Chapter 267: A Black Mask (1/2)
Arthur couldn't remember how much time he kept injecting mana or trying to resurrect her. He fell into the what-ifs and despair of losing a friend of his until Rae pulled on his shoulder.
”She's gone.”
”Shut up!” Arthur slapped her hand away as he kept trying. He wouldn't believe that someone he knew for so long can die like this, with not even a ripple in the world.
He had always thought of death as something grand, a thing that you can't help but see, even if you don't like it. It shouldn't happen this easily, what's the meaning if it did?
”Alexie,” Rae said to him again but Arthur didn't answer. His movements turned slower and slower until he retracted his hands and rested them on his thighs. They were shaking.
It was unrelated, but as he looked at his hands, he found the situational laughable. With all the stats he gathered, with all the powers he gained, he could never escape from being a human. His eyes blurred as he turned to look at Ellen's pale face.
She was with him a few hours ago, as silent and as quiet but she was there. Yet now, she'll never move again. She was the person who helped him the most in the runes club and probably the first friend he made in a long time.
He tried to help her, but where did that lead her? If he hadn't helped her to get into Jerano, she would have been alive now.
Arthur knew he couldn't have possibly known, but it did little to lessen the guilt he felt. If he had paid more attention to her, she wouldn't have died away from everyone who cared about her.
”Alexie,” Rae called out again, an urgent tone in her voice. Arthur snapped out of it and turned to look at the figures who started standing up. ”They're coming back to life. They were dead a moment ago.”
The guild members, men, women, mages, and warriors, rose to life around them. Arthur turned back toward Ellen but she was still unmoving.
'Is she safe from being controlled because I disrupted their ritual?' Arthur looked at the guild members who didn't resemble Ori in any way. They had no Enders power trying to control them. He couldn't save them using his mana of creation, they were already dead, unlike Ori.
”Should we make a run for it?” Rae suggested as the people around them started taking out their weapons.
”There's no place to run to, this space is theirs.” Arthur stared at Ellen silently as he caressed her shoulder gently. ”They are here, hiding behind their army of undead.”
It then suddenly clicked. This wasn't the first time that Arthur has seen this phenomenon, he had seen it before with Juan. The person he was in a dungeon with at the time of his awakening has turned into an undead when Arthur came to the mountain range after his breakthrough.
When he was alive, Juan was a powerful deme-ranker. It was also the reason he looked down on Arthur so much. However, when Arthur met him again, his strength decreased significantly after he turned into an undead.
If Arthur's guess was correct, then Juan fell after the serpent broke down the floor and ended up in the mountain range the same way that he did. However, he was dead at that time either due to the serpent's attack or because something else killed him.
Finding Juan's body, the Undead Lord turned him into an undead. Juan then met Arthur and received his blissful rest at last.
”They aren't as strong as they were,” Arthur said as he placed his hand on Ellen's body, making it disappear into his subspace. When he stood up, Rae looked at him with furrowed brows. ”I can't leave her here.”
The moment something dies, it becomes eligible to go into his subspace. This way, he wouldn't have to leave Ellen here. His grief started to morph into something more dangerous.
”The bastards are still here.” Arthur clenched his fist. ”Whoever is behind all of this is still here. If we want to get out, we'll have to find them in this castle. Rise!” He threw out his hand and a shadow formed beside him. ”Keep an eye on the castle from the outside. If someone leaves, report to me.”
The shadow disappeared instantly. Rae looked at him with widened eyes but he couldn't care less at the moment. All he could feel was cold rage about Ellen's death.