NOVEL NEXT Chapter 51: An issue
'This again,' Asher thought with growing frustration, his eyes narrowing as he realized he'd made a catastrophic miscalculation.
He had burned through every drop of his ether in that single, devastating attack, and now just remaining upright was taking every ounce of his willpower. His legs trembled, and his vision swam with exhaustion. 'Why does it always drain me completely whenever I use the connection?' At this rate, using this ability was completely impractical.
It was like being surrounded by a horde of monsters while holding a gun with only one bullet. No matter how clever his strategy, he'd be royally screwed the moment he pulled the trigger. Sure, the attack had been effective—devastatingly so. That single blast had literally decimated the loop array, and the people caught within it had simply... vanished.
But being practical about it, if he couldn't control the ether flowing into his attacks, he was nothing more than a glass cannon. Worse yet, this particular cannon could only fire once before becoming utterly useless.
He needed to understand how this ability actually worked. It definitely connected him to Anna through the slave seal—that was his only source of ether in the first place. He had a nagging suspicion that his alter ego had sealed away his natural ether pool, and since he didn't have access to those hidden memories, he would need to find another way to...
Wait.
'You require two souls, right?' he asked internally, remembering the requirement for unlocking those hidden memories.
[....]
A frown creased his brow. The entity wasn't responding—again. In fact, ever since encountering this particular group, he'd had an odd feeling about the whole situation. The fact that the system hadn't confirmed any kills only meant one thing.
'They didn't die,' he realized, then glanced around their surroundings.
"Asher?" Natalia's voice cut through his thoughts. He turned to find her staring at him with absolute shock written across her face, which was entirely understandable. The kind of power he'd just displayed wasn't something any ordinary person could wield. Hell, it was probably on par with a celestial-level spell, so her amazement was perfectly justified.
"Let's get you somewhere safe," he said, taking stock of their environment. They were still in the alley, just like in the illusion, but this time he could see people walking past both ends of the narrow passage.
'What happened?' he wondered. Had those people been part of the array all along?
It was certainly possible.
Or was it something else entirely?
Now that he thought about it more carefully, creating such an elaborate array would require a tremendous amount of ether, which meant using a high-rank ether core. Those things were expensive as hell—they would have spent a fortune to acquire one. It would be monumentally stupid to sacrifice something that valuable just to steal from someone when they weren't even sure how much they'd gain from it.
Unless... what if the points stored in Natalia's card were truly that valuable? Or perhaps he was looking at this all wrong. Maybe it wasn't the card they were after at all—maybe there was something else hidden in her bag.
He sighed, running a hand through his hair as another thought occurred to him.
'Using a high-tier ether core would leak massive amounts of ether and would definitely attract the attention of the authorities,' he mused. That could only mean one thing...
'An ability,' he concluded.
It seemed they'd been looking at this wrong from the very beginning. It wasn't a loop array or some elaborate magical construct—it was someone's personal ability creating the illusion.
He walked toward the wheelchair, reaching for the handle. However, the next instant...
'Fuck.' He had completely underestimated the impact that attack had really had on his body.
Thud.
"Asher!"
...
...
"GAHHH!" A man sprang up with a strangled cry, and just as he did, many others around him did the same, all emerging from what looked like a collective nightmare.
The man looked around frantically, then turned to see a woman kneeling with crossed legs on the ground, blood flowing from multiple wounds across her body like crimson rivers.
"Ezra!" He scrambled to his feet and shook her desperately, but her eyes remained unresponsive, staring blankly at nothing.
"What the hell happened?" demanded a lady with shock apparent on her face, her voice cracking with panic.
"It's that guy..." someone muttered darkly.
"Ether pool combustion?" suggested a young man with striking green hair and brown eyes, pulling himself up from the magic circle where they had all been lying unconscious.
"No," the man with blue hair and matching eyes cursed, kneeling beside the unresponsive woman. He looked desperately at their companion—a lady with grey hair and blue eyes whose hands began glowing with a faint green light. She placed her healing hands gently on Ezra's back.
"Something... is wrong," she said after a moment, her frown deepening with concern.
"What do you mean?" the green-haired young man asked, his voice tight with worry.
"I don't know exactly. She's stable—her ether core just suffered minor damage from the backlash, but that's manageable. There's something else going on here," she said, then sighed heavily.
"Who was that bastard in the first place?" growled the guy with grey hair, grinding his teeth in frustration. "He wasn't supposed to be with Natalia, was he?"
They had been planning this operation for so damn long, months of careful preparation and surveillance. And just like that, with a simple attack, some unknown guy had ruined everything. Not only that, but their most valuable team member had suffered major damage in the process.
"I don't know. I've never seen him before," said the girl with green hair, sighing as she looked at her friend who had suffered the backlash of her own ability. With just that one devastating attack, the dream construct had completely shattered, and the abrupt disconnection had damaged her ether core.
"I think he's a student," the blue-haired man said through gritted teeth, his hands clenched into fists.
"A transfer student, maybe?" someone suggested.
"Perhaps. That would explain why we don't have any intel on him."
"We need to get her to the infirmary immediately," the green-haired girl said, her voice taking on an urgent tone.
"What would we say happened to her?" asked the green-haired boy, clearly concerned about maintaining their cover.
The group fell silent, each lost in their own thoughts about how to explain their unconscious teammate's condition without revealing their illegal activities.
"You guys head back to the academy and find that bastard," the blue-haired man said finally, "I'll take care of Ezra."