Chapter 303: Flames of Sorrow

They both spent the rest of their day traveling towards the massive clump of buildings. Jacob craned his neck upward admiring how massive some of the buildings were built. There were some that looked to be completely made out of glass. However, each pane was either cracked, broken, or missing entirely.

There were other buildings that appeared to be made out of a unique metal. However, just like the windowed structures, there was severe damage done across its entire surface. There were even some buildings that looked to be completely broken in half.

"This place is massive. I don’t see an end to these buildings. And what is this strange road under our feet?"

Beneath the snow, a dark black road with colored stripes in the center were revealed. Maria tapped her foot against it multiple times to investigate its sturdiness.

"They must have some really nice carriages if this is what their roads look like."

"That’s the weird part. I don’t see any carriages anywhere! I don’t see horses or corpses of them either. This place is quite literally a ghost town. It reminds me of the neighborhoods in the time leviathan."

Maria stepped through a giant window of a clothes store. There were dozens of wracks of all different kinds of clothes hanging on thin pieces of metal. Jacob picked up a bright colored shirt and showed it to Maria.

"How would this look on me?"

Maria giggled.

"Terrible. At least get a green one!"

"What?! I think your sense of fashion is tad skewed. It’s simple. I like it!"

Maria rummaged around the clothes a bit more before finally pulling out a sweater that was way too large for her to wear. She brought it up to a cracked mirror hidden in the corner of the room and threw the sweater over her armor. Jacob walked up behind her and kissed her cheek.

"I think this really suits you. I like it."

Just then, Maria ripped the sweater effortlessly off her body.

"There’s hardly any padding in that thing! An arrow could fly right through one of those holes and kill me! Why even bother wearing clothes at that point?!"

Jacob furrowed his brow being reminded of his girlfriend’s unique taste in attire.

’She won’t find anything like that in here!!’

"I find it hard to believe that these were the kinds of clothes they were selling. They are all so thin and even the thicker ones don’t look comfortable at all. What kind of lives were people living here?!"

Jacob shrugged his shoulders.

"I’m not sure, but do we have time to be wasting in this random store?"

Maria shot him an angry look before nodding slowly.

"I guess you’re right, but shouldn’t we at least look for clues as to where the monster traveled? Think about it. With all these buildings everywhere, there had to be tens of thousands of people living in this place. That’s a prime location for a monster going on a rampage!"

"Well, it looks like he already rampaged through here. There aren’t even any people left as evidence. It’s kind of creepy."

They both walked back out of the store through the broken window, continuing their walk between the vast buildings.

"Then, what would happen if you ran out of people to hunt? Where would you go then?"

Jacob paused for a moment to think over the question.

"I wouldn’t move much further to be honest with you. I would have to make sure that those were the last of the last before giving up."

Maria smiled and ran ahead.

"All I heard is we are close!"

Jacob ran after her, snow pelting against his face as he ran.

"I never said that at all! He could be anywhere!"

Jacob and Maria continued running through the empty streets of the city, looking into broken buildings as they passed. Each one held its own unique items, all with small pieces of paper that had numbers written on them.

What was once a place that thousands had thrived now become a desolate expanse of frost. There was no life anymore, just a jungle of metal, glass and torn paper. It took Maria and Jacob an entire extra day before they finished mapping every street they could.

Just when they began losing hope, similar to how a spark of joy ignited in their hearts, a flicker of a flame was seen far off in the distance, miles away from where they were.

"Maria. There’s a fire."

She looked at Jacob trying her best to contain her excitement.

"What do you think the odds are that the fire was made naturally in these elements?"

Jacob smiled wider while beginning to run towards the dim light.

"Slim to none, and we don’t have Squabee with us. Let’s go check it out!"

They crashed across the snowy slopes of the land, leaving the iron forest behind them. They had expected much more from such a strange city, but their hopes had been brutally tarnished. However, this light was their last chance. The final battle was nearly less than one hundred hours away from happening and they still hadn’t even found a trace of the Frost Monarch.

With snowy conditions like the kind they were travelling in, footsteps disappeared in mere minutes. That meant they only had their intuition to guide them, and Jacob’s intuition was screaming at him to go towards the flames.

As he and Maria mounted the final hill, his breath stopped at the sight below him.

"This is... that can’t be."

Surrounding the flaming figure, there was no snow to be found. Any pellet that managed to get within its radius turned into rain and fell against the flames with a sizzle. The flames were constantly dimming, but a mysterious power would force them to stay alive every time they were about to be extinguished.

The flaming figure held a faint familiarity in Jacob’s heart, one that Maria couldn’t find in her own. She used her eye on it hoping to gain some information. As she did, Jacob whispered softly under his breath.

"Zoey..."

Maria raised her eyebrows and ran towards her, leaving Jacob behind. However, before she could get far enough, Jacob grabbed her arm.

"Wait!"

Small tears were streaming down Maria’s cheeks before they evaporated from the intense heat.

"It’s Zoey. She’s alive! We need to get her out of that state!"

Jacob refused to meet Maria’s eyes.

"Maria."

"Come on, Jacob! We have to try! She’s our friend! There has to be some way we can bring her back!"

"Please... you read her description. You already know we can’t."

"To hell with the description! Who cares about something like that! She survived Zalo just to end up like... like THIS?! I can’t let it continue!"

Jacob pulled Maria into an embrace as he stared at Defiled Flame with his magical eye.

Name: Defiled Flame

Class: Unidentifiable.

Description: This user’s blood was mixed with that of a god, giving life to her unfathomable transformation. An emotion so deep it combined both body and soul into a singular being — a feat not even Zalo was ever capable of accomplishing with his unholy power. Her flames burn for as long as she mourns. No power, not even her creators, can ever extinguish her flames.

[Deceased]: This user has undergone a transformation nothing can come back from. It was never supposed to be possible to combine a soul with its body. Undoing such a bond would be just as impossible, and undoubtably damage both aspects.

[Hollow Being]: There is no voice coming from this body, as if your eye is trying to communicate with the shell of something that once was.

"She’s not there anymore. This isn’t Zoey."

"But... she’s here. She’s really here."

"This is what she left behind, Maria. She threw everything away for a chance to fight Zalo, including her very soul. To think she would put herself in this state willingly for Serena..."

At the mention of Serena’s name, the flame’s roared into the air uncontrollably for a few moments before dying back down.

"Then, what do we do?! We can’t just leave her like this!!"

Jacob looked into her deep verdant eyes with regret.

"I’m sorry, Maria."

Jacob grabbed her hand and guided her away. Trying to hold back her emotions, Maria slammed her spear into the ground below her, creating a devastating crack in the earth that stretched for miles in front of her. Defiled Flame was flying lightly above the crack, seemingly unaffected by gravity as it remained stationary.

Maria panted heavily and stomped away while walking next to Jacob, biting her lower lip till it bled. Taking one look back, Jacob studied the figure one last time. It was holding itself gently with a grief-stricken, hollow expression on its face. It didn’t make him feel good that he had no choice but to leave someone who looked like his friend in that state, but it was clear that the friend he knew had long since disappeared, consumed in her own flames of sorrow.