My Yandere Empress

Chapter 18: Ch 18: Rescued

For a few seconds, he just let the currents guide him under its unruly sweep. He felt his body bend, strained under the heavy force of the descending waterfall. For a moment, he thought he would snap his spine and that would be the end of him. But the pressure subsided slowly over time.

He trashed around in the waters as he felt a sense of control return to his limbs. This time, he didn’t rise to the surface level, knowing the slime might be waiting for him with yet another trick.

Rather, he peered his eyes open and with heavy difficulty, he saw the outlines of the river bank.

He swam towards the direction like a man possessed. His lungs were running out of breath and his lungs were filling with water. His ears rang amd his eyes felt extremely dizzy; an effect born out of being trashed by the river now and by the sheer deficiency of energy in his body.

His hands scraped against the roughened rocks as he pulled himself to the surface. Before anything else could happen, he almost jumped and rolled along the ground, dust and dirt smearing his wet body.

"Holy shit...I made it! I fucking made it alive..."

His lungs burned as his nostrils and mouth greedily sucked in air. His unfocused eyes however, caught a large shadow looming over him.

The Uncommon Grade Devouring Slime had finally moved as it’s tendrils glided across the walls and placed itself above Enzo. It lacked eyes and yet, Enzo felt all its attention solely focussed on him.

Then before Enzo could even move his body an inch, the slime dropped onto him engulfing him in one single move. It applied direct pressure to his limbs, restricting any form of movement or resistance.

At the same time, Enzo who had just been able to breath in air after being underwater for a while, now found himself in the same situation that he was a few minutes ago.

This time he was being deprived of all his leftover stamina at an alarming rate. His mana reservoirs were almost empty as well.

Enzo, now trapped under the monster, could do nothing but only gaze in helplessness. His vision would go white for a second before coming back to normal. The rate at which it was happening increased as well.

He shoudn have felt a sense of crisis but his mind was so dizzy that he couldn’t even register the threat properly. freewebnøvel.com

In this near hallucination stage, he even wondered if he should just sleep. Maybe then, the pain in his aching body and the throb in his beating heart would go away...

His eyes snapped into focus.

A gasp almost escaped him as he realised how his complacency was about to cost him his life. He could already feel he was nearing his end and thus, decided to go for a final fight.

His hands twitched at both his sides, nothing but to be noticed. The movement was subtle, mainly to probe if he could rotate his limbs atleast a little.

Enzo half closed his eyes as he gathered every bit of energy he could muster, even when the thumping body of the slime was devouring his very life energy.

Then...

He activated [Mana Vision]. His eyes drifted downwards like a startled rabbit as the skill shut down abruptly. He already had a negligible amount of mana inside him and thus, he wasn’t truly surprised when he wasn’t able to operate his skill for more than a mere second.

But...that was enough. He had already seen what he needed to.

Both his hands shot upwards as they pierced the jelly like skin of the devouring slime. On realising what just happened, the slime screamed in retrospect.

The same chilling sound, now at point blank range, almost shattered Enzo’s consciousness. He bit down on his own tongue just to prevent getting knocked out cold.

’Go! Go! Get those two!’

His teeth gritted against each other like two stones being used to light a fire. His jaw clamped shut as every muscle in his body were drawn taut while his mind screamed in rage. All of this just to convince himself he wasn’t hallucinating about doing something - he was actually doing it.

His hands roamed inside the slime’s body and reached the location he was searching for. Without the guidance of the Mana Vision anymore, he hesitated for a second but soon clasped his hands.

Two shattering sounds occured simultaneously as the screaming stopped forever.

The next moment, a dinging sound rang inside his mind accompanied by the gurgling noises of the slime dissolving above him into water and miasma.

Soon enough, Enzo was drenched in a puddle of water as the demonic miasma spread to the surroundings.

With a groan, he turned his head towards the river. Somehow impossibly, the currents of the water had brought many of the common grade slimes on shore. They all shrieked in distress, probably because of the death of their leader.

But nevertheless, they were still approaching his direction, hostility burning the very air they crossed.

A resigned smile lit up his face as a final verdict passed inside his head.

’I am going to die...’

Even turning his head had been such a toiling work for him just now. And he knew with certainty that no matter how much he tried, it was all useless as his body refused to hear his commands.

When they were almost upon him, he could no longer hold himself to reality as his eyes finally started drooping.

"It was really reckless of you. Entering a dungeon with no preparations."

A foreign voice registered at the back of his mind. For just a brief moment, his forehead furrowed as accompanied with the voice, he also saw a sharp blade passing by him, cutting the air in halves and heading towards the nearest slime.

But...exhaustion finally took over him as Enzo lost his consciousness.

***

Pain.

That was all he felt before he properly gained consciousness. He felt himself shifting on a smooth surface as ruffling sounds crackled near his ears.

His eyes snapped open as he came face to face with the night sky that now held tints of the glow that indicated dawn was near.

He slowly lifted himself on his elbows as a groan escaped his lips. His body still ached from all the previous adventures but atleast now his mind was back to normal. He no longer felt as lightheaded as he has been before fainting.

Although he felt a little weak, it was still not enough to hinder his movements. He knew a proper rest would make him all fine.

Looking around, he saw that he was no longer in the dungeon. But in a barren land, which was surrounded by sprawling vegetation.

He grimaced lightly as he realised where he actually was - the same place where the Gate had appeared. Just that where he was sitting right now was where the Great Old One should have been.

But nothing remained of that old and dead tree. It was as if it had vanished completely, only leaving an uprooted land in its wake.

He sighed and then with a rising dread in his heart looked behind him as he stood up from the ground.

At the person who probably had saved him and taken him out of the gate in one piece.

But as his eyes fell on the figure, his mind short circuited. His breathing stopped and the world narrowed on the person sitting on a rock a little distance away.

"Oh...you are finally awake."