Chapter 1044: Moving (1)
Chapter 1044: Moving (1)
Radiant stars appeared all around the group, summoned by the Penetrator through [Brilliant King's Adoring Stars]. They shot bolts of Levin that swam through him and rejuvenated both his shattered bones and his partly molten armour.
The Null Life Essence Replicus had dispensed while keeping it tethered to his body also slowly slithered back into him at his will.
"The third eye, huh?" the Penetrator said as he started to rise and stand over the odd silk sheet. His socket flames burst with a greater degree of liveliness than before. He looked at Yuyui's palm.
Within it was an eye with dark sclera, its iris spotting an ice blue hue.
Replicus was a little confused.
Wasn't this just Yuyui's Eye of Dispersal?
The green-haired girl, more ancient than she looked, possessed a Hidden Class called the Pinnacle Occuluthon.
As far as Replicus knew, it was a Hidden Class forged by a cultish group of twelve powerful women from millennia ago, from Fulgardt's time; the Order of the Trodden Rose.
The cult started in response to the intense rise in misogyny when the terror Fulgardt inspired became too deep, causing already established forms of social evil to witness a new high. Of course, this 'just' movement turned into an unhealthy obsession that merely replaced the oppression of women, leaving many settlements on the continent of Feinheath littered with the desecrated corpses of boys and men, most of them innocent.
After these twelve women were driven back by authorities in that time, they, of course, combined their efforts to create a legacy for someone who would inherit their will one day. They guaranteed that that certain someone would have a lot of options against whatever stood in their path, thus the birth of the Diverse Occulus; a power that offered 12 eyes, each with different, overwhelming properties.
Unfortunately, for the Oder of the Trodden Rose, the one who inherited their powers, was... "Oh! Sorry about that! It's this," Yuyui said, revealing her other palm, which had an eye spotting an iris that looked distinctly like a purple arrow. "It's called the Eye of Moving." Replicus tilted his head.
"The Eye of Moving?"
"Yu?" a sluggish voice came from behind, interrupting the conversation.
Grim was the first to recover out of the other three. He had reverted back to his human form, and he, for the most part, looked stellar. Since they were out of the hazardous part of the battlefield, the area dictated by Jerthrax's invisible field of oppression, he was able to use this chance to activate Granted Restoration, healing his wounds.
He looked at Yuyui with a befuddled expression.
Yuyui gave the Unlimited a big smile.
"Why do you look so surprised? Are you impressed that I travelled halfway across the world - actually more than that - to save your furry butt?" she said with her chest pushing out from her odd gear.
Grim didn't even know what to say.
Thankfully, Pherdanta and Baddan rising while healing themselves, covered for his stunned silence. The former healed in the same way he did while Baddan used the healing potions Replicus had provided him since he wouldn't accept a Granted Armament of his own.
Pherdanta expressed the same degree of surprise.
"You are the one who saved us?" she asked with a sincere and thankful tone that turned Yuyui a little humble.
"Well, yes. It wasn't easy though. I think Master played a huge role too. You were already burning by the time I arrived. You might not have made it if Master didn't do... whatever he did," the green-haired said.
Of course, she couldn't perceive the Null Life Essence that had wrapped around the four, preventing them from dying instantly from the dragon's breath.
Pherdanta turned to Replicus. She did vaguely remember Replicus spreading out his arms before their fuming bodies. This thought made her feel both touched... and disappointed.
"Yuyui," Replicus suddenly said.
'Yes, Master?"
"Do you have a way to save her?" the Penetrator said while crouching by Allora's body.
In truth, Replicus had a lot of questions for Yuyui to satisfy his curiosity about the immensity of the feats she had just displayed, but the thought of Allora going for long and longer while bearing undeserved agony because of the burden of a mission he had placed upon her, threw his extraneous inquisitions away.
Allora looked much worse than before. She was still convulsing while her eyes were rolled back, but her body might as well have been a log that had barely survived the fiery tenure of a bonfire at this point. Thankfully - or perhaps otherwise - it seemed being roasted alive paled in comparison to what she was going through.
Yuyui hurried to Allora's side and wore hesitant look.
Replicus, on the other hand, turned behind him, towards Bassbion and Yagrina.
He had asked Yuyui for help, but he intended to extend his inquiry to these two.
"Hmph. So, this time you understand what we are," Bassbion said as she folded her arms, which produced a tin-like noise with her white plate armour. She noticed Replicus' strange gaze. The purposeful hole in the middle of her cap-like helmet seemed to mock the
Penetrator.
Replicus had never interacted with these two. He had last spoken to them as Skullius, back when he reached Genhuis City for the first time. Bassbion seemed to have noticed this difference between him and the old Skullius.
Replicus nodded.
"You are Spirits. Can you discern what kind of damage she's taken? Does it have to do with the soul?" he asked.
Bassbion said nothing, while Yagrina squinted her eyes at Allora's body.
"No. Her soul is fine. It's her flesh that is being tormented. Whatever harmed her refuses for her body to heal and instead, keeps it in a state where it causes its owner tremendous pain. I'm afraid she can't be healed through conventional means," the slightly plump Spirit said. Bassbion scoffed, her unsavoury intent directed at Replicus.
"How unrefined. For someone with such a damaged soul, it is unpleasant to see that you struggle to identify things like this. Have you learned nothing since?"
Replicus sighed.
As insufferable as this Spirit was, she was right. He did lack extensive knowledge of souls despite the fact that two of his biggest enemies seemed to understand them quite well; the masked man and Somanda.
The Penetrator had feared that Allora's soul had been affected by whatever Em-Sul used against her and thus decided to ask the two Spirits if that was the case.
His time in the Severed Union had led to him understanding what Spirits really were, though. Aside from Bassbion and Yagrina, Replicus, as Skullius, had seen one other Spirit.
It was Sera, who had been Bek's beloved before she died.
Somehow, Bek, the Spirit Warden had managed to not only revive himself after his own death, but he had also revived Sera, though, by then she had become a mutated denizen of the afterlife, the Yormuness.
As Replicus understood it, Spirits were caretakers of the Yormuness. They received and tended to souls that landed within the layers of the Yormuness. He didn't know how the Order of the Trodden Rose had extracted Yagrina and Bassbion from their duties there so that they could be incorporated as aides into the Pinnacle Occuluthon's power set, but he had thought they
had a solution.
He was wrong.
However...
"I...I think I can save her," Yuyui said with an intense fire in her eyes.
Replicus turned to the girl.
For a few seconds, the two exchanged no words and only kept staring at each other.
Yuyui seemed so determined that Replicus could hardly master the strength to ask how she could help. Seeing her so confident, or at least displaying such resolve to power through obstacles made him realise that she had changed quite a bit.
'No wonder I didn't recognise her presence until I saw her face...' he thought.
"Do what you can then," he urged her.
Yuyui nodded, and took a few deep breaths.
"Do you need help with anything?" Grim asked with a sombre tone. Yuyui smiled at him, and
then her eyes avoiding his.
"I don't think you'd want to help for what I'm about to do. It might get messy. It's going to
get messy," she said, and planted her palm, the one which Replicus recognized to hold the so-called Eye of Moving on Allora's chest.
A moment later, Yuyui removed her hand, and to everyone's surprise, on Allora's chest was a
blue eye with a golden slit as its pupil.
That was...the Inhumane Eye!