337 – Rescue

I don’t guarantee a 100% perfect translation.

Feel free to correct me in the comments.

Next chapter in about 12+ hours

 

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Anna nodded, the black fire stretches into a thread and gently reaches the crystal pillar.

The rest of the witches can’t help but to hold their breath, and quietly watch as the point of contact lets out green smoke, but is not the smoke that’s green, rather the black fire making contact lets out a greenish hue, coloring the smoke above it in different shades of green.

The black fire then penetrates the crystal stone.

„How is it?” Tilly asks.

„A little hard, but I’m sure I can cut it” Anna replies.

However, the „ice coffin” then presents some changes, from the point where the black fire was inserted, like a cobweb, cracks started to form and in an instant covered the entire surface. At the same time Shavi deployed her barrier covering all the witches.

But a shattering blast didn’t occur, and as if made of glass, the crystal started to collapse into the ground revealing a cold core, actually the crystal pillar was composed of two layers, the inner one being a real ice crystal. Suddenly everyone felt a chill in the air and the surrounding temperature started to drop.

Luckily, Anna used her fire to keep the temperature from dropping and made it raise to normal again.

Under the heat from the black fire, the ice crystal melted faster, the transparency also started to drop and the shape was no longer angular, just like regular ice, it started to lose its shape once it started melting unevenly. But Tilly noticed that there was no water being poured into the ground and the melted parts were turning into mist, as if the „ice coffin” had never existed in the first place.

When all of the ice crystal was completely melted, it was revealed the female body that was trapped inside.

She seemed as if she was in a deep sleep, her hair and robes were not showing indications of being wet, like she was never frozen. Losing the support of the ice pillar, her body fell backwards but Ash was there and she fell into her arms.

„Is she alive?” 

„Although is very weak, her heartbeat has not stopped” Ash presses her hand on the unknown female’s chest „this is…… simply unbelievable.”

Indeed unbelievable, Tilly discovered that since arriving at Border Town, in less than one week’s time, she had experienced more incredible things than in the whole last year. However, she also feels a little relieved, if she can survive the ice’s low temperature while being trapped inside, it’s almost certain that the other party is a witch.

At the very least, this risky adventure was not for nothing.

As for her name, her origin, and why she was trapped inside of these ruins, those are question that can wait until they return and talk about it slowly.

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Andrea was somewhat bored of just defending the hole, from time to time she would glance at the bottom of the hole, hoping to be the first one to see Tilly when she returned.

There was no trace of the Devils around the ruins, and even the demonic beasts were rarely appearing, occasionally from the woods some common wolf species or wild boar species would appear, but before she could draw her bow, Nightingale had already nailed her daggers into their heads.

The passage of time seemed to become slow, in addition to her, around the hole were the other witches of the Witch Association, even if she wanted to talk to them to kill time she was unable to do it. Although the woman called Wendy looked very kind, Andrea had the determination to not talk on her own initiative.

As Dawn’s former upper nobility, being elegant and reserved were essential qualities of unmarried women.

Well, she could look for Nightingale to chat, she heard she once fought against Ash, but she doesn’t know who came on top. If she inquiries about that old match, it will count as gathering information, it’d not be like she’s taking the initiative to talk.

Well, this is just work.

She stretches out and pats the snow off her head, and as she’s about to start to walk, suddenly Nightingale jumps out and disappears in a heartbeat.

With that curly golden hair, it looked like an elegant noble woman gracefully leaning against the balloon’s basket, but in the blink of an eye she now lost trace of her. That reminds her, her ability seemed to be hiding her appearance.

Thinking of what just happened, Andrea calms down and pays close attention to the surrounding sounds. When one can’t rely on the vision, the ears and nose become the best way to locate the whereabouts of enemies.

Afterward she heard footsteps mixing among the sound of the wind.

Is it Nightingale?

No, that’s not it, Andrea felt goosebumps, the sound of these footsteps obviously didn’t belong to a person or a group of people, it came from the forest at the front, about a hundred steps away from her position! But after taking a broad view, it seemed like a quiet place, not even a shadow could be seen.

The sound of footsteps is closing in, damn, the enemy is invisible!

Just as she’s about to warn the others, a thundering sound resonates in her ears.

After the flame appears midair followed by a burst of wind, a strange shaped monster emerges, it has a narrow head as well as a pair of sharp sickles, it looks like a variation of a praying mantis, however it moves differently from the insect, this one was walking erected.

As the arrows from the gun hits it and shatters a side of its face, black blood was sprayed from its skull almost splashing on Andrea.

The monster came crashing to the ground loudly, and afterwards she saw Nightingale’s cloak and hood fluttering.

Followed by a second gunshot!

Damn, she was negligent! Andrea clenches her lips, she noticed all of it earlier than herself.

She summoned her magic power longbow, but she actually does not know where she should fire toward, she carefully walks back to the basket, and stands together with the other witches.

Four more gunshots and four more monsters drops dead, stroke down by a single blow.

When Nightingale appeared again at the side of a monster, Andrea puts away her weapon and walks quickly towards her.

„What is this?”

„I’m not sure if is a Devil or a demonic beast” she squats down to inspect the enemy’s body and sickle „from the blood color, it seems like it’s a demonic beast.”

„When did you discover them?”

„From the start” Nightingale smiled, „in the dense fog, their magic power shines like the stars in the night sky which makes them considerably conspicuous.”

„Can demonic beasts have this ability?” Andrea frowned.

The opposite party smiles „Uhh…… it’s probably a special type of hybrid species.”

At this time, the witches that went into the hole also happen to return, and in addition to the seven of them, Ash is carrying a blue haired woman on her shoulders.

„Did you rescue her in the ruins?” Andrea went ahead and said.

„Correct” Tilly nods „Let’s talk about the specifics inside Far Gaze while we return from this forest, it makes me feel restless. Right, did you encounter anything dangerous above ground?”

„A few hybrid species and demonic beasts came a few times but they are all dead” Nightingale shrugs.

The hot-air balloon quickly inflates and lifts off, the hanging basket passing over the tip of the trees, and it began moving towards the town. At this moment, Silvy asks in an alarmed tone „Gee, what are those things below? demonic beasts?”

„demonic beasts?” Andrea pokes her head out and looks in the direction of the ruins, but she couldn’t see anything.

No, there was something on the ground moving, the black blood of the dead monsters was being trampled and scattered, and the snow and soil at some points showed strange swaying from side to side, if one didn’t look carefully it was easy to miss these changes.

„Aren’t they those strange hybrid species?” Nightingale throws a glance at the tunnel „there’s probably over a hundred of them rushing towards the hole… …Were they attracted by that big bug? Do they want to eat it?” She yawns „well, it’s not related to us anymore.”

 

 

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