Chapter Twenty Three

With a thud, she stepped on the damp ground.

Basking in both the moonlight and the orange glow, Loine swept her glance across her surroundings.

"Where did they go?"

Failing to spot what she was hoping to see, she pursed her lips and walked between the trees.

[Crack!]

She walked around for a while before stopping a few feet away from a depression on the ground. Normally, it wouldn't have caught her attention. But she immediately focused her vision on this particular sight.

"…"

The ground in front of her was harboring two deep holes. What caught her attention was that it was a mark formed by a person's foot.

Shaking her head, she tried to shake off the bad feeling on her heart…but what was located behind the bushes near the footprints amplified her worries.

"…!"

The ground was littered with heavy footprints as if the owner had struggled to hold some heavy burden.

She squinted her eyes and kneeled down in order to scrutinize the dent on the ground. It may have been her feelings, but she thought that the size of the foot looked like her baby-faced siblings.

'They fought against someone?'

She teleported them here because she had thought that no one would pay attention to weaklings such as them, but it seems that her prediction was inaccurate.

The terrible sensation on her heart amplified, and she stood up abruptly.

Loine then swung her head all over the ground in hopes to know where her siblings had gone.

'They went there…!'

Using her Authority, she let the light engulf her as she repeatedly disappears and reappears. With every blink, she traveled a few meters from before, leaving marks of light behind her.

But she almost fell to the ground only after four blinks. She kneeled on the ground and covered her ears, her facial expressions crumbling.

[Swaaa…][Siuuu…][Khaaa…]

Overlapping noises of whispers rang out on her ears all at once. Unlike earlier on the city, this time it was forceful and significantly more painful.

She held back from yelping in pain and listened to the ethereal whispers.

[…It's…]

Various noises made out of countless instruments formed words which were tortured her mind.

Loine couldn't handle the forcefulness from these words and struck her fingers into the ground, clawing them to distract her from the torment.

The vein on her forehead bulged, as she started to grit her teeth. Her eyes were now clouded as if her soul was being ripped apart from her body.

[…a…]

'a what!?' she started banging her head on the ground, trying to distract herself from the suffering.

[…trap…]

"a-a…t-trap…?'

Suddenly, the whispers turned from being turbid and mysterious into something else. The noises started turning violent, amplifying the pain in her mind.

"Kagh!"

The abrupt change had a toll on her mind, making her scream in pain. Holding herself from losing consciousness, Loine harshly bit the inside of her mouth, letting loose of the metal-like flavor.

Until finally, the noises finally muttered a word.

[…rrrRUN…!]

"…!"

Those ethereal noises finally disappeared from her mind, but she still held her hands to her ears. Even though the noise had left, she still felt as if something was gouging her ears.

She shakily stood up and greedily gasped for air.

'Who sent that transmission, and what did they mean by a trap?'

Hissing in agony, she held her palm against her forehead. Loine tried to gather her thoughts, but a loud noise interrupted her.

[BOOOM!!!]

"Ah!" Loine jumped in surprise.

Over her head, a mushroom cloud rose to the sky. The loud noise reminded her of the earlier suffering, and her eardrums pulsed in pain.

"Wait, an explosion this big will definitely…!"

The walls near her exploded shortly after, but she had already disappeared from that spot.

With a flash of light, she reappeared in the night sky. The stern-looking woman had transferred herself to several hundred meters to the air.

"No!"

The huge explosion occurred from the other side of the city, but its aftereffects would surely even hit the position she was currently at.

[Crack!]

She watched as the city walls were disintegrated, launching deadly projectiles into the air.

'Where are they?!' Loine was desperately trying to spot her siblings. It was for that reason that she teleported to the air, not somewhere far away.

As the impact from the explosion reached wider, Loine clenched her palms to the point where her fingers had penetrated her skin.

The huge pillar of flame illuminated its surroundings as if it was a tremendously gigantic torch.

'Where…where!?'

Tears started to form on her eyelids. If she knew that this was going to happen, she would've evacuated them as soon as the earthquake hit.

She dropped them so her siblings would be able to experience the power of a high-tier Ruler. But to her desperation, a gigantic explosion occurred in the city itself, endangering everyone present.

"Where?!" She swung her head everywhere while floating in the air. The explosion had traveled a certain distance already.

[Crack!] [Crack!]

But no matter how hard she swung her head, Karan and Kyle wasn't reflected in her eyes.

Suddenly, a large orb of light manifested on the forest below her. The rays of light it emanated were blinding, catching her attention easily. The large orb exploded not even seconds after it was formed.

Witnessing the pillar of light rising to the sky, Loine widened her eyes. This ability reminded her of a certain someone.

With her eyebrows furrowed, she scrutinized the silhouette launched by the pillar of light. It took her only a moment to realize that the silhouette was actually her siblings, grasping each other rightly.

[Crack!] [Crack!] [Crack!]

'Wait, if that pillar of light was Karan's Authority…then!?'

"No!"

Loine immediately let the light engulf her being, bringing her closer to her siblings. She had accurately transferred herself near them, but she didn't think that Karan would be crazy enough to create another ball of energy.

Her eyes widened and she hastily opened her mouth.

"Wait, don't—!"

Unfortunately, Karan exploded the second orb of energy, launching a pillar of light to the starry sky. Loine got hit in the face, launching her away from them.

"Keough!"

'No! If you do that, your body will—!'

Her elbow got hit lightly by the impact of the explosion, burning her skin. But she didn't have the leeway to worry about it.

'Using "Store" will reflect a part of the explosion to the user themselves. And to make things worse, the amount of energy that Karan had exploded—!'

With a flash of light, she disappeared and reappeared once more in their direction. She could see them being stained by blood and dirt, but the most concerning was Karan's body.

Kyle's limbs were pointing into directions that shouldn't be directed. In his hands, Karan looked even more hurt. His limbs distorted even worse than Kyle's, and his eyes were almost closed.

[Crack!] [Crack!] [Crack!] [Crack!]

"No!"

She blinked forward a couple more times.

"Nooo!!!"

Getting closer to them, Loine can now see them clearly than before. Both of them were covered in a veil of crimson, and even pieces of bones protruded from Karan's body.

'If it wasn't for me…!'

If Loine had brought them to somewhere far away, then they wouldn't have ended up in this situation.

Kyle had several of his bones broken, while Karan is almost at death's door.

Biting her lips hard, she blinked on top of them and touched their body.

'Think, what does that place looks like!'

The stern-looking woman closed her eyes and thought of their destination carefully. A single mistake on her part would bring them to somewhere random, and could even cost their lives.

Two seconds was all it took for her to teleport them away.

----

"Aargh! Ugh!"

Kyle was lying down, groaning in extreme agony. His left arm and left leg were broken from the impact, leaving him incapable of standing by himself.

He was currently on a bed. His surroundings were filled with the color of white, and various artifacts and instruments were put all over the place.

Loine was standing beside his bed, her eyes were puffy and cracks of red ran through her eyes. Even though she didn't get injured severely, the condition of Karan and Kyle concerned her a lot.

With Kyle's groan in the background, she spoke.

"Sorry…"

"Ugh…Sorry for what?"

Loine bit her lower lips and spoke in a quivering voice.

"For leaving both of you there…!"

She clenched her fist and closed her eyes, her expression was close to tears.

Kyle looked at her expression and sighed.

"D-don't worry, what matters is that you eventually rescued us."

A corner of his mouth rose, before dropping again due to the pain from his limbs. Loine looked in sorrow at this scene and dropped her head.

"But still—!"

Her shoulders trembled.

"If only I didn't leave both of you to fend off for yourselves back then! If only I had teleported both of you to safety since the beginning!"

Droplets of tears dropped.