Chapter 314: Ch 313: Goodbye Lyra - Part 2

Lyra looked unsure of what she should do, so Kael spoke firmly, refusing to let the uncertainty in his heart reach his voice.

He had no idea what Lyra intended to do after sending him away, nor did he know whether he would be able to find his way back to her once he entered the other domains. But there was one thing he was certain of.

He would come back.

Lyra stared at him in shock, her eyes widening as she looked down at the hand wrapped around her wrist.

"Kael..."

For a moment, she seemed unable to say anything else. Then her lips slowly curled into a smile, although tears continued to roll down her cheeks.

It was not the usual embarrassed smile she gave him whenever he teased her, nor was it the confident smile of someone who believed she had everything under control.

It was the smile of someone who had finally been given a reason to hope.

"You really are unfair, Kael..."

Her voice trembled as she wiped away the tears with her free hand.

"You always know exactly what to say to make me want to believe you."

"But you like me like this, right?"

Kael tightened his grip on her wrist. Lyra stared at him for several seconds before letting out a small, broken laugh.

"You are right..."

The space between them continued to widen, slowly forcing Kael’s hand away from hers.

"I will wait for you."

Her voice was soft, but there was no hesitation in it this time.

"I will wait for as long as it takes."

Kael finally lost his grip as the distance became too great, and Lyra’s figure began fading away.

But even as she disappeared, Kael could still see her crying smile. He had a feeling this was a promise Lyra was not going to keep. But she looked as though she had no regrets in her life.

It was too late for Kael to go and be by her side now. The world around them had all but collapsed, and the door between them was closing. Once again, he was being pushed forward by the currents of this world.

"I have made sure you get to the others without much trouble. Please believe in my powers and what I want to show you."

Lyra’s last words were strong, and Kael could no longer see her even if he turned his head back. But somehow, he could still see her eyes burning, and he let out a shaky smile.

"Alright, time to go and find the other two troublemakers."

...

Time held no meaning in this space. Every nook and cranny looked the same. There was no point in trying to figure out where he was.

And yet, Kael kept looking for the guide that Lyra had promised him.

It would have been almost impossible for her to use her powers, but she was still determined to see things through.

He trusted her and kept moving, and he finally sensed it—her magical power that had been dormant until now.

It started to glow, and Kael followed those traces in order to get out of his current location. But the second Lyra’s power started to glow, the corruption sensed him and started to rush after him.

"Tsk, this is so annoying. Why did the corruption have to sense everything that goes on in its domain? Can’t it overlook things once in a while?"

Kael tried to complain, but it all fell on deaf ears. All he could do at this point was outrun the ruins around him.

The shining light suddenly took a right turn in front of him, and Kael quickly twisted his body to follow it.

He made it just in time before the corridor in front of him collapsed.

"Phew, I made it. Now... where am I?"

Kael looked around the new space he had found himself in and immediately noticed that he was no longer in a forest. Instead, he was in a small and dark place that reeked of waste and carelessness.

He did not have to be a genius to know where he was.

"This place is...the gladiator arena living quarters."

More specifically, these were the low-level gladiator rings that were assigned to the people whose deaths would have no impact on this world.

"Well, being here is enough to tell me whose dream I am in right now. But this was the last way I wanted to see her past."

This place could only belong to Iris, who had grown up as a gladiator. So she was also the only one who could ever dream of such a place.

That person was Iris.

And right now, he could feel a faint hint of her power in the air. She was around, but her presence was so weak that he could not tell where she was exactly.

Kael had never been to the gladiator arena before he went to get Iris, but because he had read the maps, he knew exactly where he needed to go and what he needed to do in order to find someone here.

He decided to take the hidden pathways he had read about, and it was a surprise to see that those passages were present in front of him.

Usually, places like these were made from the memories of their host. So these passages were something Iris must be familiar with as well.

It was a sudden stroke of good luck that Kael decided not to look too much into.

Kael cautiously stepped into the hidden passage, keeping his senses focused on the faint trace of Iris’s magic. The further he went, the stronger the unpleasant smell became, and he could hear distant screams echoing through the walls.

It was clear that this place was not simply a memory of Iris’s childhood. It was a memory of everything she had been forced to endure.

Kael’s expression slowly became serious as he continued walking.

"If this is really Iris’s domain, then she must be around here. I need to drag her out now."