Grey dropped down to the ground, wheezing. Or, rather, he tried to. Instead of air, he coughed out blood.
The holes in his body certainly weren’t helping him breathe, and neither was the scorching pain that etched itself across a side of his face.
Thanks to Esmeralda’s eye, the Energy Reserve the Frankenstein creation could withstand was unfathomably higher than what Grey was used to. Unfortunately, while the witch’s eye took the brunt of it, the rest was still attached to his face.
The best case scenario was a blind eye. The worst case? His entire brain would be fried in short order.
Not that it would matter while he was bleeding out.
’I can’t... I can’t die...’
Grey tried to hold onto some bare amounts of consciousness. Even though the Fog of Chaos was dissipating right now—or, at the very least, it was blocked for the time being—Grey really didn’t want to fight the bastard again. He was too powerful.
If Valdris wasn’t so careless, the odds of winning were too low.
Esmeralda’s eye could definitely kill him, but it was something he could only use once. What would he do if Valdris wasn’t literally sinking his teeth into him and chose to dodge instead?
The worst part was that the Fog of Chaos seemed to ignore the protection of his holy bracelet because it was triggered by his inventory space, and Valdris seemed to have some control over it.
The best thing to do was to accept the results of this loop and survive.
’Dammit.’ Grey coughed again, but it echoed oddly.
It took him a moment to realize that it was echoing not because of him or the space, but instead because the second cough didn’t come from him.
His head weakly turned to find that Amunet was wheezing herself.
’She’s alive? How?’
The questions he had were answered when pools of blood that had bubbled out from her earlier began to be sucked back in.
’Wait, no. That’s impossible. She was sucked dry by...’
Realization struck Grey. That blood was Amunet’s. It was Esmeralda’s.
Slowly, Amunet began to gain some ruddiness to her and for some reason, Grey found himself sighing in relief.
At least this way, he didn’t have to be a dick. If he was so hell bent on survival this time, it wasn’t lost on him that it meant Amunet wouldn’t be able to live again. But it seemed that he wasn’t going to have to make the hard choice.
Now, he just had to survive...
Grey coughed again. ’Shit...’
Amunet groaned. "Grey..."
Her voice sounded as though she hadn’t had water in weeks. Granted, that was probably the best case scenario for someone who had been sucked dry by a giant vampire literal moments ago.
"Can’t talk... busy... call again tom... orrow..."
Amunet laughed and then almost immediately stopped. "Ow... ow... hold on... I can... do something... Their blood just takes... a lot..."
Grey had no idea what that meant, but clearly Amunet wasn’t in a position to talk very much.
He felt his consciousness fluttering away, and part of him was hoping that maybe the rewards would have something that could heal him. But for the life of him, he couldn’t seem to keep his eyes open.
Darkness swallowed him up, and deep within him, Grey found a kernel of something that definitely shouldn’t be there.
’Why...’
A fang. It was still... in his heart.
’Well... that’s not good, now is it?’
He coughed again, pain he thought he was doing quite a good job at ignoring bubbling back up.
The Fog of Chaos in the area should have already dissipated, but the fang left behind by Valdris was like an anchor for the pieces that had just been in his heart.
It could neither advance nor retreat, but it was oddly the only reason he was alive right now. If that fang was gone, he would have already bled out.
’Worst hickey I’ve ever gotten, holy hell... even that foreign exchange student who started sucking my nose wasn’t this bad.’
Grey felt a touch to his side. Amunet had crawled over, or at least he thought. He couldn’t quite see straight right now. The world was blocks of black and brightness, nothing in between.
"Don’t move. I don’t know if this will work for you, but it’s the only chance you’ve got."
Amunet’s voice was already a lot steadier. Grey was starting to regret not taking a look at the tome. He was being pulled in so many different directions at once, it was almost impossible to tell what was the smart choice and what was a waste of time.
At the moment, it seemed his top priority was to finish this Instance as quickly as possible so he could make it back to his Canon Event. But now he wasn’t so sure.
How had Amunet even learned all these techniques so quickly? It couldn’t have been as easy as downloading it, otherwise it wouldn’t have taken so much for Grey to get his Metal Affinity Ability to Level 8.
"I got it..." Grey wheezed out.
"There’s not much blood left, but I think Valdris has some left beneath his cauterized wounds. I’ll try to use that."
Grey grunted in acknowledgement. In reality, he was plotting on pulling the fang out the moment he got enough strength. If he didn’t, he would never heal properly.
A pulse came from his eye and Grey’s brows furrowed. Then a better idea came to mind.
’You better fucking hold on.’ Grey echoed in his mind, but it was hard to tell if he was speaking to himself or someone else. Or maybe it was something else.
His body suddenly seized as what felt like a spike drove through his chest.
"Sorry, sorry. This will hurt."
"Thanks for the warning." Grey said through gritted teeth. But despite his complaints, he had already turned his attention elsewhere.
There was just a sliver of energy left in Esmeralda’s eye. Not enough to send out an attack like that again, but maybe just enough to allow Prometheus to devour something else.
There was nothing about Prometheus that suggested it was related to metal. So if Grey could devour metal, why couldn’t he devour something else?
Like a fang?
Or the Fog of Chaos.
Flames erupted from his heart as blood poured in.