Chapter 37: Accidental Guiding
The entire safety zone descended into complete chaos.
Panic unlike anything Ethan had ever witnessed erupted in every corner of the underground shelter. Students shoved against one another, terrified voices rising into frantic arguments as fear consumed whatever composure they had left.
"A Corrupted Sentinel?!"
"We have to get out of here!"
"Are you crazy? Going outside is suicide!"
"If we stay here, he’ll find us!"
"Run!"
"No! Stay where you are!"
The shelter instantly split into two groups.
One desperately wanted to flee through the broken entrance before the Corrupted Sentinel reached them.
The other refused to move, convinced that running outside was no different from throwing themselves into the jaws of death.
After all...
To many of them, a Corrupted Sentinel was even more terrifying than the monsters from earlier.
At least monsters attacked indiscriminately.
A Corrupted Sentinel possessed overwhelming power, heightened instincts, and enough intelligence to track living beings. Plus if he knew where the academy’s safety zone was...
Then this shelter had just become a trap.
Unfortunately, the argument didn’t even last long enough to reach a conclusion.
A horrifying roar suddenly echoed from outside.
It wasn’t human.
Nor did it resemble the cry of any monster Ethan had ever heard.
It was a sound filled with unbearable agony, fury and madness all twisted together into something that made every hair on Ethan’s body stand upright.
Silence fell over the shelter instantly.
Everyone froze like frightened prey, not a single person dared to move.
BOOM!
Something slammed against the reinforced entrance. The entire underground shelter shook violently.
BOOM!!
Another impact followed, stronger than the first.
Cracks immediately spread across the academy’s protective barrier, the once brilliant golden shield flickering uncontrollably as if it could collapse at any second.
BOOOOOOM!!
The third impact shattered everything. The barrier exploded into countless fragments of light before disappearing entirely.
At the same time...
The massive steel entrance was blasted inward. Dust, shattered metal and broken concrete filled the air.
Then...
A figure slowly emerged from the smoke.
Ethan’s heartbeat nearly stopped.
"D...Drey..."
...No
That...
That didn’t look like the Drey he knew at all.
The man standing before them looked less like a human and more like a nightmare wearing Drey’s face.
His dark hair had become completely disheveled, strands falling wildly across glowing crimson eyes devoid of reason or recognition. Thick black veins spread from beneath his collar up his neck, crawling across half his face like living corruption. Dense black spiritual energy poured endlessly from his body, twisting and writhing around him like countless serpents.
His breathing was heavy and uneven. Every exhale carried an animalistic growl that echoed throughout the shelter.
The pressure alone was suffocating.
Students closest to him collapsed onto their knees before they could even react, unable to withstand the terrifying spiritual pressure radiating from his body.
"He..."
"He’s completely corrupted..."
The first scream finally shattered the silence.
Then another.
And another.
Within seconds, the shelter dissolved into complete hysteria.
Students scrambled over one another in desperate attempts to escape through the destroyed entrance while others rushed deeper into the underground chamber, crying as they searched for somewhere—anywhere—to hide.
Ethan hesitated for only a heartbeat before instinct screamed at him that running was undoubtedly the better option. He immediately got to his feet and prepared to flee.
He had barely taken few steps when a piercing scream echoed behind him.
It sounded painfully familiar.
Instinctively, Ethan turned toward the source.
His eyes widened so much they nearly popped out of their sockets.
"Jeff?!"
The very same strawberry-blond-haired boy who had kindly helped him move into his new dorm was now suspended several feet above the ground.
Drey’s hand was wrapped tightly around Jeff’s throat.
Jeff clawed desperately at Drey’s wrist, his face rapidly turning pale as he struggled for air. His legs kicked helplessly in midair, and judging from the way his eyes were beginning to roll back...
He was only seconds away from passing into the afterlife.
Ethan’s entire body froze. He genuinely had no idea what to do.
That was a Corrupted Sentinel. Not just any Sentinel...
Lord Drey.
One of the strongest students in the academy. Trying to stop him was practically suicide.
His rational mind screamed at him to leave.
Run and escape while he still could.
But another voice rose inside him.
A painfully familiar one.
The same foolish softness that had gotten him killed during the zombie apocalypse.
If he ran now...
If Jeff died...
Then Ethan would spend the rest of his life remembering that he had watched someone who had shown him nothing but kindness die right in front of him...
...without even trying.
"...Damn it."
Guess which side won.
Without giving himself another second to think, Ethan shoved his way through the panicking crowd and sprinted straight toward Drey.
"Drey!"
He grabbed the hand wrapped around Jeff’s throat with both of his own and desperately tried to pry it away.
It didn’t move.
Not even a little.
Sweat instantly covered Ethan’s forehead.
His arms trembled from the effort, yet Drey’s grip remained as solid as steel.
Grinding his teeth, Ethan looked from Jeff’s rapidly fading face back to Drey before shouting at the top of his lungs, hoping—praying—that some tiny shred of Drey’s consciousness could still hear him.
"Drey, stop! Whatever you’re doing, you’ll regret it when you realize you killed someone!"
As he shouted, Ethan instinctively raised his other hand and shoved hard against Drey’s chest.
The next moment...
Reality shattered, everything around him twisted violently.
The screams.
The collapsing safety zone.
The students.
Drey.
Everything single thing had disappeared.
Even the sensation of his own body dissolved.
His vision went completely white. Darkness swallowing everything.
"...!"
Ethan abruptly opened his eyes.
The first thing he noticed was the suffocating silence.
The second...
Made every drop of blood in his body turn cold.
"...What..."
His voice came out barely above a whisper.
This place...
It was horrifying.
The sky above wasn’t really a sky at all. Endless black clouds churned violently overhead, occasionally splitting apart as crimson lightning silently flashed across the heavens before disappearing again.
The ground beneath his feet resembled cracked obsidian, countless fissures spreading endlessly into the distance. Thick streams of black water seeped through those fractures like corrupted blood, releasing an unbearable feeling of oppression that made breathing difficult.
Farther ahead stretched an enormous sea.
Or...
At least it should have been one.
Instead of clear spiritual waters like his own Mental Sea, this one had become a vast ocean of pitch-black liquid that constantly rippled without wind. Every wave carried strands of corruption that slithered across its surface like living shadows.
Dead trees twisted unnaturally along the shoreline, their branches resembling skeletal hands reaching desperately toward the crimson sky.
The air itself felt rotten.
Heavy.
Every breath filled Ethan’s lungs with an indescribable sense of despair.
Occasionally, tiny mutated creatures no larger than rabbits crawled from cracks in the black earth. Their bodies were grotesquely deformed, covered in writhing corruption before disappearing back beneath the ground moments later.
The entire world looked...
Dying.
It felt less like standing inside someone’s consciousness...
...and more like walking through a world that was slowly dying.
"...Fuck."
Ethan slowly turned in a circle, horror filling his eyes.
"What the hell kind of decision did i just make?"
His breathing became uneven.
"This..."
"This isn’t my Mental Sea."
Not even close.
His own Mental Sea was small, but peaceful.
This place...
This place was a nightmare.
"...Drey’s..."
...Have I somehow ended up inside Drey’s mental sea?
Had the rampaging Sentinel mistaken their physical contact for Guiding?
"No..."
"I seriously didn’t mean to do that!"
"No..."
His first instinct was to leave.
Immediately.
Every fiber of his being screamed at him to run before this terrifying place swallowed him whole.
The problem was...
He had absolutely no idea how he had entered.
Which meant...
He had no idea how to leave either.
"..."
Although Ethan knew next to nothing about Guiding, standing here panicking wasn’t going to solve anything.
Taking a slow, shaky breath, he clenched his fists and forced himself to calm down.
He had unknowingly... accidentally... thrown himself into this mess.
That meant there was only one thing left for him to do.
Steeling his heart, Ethan slowly lifted his head, his gaze hardening with determination despite the fear coursing through every inch of his body.
"If I’ve already been dragged into your Mental Sea..."
"...then I’ll just have to guide you."
"...Even if I have to purify every last trace of your corruption myself."