Chương 24: Guilty as Charged

Ch 24: Guilty as Charged Before my vision had even recovered, searing pain erupted across my body. I slapped at my sides on instinct, trying to smother the burning sensation spreading from the inside of my pockets.

"The spells..." Sahirah's voice reached me just as the white glare began to fade. The first thing I saw was the state of our uniforms. Both of our pockets had been blown open. My clothes were scorched, and the fabric across Sahirah's back had burned away where she'd been carrying the backup copies of the FEIO spell. Our clothes were the least of our problems. Far worse was what she held in her hands. Charred scraps of paper. She looked at me with exactly the same expression I was giving her.

The expression of two people who knew they were completely screwed. Yeah... Presence Erasure. Haste. Illusion Traps. Every spell stored in our pockets had been reduced to ash. Which meant Sahirah's enormous mana reserves had suddenly become almost useless, while my inefficient inkless casting was the only offensive option we had left. Well... that, and Lathara, assuming she was already on her way. Because the enemy standing before us wasn't someone we could defeat on our own.

[Mimic Queen, Lvl 402] The name still hovered above Niori's head. Oddly enough, the system sphere remained completely intact. Every other inscribed paper on Sahirah's body had burned away, yet somehow the prototype had survived.

"So this is how you track us," the Mimic Queen said, her smile widening until it became unsettling. Her mere presence seemed to fill the corridor.

"It will be fascinating to learn how it works after one of my crawlers has tasted your memories." Did she really want to use one of her worms to steal my memories? A crooked smile covered my face. If she intended to keep me alive long enough to infect me... then I'd exploit every second she unknowingly handed me to wait for Lathara. Right now, buying time was our greatest weapon. I stepped behind Sahirah, resting both hands on her shoulders before gently nudging her one step toward the Mimic Queen.

"Her body is very tasty too," I said with an exaggerated grin.

"She's got an absurd amount of mana, she's healthy, young... honestly, every worm in this world would love to have her." Sahirah spun around so fast I thought she might actually bite me. The look she gave me suggested I'd just murdered her firstborn in front of her. I ignored it.

"Just look at her," I continued, patting her shoulder.

"Beautiful face, perfect skin, adorable sharp teeth. Really, you'd be wasting your time stealing just my body and leaving hers." Mana began leaking from Sahirah's body.

"Eric Nevermore." She said my full name. Ice ran down my spine. Every instinct I had screamed that, spell scrolls or not, she possessed more than enough raw mana to vaporize me if she truly lost her temper. Almost reflexively, I squeezed her shoulder. And I did it firmly. The very same gesture I'd used countless times during our dual cultivation. Very slowly... the pressure filling the corridor eased. The dangerous sharpness left her eyes. Thank goodness she got the message.

The monster wearing Niori's body watched our exchange without interrupting. Just as I was preparing another enthusiastic speech about Sahirah's outstanding qualities as premium worm housing, the Mimic Queen finally spoke.

"Do you truly believe I'm that foolish, human?" she asked.

"I've allowed your little performance because I was buying time as well." My body stiffened. She had been stalling? Why? I got my answer a second later. The two swarms we'd escaped earlier flooded into the corridor from opposite directions. Worms poured over the floor, climbed the walls in disgusting waves, and spread across the ceiling, their slime allowing them to cling upside down as if gravity was a suggestion. Countless eyeless mouths opened and closed while the entire corridor seemed to writhe around us.

Sahirah stepped closer until our shoulders nearly touched. I slowly raised my left arm, desperately trying to choose where to aim. But even that seemed pointless as there were far more enemies than I had mana.

"You've lost." The Mimic Queen said it almost gently. Without thinking, Sahirah and I backed ourselves against the wall. Even without exchanging words, somehow we'd both reached the exact same conclusion. This was where we'd make our last stand.

"Eric, we're going to–" She never finished. A loud detonation thundered through the corridor behind the Mimic Queen. A brilliant sphere of white-blue light erupted into existence, crackling so violently that its power seemed to make the air vibrate. Lightning exploded from it in every direction. Bolt after bolt lashed across the corridor, striking Mimic after Mimic. Then the sphere began pulling. An overwhelming gravitational force seized every parasite in its reach.

Worms that had been racing along the floor, walls, and ceiling were ripped free and hurled screaming toward the glowing core, where arcs of lightning shredded them into smoking fragments. It was like watching an inescapable insect trap devour an entire swarm of mosquitoes in seconds. When the spell finally faded, one entire side of the corridor had been swept clean. Only scorched walls and black remains were left behind. The Mimic Queen turned.

Beyond the carpet of dead parasites, Lathara approached at an unhurried pace. Two brilliant rings of runes revolved around each wrist, casting a shifting mana glow across the ruined hallway. She stopped roughly twenty paces from the Mimic Queen.

"I must admit," she said calmly, "Principal Zorik significantly understated the difficulty of the task when he convinced me to remain available in case a few students needed assistance tonight." [Lathara Ozira Melsor, Lvl 343] That... wasn't encouraging. I knew this version of the system better than anyone, and it definitely wasn't perfect. But seeing our strongest reinforcement displaying a lower level than the enemy she was facing did very little to boost my confidence.

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"You have no idea," the Mimic Queen replied with a delighted smile, "how powerful my kind becomes when gifted a truly worthy body." Four immense rings of runes blossomed around her wrists. Each one dwarfed Lathara's in size and complexity. Every muscle in my body went rigid. While I stood frozen, trying to process just how catastrophically outmatched we were, Sahirah leaned close enough for her breath to brush against my ear.

"That's our chance," she whispered.

"Get us out of here." The words cut through the panic. Adrenaline flooded my veins. Without another thought, I grabbed Sahirah beneath her arms and invoked Haste through my Casting Assistant. We shot toward the opening Lathara had carved through the swarm. The Mimic Queen barely spared us a glance before returning her attention to Lathara.

"Capture your meal, my darlings. Claim his memories for your queen." Then, she turned to Lathara.

"I'll deal with the strongest threat." At her command, every surviving worm surged after us. I burned mana with another Haste spell. Then another. Ahead of us, flashes of impossible magic erupted as Lathara and the Mimic Queen exchanged their opening spells, bathing the corridor in alternating blue and crimson light. As tempting as it was to witness a battle between monsters of that caliber... I didn't look back. I couldn't afford to.

Instead, I kept casting Haste over and over, ignoring the outrageous mana cost of carrying both of us. Even so, every time I risked a glance over my shoulder, the swarm was still there. The worms flowed around every corner like wasps, disappearing into the walls through camouflage only to reappear seconds later, never slowing, never giving up.

"That's bad," I muttered.

"That's really fucking bad." Sahirah tightened her grip on my shoulder.

"I still have mana conductive ink with me." I blinked.

"You do?" Suddenly... our chances didn't seem quite so hopeless anymore. I came to an abrupt stop. No words were needed. Sahirah immediately reached beneath what looked like a band strapped around her knee and pulled out a tiny vial she carried like a concealed weapon. As she handed it to me, her eyes alone told me everything else. No paper. No quill.

"Your palms," I said. She held out both hands without hesitation. I uncorked the vial and dipped my little finger into the ink, using it as an improvised brush. In seconds, I scrawled the ugliest runes I'd ever written across each of her palms. There were barely any. Four runes on each hand. An incomplete construct no Grey textbook would have dignified by calling a spell. I smiled anyway. I'd just inscribed two copies each of Mana Projection and Mana Accumulation.

And because this was Sahirah, she didn't need elegant rune paths, perfect control, or flawless resonance. She could simply force an ocean of mana through them until something happened. The swarm spilled into view from the corridor we'd just escaped.

"What now?" she asked urgently.

"Aim, let your mana go wild... and hope for the best." She drew one slow breath. Then she raised both hands. Her body became perfectly still. Her eyes narrowed. Mana erupted from her like a living storm, torrents of blue light racing toward the runes on her palms. Her long black hair floated around her as though she were submerged beneath invisible water, while the air itself glowed around her. The Mimics didn't hesitate. They kept charging. As for me...

In a shining display of courage worthy of every heroic tale ever told, I quietly stepped behind Sahirah and gave her shoulder an encouraging pat. Apparently, hiding behind the strongest woman I could find remained my signature survival strategy. She ignored me completely. The Mana Accumulation runes reached saturation, glowing so brightly they lit up the corridor ahead. Her hair floated wildly around her.

The instant the first worm came close enough for me to see the saliva glistening between its jagged teeth over her shoulder... the Mana Projection runes activated. Mana exploded outward. There was no elegance, no refinement whatsoever, no spellcraft either. The attack was just an overwhelming wave of raw mana erupting from Sahirah's body. Even standing behind her, I felt my core burn as someone else's mana washed through me like an icy flood. The Mimics... Every single one of them collapsed.

The ones clinging to the walls. The ones racing across the ceiling. And even those slithering over the floor like the ugliest snakes. Every last one dropped at once. Silence returned. Sahirah's hair slowly settled back against her shoulders as gravity reclaimed it. She immediately turned toward me.

"Did... did we win?" Pretending I hadn't spent the entire attack hiding behind her, I stepped up beside her to inspect the aftermath. The corridor was covered with motionless worms. Could we really have defeated dozens of creatures that powerful with nothing more than a crude burst of raw mana? I approached the nearest one and crouched beside it. Its enormous mouth rested just a bit open. At first I thought it was dead, but then I noticed the movement.

Dark veins moved beneath its translucent skin, constantly pumping black blood while the thing drew slow breaths through rows of glistening teeth. Its body moved ever so slightly... It wasn't really dead.

"Fuck." I instantly entered my Mind Library and drafted an enhanced version of the basic fireball. The moment reality returned, the worms were already beginning to stir. With the Casting Assistant doing the heavy lifting, I hurled a blazing fireball straight into the nearest creature's open mouth. It vanished inside. A heartbeat later, flames burst through the creature's body as it convulsed violently, burning from the inside out. One down. Several dozen to go.

Even if I emptied every remaining drop of mana, I couldn't kill them all before they recovered. Sahirah realized it at the same time. She grabbed me by the collar and yanked me backward.

"Get us out of here, Eric." I had enough mana for perhaps three more Haste spells. That meant this was our only chance. I wrapped an arm around her and burned another Haste, putting as much distance between us and the recovering Mimics as possible before they regained full control of their bodies. The problem was... Where now? The faculty wing was nearby, but it would be deserted at this hour, and every door would be locked. The main exit lay behind us... along with the Mimic Queen and Lathara's battle.

That left precious few options. Running had suddenly become hiding. But where?

"The classrooms," Sahirah said out of nowhere.

"They keep paper and quills in there." My eyes lit up. I didn't waste time praising the idea. I simply spent another Haste spell dragging us toward the nearest classroom. The instant we crossed the threshold, Sahirah leaped out of my arms and sprinted straight for the teacher's desk. While I slammed the door shut, she grabbed the drawers.

"Locked!" She didn't even wait for my answer. With a frustrated growl, she began kicking the wooden drawers over and over, attacking them like a wild beast that refused to accept the existence of locked furniture. Meanwhile, I dragged chairs across the room, piling them against the entrance in hopes of buying us a few extra minutes. I'd barely stacked the fifth chair when a loud crack echoed behind me. Sahirah's latest kick shattered the drawer. I hurried over. Hope lasted exactly one second.

She reached inside and pulled out... an old quill. No paper. Nothing else. Then something slammed into the classroom door, and the barricade lurched inward. Both of us froze. Our eyes met. Creativity suddenly became a matter of survival. I snatched the quill from her hand, uncorked the ink vial once more, and shamelessly declared,"Pull up your shirt and bend over the table." She stared at me.

"... Pull up my shirt and bend over?" I pointed at her back.

"Your back has plenty of room for runes, doesn't it?" She hesitated, but when the lower corner of the door finally gave way and wood splinters flew across the room, I watched every emotion cross her face before she gave in. She bent over the table, pulled up her shirt, and turned her head to stare straight into my soul.

"If you so much as make fun of me because of this when this is over," she warned, "consider yourself a dead human." Another loud crash echoed through the room, and I saw the muscles in her exposed back tense in real time.

"If we survive this," I said, "I'll gladly put my life in your hands." I was already drawing runes as I spoke, racing against time, against the awful quill, against the tiny amount of ink left, and even against my own memory, since I had never added the Presence Erasure spell to my Mind Library. Yeah... a spell with nearly two hundred runes was nowhere near my current limit of thirty-five for inkless casting. Fortunately, I had copied it enough times that I had memorized its individual modules.

Whenever I made a mistake, I simply wiped away the fresh ink with Sahirah's shirt, despite the obvious annoyance in her glare. I was already more than one hundred and fifty runes into the spell when the sound of the barricade collapsing shattered my concentration. One of the worms was already squeezing through the broken doorway, half its body inside the classroom.

Panicking, I dipped the quill back into the ink, only for the entire vial to slip from my fingers and shatter against the floor, black ink spreading everywhere.

"No fucking way," I growled, slamming my fist against the table.

"Did... you just drop the ink?" Our level of improvisation had already reached dangerous heights, but now I had to outdo even that. Keeping Sahirah's shirt lifted with my right hand so the unfinished spell wouldn't be ruined, I guided her back to her feet. She looked at me, completely confused. Before she could ask what I was doing, I reached around her and pressed my left hand directly against the unfinished section of the spell on her back.

I entered my Mind Library, drafted the remaining thirty-two runes in my mind, and returned to reality. With my Casting Assistant working in a way it had never been designed to, I painted the remaining runes with my own mana, completing the final module directly atop the ink already inscribed on Sahirah's back. Only one obstacle remained. The first worm finally squeezed into the room, followed by a second... then a third. Pulling Sahirah into a corner to buy us a few precious seconds, I whispered,"Resonance. Now."

She didn't ask for an explanation. She didn't know what I was planning or what I was doing, yet she closed her eyes, her mana beginning to sing in that familiar melody only the two of us shared. I closed my own eyes, found my harmony, and the moment another massive section of the door gave way and the entire swarm poured into the classroom, I fed the mana necessary to activate the Presence Erasure spell. The spell slowly activated.

And since I didn't have a lot of juice left, her mana would have to carry what mine couldn't. Worse yet, there was no way to know whether it had worked. My heart nearly stopped when four Mimics slithered toward us, their enormous mouths opening as they loomed only a few steps away, each as thick as my upper arm. Every possible disaster flashed through my mind at once. A mistake somewhere in the spell. A rune drawn poorly because of the rush or the worn-out quill.

An unknown interaction caused by a spell drawing from two mana pools at once. Or worse... a catastrophic failure if our hearts fell even slightly out of sync. Sahirah opened her eyes then, terror written across her face as she saw the wall of worms surrounding us.

"Hey," I whispered.

"Look at me, not them. If our resonance breaks now, we're dead for real." My words reached her. Her green and amber eyes locked onto mine. She flinched once, unable to stop herself from glancing sideways, but then forced herself to focus entirely on me. From the corner of my eye, I watched the creatures searching the room with whatever senses they possessed. They grew restless. More restless. Then one of them finally turned away. The others followed. Still, relief took a long time to settle.

Even after silence returned to the classroom, our hearts kept hammering in our chests. When I finally felt the muscles in Sahirah's back relax beneath my hand, she spoke in an accusing voice.

"You told the Mimics how tasty my body was. You shamelessly used my back as a drafting table. And after all that, you still dropped the precious ink I gave you." Looking straight into my eyes, she asked, "A girl deserves an explanation, human."

"None," I admitted.

"I'm guilty as charged." I smiled.

"But I know you'll forgive me."

"And how do you kn–" I cut her off with a kiss. My right hand slipped to her waist as the spell collapsed around us, and the sharp tips of her teeth pricked my lips. I didn't mind. Not even when both her hands wrapped around my neck and she kissed me back with even greater urgency. In that single wordless moment, we managed to say both I like you and I'm glad we're both alive without speaking at all, allowing ourselves to forget, if only briefly, the disaster waiting for us once this night was over.

When we finally pulled apart, both of us breathless, Sahirah looked away, perhaps embarrassed by what she had just shared with someone from an entirely different species. Well, that was just my own assumption. Whatever the reason, I refused to let the moment become awkward. I gently rested a hand on top of her head.

"Come on," I said softly.

"Let's go see how our friends are doing."