– Memories: Logout [Retracted]

t. ” Keen commands, walking forward nonchalantly. He bites his forefinger and takes out his in whip form in his right hand.

Right away, a series of spikes rain down on their direction. Keen almost seems to teleport to Vis direction given his immense speed and hits the large, needle-like projectiles with his blood whip. He hits almost all the enemy weapons perfectly except for a pair which he catches with bare hands. Although already aware of his strength, she is still continuously overwhelmed by the feat he shows. The giggling of the enemy turn to utter shock.

”Here. Lets give them a taste of their own poison. ” He hands her two of the projectile weapons.

Although still annoyed by his way of training her, Vi has no qualms accepting the weapon. She must survive the night and return to Topsy Town as a proper assassin.

”Maybe Ill just follow you, after all. ” Keen says in a gentle tone. ”You go storm the front while I back you up. Don destroy their core. Lets not gather Release so carelessly. ”

He has a fair point. They immediately unlocked the fact that not destroying the monster core prevents the Release from forcing a random memory into their minds. Their encounter with the snake-spider proved that. Having that established would lessen the probability of being turned into an Insane.

”Why will you follow me? I can manage on my own. ” She runs ahead of him with a pair of bone-white stakes, one meter long each, on both hands.

He just follows Vi with soundless steps, readying to finish the enemies who would pose a serious threat to her. The enemies are weaker than him, but a lot stronger than her.

With enough concentration, Vi is finally able to pinpoint the location of one enemy. She charges toward an approximation of its next location within the next five seconds and throws one of her weapons ahead.

With an obvious surprise, the little monster is hit on its toe and shrieks in pain. It is half a meter tall and has a single large eye at the center of its face, a circular mouth filled with triangular teeth on the upper half of its chest, and limbs like a monkeys.

The next monster approaches with a maniacal scream that contains more than four frequencies. Its eyes are glowing red in a bestial rage while throwing a series of four spikes towards Vis direction.

She quickly evades, but sprains an ankle in doing so due to a misstep. Keen appears before her and swipes the enemy projectiles to another third monster with his blood. Even with an injury, Vi proceeds with the finishing blow to the screaming little monster she latched in place.

She almost destroys the core that contained the Release fragment located in its head, if not for the monsters sudden jerk that redirects her attack to its mouth. After a few more screams in both high and low frequencies, the one-eyed monster stops moving and disintegrates into black pixels. Its core is left behind, glowing purple even in the darkness.

Keen calls her attention with a slight nudge on her shoulder as the remaining one-eyed monsters run swiftly to them from different directions. She quickly pulls out the other spike from the ground and gets to a defensive stance when the ground starts rumbling.

The grassland where the little monsters are stepping on suddenly collapses, revealing an enormous centipede twenty meters long showing its hostility with its pair of heads elevated six meters above the ground to somehow intimidate the prey.

Vi steps back, feeling the pain on her left ankle. However, Keen just stares at the scene without a word as the centipede breaks the little monsters into pieces with the motion of its long body and scythe-shaped limbs.

”It likes to be the alpha predator. ” Keen bites another forefinger and takes out another . This time, however, he has restructured his weapons as slick javelins. ”Ill handle this one. Take cover. Use Zekes potion to heal your ankle. Wait for my signal to take the final strike. ”

His series of commands almost annoys her, if only she is not used to receiving continuous jabs of instructions in her real life. With how easily the large creature took out the little monsters she found hard to deal with, surely she cannot handle this much in her current level. Her passive skill should also be effective against the centipede while she hides and Keen draws its attention. Hence, she agrees to the strategy.

However, while about to hide her presence behind a thick-bodied tree around five meters in diameter, an even larger centipede appears beside the first one. Its limbs are colored deep red from the blood stains of its former victims.

Keen, despite the challenge, simply lets out a soft chuckle. Even without blinking, she is unable to see what happens next after he let loose the same commanding aura he had when cornered by the Insane mob.

He disappears from her sight, only to be seen again two seconds later with bright red orbs glowing under his hood and walking to Vis direction. When he shows his vampiric fangs in a desolate sigh, the two centipedes shatter to pieces and disintegrate into pixels. His scarlet, hooded long coat now has a blood-red hue.