As the slash severed the flesh tendrils, a red figure leaped from high above and landed in front of Sean and Ignia.
"Are you two alright?"
Tall stature, athletic build, and the most eye-catching red attire.
The Red Dragon Witch, Frelia Igueil, had finally arrived!
Sean breathed a slight sigh of relief at the sight of her. This meant she had seen his signal flare! Otherwise, given the size of the Earl's estate, even if she flew over, she might not have found this spot immediately.
"We're fine," Sean said.
She glanced at him, especially at the firearm still in his hand.
The other one had been discarded earlier when he used the smoke bomb, likely still at the entrance to the Earl's residence—right where the flesh tendrils had emerged!
"What is that thing? And where is the Earl?"
The flesh tendrils, which had nearly filled the entire corridor, slowed their movement after being severed by her. Meanwhile, wyvern-like magical beasts in the sky kept spewing flames.
"The Earl, he..."
"What about the Earl?" the Red Dragon Witch asked, looking at Ignia, who had spoken.
After all, Ignia was the one who had summoned her, yet the true master of Koga City was nowhere to be seen.
"That... that thing over there is probably him!" Ignia pointed at the flesh tendrils.
Near the corridor, especially around the courtyard, lay the corpses of the rioters who had fallen earlier, now all covered by these tendrils. To Sean, it seemed as if they were being absorbed by it.
Where the bodies had been, the tendrils would bulge for a few seconds before softening again.
"What do you mean? I asked you, where is the Earl?"
The Red Dragon Witch seemed not to understand Ignia's words. She watched as the tendrils charged out from the corner again, immune even to the flames.
The houses along the path were nearly destroyed, yet the most critical target to protect—Earl Hamilton—was nowhere to be found!
"Don't scare her. That is Earl Hamilton. A rank 9 Order wizard injected him with some power that caused his body to mutate, and that power comes from the Cain Tablet," Sean said, stepping in front of Ignia.
Whether it was fear of the grotesque monster before her or the pressure of facing such a high-level witch, Ignia's speech had become unclear.
The Tablet!
The Red Dragon Witch's eyes flickered noticeably at the mention of the Cain Tablet.
Sean also noticed the statuses above her head: [Shock!] and [Worry!]
"Get out of here, both of you. Leave the rest to me," the Red Dragon Witch suddenly said.
Boom!
A loud crash.
The pillars of the house were shattered by the tendrils, causing the surrounding buildings to collapse.
"Kry..."
She shouted, and the wyvern circling in the sky immediately flew over.
"Grab onto it, let it take you away." She tightened her grip on her long staff.
When Sean had first welcomed her, he hadn't paid much attention to this weapon. Now, it looked more like a spear than a staff, with a semicircular ornament at the top and a sharp blade like a lance above it.
"Hurry... grab its feet and go, or it'll be too late. Don't tell anyone else about this for now."
She swung her spear, unleashing a piercing flame attack that shot straight down the corridor.
In Sean's eyes, it was like a beam of light cutting straight through the entire corridor...
Like slicing through tofu, the flesh tendrils were split into several pieces from the center point, severed all the way to the corner.
"Now, go!"
The Red Dragon Witch urged them to leave quickly.
Her expression clearly showed she knew about the Tablet.
"Come with us. It only lasts 20 minutes. If we ignore it for twenty minutes, it should disappear."
In his view...
[!a#￥*] o: 22:35
The timer was counting down, so Sean figured this was the duration of this unidentifiable, indescribable monster.
He remembered it was activated by that wizard named Wiseman using magic, so it should have a limited existence...
"Twenty minutes? How do you know? Once this thing appears, it grows wildly and absorbs life around it. You're no match for it."
She slapped the wyvern's body.
"Kry, take them away..."
With a long screech, the wyvern swiftly took off.
Sean and Ignia were lifted into the air by the wyvern.
"Sean~"
"Don't be afraid, we're safe for now."
Looking down, the Red Dragon Witch Frelia was indeed a melee mage, covered in a special protective armor, engaging the monster in close combat.
[Protection~], [Enhancement~]—these were the statuses Sean could see on her.
"What is that thing? Why did Earl Hamilton turn into such a monster?!" Ignia couldn't describe the thing before her—it was bizarre, and those flesh-like limbs didn't seem like ordinary muscle tissue.
"I'm afraid this is the true form of the Tablet."
"The Cain Tablet?"
Sean didn't know how to describe this feeling. He couldn't see any attributes of the monster; even its status was gibberish.
Everything was unreadable except for the countdown!
As the wyvern climbed higher, their field of view expanded. Though most of the buildings below were destroyed by the monster, it actually made the view clearer.
Sean didn't see Wiseman or the warrior from earlier among the rubble, but he could directly see the monster's terrifyingly long tentacles.
Like a dark, massive serpent, stretching from the corridor to the center of the debris...
"Sean, look down there!!"
The center of the rubble was likely the Earl's original room, now collapsed into a mass of dark matter.
A four-to-five-meter irregular area, like a pile of mashed rotten flesh, yet it wasn't any muscle tissue he'd ever seen. Its chaotic surface had countless tentacles constantly writhing outward.
It felt like its fur.
Some long, some short, and the one stretching into the corridor was just a slightly longer one. Around it were many tentacles of similar length, still growing.
On its soft, black skin, countless faces seemed to be wailing endlessly.
The sound was piercing...
When they got closer, Sean felt a chill run through his body from hearing it.
Beside him, Ignia and the wyvern holding them above also seemed affected, showing a [Confused!] status.
"Ignia..."
"Yeah."
"Do you see a red head in its center?"
Though his vision was filled with gibberish, one spot stood out.
In the middle of the irregular black mass was a red head, looking like Earl Hamilton's agonized face from his final moments.
"Attack that thing!"