CHAPTER 299: CHAPTER 299. MOVEMENT

" Thanks to Anaya, I was able to learn a rank 0 protective rune quickly. But this guy’s spiritual power is extremely pitiful.

I’ve confirmed that after just ten seconds of using the rank 0 concealment rune and protective rune, I’ll have to wait thirty minutes before I can use spiritual power again. I’ll have to use each of the runes carefully. Also, if possible, I could use the vines I create to restrict the movements of certain threats headed my way and buy myself some time.

Even with the vines ,I cannot spam them endlessly like in my original body where I can use my affinities without thinking of draining my universe energy reserves . Plus, this guy is just too weak.

Of course, if the threat is way above me, I can only run away using the concealment technique, if that’s even possible. I’ve also managed to practically confirm that I can’t use my affinities and techniques. It seems I’m really stuck with what this guy’s got. Time to move."

Kailen moved.

There was no enemy in sight, therefore he didn’t waste his spiritual power activating the concealment technique, as he only wanted to use it when necessary.

He moved stealthily, but with moderate speed, panting quite heavily—a testament of how weak the endurance of the body he had inhabited was.

His footsteps echoed softly as he rounded several dead bodies, ignoring the stench of decomposed flesh and charred corpses around him. His gaze lingered across several individuals, some machine race and others of different races, hiding in different spots he rounded across.

Some were wounded, almost bleeding to death. Yet their companions could only watch with pain, unable to do anything to save them.

Kailen ignored them and pressed on.

He was no savior, he was more damned than them. Besides, even if he had wanted to help, did he have the means to?

" Who goes there?"

Kailen activated the concealment technique as soon as the voice sounded, the feminine dwarf looking in his direction.

She sensed no one was there—luckily, thanks to him activating the concealment technique early. However, she didn’t seem to give up. She wanted to make sure she had not spotted an enemy.

" Damnation."

He used that split moment in that small window of opportunity to detect the universe energy fluctuations from the Dwarf.

" By the time the concealment effect will wear off she’d be here and I’ll be in trouble. A rank 2 beginner stage ascendant level dwarf. Perhaps a young soldier. I’m no match for her huh. Talk about falling from grace."

Quickly, he didn’t hesitate, joining several mass of corpses piled up at the corner of the rundown alleyway where he currently was. He covered himself with their blood, blending perfectly with them.

In fact, he buried himself deeply beneath a couple of corpses.

The scent of their rottenness almost made him vomit, but he held himself back. Anything to survive!

He felt like suffocating beneath the dark, maggot-infested corpses draining with pus, leaking on him, the one beneath them.

" Shit, shit, shit!"

The slow sound of approaching footsteps echoed nearer, until the footsteps finally ceased their movements when the dwarf stood before the corpses.

" Strange, I thought I saw someone here? Let’s stand here for a while, just in case the bastard is probably hiding somewhere here."

" Oh you gotta be fucking kidding me!" Kailen cursed, groaning inwardly, suffocating under the dead bodies. " At least she didn’t discover me, for now. I guess I have to endure."

An hour turned into two hours. The female dwarf even started watching a holographic video in the process.

" Please leave, Miss Dwarf... I need to survive. If you do, I’ll—uh... I’ll buy you a cup of coffee. Wait. Why the hell did I just say that? I’m really losing it ain’t I?" Kailen realized he had just said something extremely out of place.

But who could blame him? Because what was happening at the moment were crushing his hopes of leaving this place either alive or anytime soon.

The female dwarf even called another fellow over, and the two of them started chatting in the end.

" I’m gonna die here ain’t I?"

Kailen had been suffocating under the dead bodies for hours. Had it not been for being in several life-and-death situations, which had in turn honed his will, he would have cracked and probably done something to unintentionally reveal his hiding place.

However, he remained still. He had to survive.

So he pressed on in the suffocating embrace of the dead bodies, pressing hard against his weak body.

His senses grew numb to the suffocating scent of dead bodies. He had been under the dead bodies for who knows how long? Hours? Days? Months?

He couldn’t even tell the time anymore.

That was when he heard several retreating footsteps.

" Seriously, when is this war gonna end? I really could use a cup of coffee," the female dwarf finally said with a sigh.

" Heh, you should really embrace your dwarf customs. Whiskey would do, what’s up with coffee?" her male counterpart added as their footsteps receded, their voices becoming more silent with time until the place grew completely silent.

Several dead bodies seemed to shuffle for a while until a hand that looked like it had been dipped into all sorts of dirty liquid sprouted from beneath them, followed by a head and a lean body.

This was Kailen, currently inhabiting the body of Nyk.

" Seriously, never thought I’d miss a shower this much. But what kind of dwarf takes coffee?"

He sighed, then started moving.

There was no time to waste. He didn’t know how long he’d been under the dead bodies but it certainly wasn’t a short period of time.

He didn’t have any time to waste.

Kailen crawled into an alleyway.

" I need to try and find a teleportation gate. This city is literally a planet. If I intend to leave the city just by walking to its outskirts, I’m gonna be doomed to die with history, drowned in the arson of these dwarves."

Kailen mused to himself. He had to find a teleportation gate that could at least help him traverse at least half of the city distance. Even if it was less than that, it would be better than being a weak, technically unarmed person roaming the streets, right?

He might end up in the hands of some insufferable dwarves who’d kill him after probably reaching the other end of the teleportation gate. But if he kept approaching the situation like he was now, he’d end up dying anyway.

He had to take a risk.

" Great. Every decision I make puts me at a risk of dying right now. But at least this one may be worth the gamble, compared to scrambling through the streets and wasting time."

However, there was one other problem with this plan.

Nyk, the previous owner of this body, had never left the house of Cyralis. As a matter of fact, he didn’t even know anywhere in the city. Also, Kailen didn’t have a map of the city so that he’d know where to go and how to arrive at a teleportation gate.

This Nyk had an AI chip on him, which would definitely have a map of the city,but the AI chips of the citizens had been disabled and destroyed by the dwarves through some means when the invasion begun.

To sum it up:

" Seriously, not even the Hunger Games would have been this harrowing."

Kailen sighed.