A couple meters out from the entrance to their base were countless bones strewn across the ground along with half-eaten bunnies. Standing in the middle, was a humanoid figure.
The reason calling it human wasn’t exactly the correct term, was because of the current appearance. There was no skin or hair on that figure. The muscles were fully exposed, but most of them were partially gnawed through or ripped out altogether.
Though they weren’t in full view, there were multiple gaps where bone was visible. Overall, there wasn’t much left. Though it was hard to see, there were organs on the floor opposite to the figure.
And they were human organs.
Though one could probably tell that it was human, so much of it was stripped away.
And the only person that this could be, was naturally Sydney. It didn’t immediately register to the people in the group, but by connecting the dots, they could come to this conclusion.
She was currently standing, facing away from the group.
Nicole slowly reached out.
“M-Mom?”
Kairos furrowed his brows. He didn’t know why, but felt like Sydney was still alive, and very much so.
Nicole took a shaky step forward, but Kairos put one hand on her shoulder. Nicole turned to look at him with a shaky expression.
“W-What?”
Kairos did not respond. He just kept looking at the figure at the front silently.
Chase couldn’t help but close his eyes in pity, murmuring to himself.
“…To lose both parents in one day. A pitiful child.”
The flesh covering Sydney’s body was twitching strangely. It moved in such a way that made it seem as though they were individually alive. Almost like they were parasites blending in to look like muscle.
Kairos suddenly narrowed his eyes.
“…She’s regrowing.”
Nicole gasped.
“Wh-What?”
Tori was originally looking away, but after hearing that, she paid close attention to what was left of Sydney. Although it was hard to see from how erratically the flesh was moving, it was indeed regenerating.
The process wasn’t the fastest, but it was at a rate that could be seen by the naked eye, which was rather startling. It did not take long for the gaps where the bones were exposed to grow over.
Slowly, the muscles were restored to their original condition. Then, skin that was at a slightly red shade regrew on top. Even the hair slowly regrew into long yellow hair, when she was previously bald just a moment ago.
One other factor was the intense waves of heat her body was emitting. It was almost as though there wasn’t a person there, but an actual fire. Despite standing a few meters away, it felt as though a warm blanket was being laid upon their faces.
Nicole was trembling slightly, overwhelmed by the rollercoaster of emotions she faced.
“M-Mom?”
Sydney raised her head slightly. It seemed that she had heard that. However, immediately afterwards, she fell down to her knees before collapsing face-first into the floor.
Nicole ran up.
“Mom!”
Kairos also hurried after her.
Nicole crouched down next to Sydney and began shaking her gently.
“Are you ok?”
Kairos lifted up Sydney’s face, taking care not to be too forceful. There was a small frown on his face, as he half expected to see something horrifying.
…But it was just her normal face, currently with the eyes closed.
Sydney’s nose moved ever so slightly, indicating that she was breathing.
Kairos let out a soft sigh.
“…She seems fine.”
He was honestly still a little creeped out, trying to justify what he just saw. That level of regeneration just… didn’t make sense. There shouldn’t have been enough energy within her body to even regenerate to that extent.
Another thing that Kairos noticed was that the red mark she initially had on her forearm was now gone.
Sydney definitely looked extremely emaciated right now, but it didn’t change that the amount she regenerated did not make sense.
Suddenly, Chase spoke up.
“Hey…”
Kairos looked up.
“What?”
Chase furrowed his brows as he looked off into the distance.
“I can’t really tell for sure, but I think there are things coming our way.”
Kairos clicked his tongue and looked at Nicole.
“Help me carry her back.”
Nicole hastily nodded before lifting the side of her up. Kairos did the same, but with only one hand as he was still holding a tiny ball of fire with the other for light.
The process was a little awkward, but they were able to fit in the door as foreboding howling sounds resounded.
Kairos furrowed his brows.
“I’d rather not fight them as I’ve already used up all my mana.”
Chase nodded.
“…Likewise.”
Tori didn’t seem to be against it either, so they all went inside the place. However, as Kairos was about to slide the door shut, visions flashed by his mind.
He saw the wolves eating the bunnies, tearing up their carcesses for a split second.
Then, these strange red monsters with red hairs sticking out of them feasting on the dead wolves.
Before he could get a better look at what they were, his vision shifted to himself, lying down on the floor with his eyes wide open and blood spilling out of his mouth. He was on the floor of his base, while the surrounding walls were all destroyed.
Kairos visibly shook when that happened.
His previous visions were pretty straightforward, telling he would turn into a monster if he was too exposed to either the red sunlight or red rain. However, he wasn’t too sure what this one was trying to tell him.
Despite feeling overwhelmed because of that vision, he grabbed onto the side of his head and ran through various possibilities.
Nicole gently touched his shoulder.
“Are you ok?”
Kairos did not respond.
Instead, he suddenly pushed aside the door and walked outside. He pulled out the red prism while he was at it.
Kairos murmured to himself.
“…The smell of blood.”
Though before, he was concerned about the usage of the red prism, not wanting to waste the energy, that suddenly changed.
Several tall walls began rising from the ground, encompassing every single bunny corpse and trail of blood. Along with that, many slightly oversized wolves came into view, running deftly.
Chase furrowed his brows.
“What are you doing?”
Tori frowned, hesitating on whether or not she should help.
Because the building of walls wasn’t exactly fast, they were able to directly jump over them easily as they were being created. Their eyes seemed to glow in the dark night as they rushed over to Kairos, teeth bared.
Though there were many wolves approaching him, Kairos still focused on creating the walls.
Nicole shouted.
“Watch out!”
However, Kairos had already seen it coming. He suddenly threw himself to the side, letting a wolf brush right past him. Though there was more where that was coming from.
He was quickly surrounded on all ends by the wolves. They spent a few seconds just watching him. Chase knew that even if he wanted to help fight, there was nothing that he could do. However, he rummaged in his bag before pulling out a flashlight.
He turned it on and pointed it towards the ground so that the glare wouldn’t get in the way.
Though the wolves were still staring, Kairos did not have the same intention of standing around. He suddenly lunged forth, reaching out with his hand that was holding the fireball. It shot out, hitting one of the wolves in the head, creating a small explosion and lighting it aflame.
Veins immediately began to bulge around the wolf’s body. Kairos just so happened to know that when veins bulge, one of the reasons was that the body was sending blood to the surface to cool down.
However, before he thought any more about it, he whipped with his leg, smashing it against the side of that wolf.
[Killed Creature – 0.1 points awarded]
Right after, he dashed past the now dead wolf, escaping the encirclement before the wolves had any time to react.
By now, the walls were tall enough for Kairos. He began creating a roof to close it all off.
At the same time, the wolves dashed towards him.
Kairos’ focus was currently sharpened to its peak. And that wasn’t because of the wolves dashing towards him, but the anxiety that came from his vision. He felt that if he did not close it off fast enough, that his death was almost certain.
As the wolves closed in on him, Nicole, who still had the red watch on her, seemed unable to handle standing by anymore.
She rushed forth, but all of the attention was on Kairos. Though she was able to plunge her axe into the body of a wolf, forcing one to engage with her, it didn’t change the overall situation.
But Kairos somehow seemed completely calm. He took off his glasses and threw them over to Chase, who caught onto them. And at that moment, the wolves pounced.
Similarly, Kairos also moved, dashing forwards and sliding down.
As he did so, he kicked upwards, slamming hard against one wolf’s ribcage and cracking it.
After picking himself up, he came face to face with another wolf that lunged towards him. He dodged just barely enough to the side, and the wolf ended up biting down on the tail of the already injured one.
Amidst its painful cries, Kairos leaped on top of it, catching the wolves off-guard. Almost immediately, he felt the difficulty of maintaining balance, but was able to stay on with the combination of his high agility, his future vision, and peak focus.
One wolf couldn’t wait and lunged forth anyway, but Kairos was able to time it so that he smashed his fist down on the top of its head. The wolf was forced down, but kept its mouth still open on instinct.
Then, it bit down on the wolf Kairos was standing on.
After taking a deep breath, he slammed down against that wolf’s skull once more, causing it to crack.
[Killed Creature – 0.1 points awarded]
Kairos could feel his knuckles stinging badly from that, but he wasn’t too focused on that. The wolf he was standing on began running around as it howled in pain, trying to get away from its comrades that suddenly started biting, and also trying to shake Kairos off.
But he wasn’t coming off any time soon.
The wolf swerved from side to side, but it would never catch Kairos off guard. He was able to respond accordingly, and remain on top.
At the same time, the roof was nearly halfway finished, just with a hole at the top that needed to be formed.
Logically, Kairos should’ve felt reassured as he was almost finished closing the place off, but for some reason his anxiety was only growing.
From outside the walls, a strange muffled bristling sound resounded. It was almost like someone was running their finger down a toothbrush, but far louder and rougher.
The wolves got closer once more and would occasionally pounce towards Kairos, but he was able to bat them away. Though he could’ve chosen more lethal methods, he currently just wanted to close off the gap.
Soon, there was only a meter wide circle in the ceiling. Considering this would just take a few seconds, Kairos began to calm down.
However, his body suddenly tensed up.
A faint red light was cast down, coming from the hole.
That was because a giant eye was looking down at all of them from that hole. It was right next to it, and the iris itself was unable to be fully seen because of the size of the hole.
“Found you.”