Chapter 312

Ascendance (XIII)

Quinn slowly opened her eyes, scanning her surroundings. It took her but a second to realize she was perched inside a tiny opening in the side of the canyon’s cliff, looming over one of the many passages. She tried to use Mana once again but to no avail. Sighing, she looked around the opening and, seeing that there was nothing there, peaked outside.

She could already hear some people in the distance, and even occasional low growls of beasts, but elected not to blindly pursue. Recalling back the rules, she recited them to herself quite a few times. It was clear that they’d have to play the game--the same way that they had to play it when the Towers descended. These were the whims of creatures beyond the scope of understanding. Fighting back... was pointless.

Even getting angry was pointless. Despite the unfairness of it all, she couldn’t complain, only comply. As such, the first thing she decided to look for was a weapon--she didn’t know just how large of a canyon this was, and if she ran into another person weaponless, her years of experience would hardly do wonders for her.

Carefully scaling the brown-dyed and rugged rocks of the canyon, she reached the dusted bottom decorated in dying weed and pebbles. Every so often, she noted a smudge of reddish brown, as though at some distant point in the past the entire part of the cliff had been dyed red in blood.

After inspecting the immediate surroundings, she began to slowly move along the edges. The canyon’s curves were midway sharp, some six-seven hundred feet of visible distance before the road curved too much. That meant that she had some four hundred yards of visibility to work with, working both in her favor as well as against her.

A few yards were definitely knocked off due to the low visibility resulting from all the dust, but that was more prevalent at the greater heights, strangely enough.

Sticking to the edge, she reached a tiny cut in the cliff, similar to the one she woke up in, and braced herself, taking a deep breath before storming inside. There was nobody there, however, just darkness--and a tiny glimmer of light in the shape of a scroll. She approached it and picked it up, the glimmer of violet shaking in her hand for a moment before it expanded, transforming into a sword.

It was an ordinary-looking sword. In fact, it was the kind she used to wield long, long--beyond long ago on the first floor of the Tower. And yet, even that made her much calmer, offering her a net of safety. Settling her breath, she left the opening and started looking around for the openings like these and, more importantly, any traces of the shimmering light.

She came to an abrupt halt, perking her ears; footsteps approached, hurried and unmasked. Quickly identifying the location, she scurried to one of the protruding rocks and hid, grasping the sword tightly in her hand. A few seconds later, a silhouette flashed past her, but before it could go much further, she stepped out and stabbed forward, easily piercing through their heart.

At the same time, she flung her free arm forward and grasped the figure’s mouth, preventing them from crying out and alerting others. Twisting the sword, she ended their life and dragged them back toward the opening.

It was a man, appearing to be in his late forties, but not someone she recognized. After tousling about and not finding anything on him, she left, once again braving the canyon’s winding paths.

Some were narrow and some were wide--some splintered and forked, and some just abruptly ended by a sky-high wall. It was unlike any other canyon she’d visited in her life, as though it was handmade for games like these.

Probably was, she mused inwardly, sitting perched on top of a precipice looming over one of the canyon’s many roads. It’s already been three hours since she woke up, and save for the one man she encountered, she hadn’t ran into anyone else--or found anything else, for that matter.

In part it was because she avoided going toward the directions from which she heard the rumbling sounds of fighting. Instead, she preferred to go the safer routes, exploring in hopes of finding either new weapons or the ‘Void Scrolls’ that the voice spoke about, whatever they may be. She suspected they were likely one-time use skills, but couldn’t be certain.

Furthermore, for the first time in eons... she felt hunger. Usually, she would just charge her body with Mana and eat for the taste and the social value of it, but now... she felt genuine hunger.

“What was it... Timebeasts?” she mumbled, recalling back the voice’s rules. She had never heard of ‘Timebeasts’ before, but in the field of people, they’d likely be easy to recognize.

Sighing, and having rested and scouted the nearby surroundings, she descended again and began threading the other paths. Eventually she ran into yet another opening within which she found a bow, strapping it to her back. Though she was far from the best archer, she had learned the basics of nearly all weapons, and bow seemed like a good choice to use here.

It was roughly five hours since she woke up that she ran into a Timebeast--the reason she was certain of its identity was that it looked entirely out of place. It was a dog-shaped, yet eagle-headed and bat-winged creature that seemed to have been force-bred into existence.

The very image of it was an image of suffering, so much so that Quinn doubted it was even edible. Nonetheless, seeing as the alternative was literal cannibalism, she approached until she was some eighty feet away, the distance at which she was relatively comfortable with shooting a bow.

The bow didn’t come with ‘arrows’, so to say, but one would appear in her hand if she imagined it. It was strange, but she didn’t question it--she’d, after all, seen stranger things.

Nocking it, she took a moment and exhaled before letting go. The arrow whizzed violently, quickly crossing the distance and lodging itself into the creature’s eye. The latter screeched in pain and swiftly began charging toward her, causing her to put the bow away and draw out her sword. Rolling to the side to dodge the charge, she immediately got back up on her feet and ran forward, stabbing and slashing at the creature’s exposed rear.

The latter thrashed violently for a moment, the bat’s wings flapping in a seemingly desperate attempt to fly, but failing completely. In the end, the creature cried out lowly one last time and toppled, dying.

Quinn took a deep breath and collected herself before walking over and beginning to skin the creature using her sword. It was... difficult--in part because she was entirely inexperienced, but in part because both the creature’s skin as well as its meat were incredibly hard. In fact, after going through the entire creature that seemed to weight least five hundred pounds, she found five-six pounds of edible flesh that wasn’t like rubber.

Sighing, she packed it all in the void pocket--it worked the same as inventory, she realized, only with limited space.

As she was quite hungry, she wanted to eat--but could hardly even consider the idea of eating the meat raw. On the other hand, she had no means of starting a fire. Recalling the dying weed and leafless trees hanging about the canyon, she first decided to go and pluck some together, and work from there.

**

Far beyond the sight of those stuck inside the canyon, three souls were viewing the entire thing in silence. Though Lear felt uncomfortable at the start, he’d gotten gripped by it. Thanks to Cain, who created a skill to translate what he saw into a screen, Te’gha and Lear could watch it without seeing it in slow motion.

Jesus, this is just straight-up a battle royale, Cain mused, pecking away at a piece of beef jerky.

“Stupid human, who do you think will win?” Te’gha suddenly asked, having finished his fish.

“I dunno,” Cain replied. “Quinn? But I plan on busting in there before the whole shit blows up.”

“H-huh?! Why?!! Stupid, stupid, stupid human! Great Te’gha won’t allow it!”

“... fuck, you’re really addicted to this shit, huh?” Cain looked oddly at the cat for a moment. “It’s ‘cause there ain’t no way in hell the winner will be given his winnings. You really think that thing can make someone a Demigod? What do you think Lear? Can it?”

“Of course not,” Lear shrugged. “If it was that easy to become a Demigod, all of us would have become one.”

“Right? Right? They’re just being fucked with,” Cain said. “And I will let my sadistic side reign for a little while ‘cause it’s kinda fun, but I’ve gotta intervene eventually. Plus, I highly doubt this was the first of the ‘games’, and that means...”

“... the stupid thing is loaded?” Te’gha asked.

“The stupid thing’s fucking loaded. It’s the return, baby.”

“Kekekeke~~”

“Hahahaha~~” Lear watched the human-cat pair in wonder and awe and confusion and a bit of fear. Both had expressions that screamed ‘thieves of all thieves’ on their faces, hardly bothering to hide their intentions.

“Are... are you really gonna rob him?” Lear asked.

“Huh? Is it robbing if we’re robbing a robber?”

“... yes?”

“Weak human, it’s not!” Te’gha chimed in.

“That’s right. Great Te’gha and Wise Te’gha has spoken. It’s not. Hahahahaha~~”

“Kekekeke~~”

“...” Lear was stunned into silence, turning his attention to the field down below, almost wanting to scream into the void ‘I don’t know these guys!’.