The excruciating pain he’d expected never came.
“Hey, kid!
What are you standing around for?
You waiting to die?
Run!
Did the Hollow expansion scare you stupid?”
Cael snapped back to his senses.
He was still running, the middle-aged man gripping his arm and dragging him forward.
The screams around him, the expanding black Hollow in the distance…
Everything was exactly the same as it had been a few minutes ago!
Return by Death?
Or had what he’d just seen been some kind of instinctive vision brought on by time slowing down?!
Cael stared at the familiar face of the man beside him as cold sweat broke out across his back.
“Fuck off!”
His expression hardened.
He yanked his arm free, immediately turned around, and sprinted toward a narrow alley on the other side of the street.
“What the hell is wrong with you?!
I was trying to help, and you curse me out?!”
The middle-aged man spat to the side before turning and running off.
Cael quickly checked his body.
There were no injuries.
In the distance, the panicked crowd continued running around helplessly, and words like “Hollow” still echoed in his ears.
A strange expression appeared on his face.
Cael had no idea what had just happened.
All he knew was that he needed to run in the opposite direction from that man.
Behind him, the multicolored darkness continued closing in.
It swept over him once again.
Passing through the outer wall of the Hollow felt like plunging into water.
Weightlessness struck him, followed by the impact of hitting the ground.
In the distance, the middle-aged man also got back to his feet and clicked his tongue.
“No helping it.
I really thought we might outrun the Hollow.
Maybe if we’d had a car…”
“What do we do now?
We should find somewhere safe to hide and wait for rescue.”
“I think I heard an Ethereal…”
“An Ethereal…?!”
“…”
The same scene again.
Hadn’t he just experienced all of this?
If so, then in a few minutes, a huge Tyrfing should appear.
Cael instinctively looked toward the corner at the end of the street.
Sure enough, a terrifying roar echoed out, and a hulking Tyrfing emerged from around the corner.
“It’s a Tyrfing!”
Someone shouted, and the crowd immediately descended into chaos.
Some ran while others hid wherever they could.
The Tyrfing was clearly coming straight for them.
The core on its head twisted violently before snapping toward the crowd.
Then the creature broke into a heavy run, each step bringing it closer like death itself.
Run!
“Don’t be afraid, sweetheart…
Mommy…
Mommy will protect you…”
“Mommy…
sob…”
A child’s crying came from behind him.
Cael’s steps faltered.
He turned around and saw a mother clutching her child on the ground.
Her foot had become trapped in a narrow crack.
Her ankle had already been scraped bloody from her desperate attempts to pull free, yet she still couldn’t escape.
Not far away, the Tyrfing was approaching her step by step.
Cael came to an abrupt stop.
Cold sweat slid down his cheek.
Every rational thought in his head was screaming at him.
Run!
Run now!
You’re just an ordinary person without even a weapon.
Going back means throwing your life away!
Conflict flashed across Cael’s face.
In the end, he gritted his teeth and made his choice.
He turned and ran back, passing the mother and child before bending down to grab a chunk of rubble and hurling it straight at the Tyrfing.
The stone struck the Ether-crystal armor covering its body without leaving so much as a scratch.
“Come on, then!”
Cael shouted as he grabbed several more rocks and threw them at the Tyrfing.
Once he saw that he’d successfully drawn its attention and the creature was charging toward him, Cael nodded toward the mother.
“Now!
Get out of here!”
Of course he was afraid.
Even the hand throwing the stones was still trembling.
But he couldn’t bring himself to stand by and do nothing.
With that, Cael sprinted toward an alley off to the side.
Running alone was obviously much easier.
The alley was also narrow and filled with turns, and for a while, even the Tyrfing couldn’t catch up with him.
Cael silently estimated the distance.
“This should be far enough.
I need to get out of here too.
I’ll go this way…”
His steps abruptly stopped.
In front of him was a dead end.
The wall was three meters tall, and there wasn’t a single thing nearby he could use as a foothold.
“Fuck!
I really screwed myself this time!”
The Tyrfing was still right behind him.
It simply started hacking through the walls in its path.
The red-brick walls couldn’t withstand the creature at all, and after only a few strikes, the Tyrfing appeared directly in front of Cael.
This was bad.
Really bad.
How the hell was he supposed to survive this?
The Tyrfing planted its feet and suddenly leaped into the air.
Its massive blade swept upward before coming down toward Cael with enough force to split a mountain.
Cael’s back was pressed against the wall.
There was nowhere to dodge.
I’m screwed!
“Duck!”
An icy female voice, completely devoid of emotion, suddenly rang out from above Cael.
His body reacted before his mind could.
He instantly crouched.
BOOM!
A brilliant blue arc of frost tore through the dark alley like a thunderbolt streaking across the sky.
The deafening crash of metal against metal made Cael’s ears ring.
A terrifying blast of force sent the Tyrfing’s massive, two-meter-tall body staggering backward.
Even the supposedly indestructible crystalline blade on its right arm shattered on impact, exploding into countless fragments.
Cael looked up in shock.
A slender fox-eared young woman stood in front of him.
She wore a fitted white shirt beneath a pale blue windbreaker.
Her long, dark teal hair was tied into a neat, practical ponytail, while the agile gray-blue fox ears atop her head were slightly drawn inward.
One hand rested against the sheath at her waist.
The other remained on the hilt of her sword.
A suffocating aura of lethal sharpness surrounded her.
“Hoshimi Miyabi?!”
Cael recognized her instantly.
That familiar presence, along with that faintly robotic air about her…
There was no mistake.
This was Hoshimi Miyabi, the Void Hunter herself—the Six-Stack, Triple-Charge Queen!
Thank god.
It was Miyabi.
He was saved!
Cael climbed to his feet and leaned against the wall.
His eyes shone with joy at surviving certain death, mixed with excitement at seeing Hoshimi Miyabi in person.
“…”
Miyabi didn’t respond.
She simply returned her blade to its sheath, leaned slightly forward, and kept her right hand firmly wrapped around the hilt.
The enormous Tyrfing charged toward her.
Its broken blade came whistling through the air.
“…Hoshimi.
Draw!”
Shing!
A flash of cold light swept past.
For a single instant, it was as though time itself had stopped.
A bone-chilling cold spread from the edge of Miyabi’s blade.
The Tyrfing froze halfway through its attack, its movements abruptly coming to a halt as though its entire body had been locked in place.
Only when the sound of Miyabi sheathing her sword rang out did anything change.
The core on the Tyrfing’s head began swelling and twisting irregularly.
Then—
Bang!
It exploded.
The Tyrfing’s body shattered along with it, breaking apart into motes of Ether light before fading away.
Only after confirming that the Tyrfing was dead did Miyabi turn toward Cael.
Her burgundy eyes slowly swept over him.
“…Are you all right?
Are you injured?”
Miyabi remained silent for several seconds before speaking.
There was no emotion in her voice, and her expression didn’t change in the slightest.
“I’m fine!
Thank you, Miyabi!
You saved my life!”
A character who had previously existed only inside a game was now standing alive right in front of him.
Of course Cael was excited.
But he didn’t dare show too much enthusiasm.
What if she thought he was some kind of creep?
“Good.
Then I’ll be going.”
Miyabi gave a slight nod and turned to leave.
“Wait!”
Cael hurriedly called out to her.
She was leaving just like that?
What was he supposed to do?
“Is there something else?”
Miyabi looked back at him, her eyes calm.
Cael cleared his throat, looking somewhat embarrassed.
“Ahem…
I don’t know my way around here.
Can I follow you, Miss Hoshimi?”
“…All right.”
Miyabi paused for a moment before nodding.
She showed no surprise that he knew her name.
If anything, she seemed completely used to it.
Only after she agreed did Cael finally breathe a sigh of relief.
Thank god.
With Miyabi around, he wouldn’t have to worry nearly as much about dying.
She was a Void Hunter capable of cutting open a Hollow, after all.
Of course, aside from his own safety, Cael was also beginning to have some questions about this world.
For example…
Why was that Tyrfing so huge?
It wasn’t anything like the ones described in the game.
And more importantly…
Why was his skin starting to itch?
It felt as though something was trying to crawl out from underneath it.
Cael’s expression stiffened.
He suddenly had a very bad feeling.
It really helps the fic grow!