CHAPTER 217: CHAPTER 217: SEPARATION

Everything happened so fast, even before she could blink her eyes. It was as if a tornado had roared over the place, limiting their eyesight range.

So, everyone outside the room didn’t know what was currently happening inside Zerra’s room. They only felt that the earth was about to split into two as they fell to the ground, grabbing anything that could keep them in place.

However, a moment later, they saw a huge, terrifying, inky black monster with thousands of tendrils grabbing, dragging, and swallowing them toward the sinkhole below it.

After it had grabbed enough, the tendrils disappeared, leaving all buildings crumbled to pieces.

Before it all happened, inside the room Zerra was in, she was trying to stop Cassias from doing his crazy action.

"Cassias, are you crazy?! Your space will burst and even disappear. Stop it!" She grabbed his arm.

At the same time, she was throwing seeds with her other hand, using every means to keep her parents from being swallowed by the sinkhole.

The vines managed to keep her parents bound, stopping them from being dragged deeper into the black mass of suction. Still, it could only keep them safe temporarily.

Because... the vines were also pulled out of their roots. She had to keep throwing and growing more, or else the result would be fatal. In her desperation, she didn’t even feel exhausted as she used all her energy to the point of overexertion.

With each passing second, her heart sank deeper.

"Zee... let go."

She saw her dad’s lips say to her as he clung to her mom tightly, wrapping her in his embrace. Nerith was unconscious.

Even Alaric knew that Zerra’s effort was a futile one. All people who had fallen into the spreading sinkhole never returned again no matter how desperately they tried.

They already knew the ending, and Zerra was just delaying the inevitable. However, she still shook her head, lips trembling.

Between keeping her attention on growing the vines and persuading Cassias, she could feel her energy draining fast.

Why did she try to stop Cassias? Ever since she found out that the nature of his space wasn’t storage space like rings or bracelets, she knew any attempt to risk his inner space was dangerous.

It was connected to his inner core. Just like a zombie’s crystal core, celestials also had one called the celestial inner core, the very source of their life force.

To think that Cassias would risk something so precious...

In this life, why was he different? Why did he always help her? Now, he was even risking his inner space to save her parents!

"Cassias, stop it!" She tried to persuade him again.

At this moment, as she suddenly turned into a three-tailed fox, she knew she had reached her limit. The sinkhole was swallowing everything, and her parents couldn’t be saved unless Cassias...

Just as her tiny figure was about to fall to the ground, a pair of powerful arms embraced her. Her heart also broke when she saw the sinkhole pull and swallow all the vines she had grown.

She couldn’t even bear to watch.

Persuading the stubborn Cassias was also useless. She didn’t want him to make such a great sacrifice.

Suddenly, she sensed a strange fluctuation. Her eyes abruptly opened. The sinkhole grew wider and wider at an alarming rate.

"Cassias!" She yelled at him urgently.

A monster filled with thousands of wriggling tendrils appeared from the sinkhole. It was growing wider because it needed to accommodate the horrifying, hideous thing!

The strong, iron-like tendrils grabbed her and Cassias, pulling them close to the sinkhole. Cassias couldn’t be interrupted midway or else everything would have gone to the drain, and he would have ended up saving no one at all.

So, Zerra took it into her own hands to wrap cocoons around both of them. She gritted her teeth, forcing herself to withdraw power from her own life force, which meant her lifespan would be shortened.

But... she had no time to hesitate any longer!

After what seemed like an eternity, time seemed to pause. Zerra was too exhausted to check what had happened.

She didn’t even know whether her body was torn to pieces or whether she was in a soul state right now. One thing for sure; the tendrils had grabbed her and Cassias inside the sinkhole!

Her parents’ fate was also unknown. She wanted to open her mouth, yet... she was too tired. Her consciousness faded, and she fell deeper.

As Cassias was clutching her hand tightly, the two floated into an unknown space, completely unconscious.

***

Outside the room.

After the raging monster stopped and it retracted its thousand tendrils...

Everything returned to silence... leaving only ruins.

Nyra and Laziel keenly sensed something was wrong. Many people had disappeared! Their parents, Zerra, and even Cassias!

"Elder sister!" Laziel sent a panicked look toward Nyra. Before she could react, however, he had already run toward the ruined building, desperately digging to find any signs of the four people.

However, until the sky completely turned dark, there was still no sign of them. The majority of people had disappeared.

"I am going to find them! Dead or alive. They have to be somewhere..." Laziel muttered hoarsely. His hands were already bloody from all the digging.

He had moved countless times, hoping to find them in another spot if they were in his current digging spot.

Nyra crouched down beside him, falling silent. She occasionally stared at the ruins in a daze.

"Let’s go." Nyra finally opened her mouth.

"Elder sister?" Laziel shot her a look of disbelief. "Are you going to abandon them just like that?"

Nyra bit her lip until it bled. "No... if their bodies aren’t here, it means they might be somewhere else."

Without waiting for him to respond, she dragged him away. Not before sending one last look at the ruined hospital buildings. They left with heavy hearts.

***

In another place... Zerra felt something tugging on her. She weakly opened her eyes, and she sucked in a deep breath when she saw where she was.