Chapter 208: Exhaustion
Chapter 206
"So, where do we go next?" Kai asked, his voice echoing as he looked around blindly, feeling the soft air rustling from the various tunnels embedded in the rock.
Trish said nothing, nor did she offer any advice whatsoever.
She simply remained standing in front of the wall with a calm expression on her face, seemingly unbothered by the precarious situation they were currently in at the moment.
’Where are we? How is there a whole different system beneath the surface of this planet?’
Trish wondered inwardly as she scanned the darkness for a few seconds.
Kai sighed deeply when he received no response from the girl.
He eventually looked away from her, trying to decide what the next course of action should be.
But then, a rhythm broke the silence.
Tak. Tak. Tak.
The sound of a delicate pair of footsteps echoed through the cavern.
Trish was walking forward carefully until she reached Kai’s position, passing by him and using the rustle of the soft wind emanating from the tunnels to guide her path.
"Ohoy~ where are you going?" Kai asked, sensing that she was moving further and further away into the gloom.
Trish gave no reply as she continued walking cautiously, being incredibly careful not to trip over any unseen obstacles in the dark.
Finally, she reached the crossroads where the tunnels were lodged in the wall, maintaining a stoic expression.
"Let’s just pick a random path," she finally uttered.
Kai frowned at the suggestion.
"A random path? What if it leads us somewhere dangerous? What if we fall into the throes of some deadly abomination we know nothing about?"
Trish remained silent for a few seconds before turning around to face Kai with a calm, steady smile on her face.
"Then we will just have to kill whatever attacks us."
Kai wanted to retort.
He wanted to argue that he was currently too weak to be of any real help.
He wanted to point out that he had depleted a significant amount of meta-force and that staying where they were for a while longer might allow them to regain whatever energy they had lost.
But then he closed his mouth.
He knew the truth: the longer they lingered here, the slimmer their chances of actually escaping would become.
Left with no other choice, he sighed deeply in resignation.
"Fine then. Let’s go," Kai uttered, wobbling forward until he stood side by side with the girl as they prepared to choose a tunnel to navigate their escape.
***
In another cavern, Felix and Chloe could be seen.
They were currently sitting down, positioned a significant distance away from one another.
Chloe could not see anything in the oppressive dark, and the lack of vision was bugging her tremendously—especially knowing that Felix was a werewolf who could likely see perfectly in the gloom.
This realization irked her, as she didn’t know if he was sizing her up as a snack or perhaps... staring at her weirdly again.
Thinking that, Chloe shifted closer to the wall while her fingers twitched.
She remained on high alert, ready to unleash her ability if Felix tried to do anything strange.
"Oh please. I’m not interested in doing anything with you, so calm down," Felix snarled while rolling his eyes in the dark.
Looking in another direction away from her, the young werewolf stared intensely into the various tunnels carved into the walls.
"... I might like women a lot, but as a werewolf; I can’t stoop so low as to have them against their wills. We aren’t humans."
Chloe lifted an eyebrow at those unexpected words, her suspicion momentarily replaced by intrigue.
"’We aren’t humans’? What exactly do you mean by that?"
Felix turned his gaze back toward her and frowned. "You know what I mean."
He decided to say nothing further on the matter, returning his focus to the tunnels.
Several seconds passed in tense silence.
They had already spent several minutes together in this cavern without Felix making any suspicious moves.
After his earlier declaration, she felt her muscles relax just a little.
Then, a spark of curiosity arose as she turned her gaze back in Felix’s direction.
"How has it been, being a werewolf? I know it’s practically awesome with the superhuman strength, speed, endurance, and vision. That’s why I wanted to become a were—"
"— It’s tiring."
Chloe paused at Felix’s sudden, blunt interruption. "Sorry?"
Felix sighed deeply before looking in her direction again, a small, weary smile playing on his lips.
"Don’t get me wrong. Being a werewolf is awesome and I would never trade it for anything in this world.
Especially considering my reputation, title, and who I actually am in the werewolf hierarchy. But," his gaze dropped down as he stared at the ground for a moment before shaking his head.
"... It’s tiring considering who I am and what is expected of me. That place suffocates me to the core.
There is no freedom to do what I want. I am always being forced to adhere to stupid rules... rituals and so on. And I am always forced to fully transform into a monster at a set period of time without knowing who is friend or who is foe. It’s exhausting."
Looking back at Chloe, he sighed again, his voice dropping an octave.
"You had requested that my brother and I turn you into a werewolf back then? Ha.... Yes. I don’t have the power nor the authority to do so, but have you considered what you would be throwing away if you actually became one?
Firstly, you could die from the initial ritual phase before the transformation even takes hold. Sorry to say, but with how pathetically weak you are currently, you wouldn’t even survive that, let alone a full moon."
Chloe fell silent at the werewolf’s harsh assessment.
Her hands were clenched tightly in anguish, her knuckles turning white.
"Yeah. You don’t have to remind me how useless I am," she said in a low voice that was easily picked up by the werewolf’s keen ears.
Noticing his blunder, Felix blinked and was about to raise his hands to apologize, but he suddenly paused.
His ears began twitching continuously, catching a sound from the distance.
Shooting upright like a bamboo stick, he moved so fast that Chloe was rattled by the sudden motion.
"Wh-What happened?"
Without giving much of an explanation, Felix grabbed Chloe by the arm and roughly pulled her to her feet before bolting in the direction of the many tunnels.
"What’s going on?!" Chloe shouted as she was dragged along.
"Brother. I can hear my brother fighting."
That was all Felix said before he scooped Chloe up in a princess-carry style.
He leaped upward with explosive force, landing perfectly in the opening of one of the tunnels before disappearing into the darkness.