“I think ‘looking for the Mystery treasure’ is enough reason. If you don’t believe me, feel free to think that I’m here to save you,” Sunders commented indifferently.
Greya realized that both Sunders and Angor didn’t want to talk about why they were here, so she didn’t pursue an answer since her life still depended on these two gentlemen.
“Well, I’ll gladly consider you as my savior then.”
While Sunders returned to examining the strings, Greya looked at Angor again. “You want to know how I met with that fox, right? Guess I should start explaining from the beginning of the darkness as well.”
Greya’s experience was quite simple. When she saw the abnormality covering the city up, she immediately headed to the teleportation station to get away from it. At that time, the dimensional balance around the city was still fine, which allowed Douglas to take a group of wizards away using a plane passageway. This meant teleportation arrays would function as well.
However, someone arrived at the station before she did. It was Fox, who already destroyed most of the arrays.
Since Greya would like to use one of the arrays to escape, the two of them started fighting each other.
The fox was only a wizard-level monster that didn’t pose much threat. However, the harp it used contained strength that easily surpassed Greya’s weakened power.
After defeating Greya, the monster played a strange song that created all these strings and bound her in place instead of ending her life right away.
“I see it now. It wanted to drain my strength so that the ‘parasites’ or whatever they are can turn me into one of the clowns. That would be better than killing me.” Greya sighed and muttered, “Thank goodness you came.”
“Fox destroyed the teleportation points?” Angor frowned. “There must be a reason for it. Are they going to make this place their hideout or something?”
Angor reached this conclusion because he knew that certain nightmare monsters were trying to invade the wizarding world for their “Queen”. And they already succeeded in establishing forward bases such as Pocratee.
Perhaps there were more monster nests at some places they didn’t know.
“But why did they go so far as to openly invade the city of a wizard organization?” Angor wondered.
“Perhaps it’s a warning. They want to declare their ‘mission’ to us, and Sleepless City is unfortunate enough to get chosen as their first target.” said Sunders. “Of course, our previous assumption still stands, that the nightmare tunnel appeared in this city by accident, while the monsters were drawn here.
“But from their actions, we can tell that they have decided to act high-profile, which means we should be prepared for more of such bold actions. So the coming demon invasion isn’t the only matter we should worry about. An enemy no less threatening has bared its teeth in this world...” Sunders shook his head as he was no longer sure what would become of this world, or whether it was good or bad.
Angor remained silent as he anxiously wished to protect his mortal family, who was very likely to be sacrificed during such a disaster.
He had to get stronger.
“What are you talking about? Demon invasion? Another enemy? You mean this darkness?” Greya understood none of Sunders’ riddles.
Again, her question was ignored. Since Sunders didn’t wish to explain, Angor would follow his example and stay quiet.
“Okay fine. Can you at least tell me where that fox showed up from? Something tortured me for good and I want to know why I deserve such treatment.”
“That fox came from the same place where your original body currently is,” said Sunders.
“My body... You mean the fox came from the Nightmare Realm?”
Sunders didn’t respond, which was his answer.
“I see... If monsters from the Nightmare Realm are invading our world... Yes, we have one hell of a catastrophe upon us.”
“You misunderstood my words. The fox probably originated from one of the core areas of the Nightmare Realm, which is hundreds of times more dangerous than where your body is trapped. Let’s put it this way: even legendary beings won’t stand a chance should they stumble into those places,” said Sunders.
Greya silently repeated those words in her mind, terrified.
If that is true, then monsters from such “core areas” can obliterate the entire wizarding world in a blink of an eye!
“Those beings aren’t something we should care about. If they do show up here, let the world’s consciousness deal with them. And if the world’s consciousness cannot keep this world safe, neither can we.”
Sunders pretended that he was not interested in this matter, but the complicated emotion hidden in his eyes suggested otherwise.
“Did you just say that the fox is only at wizard level?” Sunders suddenly changed the subject.
Greya nodded as she cursed furiously. “Surely I won’t lose to that filthy animal if not for that Mystery weapon in its hands!”
There was a tiny hint of greed in her eyes.
Sunders smiled. The last time he encountered the fox in Twilight Auction House, it was definitely stronger than most level-2 wizards. It had only been less than a year, but the monster’s strength was weakened so badly...
Sunders had realized that now was a perfect chance to kill the nightmare monsters, before they could absorb enough nightmare energy and regain their strength.
Sunders removed his thoughtful look and looked at Greya. “It’s too difficult to sever the strings. I’ve tried. My strongest attack does not have any effect. Thankfully, all the strings are independent of each other, so we can try pulling them from your body one by one. This will be painful, be prepared.”
As far as they could see, there were over twenty strings lodged inside Greya’s form. Angor shivered a little when he imagined how it would feel like.
“Just do it.” Greya didn’t seem too concerned. “I won’t become a truth-finder in the first place if I can’t even stand some pain.”
Sunders nodded. One by one, he destroyed the pillars, which locked the strings in place, and each time he did so, he would swiftly remove the respective string from Greya’s position by pulling it away as fast as he could.
Angor couldn’t see through all the dust caused by falling pillars, but he could somewhat tell Greya’s condition judging from the spilled blood that came with the strings.
When everything settled down, Angor saw Greya kneeling in her own blood while a number of bleeding lacerations covered her body.
Angor couldn’t help wincing when looking at Greya’s tattered form.
Again, Sunders helped her mend her wounds by casting Resuscitation. Soon enough, Greya’s skin regained its former smoothness.
However, the healing spell couldn’t help her regain all the blood she had lost. Greya only managed to stay awake for a short period of time before she collapsed.
Sunders turned away to leave.
Angor thought his professor would further help Greya by putting her into his gravity garden. It seemed he was wrong.
And since he couldn’t just leave Greya like that, Angor decided to ask Toby to transfer Greya into Snowy Feather.
With Greya safe, Sunders’ next mission was to kill the fox and obtain that harp.
As for Angor... he still planned to find Nausica first and maybe kill Hookdick while at it.
Since they had different goals, Angor was ready to part ways with his teacher again.
And he was rather surprised to see Sunders waiting at the entrance of the teleportation station. The gentleman was gazing at the plaza area in front of the building with a strange look.
Angor looked in the same direction and saw a small shadow on the other side of the plaza. Using the Illumination effect, which was still shining behind them, Angor quickly recognized the shadow as the spotted puppy who brought him to this place earlier.
The puppy bared its teeth at Sunders, but it lowered its posture and started wagging its tail happily when it saw Angor.
“Professor, that’s the dog I mentioned earlier.” Angor pointed a finger at the animal.
Sunders frowned. As Angor said, the puppy appeared to be an ordinary pet no matter how he looked.
When Sunders heard Angor mentioning a strange dog, he thought his student was referring to the unknown nightmare monster called “Yorkshire”. But this puppy surely didn’t look like a nightmare monster.
Yet something felt extremely wrong...