Chapter 82 RUN AWAY!

Calista was unable to understand what Valerie was doing. One second she was all like she would be staying behind and the very next second she had changed her mind. But Calista trusted her judgement. She had firm belief that whatever Valerie had planned must have been thought of after careful evaluation of all the alternatives available. She wouldn't put all of their lives in danger just to save her own life. Valerie was not that kind of person.

So, she agreed in a blink and gave command of the escape operation to Valerie and asked the girls to get ready as well.

Before Alissa could open her mouth to show her resistance, Valerie had already caught up to her and was running away while dragging Alissa with her. She was not going to see another student fall based on stupidity. She understood her emotions but she wasn't going to let her do something impulsive like that.

Similarly, Dahila was carried by Calista and they escaped like lightning. All this had happened in the blink of an eye and even Kyouko and the injured S rank mage didn't manage to catch a wisp of their plan until it had been perfectly executed. It had only been possible because both of them had been too focused on Zavier who was still breathing slightly. They were worried that he might still have some hidden trump card that he had yet to reveal. After all he had been doing the same thing ever since the fight had begun.

In their cautiousness, they had let their actual target escape. Kyouko on the other hand thought that the escape party might have been a diversion to get them to go after them which would give more time to Zavier to pull another trick so she was adamant on not leaving. She had already come very close to death today, and she was not a fan of it.

When they were getting farther and farther and Zavier had yet to make another move, both Kyouko and the other mage got worried that there might not have been another scheme and that they had been fooled.

They intended to follow after them with the highest speed but as soon as they made a move, a burst of icy aura engulfed their very existence. They felt as if in front of that aura, all they could do was offer up their lives on a silver platter and be happy about it too.

It was so frightening that the two S rank mages weren't sure that they could survive for three seconds in front of it. Their instincts were screaming to run but at the same time their brain was telling them that it would be no use even if they tried to run.

Kyouko was afraid that Zavier had revealed his trump card finally. This was what she had been afraid of and the reason why she had been unwilling to leave earlier.

In reality, it might have been called Zavier's trump card but it wasn't exactly his. He had the key to the wooden box that had been given to him by a mysterious person who had appeared to be helping him but Zavier wasn't sure of his intentions.

Just as Kyouko and her aide had turned to chase after his companions he had turned the key in the wooden box to release whatever was sealed inside of it. He himself had not been sure of the result of opening that box. Whatever it was could have either been good or bad.

This was a gamble that he was willing to take at this point. If it was something good and he could take advantage of it to make a comeback; that would have been the best. But if it was something bad, Zavier wanted it to be the worst of them all so that he could engulf Kyouko and the S rank mage in that misfortune with him.

Zavier was feeling peaceful since he had done his best and had helped his companions escape. He had even held the enemies at bay and had given his companions as much of a lead as he could have. He had done his best and he could finally rest which in his case meant moving to another body.

But when the box was opened, the peace that he had been feeling ran out the window and was replaced by a nerve breaking and mind shattering fear. A horror so intense that Zavier even forgot about the pain that was wrecking every part of his body.

Icy fog escaped the box like an endless stream and started to converge on top of the wooden box. The fog continued to grow dense and soon took the shape of a face, a human face made up of icy fog. It wasn't a mature face but the face of a baby which was even more freakish. A baby's face floating in the air without a body; nothing came close to being more freakish than that.

The baby face soon twisted into a bizarre smile that looked nothing like a baby's. It was not an innocent smile but the smile appeared to be sadistic to him. Zavier had seen such smiles before so he could tell that the monster was anything but good. For the first time, he was thankful that he had had his heart pierced and was on his way to death.

He wanted to commit suicide to make it faster so as to escape the horror of this monstrosity that he had released but was unable to move anymore due to his injuries and blood loss. He was so close to death that just a millimetre more would have taken him away but instead he had been left with a wisp of life in him so that he could remain in the grasp of the ugly and freakish monster.

Just as he was cursing his fate, the moment came and everything returned to silence. His consciousness traversed and merged with the clone having the Necromancer system.

The clone had always been on standby in a place that was far enough away from the battlefield after he had lost his fighting prowess earlier in the fight with Kyouko. The corpse that it had been controlling had been expended while trying to fight off God's gift. Since, he didn't have any individual fighting ability; Zavier had asked it to stand a little further away from the battlefield.

As soon as Zavier woke up in his new body, he could appreciate his luck at last. He didn't have to be there when the monster went about its daily routine with Kyouko and the S rank mage. He wasn't sure if he would ever be happier after having died.

In the meantime, Kyouko and the S rank mage had been trapped with the monster on their own. Everyone else had managed to escape, some on their feet and some in their soul form. Kyouko couldn't help but curse Zavier. Even in his death, he had left a surprise for her; a surprise that was more than capable of killing her. She wondered who exactly was that brat and why would he have such a thing in his possession.

The baby face made out of white fog had been fully formed and there was no longer a stream of mist flowing out of the wooden box. All of it had been released and the monster was truly free.

The face was more than dozens of feet in size and had that creepy smile plastered all over it. Smiling faces were pleasant to look at but not this one. The eternal smile was creepy beyond any extreme. It was only capable of making others uncomfortable and horror stricken.

Its huge eyes were currently focused on the S rank mage in Kyouko's team. The man felt that he had been paralyzed, as if all his strength had been sucked out of him through that gaze. He had been rendered motionless, without any ability whatsoever. Even his mana had stagnated in his body. He was unable to feel the presence of any magic inside him. The ghastly face had the ability to overwhelm all his senses it seemed while at the same time it could heighten the fear and horror that one felt during all this.

If it had been any other situation the man would have had the ability to remain calm even in the face of death. After all he wasn't a newborn baby, he had been through many life and death battles like earlier in the day. He had always known that he might be the one to fall one day and he had made his peace with that ending. But today he felt terrified, of death, of pain, of leaving behind regrets, and of the calamity in front of him.

This was not normal. The man felt that the fear that he had been feeling had not been normal which brought some clarity to his mind. He focused and the answer that had been looming around him all this while came to him.

The monster wanted him to be afraid for some reason.

Of course he was unable to communicate his thoughts to Kyouko due to the paralysis. He senses felt as if they were wading through a thick marshy area.

At that moment, the huge face gradually approached him and stared him right in his face.

Kyouko was horrified. She shouted at the top of her voice, "RUN….RUN AWAY!"

But there was no response from the man. The man hadn't even looked at her. He was frozen in place waiting for the monster to do anything it wanted.

At that moment, the grin on the face of the monster grew even larger and was almost reached the edge of its face. It felt as if the lower half of its face was just a weird smile that it had long forgotten was there.

The monster let out an eerie laughter. The sound of it was so shrill and so terrifying that it penetrated into their very souls and made them feel horrified.

The mouth that had previously been curved into a smile was now opening like the maw of a great chasm. The curvature of the mouth had taken up almost all of the face below the eyes. There were the eyes and then the great opening in its face that looked like its mouth.

Kyouko's voice got lost inside her. She could only move her lips in an attempt to warn the man to move. The man on the other hand never looked at her. She couldn't have imagined the horror that he might have been feeling at that moment. The monster wasn't even attentive towards her and she was hardly able to bring out her voice. She could only speculate on what was happening in his mind at that time.

The face got closer to the man, opened to its widest and chomped down. The man was swallowed whole, not even a speck of blood was left behind. It was as if he had never been there and Kyouko had imagined it all.

As soon as the gaping maw closed, the monster turned towards Kyouko with a sudden movement that took her by surprise.

It then gave out a laugh as if it had pulled a prank on her.

Kyouko had been feeling disgusted by the monster ever since she had laid her eyes on it. But the moment that the monster made eye contact with her, she came to understand the true horror of it.

She realized why the S rank mage had never replied and why he had never tried to move away after being stared down by the monster.

Kyouko instantly realized that this must have been the ability of the monster. Even if she knew about it, it was impossible for her to do anything. The ability was really too broken. Even if she wanted to escape, she couldn't.