A Journey Unwanted

[Realm: Uhorus]

[Location: Galadriel]

[Western Outskirts]

They had both seen enough—truly seen it. There had always been a pattern behind the chaos, a logic buried beneath something that otherwise appeared mindless and endless. The tears that poured forth from Abyssal Creatures were not random. They reacted, adjusted, and then defended. And when confronted with something overwhelming, something far beyond what they were accustomed to handling, they did not simply continue as they were—they overextended, pouring far too much energy into a single response.

Lucinda exhaled slowly through her nose, her grip tightening just slightly along the hilt of her blade as her gaze remained fixed on the distant, shifting silhouette of the Abyssal Creature. Its form had grown again, its proportions more exaggerated, and its presence heavier, as though the air resisted it.

("I suppose I never bothered with large-scale spells or deliberately flexing my mana like this...") she thought, the realization settling in idly. ("The Abyssal Creatures up until now were far too weak to justify that kind of effort. It seemed too unnecessary at the time.")

Her fingers adjusted along the grip again.

("But now...") her eyes narrowed just slightly, the crimson in them sharpening as she studied the creature more carefully, ("this is different. This one forced a response, and it forced me to escalate.")

The wind dragged across the open plain, tugging at strands of her pale hair, carrying with it the residue of scorched earth and something far fouler beneath it.

("And it’s odd...") she continued internally, her thoughts slowing ever so slightly. ("Someone like Mirabella... with how destructive her output naturally is, she should have triggered something like this before. She should have noticed this pattern and defensive reaction.")

Her brow furrowed slightly in consideration.

("Unless there’s another condition. Something more specific than just raw power or perhaps something about how that power is applied.")

The thought lingered, incomplete, but she let it rest. There would be time to revisit it later—if there was a later.

For now, there was only the present.

Her stance shifted with her weight settling more evenly, and her shoulders relaxing just enough.

("I’ll have to use a lot more power than before.") Her gaze lifted slightly, turning briefly toward the sky—the fractured expanse where the tears pulsed, their edges trembling almost imperceptibly. ("If I want to make sure those tears stay closed, I can’t hesitate. The moment I push against them directly, they’ll respond the same way—overcompensate and divert everything into defense.")

Her grip tightened fully.

("But it won’t be enough.") The thought was calm and certain. She was not arrogant, merely resolved.

Meanwhile, in the distance, the Abyssal Creature reacted.

Its body shifted, as ever it felt wrong even at a glance. Its elongated frame bent forward unnaturally, joints compressing at impossible angles, its torso folding as though gravity had suddenly changed direction for it alone. The violet markings along its body pulsed once then sharply intensified.

Lucinda did not move, but it did.

Not gradually or with any warning beyond that brief distortion of posture, it shot forward. The ground beneath it broke violently, a sharp concussive burst tearing outward as its mass displaced the earth, launching itself with such force that the space it occupied a moment prior seemed to collapse inward. Air split around it, a violent rush following in its wake.

It reached her in an instant.

There was no time for anyone to react. No time to think, reposition, or even consider defending.

But Lucinda did not flinch.

Even as its elongated arm rose overhead, far too fast, those blade-like fingers curving inward as they descended toward her with lethality, she remained still for that fraction of a second longer than anyone else would have dared.

Then she moved, she dipped, her body lowering just enough for the creature’s limb to pass over her head, the force of its swing dragging the air violently in its wake, a sharp whistle cutting through the space where she had just been.

Her heel pivoted, and her entire body followed. The motion was seamless as she spun, her left leg lashed out. There was no wind-up as her strike connected squarely with the creature’s midsection. The force released immediately.

It erupted outward in a shockwave, a violent burst of energy that detonated from the point of impact, cracking the already damaged ground beneath them and sending a visible ripple through the air.

The Abyssal Creature’s body distorted around the strike, then it was launched.

Its elongated form snapped backward as it tore upward into the sky, the sheer force of the kick sending it hurtling through the air at a sharp angle, its limbs trailing behind it as though struggling to keep up with the rest of its body.

A low, thunderous echo followed in the wake of the impact, rolling outward across the plain.

Lucinda did not pursue; instead, she completed the motion of her spin, her foot settling back against the broken ground with a step as she turned her gaze upward, tracking the creature’s ascent for only a moment before her attention shifted beyond it—to the sky itself.

Her blade moved next, with a smooth motion, she drove it downward into the earth beside her. The steel pierced the broken ground with a dull sound, anchoring itself firmly.

Her hand lifted for a moment.

For a few seconds, it remained raised toward the fractured sky, fingers slightly curled as though she were already grasping something that stretched far beyond the visible. The pressure in the air thickened, dense enough that the grass at her feet bent flat against the ground, the soil beneath her sabatons cracking further in creeping fractures that spread outward.

She inhaled once.

Then spoke.

"Technique Development: Partial Ascendance."

The change was immediate.

Her white hair ignited.

Not with flame in the conventional sense, but with a blinding, fire-like brilliance that surged upward in a burst of white light. Each strand seemed to dissolve into light, flowing like fire, its edges flickering with a heat that did not burn the air yet distorted it all the same. It cascaded upward and outward, as though gravity had lost its hold on it entirely.

Her eyes followed.

Crimson turned incandescent.

They burned with a sharp, piercing intensity that cut through the dim, corrupted light of the sky above.

Then the aura came, it erupted around her. A violent surge of white mana detonated from her body in a sudden expansion that shattered the ground beneath her completely. The earth collapsed inward under the force, forming a deep crater that spread rapidly outward, the shockwave ripping through the terrain in a wide radius. Dust and pieces of stone were thrown into the air, suspended for a fraction of a moment before being violently cast aside.

The air screamed.

That was the only way to describe it—the pressure and the density of the aura, it forced the surrounding space into a strained, trembling state. The very atmosphere warped around her, bending under the weight of her presence.

The ground quaked with low vibration that traveled outward in waves, as though the land was struggling to stabilize beneath her.

Lucinda did not linger.

The aura still roared around her form as she bent her knees slightly—just enough. Then she launched, the movement was instantaneous.

The ground beneath her detonated further. The crater deepened violently as she shot upward, the force of her ascent compressing the earth beneath her before releasing it in a massive burst that sent debris erupting outward in all directions. A deafening boom followed, trailing her ascent as the air struggled to fill the vacuum she left behind.

She became a streak of white, she was nothing more than a blazing figure tearing through the sky with such speed that the distance between ground and the skies collapsed into irrelevance.

Above, the Abyssal Creature reacted.

It did not remain idle this time.

The moment her presence surged upward, the creature responded with immediate and aggressive adaptation. Its already distorted form expanded further, its limbs thickening and elongating, its torso swelling as though fed directly by the energy spilling from the tears above. The violet markings across its body flared violently, pulsing in rapid succession as Abyssal Energy flooded into it.

It grew.

Its arm—already disproportionate—expanded to an even more grotesque scale, the limb twisting as it gathered momentum before lashing outward in a wide, sweeping arc aimed directly at the ascending Lucinda.

The air split around the swing, a violent shockwave preceding the strike itself.

Lucinda did not slow, her gaze locked onto the incoming mass, her expression unchanged as her hand moved, she clenched her fist.

Her arm drew back only slightly before she drove her fist forward. In the moment of impact, there was no resistance. Her fist tore through the massive limb as though it did not exist, the force behind the strike overwhelming whatever density or adaptation the creature had attempted to manifest. The arm split instantly and violently, the structure of it unraveling under the pressure.

But the strike did not end there.

The moment her fist broke through, the light followed.

A concentrated burst of blinding white erupted from the point of impact, expanding outward in a violent surge that erased it. The Abyssal mass caught in that burst disintegrated instantly, its form collapsing into fragments that were consumed before they could even scatter.

The light surged upward, condensing and focusing. What began as a burst became a beam—a massive, blinding pillar of white that erupted from Lucinda’s strike and continued its path without interruption. It carved through the sky with overwhelming force, the sheer intensity of it causing the air around it to rupture in repeated concussive bursts.

Boom!

Boom!

Boom!

Each successive shockwave rippled outward as the pillar ascended, the sound echoing across the open plains below like thunder.

Lucinda did not stop.

Her body followed through the strike, her ascent continuing as she drove the attack further, guiding the pillar upward. Then there was impact once more, the beam collided with one of the tears. There was no gradual resistance or any visible struggle.

The moment the light made contact, it detonated.

A massive explosion of white engulfed the tear instantly, the rupture expanding outward with violent force. The structure of the tear collapsed inward under the pressure before being completely consumed, its edges disintegrating into nothingness.

But the destruction did not remain contained, the explosion expanded outward and rapidly at that. The force of it surged into the surrounding space, catching nearby tears within its radius. One after another, they were swallowed by the expanding blast, their connections severed and their forms destabilizing before collapsing entirely.

A dozen tears were simply gone. Erased in a single, overwhelming detonation.

The shockwave that followed was immense.

It tore through the sky in a visible ripple, distorting the air as it expanded outward before slamming downward toward the ground below. The plains shuddered under the impact, the already broken terrain breaking further as the force pressed into it.

For a moment, everything stilled.

The light began to fade, the pillar collapsing inward as its purpose was fulfilled.

Lucinda hovered in the aftermath, her aura still burning around her form, her gaze remained fixed on the sky.

On what remained.

"...That should be enough to prove the theory," she said quietly, her voice was not triumphant or relieved. Her eyes narrowed slightly as she assessed the remaining tears, the small strain in their structure now more visible than before. "But it’s far from over."

Her hand flexed once at her side, the white aura flickering in response.

"They’ll adjust again or whatever’s behind them will."

But now, they could push back.