CHAPTER 96: MOVING FORWARD

All the memories—getting beaten, watching her parents and maids—who were more like friends—die.

Starving for days in a dark dungeon, then finally giving up and accepting becoming a maid, then getting tortured for six straight years in every possible way.

And then, one day, out of nowhere, everything changed... giving her hope for the first time in her life.

But then, as if the God couldn’t endure that hope—

It all changed again.

Just after a single day. Her life snapped back to torture.

That kid, Leor—mocking, laughing, trying every way to break her—finally turning her into an actual monster.

It all flashed through her mind in just a single moment.

But... she still stared straight into Johan’s gleaming golden eyes, as if wanting to face it all right then and there.

Even though her face was already wet with tears, and snot.

Even though her breathing was so fast that she would get a heart attack any second...

She still stared.

And, after just a minute of it, it wasn’t as scary as before.

Just... warm. ’Maybe because of that smile. Maybe because of that face.’

It just gave a kind of feeling that said, ’Everything will be fine. I am still standing behind you.’

And this feeling felt amazing.

Orihime sighed, watching Olivia’s tears stop, while Sebastian nodded with satisfaction, as if he had predicted this exact outcome.

Johan gently rubbed her head while turning back to the still creeped-out Orihime.

"Alright, Orihime, you wanna be next?" Johan joked, making her tremble all over.

Olivia chuckled, staring at Johan’s smiling face as if it were the most beautiful thing in the world.

Orihime made her own comeback, "First clean that puke and snot away from your coat, then talk!

You genuinely smell worse than shit!"

—making Johan flinch and remember the fact.

Johan made eye contact with Sebastian, and Sebastian, as if understanding, instantly raised a finger.

"[Atomic Descend]" he muttered softly.

And instantly, all the atoms that made up the dirt, puke, and snot fell to the ground, cleaning Johan’s clothes to perfection.

Johan smiled in approval, quickly turning toward the giant brick wall.

Watching Johan turn, Sebastian, Orihime, and Olivia’s faces also became serious, walking right behind him.

Johan nodded cautiously, then raised his arm, softly brushing his finger against the brick wall. After a second—

"Alright Sebastian, break the wall!" he said in a composed tone.

Sebastian nodded, joining his hands together in a praying motion, and then slowly opened them toward the wall.

Instantly, without even a single dust particle falling, the hundred-foot-wide brick wall vanished, leaving not a single trace of its existence behind.

The technique Sebastian had used was [Nucleus Destruction].

It destroyed the particles from the inside out with extremely dense gravity that made the bricks—and the force field—completely invisible to human eyes.

Truly a perfect technique to invade some thick noble’s house walls to assassinate them.

Orihime stared, amazed at Sebastian’s vast mastery of gravitation magic, realizing that the information from the court wasn’t an exaggeration.

This was really a man who could fight against multiple Stage Zeros entirely on his own.

The air finally settled as the thick gray fog rushed toward them faster than the speed of sound, filling their lungs in less than a second, as if it was aiming for that.

It startled everyone besides Johan, who said calmly with a cough, "Don’t worry, [Divine Protection] is active. The fog can’t harm us anymore, just stay on the lookout for attacks."

All three instantly nodded, spreading their Aether senses to the limit.

Olivia raised her arms in defense, while Sebastian cast [Reflect] on all four of them—even with [Divine Protection]—struggling to breathe due to his cancer.

Johan sighed, while Olivia glanced worriedly, both able to sense his condition due to their heightened senses, even in the thick fog.

The fire torch’s light had entirely vanished due to the heaviness of the fog, making them effectively blind by eyes.

Johan felt an urge to just use Echoes and figure out the way out of the fog, but this was too risky of a place to sit.

They walked for a while, almost glued to each other so no one got lost, Olivia even holding Johan’s hand.

Suddenly, Olivia raised her right arm in defense in the opposite direction, turning around immediately with a frown. Johan and Orihime followed, their flesh trembling due to the sudden pressure.

"It seems like a titan... we should be fine with [Reflect]. But we can’t rely on it..." Sebastian analyzed sharply—

As the pure black, thick-fleshed humanoid with over ten-foot-long teeth, a fifty-foot tongue, and a body as big as two thousand feet—still not reaching the roof of the dungeon—crawled toward them on all fours at over eighty kilometers per hour.

Its pure red eyes glaring with a sharp glint.

Orihime suppressed the urge to scream, as it might call that titan’s entire family, instantly raising both her arms to cast a spell.

But—

Johan raised his hand without looking, making all three of them stop and look at him with worry as the titan rushed closer and closer toward them.

Even though [Reflect] was protecting them, the sound of the titan getting return damage from [Reflect] would definitely call all the other monsters toward them, and [Reflect] couldn’t be up forever as it required constant Aether from Sebastian to be maintained every second.

And fighting all the monsters they could sense in this weird fog?

Yeah, that was suicide—even for them.

Johan wasn’t bothered much, just raising a finger toward the incoming titan.

Sebastian’s focus hardened, casting a [Maximum Output Blackhole] in his mouth, prepared to release at a moment’s notice—

If whatever Johan was planning failed.

This was not doubt in Johan’s abilities, but just making sure if anything went wrong.

[Maximum Output Blackhole] would be able to kill the titan immediately, even though it would consume more than fifty percent of Sebastian’s Aether reserves, leaving only twenty.

Johan’s index finger glowed, slowly releasing gray light as he stared at the titan just five meters away from him, emotionlessly.

==

A.N. = Apologies, only 2 Chapters today. And for the late update. I suffered a burnout from writing 15 Chapters in two nights and a day, without sleep :(