Heir Of The Supreme
Chapter 74: Once More In The Dark (1)

Chapter 74: Once More In The Dark (1)

Stamping out the smouldering remains of their fire, the two departed from their campsite the night and once more began their seemingly never-ending trek through the dimly lit cavern expanse.

After their ’fight,’ the two of them hadn’t said as much as a word to the other.

While Blaine had resumed his usual silent persona, Cecelia was too pissed to respond if anything.

After how much she’d idolized the honour of the kingdom’s knights, Blaine’s actions were nothing short of sacrilegious to her beliefs.

Why would someone who embodied the concepts of chivalry be so... unscrupulous?

Although Cecelia didn’t have many chances to interact with the Royal Guard herself, she had seen plenty of videos about them.

Blaine’s actions, however, went completely against everything she knew.

However, the princess didn’t have the heart to call him out.

He did beat her so effortlessly, after all... Perhaps there was some method behind his madness.

Thinking this, Cecelia couldn’t help but feel conflicted.

His methods were effective, but they just seemed... wrong.

’Why do you even need to care about that? As long as you’re strong enough to protect yourself, does it matter?’

A wry smile broke out on Cecelia’s lips.

Maybe it was better to just follow the boy’s words.

Just as she thought that... A hint of movement caught itself in the corner of her eyes.

Noticing this as well, Blaine’s eyes narrowed as he quickly dropped his backpack and unsheathed the dagger in his hands.

Since Blaine’s injured left arm was pretty much healed by now, Cecelia had returned the dagger she carried with her to him.

It was still far more effective in his hands than hers.

Instead, she pulled out a sharpened piece of bone that they’d harvested from the corpse of a Rank-2 Unknown Blaine had killed prior.

While it wasn’t crafted with a Mana Core and thus lacked the qualifications to be an artifact, it was still better than simply being empty-handed.

As Blaine’s eyes focused in the darkness, he soon made out the silhouette of a long, pink, serpentine body.

The creature was the length of two full-grown humans and wide enough to swallow one, too, with its sizeable gaping maw.

In fact, the creature’s head consisted of only two beady eyes on either side of its body, giving more than ample space for its enlarged mouth. Inside it, a large assortment of sharp razer-like teeth arranged into circular arrangements, seemingly designed to shred whatever unlucky creature entered it to ribbons.

Cecelia’s eyes widened slightly as she took in the sight.

In a soft, almost imperceptible voice, she whispered.

"That’s a Wormprey."

Having seen this creature before in a biological textbook, she was able to identify it with only a glance.

This species was quite common, occurring in underground environments.

It was a surprise that they hadn’t encountered one yet, even during their trip through the tunnel.

Glancing at the reading on her Power Analyzer, she continued: "It’s a Rank 2 Imp."

Hidden beneath her feelings of fear, Cecelia couldn’t help but feel a tinge of relief.

As for why? It was simple.

This wasn’t her enemy to fight.

Affirming her thoughts, Blaine took a step forward and kicked off the ground.

Breaking into a sprint, the auburn-haired youth began to quickly close the distance between him and his foe.

However, he wasn’t the only one preparing for battle.

The Wormprey slithered across the cavern floor, heading in Blaine’s direction, fully intent on swallowing the youth in its large mouth.

As soon as Blaine was only moments away from being devoured whole, he pivoted his feet and dodged the oncoming attack.

The monster’s body flew past him at a distance, close enough that Blaine could feel a sharp wind prick his skin.

Not wasting another moment, Blaine plunged the Rank-3 dagger into the creature’s flesh and channelled his mana into it.

Considering the relative ease with which he accomplished such a feat, one would forget that this was a battle between a 1-Star and a Rank 2. However, that was just the power of owning a Rank-3 artifact.

As the monster writhed in agony from the sharp pain, the analgesic poison quickly flooded through the wound and into the monster’s body.

However, Blaine still needed to buy more time.

Jumping away this time, Blaine made sure to pull on the knife’s hilt to take the blade out of the creature’s body.

Unlike the Unknown, the Wormprey was far too large for Blaine to repeatedly inject his mana into a single point while dodging all of its attacks.

Instead, he would be forced to repeatedly cut and hack away at the monster until it either died or succumbed to the poison.

Narrowly dodging a swing from the monster’s fleshy pink tail, Blaine somersaulted through the air like an acrobat and nimbly on the ground several feet away.

However, this was just the beginning.

Circling back, the monster looped in on itself, caging Blaine with its large serpentine body.

After sealing off Blaine’s way of escape, the monster began to slither in a circle, slowly narrowing the space Blaine had left.

He was trapped.

Unfortunately for the monster, Blaine wasn’t just going to sit idle and let himself be its meal.

Running towards the creature’s head, Blaine plunged his poison-coated dagger straight into the monster’s beady eye, causing a viscous purple-red liquid to flow out.

The monster’s body convulsed from the sudden attack. It blindly flailed its body in Blaine’s direction, hoping to kill the wretched human as quickly as possible.

However, before he could be buried under its giant body, Blaine quickly channelled his mana art to create a flight of green stairs, which he then used to hastily climb over the monster.

Even whilst escaping from the death trap, Blaine didn’t forget to quickly run his dagger across the monster’s body and inject as much poison as he could manage into it.

The creature let out an ear-piercing shriek as it wretched in agony.

"SCREEEEEEE!"

Blaine hastily raised his hands to cup his ears from the sonic attack. Unfortunately, being so close to the origin of the noise, that did little to help.

Luckily... it looked like the toxins were finally starting to kick in as the monster’s movements finally began to dull.

However, before Blaine could let himself catch a breath, a sudden rumbling sound echoed through the underground cavern.

Recognizing this particular sound, Blaine’s eyes darted to the cavern ceiling, locking on one of the clusters of moss.

When the soft glow of the bioluminescent moss began to slowly flicker, Blaine quickly realized that his worst fears were coming true.

The ’Darkness Monster’ had returned.