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?"

shocked to see that the person was Ryan who seemed to have tears streaming from the side of his eyes. As he raised his head,

clearly trying to protect

eventually spread across Smallsnake's face as he lowered his head back down and turned

still alive,

but now he knew...He knew that he

part of him felt great relief once

last long as he soon

Bang—!

"Ukh, shit, hurry up!"

voice seemed to belong to another familiar figure who was standing not

what seemed to

able to last much longer. The core I'm using is about to

"A couple more seconds."

out from his body started to fluctuate wildly and the room shook

up to something, desperately tried to stop whatever he was doing, but regardless of much he tried, he would always get blocked by

"Ready!"

in spite of the demon's desperate attempts, he was unable to fully free himself from their attacks and Kevin was finally able to

took a step forward and

look of utter terror on the demon's

Booom—!

his eyes. In the aftermath of the explosion, Melissa

"Fucking hell..."

heard her curse coming from a meter away

Tin. Tin. Tin.

also hear the sound of small rocks hitting against the barrier that

before it finally stopped. Opening his eyes, Smallsnake was met with a large cloud of dust

of the attack and saw Kevin as

a mess. Nevertheless, they appeared to be relieved as Kevin held

"I…did it…"

observed the core in his hand. Taking another breath,

Crack—!

in relief and tried

harder

echoed

he cleaned the small pieces of the core he

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

"Tell me about it."

as she lay on the ground with both hands and legs spread apart. Not far from her were her

I'll be able to fight again. If another Marquis ranked demon comes, just know that I

I'll be able to

as he slowly stood up and turned to face one of

told me that it might take a while, but I seriously think that

went for their mana which was

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

he hoped Ren would arrive before any demons

he said those words, he was

"Is it this way?"

The

their heads, they were confronted with a scene that changed their