Chapter 38 Petrification

The real world was not a video game.

There was no cinematic cutscene before a boss appeared.

No enormous empty arena.

No swelling background music warning you that a deadly battle was about to begin.

Real combat could begin as abruptly as it ended.

Often, adventurers were no different from rabbits beneath a hawk’s claws or mosquitoes in a tree frog’s mouth.

When faced with a predator far above them on the food chain, they might die before even understanding what had killed them.

Larry was the first.

He stood closest.

Still wearing his fitted armor, sweat running down his face, he had half-turned toward Doris to show her the lifelike statue he had discovered.

Then all sensation vanished from his back.

The terror in the blond girl’s eyes told him something was terribly wrong.

There was no time to look behind him.

Larry acted on instinct.

He thrust out one hand, using every scrap of strength he had left as though he wanted to shove Doris out of danger.

But Doris did something no one expected.

The thin blond girl, who looked as though a strong gust might knock her over, did not turn and run.

Instead, she stepped toward him.

Her face had gone white, but her expression was firm.

Both hands locked around Larry’s.

She threw her weight backward, slender arms trembling as she tried desperately to drag him away from whatever was happening.

The two of them had been awkward with each other since the mission began.

Now, in the face of death, that awkwardness finally fell away.

For the first time, they understood what they meant to each other.

It changed nothing.

No matter how heartfelt or moving their love might have been, it could not stand against a power so far beyond them.

A lifeless gray-white color spread across Larry’s back at a speed visible to the naked eye.

It swallowed color.

It swallowed life.

His back.

His chest.

His abdomen.

His arms…

One breath.

That was all it took.

Larry and Doris were still frozen in the same pose, hands locked together as they stared at each other.

A few strands of Doris’s hair still hung beside her cheek as though caught in motion. The veins on Larry’s neck remained raised from the strain.

But neither of them moved.

Just like the statues of snakes and crawling creatures scattered across the ground, they had become two pale stone figures.

Silent.

Motionless.

Hai’an and Wood were next.

Even with more distance between them and the source of the attack, neither escaped untouched.

Almost the instant Wood shouted his warning, something fragile shattered on Hai’an’s body.

Tink!

A brilliant green light, fresh and vivid as a new sprout after rain, erupted from his waist.

The glow instantly wrapped around Hai’an’s entire body.

The air in front of him twisted.

An invisible force seemed to slam against the green radiance and stop.

The entire exchange lasted less than a heartbeat.

Hai’an’s expression was still blank with confusion.

Then understanding struck.

They were under attack.

And one of the magic items meant to save his life had already been consumed.

Wood was the only class holder in the party.

He was hardly among the greatest of them, and he was still far below the boundary known as the Transcendent Tier.

But a Rogue’s extraordinary agility still made him the fastest person there to react.

His body blurred.

The shadow beneath his feet stretched with him.

He did not dodge.

He did not block.

Instead, in that instant, Wood drew every strand of his concentration inward.

His jaw clenched.

Every muscle in his body tightened.

He stood like an ascetic on a shoreline facing an incoming wave as that invisible power rolled through the air toward him.

Hummm!

His body went rigid.

Then, just as suddenly, it relaxed.

The superior physical abilities granted by his class had allowed him to withstand the force trying to invade his body.

Wood did not waste even a fraction of a second feeling relieved.

The normally calm Rogue looked almost frantic.

He spun around and lunged for Hai’an.

“Run!”

Xia Nan was the last.

He had been standing on the other side of the courtyard.

Since he had already decided they would turn back and that he could explore these ruins some other time, he had no interest in collecting souvenirs.

Larry’s excited shouting had not tempted him over.

As a result, Xia Nan remained at the rear of the group.

And because of that, he saw almost everything.

Larry and Doris struggling against each other before turning to stone.

The green light erupting around Hai’an.

Wood’s reaction.

All of it.

Yet scenes that looked so clear in memory could occupy almost no time at all.

A dewdrop striking water.

A bird’s wing changing angle in flight.

Moments that the eye could capture in exquisite detail were still only moments.

Xia Nan had already reacted as quickly as he possibly could.

Larry turned his head.

Xia Nan stopped walking toward him.

Wood shouted a warning.

Xia Nan’s hand immediately reached back for the sword hilt over his shoulder.

Green light flashed around Hai’an.

The iron-gray Decapitating Longsword slid free of its sheath.

Then Wood’s shout reached Xia Nan’s ears.

“Run!”

His brain recognized the sound.

Processed its meaning.

Issued a command.

Nerves carried that command through his body.

Muscles contracted.

Bones moved.

His foot began to lift.

And by the time Xia Nan took his first step, the invisible force had already reached him.

Boom!

The world seemed to go silent.

The vivid colors before his eyes began to drain away.

Xia Nan could barely describe what he felt.

It reminded him of winter swimming at more than twenty degrees below freezing.

First came the cold.

A sudden, biting chill spread across his skin, sharp enough to sting, as if freezing water were trying to seep through his pores and sink into his muscles and bones.

Then came numbness.

Sensation began disappearing from every part of him touched by that cold, as though his body were freezing piece by piece.

Then instinct took over.

Blood vessels constricted.

His circulation accelerated.

Warmth surged through him in wave after wave, fighting against the force invading from outside.

The two precious attribute points granted by the Mastery-rank [Spinning Slash].

The resilience of a man who had already lived two lives.

Body and mind came together in that instant.

They formed a wall.

A barrier against the petrifying power trying to push farther inside him.

And somehow, Xia Nan endured the test between life and death.

His consciousness flickered.

Then color flooded back into the world.

Xia Nan looked down.

His fingertips were gray-white.

So were his knees.

Even the toes of his boots were covered in a thin layer of lifeless pale stone.

Ahead of him, Wood had tucked Hai’an under one arm and was sprinting for the trees outside the courtyard.

Panic filled the Half-Elf’s face.

His lips had lost all color.

He twisted around in Wood’s grip and shouted at Xia Nan.

“Run!”

Only then did Xia Nan finally see the creature responsible for nearly wiping out the entire party in a single breath.

A massive, bloated shape dragged itself from the misty forest behind the courtyard.

It emerged slowly.

Unhurried.

With the calm, lazy confidence of a predator that already considered its prey dead.