CHAPTER 770: AGARION

Even if it was dangerous, no, BECAUSE it was dangerous, Alice had no itention of backing down.

Warnings only meant one thing, she simply had to move faster before someone else caught on to what she’s doing.

She stepped away from the main path and found a patch of grass with a tree. After a quick glance around to make sure no one was watching her, she sat down and leaned against the trunk.

Placing her palm against the grass, she closed her eyes.

Blood began to converge beneath her palm. She needed something precise. A thread thinner than before. Thinner than a needle’s point. This thread didn’t been to be strong, it didn’t need to cut someone, all it needed to do was reach the heart of this island.

Creating an orb with the blood, she began to compress it.

Smaller, thinner, tighter.

The orb began to spin, with each rotation its size would shrink until a smile appeared on Alice’s face.

Perfection.

She launched the thread. It vanished into the earth, tunnelling through the dirt and stone with zero resistance. She guided it, making sure she avoided any rooms that were buried beneath the ground.

After all, the last thing she needed was for someone to notice crumbling dirt dropping from the ceiling and begin to ask questions.

As long as she kept the tunnelling in the dirt, she could cover her tracks.

Attaching a portion of her senses to the thread, she pulsed out small echoes of energy to map her surroundings.

But after a while. . . The earth felt.

Wrong.

So very wrong.

It didn’t feel like earth at all.

In fact, it felt similar to flesh yet at the same time, not quite.

A frown deepened on Alice’s face as she continued deeper.

She could feel the walls of this ’flesh’ pulsing. A heart beat? Weak yet alive.

Just as she was about to continue, she noticed Solaris’ divinity disappear.

’Gwen must’ve finished up by now. I should finish this quickly.’

Tapping her finger, she increased the thread’s speed!

Then she broke through the layer surrounding the hidden chamber and the sickening aura of miasma forced its way out.

Alice felt a chill down her spine.

Terminus? No, not quite.

The chamber was much larger than expected so just pulsing out a thin wave of energy wasn’t enough.

Overlaying a layer of blood under her eyelid, Alice created a blood mirror on the other side of the thread.

The moment she linked her sight, she held her breath.

Down here, the world was. . . twisted.

People walking on walls and ceilings. Staircases leading horizontally, intersecting pathways that violated the laws of reality.

Gravity bending in unnatural ways and chains that floated through the air.

A chamber swallowed in a red haze surrounded by a maze of constructs.

Flesh walls surrounded this chamber with giant nails hammered into it.

And contained in the centre of all of this, a colossus of iron and flesh stood. Obsidian armour, rusted and burning on the edges. Attached onto his shoulder plates was a long black cloak, tattered and pooling by its feet from the sheer length.

It wore a jagged helmet concealing its face and mounted onto his back was a ring of gold. In one way, it felt similar to a corrupted golden halo like artistic depictions of the sun.

In the titan’s hands, held a giant greatsword embedded into the ground. It stood, unmoving.

[Agarion – Unsealed Lord of Radiance ✦✦✦✦✦✦✦✦✦]

Nine star sealed Lord of Old. No, that wasn’t accurate!

’Cayla. Why does it say Unsealed?’ Alice’s smile twitched.

[You’re asking me that as if I have an answer ready for you. Unfortunately, I’m already scrambling to figure out what the hell is going on!] Cayla retorted.

When she was spending time in Caelan’s Library, she wasn’t reading through everything carefully. Rather, she was flipping through them and memorising the page as a whole rather than the information that was contained within.

After seeing Agarion, she had already began to filter through the knowledge she has in hopes of finding an answer.

While Cayla was busy, Alice hesitated but continued to scout out the area.

Despite being ’Unsealed’ it seemed as though Agarion was not making a move. Something was restraining him.

The only reason why he’s considered ’Unsealed’ is because the Abyssal bindings were broken. Meaning, like what happened with the White Death, this Abyss Lord of Old could die.

Peaking beneath his cloak, Alice noticed that there were priests harvesting his blood and flesh. Digging away at him while his regeneration gave them new materials to work with.

[They’re not harvesting his actual blood and flesh. They’re merely containers to hold his life force.] Cayla corrected what Alice was thinking.

[So in essence, they’re draining him of whatever power he has in his Spiritual Heart while leaving his body intact.]

Hearing this, Alice frowned.

Lord of Radiance. . . Considering his title is Radiance, a connection could be made between him and the Sun Church.

Was this possibly what Elior was talking about? A different way to gain power.

Alice stared at what the priests were doing.

What kind of energy were they harvesting?

She could feel the puzzle pieces slowly coming together.

Ideas that flowed through her mind.

Connections being formed and new possibilities. She could see another path branching out.

Another possibility.

For Suyin even.

If the Abyss refused to grant her power then perhaps. . .

[Alice.] Cayla grabbed Alice’s shoulder.

’Huh? Oh, sorry.’ Alice massaged her eyes.

Cayla furrowed her brows.

Alice was getting lost in her own thoughts more and more recently. Not a good sign considering their. . . fears regarding her connection to Yvael.

With Cayla calming her down, Alice decided to give the Unsealed Lord one more look before retracting her gaze.

At that moment, she felt it stir. A pair of eyes swivelling towards her direction.

It was from the Lord.

Then it moved. . .

*RUMBLE!!!

The entire island shook, the Lord began to shift under its bindings.

The Lord straining and groaning with the sounds of the earth splintering apart. The ring of gold mounted behind its head fluctuating with a radiant glow.

A deep, guttural exhale erupted from the Lord’s core as molten gold poured down from the ceiling.

Five radiant spears took aim, piercing the Lord through both its arms, its legs and finally, through its throat.

Chains burst out, latching onto the nails embedded into the wall as the Lord was forced to behave itself once more.

But its gaze, its glare never left the fragment of the blood mirror that Alice sent down.

Quickly retracted her thread and mirror, Alice slowly opened her eyes.

Cold sweat filled her back as she could feel her head pounding against her chest.

In that moment, had it not been for the spears and chains, she felt as though the Lord would’ve consumed everything in its surroundings. Her included.

Even now, despite retracting her threads, the island was still shaking with priests hurriedly running around to resolve the issue.

Meanwhile, Elior dashed out from his building. His head turning to try and find Kaia before locking onto her.

"What did you do?!"

"What do you mean? I’ve been sittin-"

*BANG!!!

Elior tried to grab Kaia’s throat but she quickly jumped up, kicking him in the chest.

"Aren’t you a rude one. You can ask the others, I’ve been siting here by the tree minding my own business."

"Tch! Your threads, you must’ve done something using them." Elior accused but even though he said this, he couldn’t sense anything around them.

There were no threads to speak of that’s snooping around.

"Just because I snooped around at first doesn’t mean all of it’s my fault. In fact, isn’t this just an earthquake? Or. . . is there an issue that I should know about?" Kaia raised an eyebrow, acting dumb.

Even though she knew that the Lord only stirred because it saw her, she couldn’t let him know that.

"By the authority granted to me as a Cardinal, I’m afraid I’m going to have to take you in for some questioning." Elior removed his earring, transforming it into an artifact.

Around Kaia, golden soldiers manifested in an attempt to apprehend her but they were too slow.

Throwing down a smoke bomb beneath her, Kaia jumped back and expanded her Zone.

Locking onto the soldiers immediately, she took aim and fired her body, destroying them before jumping into the air to avoid a sword slash.

However, Elior predicted this and a golden cage was waiting for her in the air.

The moment it wrapped around Kaia, she grinned and stuck out her tongue.

"Huh?"

Furrowing his brows, Elior’s pupils constricted as he noticed her figure begin to disintegrate.

An illusion!

*BANG!!!

He felt a kick to the back of his knees, forcing him to fall back as his posture was broken.

Kaia’s arm coiled around his neck while a dagger was held above his eye.

"Again, throwing accusations and forcing people to abide by your will. I’m not like that buddy. Now we can talk like civilised people or do you want to lose an eye and we continue to fight?" Kaia asked as Elior gritted his teeth.

*KRK!!!

"ARG!!!" Elior cried out in pain as the dagger plunged into his eye.

She did not hesitate at all!

The moment he didn’t give up, she struck!

*BANG!!!

Unleashing a pulse of energy to throw her off, Elior glared at Kaia who simply smirked and licked the blood from her fingers.

Ripping the dagger out, Elior wanted to grab a vial of healing blood when Kaia threw a set of needles towards his throat.

Quickly stepping to the side to avoid them, his pupil constricted seeing Kaia already in range with an arrow on the verge of firing, aiming directly at his head.

"Stop!"

*RUMBLE!!!

A flaming spear crashed down between them, forcing the two to step away as they both turned towards Gwen.

She picked up the spear and turned to Kaia before glaring at Elior.

"Care to explain what the hell is going on?"