YEAR 1549 OF THE THIRD CALENDAR

  MORNING

  10:15

  The throne room had completely collapsed on itself. The throne now loomed over a lake of debris… A large piece of rubble moved, and alongside a cloud of dust, was suddenly propelled into the air, crashing a long distance away as Salael Vomhargon emerged.

  “Well… Where the hell did he disappear to?”

  The old man calmly dusted his shoulders. His body was marked by two burns, two bruises, and three cuts, but none of those injuries seemed to bother him at all–What he was actually interested in was where Denaiel was hidden.

  He knew very well that the various wounds and the collapse had not been enough to deal with Red Snow. Salael had cut down countless enemies. As such, he was used to the subtle sensation of experience being funnelled into him by the system… In fact, even assassins with skills to fake their death were unable to fool him at this point.

  Alas, Denaiel’s presence had suddenly expanded across the entire room before vanishing right as the collapse was happening. In short, the enforcer could be anywhere beneath the debris right now, presumably still.

  It was indeed the best call. Although skilled and powerful, Denaiel had been forced into a mostly defensive position during their confrontation and had actually racked up so many injuries that his healing magic had lost much of its efficiency on top of him losing much of his mana reserves in general… Right now, he was quite severely wounded.

  The collapse had been very convenient for him, indeed.

  Salael could spend some time looking for Denaiel, but it wasn’t unlikely that he had straight-up escaped the area entirely.

  The old noble shrugged. He hadn’t been told to eliminate Red Snow, and he had the feeling that Denaiel wouldn’t actually bother with the whole vengeance shtick at all were Beelmart to fall and his king to be slain.

  “Don’t think that I can’t read a kid like you… You put your sister above your king, don’t you?”

  Salael sped off, intent on catching up to Beliol Azt Mastras. He had heard that the old king of Beelmart was actually quite powerful, even if Salael himself had never gotten to see or test that strength in person…

  It was time for him to see if the rumours were true…

  ___

  “Fucking hell”

  Elvitius let his back crash against a wall. He slid down the ground, feeling his many injuries as they inflicted awful suffering upon his flesh… In front of him was a hole in the side of the castle, strong winds pushed snow inside, only making his pain worse. His adversary was nowhere to be seen–Of course, he had thrown her through the wall, and into the ravine that lay directly next to the castle.

  He had felt a string of experience, but he did not believe it to be real for even a second. There was no way Halini would have died from a measly fall–It seemed more likely that she had judged her own injuries to be too severe, or perhaps something else had been on her mind, but it was more likely she had just taken this occasion to make a swift and unopposed exit.

  Well… It didn’t matter much. Sir Salael had told him to avoid killing her anyway–Not that he felt like he actually could have killed her without getting turned into charcoal himself… This woman was as unpredictable as one could get, and she wielded far too great a firepower for someone of her… Mental state.

  He was frankly surprised that he had gotten off with such ‘light’ injuries. As long as he gets to a good healer, he should be able to make a full recovery without much of an issue. He had protected himself well enough from the flames using his blood magic… Though his armour had been melted, sometimes directly upon his skin.

  It was not comfortable in the least, and he didn’t believe that he would be able to fight at all without inducing adrenaline throughout his body.

  “Hopefully… Sir Salael will be able to finish the job soon”

  There was just one thing that the knight found worrying… There was another fight taking place somewhere inside the castle, completely in the opposite end from where Salael Vomhargon had gone, and as far as Elvitius was aware, all of the powerful individuals should no longer be in a combat situation at this point.

  Just by the sounds and tremors, he could tell that it was a violent confrontation that had absolutely decimated the palace’s interior…

  This day had been chosen very carefully. The only powerhouses who should have been inside the castle were Beliol Azt Mastras himself and his two enforcers. All of his other powerful servants should have been away and had normally been intercepted by the swift deployment of Leton Nebulo’s war automatons.

  Elvitius had seen those things in action, and it was almost upsetting how powerful machines could be… With a whole bunch of those taking care of lone targets, the blood knight couldn’t imagine how any of them could have made their way to the castle, but also somehow encountered someone else of great enough power to result in such a destructive fight.

  The only person he could think of would be the unknown quantity… The person or entity Beelmart had made a deal with. The Master of Nightmares.

  “Damn it… I can’t fight properly like this…”

  Unfortunately, a guard of the castle appeared at the end of the hallway–The warrior was also wounded, but it wasn’t like Elvitius could ignore him. Hopefully, whoever the ally fighting in the distance was, they would be able to win on their own.

  ___

  For the love of–

  SHLAD emitted a condensed pulse from his left hand, sending me flying straight through a wall–For the… Nineteenth time, I think? The only difference with the previous instances was that this one was much worse. Instead of ending up in just another room of the castle, I landed in deep snow.

  Stolen novel; please report.

  I was outside the castle. At its front, as a matter of fact. Why was it so bad? Because the motherfucker had way more room for opportunity to blast me with one of his overpowered ranged attacks! Like this, he could pretty much guarantee that he wouldn't hit an ally or bystanders accidentally.

  The only saving grace amidst all of this mess was that he was quite beaten up by now. My right fist had been bent into an unrecognisable lump of steel at this point, and my left hand was also quite out of shape–Literally.

  I had sustained damage all over my steel frame, but the same was true for SHLAD-01. My repeated strikes to his chest had damaged a whole bunch of his internal devices, and in particular, I had managed to inflict more damage to his engines, causing one of them to explode completely, resulting in a gaping hole through his torso.

  One of the many joints in his right leg had also been busted to the point of barely being able to move anymore, so he had to move around with what was essentially a limp–Overall, we were both in pretty bad shape, but at least, my upgrades hadn’t been touched much, I could still zap this bastards if needed, and he knew it.

  I just needed to bring out my wires to make him reconsider trying to approach me too closely, without his engines to move around quickly, being overly aggressive was far more risky for him now. If I could send excess lightning throughout his circuits and send him into paralysis, then there was no telling how much I would be able to damage him.

  Now, however, I dearly wanted him close. His sickle was dangerous, but far less so than the projectiles his left hand could launch my way… He also knew this.

  SHLAD raised his left hand, pointing it at me as energy gathered into robotic palms, all of his fingers spread apart to give way to what was to come.

  “Your end is now. I believe that there is no place bad enough in Hell for you to burn, but My Creator hoped that you would see Heaven. Farewell”

  The mass of compressed energy became blinding, and…

  I am leaving.

  I warped away before he could erase me from goddamn existence. I manifested in my knightly form near the beastfolk city, where I had ruined the local business a little while ago… Months count as a little while ago, right?

  Hopefully, this pile of junk won’t be able to repair himself, and I’ll be able to finish him off while I am fresh and in a place where he can’t just blast everything to oblivion… It’s almost too easy!

  Mara!

  Yes?

  Move!

  I did as Nara said, only to narrowly avoid a downward strike of a sickle that would have split me in half along the vertical axis. From an orb of sparking, purple lightning. SHLAD descended from the sky, his weight crashing down upon the green plain as his red visual sensors locked onto me–Is it me or they are a darker shade of red than before?

  “Where do you think you are going? Did you perhaps imagine that I would have approached you again without a solution to this? You can fool me once. Not twice. I am perfectly capable of adapting and evolving if need be. You can’t run from me”

  What the hell? In what world is this possible? He only saw me warp away once, and he had already found a way to follow me? Where did he put that new device? How unlucky do I have to be that my hammering didn’t damage this one? Or that the engine exploding didn’t put it out of service?

  “The end is now”

  I aligned myself with the city behind me and poured all of my focus into ‘Steel Manipulation’ to stop the murder bot from getting close to me as I attempted to back off–To have a chance, it would be best if I could use civilians as meatshields.

  “This form is too weak against me”

  SHLAD fired energy bullets at me, nothing strong enough to be a threat against the city behind, but definitely enough to blast me to pieces. I needed to make wide movements to dodge them–Which resulted in me being unable to maintain ‘Steel Manipulation’. He rapidly made his way toward me, using his sickle to stab into the ground and drag himself closer.

  The sickle swung and struck a hastily manifested shield. Sparks flew. The shield and the arm behind it were split, while the rest of me was flung to the side into a tree trunk.

  SHLAD charged his freaking blast of annihilation again.

  Shit. I had called back my little sisters a while ago, and since I always manifested as my knightly self, I hadn’t been able to summon them back. Otherwise, Ophelie could have lodged her stake through gaps into SHLAD, which would have ensured that Elowen could have been able to force the robot’s arm to the side.

  Alas, this wasn’t possible right now, and I could only attempt to dodge the incoming blast…

  …My ‘Base Form’ has been damaged a fair bit. I just recently shifted to my knightly form and was just damaged as well. I can’t go into my ‘Molten Steel Form’ just yet. This sucks…

  Mara. You just need to hold on for a few more minutes, trust me. On my signal, leap to the side I tell you to. I can help you dodge…

  You have my trust, Nara.

  You will probably still sustain heavy damage, but do not give up. Do not hesitate to use all of your abilities–You have the funds for it

  SHLAD’s mass of energy brightened up.

  Right!

  I jumped to the right without delay as a wide stream of all sorts of energy smashed together, headed straight at me–The left foot made contact with it, and it simply disappeared from existence.

  Using ‘Steel Shaping’, I manifested masses of steel, which I launched at the robot using ‘Steel Manipulation’ before rushing away into the forest. A good portion of it was simply gone after the beam had gone through it.

  SHLAD immediately went after me, and with a hand and foot missing, I wasn’t exactly in my best shape to outrun him. I was struck by a smaller blast in the back, but did not stop. I continuously summoned barriers of steel behind me, but my pursuer wasn’t slowed much. No matter what I did, he was just launching himself forward using his sickle as an anchor.

  Another blast came, and this one blew off my other leg, leaving me with just one intact limb to keep on crawling away. I couldn’t get away in any capacity anymore, so I summoned a sword and launched a ‘Spectre Blade’ right at him.

  While it dealt no damage, it did do a good job of putting him on guard for a few moments. The attack surprised him enough to make him back off…

  He raised his sickle, and bisected me–Which wasn’t enough to actually put me in a grave.

  “How troublesome”

  He pinned me to the ground with his feet, beginning to charge up another one of his destructive blasts–The robot was taking longer this time. It had seemingly overheated his internals to launch that first blast.

  The red glow in his eyes flickered. He seemed to sense something.

  How odd… I felt genuine confusion from him. As in, his negative emotion flew toward me…

  “Impossible…!”

  Congratulations, Mara Maeve Maya Nebulo! You have reached the first checkpoint toward the acquisition of your ‘Nightmare Form’

  Enough people have been infected with your nightmares.

  Enough people died at your hands in the final trials

  Enough people died in the real world as a consequence of your nightmare that did not involve a final trial

  You have familiarised yourself with the nightmares

  You have shown great adaptability when given different bodies and unique abilities

  However, this is only the entry point toward truly acquiring this checkpoint…

  BEHOLD, WITNESS WHAT COULD HAVE BEEN.

  WELCOME, TO AN A.R.DL

  GOOD LUCK, MARA MAEVE MAYA NEBULO

  …What the–