Tenebrous Wolf
Chapter 102: Grace of Providence

Chapter 102: Grace of Providence

Following the collapse of the awakened commander, Seraphim gave her silver blade a sharp twist and pulled it free, tearing through flesh and unleashing a fresh wave of greenish blood.

After that, she swung the sword to the side, flinging away bits of brain matter and gore clinging to the edge.

It was finally over.

There was no need to check if it still lived. The voice of Chaos had already echoed in her mind, confirming the kill. She had delivered the finishing blow.

More importantly, it had granted her a Nightmare — and it was an armor-type — exactly what she needed. Her advanced battlesuit had stopped functioning some time ago, leaving her virtually unprotected in the Chaos Realm. At this point, she might as well have been walking around in her birthday suit.

With a tired sigh, Sera summoned the chaos runes.

Nightmare: [Duskborne Armor]

Nightmare Rank: Awakened

Nightmare Type: Armour

Nightmare Description. [A shard of solitude forged in the all-swallowing darkness of Soul Grave. Burdened by the weight of the ruined world, a lone wanderer traversed the desolate wastes in search of his twilight. But as time passed, the purpose of his journey faded, along with his memories, name, and history. What remained was a hollow shell, emptied by loss. This armor draws its strength from the wearer’s grief, growing heavier, and more powerful, with every sorrow carried.]

’What an interesting description.’

Armor that got tougher the more pain and sorrow its wearer carried. And on top of that, it was an Awakened-rank Nightmare.

Who wouldn’t find that interesting?

Tempting as it was to equip it immediately, she resisted and shook her head. Now wasn’t the time.

Instead, she leapt down from the commander’s head, landing with quiet grace. A few seconds later, Adrian hesitantly approached while keeping his gaze on the slain commander.

Noticing his tense shoulders, Sera casually addressed him:

"If you’re worried about it suddenly getting up, don’t bother."

"I see. So it’s really dead?"

"Yes."

Seraphim replied, nodding her head whereas Adrian let out a breath of relief. It was as though a heavy weight had been lifted up from its shoulders.

It was impossible to be too cautious in the Chaos Realm.

According to military reports, there have been rare cases where a Hollow feigned death, only to strike mercilessly the moment its target let down their guard. While such incidents were uncommon, monsters possessing intelligence beyond a rudimentary level were rare to begin with; either because they fled upon discovery or eliminated anyone who encountered them, leaving little information behind.

To counter this risk, all personnel entering the Chaos Realm were strictly instructed to await the voice of Chaos confirming a creature’s death before lowering their guard. And in the case, only Seraphim heard the voice of Chaos due delivering the finishing blow.

For that reason, Adrian remained cautious as he approached Sera, who stood close to the creature. If she hadn’t spoken up, he would’ve driven Windbreaker into its body just to make sure it was truly dead.

As it turned out, though, his worry had been unnecessary.

Regardless, they had taken down an awakened, commander-class Hollow, an almost unbelievable feat. Each of them had poured their strength into the battle, and even then, they had only narrowly overcome the relentless beast.

It had been nothing short of a blend of hard work and luck.

Glancing around, Sera spotted Morgan in the distance. The brunette stood before the Stalker, which lay motionless on the ground. One look was enough to confirm the humanoid Hollow was dead.

Its chest was crushed so deeply, it looked as though the beast had been struck by a speeding train. Barring some kind of miracle, there was no way it could’ve survived such a devastating blow.

As for Morgan, her face was a quiet storm of conflicting emotions; indifference, anger, sorrow and a slight hint of pain.

Losing her monster servant must have hit her hard. The Stalker’s death not only reduced the group’s manpower, but it likely affected Morgan on a personal level as well. Truthfully, though, she wasn’t deeply moved. She was a demoness, after all. Forming emotional attachments, especially to a mindless, bestial creature, wasn’t in her nature.

Even so, losing her first underling like this didn’t sit right with her. It had been an Awakened-class monster — one she had gone out of her way to permanently tame. Finding another as useful would be a real pain.

With that thought, the disguised succubus clicked her tongue.

Unaware of Morgan’s thoughts, Seraphim watched her in silence for a few moments. Then, her gaze drifted and something felt wrong.

"Where is Klaus?"

Adrian blinked, startled by the question. He glanced around, as if expecting Klaus to be nearby.

"Now that you mention it... I haven’t seen him in a while. Not since we started. Where did he go?"

Seraphim’s expression darkened.

A troubling thought crept in. Two possibilities explained Klaus’s absence: either he’d been caught in the chaos of the operation or he’d run.

The second seemed far more likely.

Klaus was the strongest among them in terms of physicality, and he’d been against the plan from the start. If anyone could slip away unnoticed, it was him.

But that possibility was more unsettling than the first.

Had he really abandoned them?

Just as that ominous thought began to settle, something strange happened.

From the slain commander’s back, a dark, humaniod mass suddenly oozed out and dropped to the ground with a wet thud.

"!?"

Immediately, the two Striders entered a defensive stance, raised their weapons and observed it carefully.

The humanoid figure was entirely black. More specifically, its whole body was covered with a mixture of greenish blood and monster waste. A heavy and revolting stench clung to the air, reaching them even from a considerable distance. Judging how it slowly emerged from the slain commander’s rear, there was little doubt about its origin.

Could the beast commander still spawn lesser Shreddings even in death?

No... that made no sense.

Even Waking Nightmares required life to replicate or generate lesser entities. What they were witnessing defied logic, and the unease it stirred in them was immediate and visceral.

However, as they would soon discover, their fear was completely misplaced.

Ignoring the terror and unease rising in their shoulders, the dark humanoid figure lifted a hand and wiped the foul substance from his face.

To their surprise, the grotesque figure that had set them on edge was none other than Klaus.

Upon seeing him, the two Striders relaxed. Seraphim lowered her sword, and Adrian let out a breath of relief, dismissing his spear, Wind Breaker.

But Klaus’s expression was off. His face was flushed red.

He was furious.

And who wouldn’t be? He had just crawled through the innards of an abomination, forced to enter it through its rear, just for the sake of slaying it. His pride had taken a brutal blow. If not for the fact that they still had to travel this world together, he might have attacked them on the spot to erase eye witnesses.

Instead, Klaus stood there in silence, shaking, trembling and burning with embarrassment.

Adrian took a cautious step forward, unsure whether to apologize or laugh. In the end, he did neither. The look on Klaus’s face was a warning in itself.

"You, uh... okay there?" he asked carefully with a neutral voice.

Klaus didn’t respond.

He simply closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and muttered something under his breath that sounded suspiciously like a curse aimed at fate itself.

Meanwhile, Sera remained silent, though the corners of her lips twitched ever so slightly. A smile threatened to break through, but she suppressed it quickly.

At some point, Morgan finally joined them. She glanced at Klaus, took in his stained, dripping body, then let her gaze drift to the torn-open corpse behind him.

It wouldn’t take a genius to piece two and two together.

A look of disgust flashed across her face before she turned her head and gave Klaus a look.

"Wait... did you seriously go in through that thing’s butt crack?"

Klaus’s eyebrow twitched. Gritting his teeth, he muttered:

"I don’t want to talk about it."

"You..." Morgan started, but Klaus cut her off with a low growl.

"I said I don’t want to talk about it."

He stood there for a moment, fuming in silence. Then, with a heavy sigh, he shook himself off and muttered,

"Let’s just keep moving."

† †

A few minutes later, nightfall had already settled in.

Seraphim, Adrian, Klaus, and Morgan collapsed into a sleep so deep, it was as if they had died. The brutal ordeal had drained them completely, none of them had the strength left to even shift their limbs.

They had taken shelter in a narrow crevice along the cliffside, hidden just enough to avoid detection. But with the Stalker gone, there was no one left to stand watch.

In truth, they were still vulnerable to wandering monsters. But at that moment, none of them cared.

Fortunately, the night passed without further incident.

By morning, no one was in a rush to make plans or suggest leaving the cliffs. They simply gathered some meat from the corpse of the slain nightmare carapaces and began extracting cores from the bodies. After some thinking, they chose to collect only a few, leaving behind the rest, including the transcendent shards.

A pile of corpses this massive was bound to attract predators, especially the transcendent kind. Carrying too many cores would only turn them into moving targets.

It was a hard decision, but a necessary sacrifice.

And, as it turned out, their quick intrusion had been correct.

Seconds after the group left the field of battle, dark shapes emerged in the distant grey sky; tiny at first, but quickly growing larger as they descended toward the cliffs. They landed near the pile of corpses in a rush of wind and dust, the force of their arrival stirring up a small whirlwind.

With a growing sense of dread, Klaus counted the approaching creatures. There were at least fifteen of those strange, never-seen-before monsters drawn by the scent of death.

The flying monstrosities were even more massive than the nightmare carapaces and at a glance, they resembled bats, but there was something unmistakably alien about them. Their bodies were longer, their skin shimmered with an oily, chitinous sheen. Each of those creatures had sharp, long talons.

They had no eyes, but their enormous wings told a clear story. Those organs weren’t for flight alone, they were tools for detecting sound and even the slightest vibration in the air. One wrong move or misplaced breath, and the group would be torn apart in seconds.

Hidden behind the rocks, they remained as still and silent as death itself. The flying slayers prowled the area, sweeping their heads from side to side, as if searching for something.

After what felt like an eternity, the creatures appeared to lose interest. A few latched onto the corpses of the nightmare carapaces, lifting them effortlessly into the air. With each beat of their vast, black wings, they stirred small hurricanes, whipping dust and bone into the wind.

Then, just as swiftly as they came, the monsters vanished into the grey sky, leaving the cliffs in silence once more.

Following the black dots, the group watched as they slowly disappeared into the grey sky above.

Luckily for them, those creatures were heading west.

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