carry her on his back.

According to little Meli, his shoulders felt comfortable and safe to be on, so John must carry her at least once every few days or she would lose the will to live.

Little Meli, who smiled at him happily whenever she saw him, the little girl who he thought was precious like a sister, Meli who he would not hesitate to protect with his own flesh and blood. Meli, who he promised to spend plenty of his time with her the next time they met.

Meli who he will never see again, murdered by vampires by cold blood. On that horrible night that he failed to return to the Harvests’ on time.

A little child who was taken from this world before John could say goodbye, a child who thought of him as her protector.

“Meli… I-I am sorry…” his hands moved to his damp eyes before he knew it. His voice was quiet as he spoke to himself. “I am so sorry. If I had been a better person, I wouldn’t have shouted at Evie. I would have gone back to all of you back in time… I would have seen all of you one last time.”

Lamenting his past, John raised his head upwards, stared at the space above him as he waited for the tears to stop and evaporate.

I am pathetic…

He knew that if Meli were still alive and saw him in such a condition, the little girl would have consoled him instead, saying something along the lines of “As long you promise to remember me.”

It was how John imagined little Meli would say had she been alive. Though childish she may be, Meli Harvest was a gentle girl. The last thing John wanted was to sadden the now deceased girl sad had she been alive to see him.

I have to keep going forward…it’s what she would have wanted.

In the eyes of the Harvest girls, he was someone who was a miracle to them. He was someone who not only captured their hearts but also someone they admired. Even when Meli and Mera are no longer here, he knew for a fact they always thought of him as someone far greater than he truly was.

And just a little, that thought propelled him forward.

Placing a hand to his sides, where he felt the warm breeze was at, he slowly raised his chest, straightened his back as the warm breeze move to the back of his shoulder blades, once again nudging him forwards into the doors before him.

“Thanks for…everything,” he uttered to the warm breeze as though he were thanking the Harvest girls. “Now I know my life is not in danger, at least in this moment, because of you.”

Though the doors bore a certain similarity to the one Prishine presented to John, unlike the sinister image that Prishine had showed him containing the moving inscription, this one was plain and void of any ominous writing.

In some sense, it was pure and untainted, unlike the one Prishine showed to him.

Though the dimensions and shape between the two were practically identical, but sensing this warm breeze that somehow had a conscious mind told John he truly had nothing to worry about.

“See you again… or not...”

Without waiting for the warm breeze to respond, John marched towards the two doors with a stoic face, disappearing into the white wall and from this reality.

And for the warm breeze that was left lingering where he originally stood, a small voice spoke.

“I’ll be waiting...”