Chapter 123: Awakened Tournament Crisis (29)

"These damn things!"

Eden twisted his body sideways, narrowly avoiding a spiked tentacle that tore through the space where his head had been a fraction of a second earlier.

He immediately retaliated.

His Essence Blade flashed, severing the enormous appendage in a single stroke. Before the severed portion could even hit the ground, a crimson mass emerged from the blade’s surface.

[Devour]

The essence snapped shut around the severed flesh.

[+1 Strength]

Eden’s smile widened.

"Hah."

He glanced at the notification before looking toward the writhing tentacle.

Another one emerged from the ground.

He cut it apart before using devour on it once more.

[+1 Vitality]

A third came flying toward him from the left.

He ducked beneath it, spun around, and drove his blade through its side.

[+1 Strength]

Eden stared at the notifications for a moment.

"Well, you’re certainly an interesting bunch."

Just one or two attribute points obviously wouldn’t change the world for him.

But considering how many tentacles surrounded him, the accumulated gains could become significant.

’If this thing intends to keep throwing its limbs at me, I might as well make the most of it.’

[Master, Watch out!]

A tentacle the size of a skyscraper suddenly descended from above.

Eden’s smile vanished.

"Shit."

He activated Burst-Step.

The ground beneath his feet exploded as he shot sideways, escaping the impact by a hair’s breadth.

The tentacle slammed into the ruins, creating a shock wave that scattered enormous chunks of concrete across the surrounding area.

Eden landed on a fractured wall and immediately looked toward the opposite side of the battlefield.

"Elio!"

The man was hit by the enormous tentacle, and launched in the opposite direction by several hundreds of meters.

A dozen of new tentacles appeared in the direction the silver-haired Awakened disappeared, blocking the path entirely.

Eden had lost sight of the silver-haired Awakened after just one successful blow.

Considering the exhausted state Eden assumed Elio was in, Eden wasn’t particularly fond of the idea of leaving him alone against something like this.

Not that Eden was in any position to complain about injuries himself.

His body was still recovering from their duel, and the battle had consumed a considerable amount of his Essence.

Nevertheless, he was confident he could handle the tentacles.

What concerned him was the creature controlling them.

An S-Rank boss, at the very least. Possibly something even worse.

Eden had never witnessed anything like this in his previous life.

There had been dungeon breaks, disastrous raids, and even the occasional appearance of an S-Rank creature in the wrong place.

But this?

A monster attacking the nation’s most important gathering of Awakened while the Association’s strongest strike team was conveniently absent?

It was far too deliberate.

’The Mad Summoner never did this in my previous life...’

’But what changed?’

’What urged him to cause such havoc?’

Eden couldn’t help but feel that Crimson-Crow was somehow connected to this catastrophe.

Before he could begin making sense of it however, he was forced out of his own mind.

A familiar voice suddenly echoed inside his mind.

[Master, to your right!]

Sylvia’s warning came just in time.

Eden twisted his body, but the tentacle was already upon him. Its spikes grazed his shoulder, tearing through his clothing and leaving a deep gash across his skin.

"Tch!"

He landed heavily, sliding backward through the rubble.

Before he could recover, three more tentacles emerged from the ground.

One from the front.

One from the left.

And another directly behind him.

Eden’s eyes narrowed.

"You’re really starting to annoy me."

His Essence surged.

The crimson mouths of Devour spread across his blade, and he swung three times in rapid succession.

Three enormous tentacles fell apart.

Three notifications appeared.

[+1 Strength]

[+1 Agility]

[+3 Vitality]

Eden barely had time to appreciate the rewards before the severed limbs began regenerating.

Their surfaces twisted and bubbled, the exposed flesh hardening into a darker, denser material. New spikes emerged along their lengths, each one considerably larger than before.

Eden’s expression darkened.

"I guess it doesn’t matter how many times I kill those tentacles."

"Fighting those tentacles will only waste our strength."

He needed to locate the source of the regeneration.

’The core.’

Eden looked up, the massive skull barely visible in the distance behind all the tentacles.

’Or, preferably, the bastard responsible for all of this.’

But Eden knew he was no match for Aphelios.

Even at full strength and health, even with Obsidian’s and Elio’s help, fighting the Mad Summoner head-on would result in a guaranteed loss.

Unfortunately, it didn’t seem like they had many options.

Dozens of new tentacles had begun gathering between Eden and the direction in which Elio had been thrown, forming an almost impenetrable wall of black flesh.

They weren’t merely attacking indiscriminately.

They were deliberately separating the strongest participants.

Eden clicked his tongue.

"You’re smarter than you look."

He tightened his grip on his blade.

"Fine. If you want my attention so badly, I’ll give you plenty of it."

The red Essence surrounding him intensified.

---

Several hundred meters away, an entirely different battle was unfolding.

"Get the fuck outta here, you disgusting pieces of shit!"

Luvian thrust both hands forward.

Crimson flames erupted from his palms, sweeping across the ruined street in a devastating wave. The fire consumed everything in its path, reducing abandoned vehicles and shattered concrete to molten slag.

Three enormous tentacles disappeared beneath the inferno.

For a moment, Luvian thought he had finally managed to destroy them.

Then the ground trembled.

The three severed appendages began growing back.

Their newly formed surfaces glowed with a dark, reddish hue, and their spikes were considerably thicker than before.

Luvian stared at them.

He stared at his hands.

Then he looked back at the tentacles.

"You can take a beating, huh."

To Luvian, this just might be the worst day of his life.

He had advanced to B-Rank.

He had reached the final round of the national tryouts with the sole purpose of getting his revenge on Eden.

Only to lose to someone he could only assume to be that bastards side piece.

And as if that humiliation ritual wasn’t enough, after all that, he was expected to fight an army of regenerating tentacles?

’What the fuck is this day?’

Another tentacle shot toward him from the side.

Luvian barely managed to raise his arm before the appendage struck.

He was sent crashing through the remains of a nearby building.

Concrete collapsed around him, burying his body beneath several tons of rubble.

For a few seconds, there was silence.

Then the rubble exploded outward.

Luvian emerged, coughing and covered in dust.

"That’s it."

His eyes burned.

"I’m going to burn every last one of you."

His Essence erupted.

The surrounding air distorted beneath the heat, and the flames gathering around his body began to shift toward a deeper crimson.

He was about to unleash another attack when he noticed something strange.

The tentacles approaching from his right had stopped moving.

Their surfaces were covered in a thick layer of ice.

Before Luvian could process what had happened, the frozen appendages shattered into thousands of fragments.

He slowly turned his head.

A familiar girl stood several dozen meters away, her long hair fluttering in the hot wind.

Sonne.

She lowered her hand as the last traces of her ice dissipated.

"That should give us a little breathing room."

Luvian stared at her.

Then he scowled.

"Why the hell are you still here?"

Sonne blinked.

"Excuse me?"

"You heard me. A C-Rank like you is useless here."

He pointed toward the evacuation route.

"The Association is evacuating civilians. You can go help them if you have a death wish."

Sonne’s expression hardened.

"I’m not leaving."

"Are you stupid?"

"Possibly. I’ve been told that before."

"This isn’t the time for jokes, dumbass."

"And this isn’t the time to abandon people who might need our help!"

Luvian clenched his jaw.

He couldn’t believe this girl.

She had just been defeated in the semifinals. She had every reason to be exhausted, injured, and frustrated.

Instead, she had apparently decided to throw herself into a battle against an unknown S-Rank monster.

For what?

Some misplaced sense of justice?

Luvian scoffed.

"Do whatever you want, then. I’m leaving."

He turned away.

"Luvian."

He ignored her.

"Luvian, wait."

"What now?"

Sonne hesitated briefly before asking her question.

"What would you do if Eden died here?"

Luvian stopped.

The words seemed to hang in the air between them.

For several seconds, he didn’t move.

’That bastard.’

The man who had humiliated him during their first encounter. The man who had made him question his own strength, his own talent, and everything he had believed about himself.

The man Luvian had spent the past several weeks wanting to defeat.

He had imagined it countless times.

Standing above Eden in the arena.

Watching that infuriating smile disappear from his face.

Finally proving that Luvian wasn’t someone who could simply be stepped over.