The Author's POV

Bang— Bang—

'What's going on?'

The sound of something crashing near Smallsnake awoke him from his slumber. With each passing second, the sound became more clear, and it wasn't long before his eyes were fully open.

Blinking his eyes several times, he thought to himself.

'Am I still alive?'

He could clearly remember being on the verge of dying not too long ago.

Did he die? …or was he still alive?

"Shit!"

Bang—!

Immediately after opening his eyes, he saw a figure being sent flying into the distance, before crashing heavily against what appeared to be a large metallic door.

A muffled sound accompanied the figure's crash.

"Kevin, how much longer do you need?"

A female voice shouted.

'Who is she?'

Squinting his eyes, Smallsnake's eyes paused on a female figure that he had never seen before in his life. She had long auburn-colored hair and seemed to be rather beautiful. The way that she moved across the black marble floor seemed extremely nimble, and so were her attacks that looked extremely sharp.

No, rather, she did seem familiar, but he just couldn't seem to recall who she was.

"Just buy me one more minute!"

Taking his eyes away from the female figure, Smallsnake's eyes finally paused on Kevin, and it was then that he noticed a large red hue coming out from his body.

The hue seemed to completely engulf the area they were in, making it extremely terrifying.

'What's going on?'

Blinking his eyes a couple of times, Smallsnake turned his head slightly and finally spotted what seemed to be a demon.

"Demon?"

His groggy mind sobered up and he tried to lift up his body.

"Smallsnake! You're awake!"

Feeling a hand press against his chest, Smallsnake was shocked to see a couple of familiar figures rush in his direction.

"You guys?"

"Smallsnake!"

Before he could speak anymore, he suddenly felt something hug his body tightly.

"Ryan?"

seemed to have tears streaming from the side of his eyes. As he raised

trying

a moment to process what was going on, a thin smile eventually spread across Smallsnake's face as he lowered his head back down and

I'm still

may not have been sure before, but now he knew...He knew that

great relief once

that didn't last long as

Bang—!

"Ukh, shit, hurry up!"

figure who was standing not so far from where she

behind what seemed to be a large

think I'll be able to last much longer. The core I'm using is about to run out of energy. So hurry up Kevin! I don't want to die in

"A couple more seconds."

from his body started

to something, desperately tried to stop whatever he was doing, but

"Ready!"

unable to fully free himself from their attacks and Kevin was finally able to complete

he took a step forward

moment, Smallsnake felt as though time had frozen completely as the air around him solidified. The last thing Smallsnake saw was the look of utter terror on the demon's face as Kevin's attack came crashing down on him and

Booom—!

forced to close his eyes. In the aftermath of the explosion, Melissa

"Fucking hell..."

heard her curse coming from a meter away from

Tin. Tin. Tin.

hear the sound of small rocks hitting against the

his eyes, Smallsnake was met with a large cloud of dust that

attack and saw Kevin as well as

appeared to be relieved as Kevin

"I…did it…"

in his hand. Taking another breath, he squeezed his hand together and the core shattered into millions of

Crack—!

in relief and tried to regain some of their lost

was much harder

voice echoed throughout

on his clothes, he cleaned the small pieces of the

strong, I didn't think they would be this strong. For a moment, I thought I

"Tell me about it."

both hands and legs spread apart. Not

another Marquis ranked demon comes, just know that

I'll

stood up and turned to face one of

have to do is wait for Ren and the others to come back. He told me that it might take a

stamina was currently almost depleted. The same went for their mana which was slowly recovering due to the

knew this. Especially since he was still suffering from the after-effects of having used Overdrive. At this moment, his whole body

no condition to fight, he hoped Ren would

hopes were answered as not even a minute after he said those words, he was able to hear the sound of several footsteps heading

"Is it this way?"

voice. His complexion instantly brightened. The same could be said

were confronted with a