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Chapter 28: The Sealed Sword

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The silence of the four was suffocating. Siva knew he had to explain but don’t know how to begin.

After the incident that disturbed the neighborhood he was staying at, the four people that often visited him in the rest house was banned.

Now, it’s been a day with this suffocating silence, though they do not have the look that demanded a kind of apology or explanation, Siva was the one who felt that he more or less had to explain.

So the problem he had is where to begin, and that’s what actually torments his thoughts.

Meanwhile, only Agatha was the one who’s been trying to break the ice non-stop.

She was saying how cool his ability was and that he was so strong and that he was so handso—cute when he was doing it.

Then, when the little Hawkeye asked when did he learn such skill, with much difficulty, he just said he programmed his talisman to have Telekinesis.

He explained the basic principles of the Raijin ability set and the price of such power, thus the reason why they came to this silent mood.

The details of the weapon’s engineering was understandable when he mentioned «disintegration» so all he had to do is to say what the prices were.

Items.

Mental Stability.

The last one was a bit alarming.

“But Siva, were you really close to dying that day?”

Siva stopped walking and turned slowly at Samara. His eyes cast down, contemplating the right words to say.

“Yes. I… almost died.”

“We saw you motionless in the bench from my window in my room.” Asked Volt.

“That’s the Triple Bloom Meditation. It is a therapy to neutralize excessive brainwaves that can cause day dreaming. But it’s a rarer case of extreme hallucination on my part, so I was undergoing this therapy in order to control my emotional surges.”

“…”

“Sigh. As you can see, the Raijin ability set is indeed a strong skill set inside the game. But with the fact that RPG: Terroa is 90% reality, the rendering of speed against the human body is also close to 90% real. I can only use that if I abandon the fear of the feedback of the skill. And I can only abandon that fear if I…”

“If you snap out.” Volt was the one who completed it.

“So what we saw back then was the feedback?!” Siva nodded to Samara. “But what is that? Before that triple thing somethingation, we saw the doctors throwing red tainted cotton tissues in a trash bin. Were you bleeding somewhere?”

“My nose. I had a nose bleed. Well, I don’t know the details too, but I think what happened to me is the same as what jet pilots feel when they suddenly flip in mid air.”

“Ah!” This time, Hawkeye hit her palm. “Vertigo!”

Siva nodded. “That’s it.”

“But perhaps a little more extreme. I remember myself twirling on the floor and vomiting while having a nosebleed and being confused of left and right. I also felt like I was inside a washing machine. Like being washed by giant hands on different directions where my lower half was going left and my upper half was going right then reverse… every second.”

Far away, Volt and Samara used a tree as a support to try to pin their balance to their feet. An animation of a dark bluish region can be seen on their foreheads with the sound effects of “blurgh”.

Surprisingly, Siva was good in these kinds of stories.

As Engineers themselves, Samara and Volt understood the concept behind the instant teleportation of Siva on the monster’s head.

But Volt had a more pressing issue he was kind of hesitating to ask.

When he recovered, Siva’s back was already on them as they continued on to walk the general direction where Cassiopeia last went.

“Anyways, are we close to where you lost your drone’s signal?”

This question was posed to Volt. “Yeah.”

It was a few hours ago, when Volt’s group was trying to find the general idea of where they are, ten drones were dispatched to gather information and create a virtual map of the area.

But only 500 meters away from them, the drones died one by one, a sign that they were discovered by monsters.

It was then that Siva logged back in after a short pause to do something offline.

In the real world, it’s been close to 72 hours since they learned of Dex’s condition. Now, he’s been trying to get back for at least a few days in the game. First things are always first; they had to get out of this forest.

They told Siva that they were fighting A-ranked and S-ranked monsters just to defend his empty avatar. They were lucky to not come across another Lapis because they themselves aren’t positive enough to escape it.

Not having the same skill set that can kill a Lapis is also one of their concerns. Even then, Volt guessed the main reason as to how Siva was able to defeat a Lapis is because of his Killing Zone. Paired with a barrage of powerful hits every second, with impacts enough to render even a dragon unconscious, no monster could actually survive that.

And there’s also that unknown skill that made him immune to the «Pose of the King» effect.

With the speed of his execution, it was a nightmare for the monsters.

Moreover…

Now they know what that ability brings Siva. So now they come to this single conclusion. The price of his power is just too great. Though it was an unspoken fact amongst Volt’s comrades, it was already a clear reality.

They even saw what that “price” was and Siva’s explanation confirmed it.

In this VR world, there was something that bridges the gap of his avatar and his real body. Something was different in his rendering than just an ordinary system avatar. They knew that there’s something wrong with Dex, but they couldn’t confirm it.

All they knew is that that was the first and the last time they will ever see the Raijin Skill again.

Technically, Volt had already guessed the general build that Siva took. But he was yet to confirm it, thus the way his hesitation caused the current mood.

Topics dried off, even Agatha who talked and talked about how they fought monsters to defend his empty avatar is drained out of options. Her attempt to create an ongoing talk by using the topic of how they tried to take as much monster resources from the Lapis Lazuli as possible is already, also, dying out.

Siva paused and turned around to them.

With the look of hesitation, embarrassment, and of his shame as the one who brought these people with him, a whirlpool of conflicting emotions began to show on his face.

He opened his mouth but closed it. Shut his eyes and inhaled deep.

When he was ready;

"I’M SORRY! IT’S MY FAULT THAT WE ARE IN THIS PLACE SO I WILL MAKE SURE THAT YOU GUYS WOULD BE ABLE TO GO BACK TO THE CITY AS MUCH AS POSSIBLE!”

When he finished it all in one breath, he released the stress in a long sigh.

“Again, I’m sorry. And also, if you’re going to ask me about those people who helped me up during my sick time, I can’t answer you anything aside from nothing.”

That’s actually what he wanted to tell them.

Volt sighed and approached him. He punched his left shoulder up front and walked on passed.

“Well, that’s that and this is this. We really can’t force you tell us but at least by that, we at least know that you wanted to tell us but can’t. So now that it’s out of the way, we can focus our strength on getting out of here.”

Samara and Hawkeye walked off smiling at Siva while Agatha paused and took his arm with a flustered face.

“You’re Siva and Dex. We already know that you are in a situation you don’t want to be in because of your brother. We’ve been banned from stepping to your house again but it’s a different matter if we’re also banned from being friends with you in here.”

She actually said that with a smile.

Though still flushed pink, she was trying her best to be as cheerful and positive as possible.

For them, Dex is a friend who needed people like them to lean on. Though his guardians banned them from ever stepping close to his house again, at least, though it’s just 90% reality, this much friendship is enough.

All that’s left is “Rex” and not “Dex” telling them the real gist of things behind his circumstances.

But if he do, Rex knew that these kind people who saw him as a friend would suffer the hammer fist of the one called Augustus Laniary.

In fact, being with them right now is already a breach of the deal he agreed upon. The only reason he wasn’t being reprimanded is either they were still oblivious of his relationship with them or because of another reason he’s still not aware of.

Along these thoughts and fears, Siva remembered his baby brother.

With that thought alone, he felt the vigor that he’d been fearing of dying suddenly burned brightly. He don’t know when he’ll be able to see him again but he was sure that in some dark corners of Augustus’ smiling lips, he was the kind of man that will not abandon his word.

Call it men’s instincts, or professional law, but he had seen, or tasted, the darkness of Augustus and he was sure that this is just some sort of random test.

He is testing my limits.

But I won’t cry, sorry. I will fight. I will bring you that damn sword and shut your smiling mouth!

The image of Augustus smiling in his mind was replaced by darkness, and the darkness was then replaced by the view of the dim forest fog.

Siva’s senses kicked in, there was something up front!

Volt who’s been leading them stopped then lowered his body, and Hawkeye and Samara took left and right.

Agatha and Siva hid behind a large tree and the rest of them jumped off to find cover. Agatha saw Siva wore his black mask and a brand new cloak, but instead of his martial gear, he now had his sword.

From the expression and forming beads of sweat, with his trembling body, Agatha, as a nursing practitioner in real life, knew that these were signs of mild anxiety.

When she remembered what he said earlier about the feedback of using the Raijin ability set, Agatha bit her lips as she understood the reason why. With that reason, comes the effect on their formation falling off.

Meaning, Siva’s fighting ability has been reduced greatly, he can’t use his best moves anymore.

This is called trauma and it’s dangerous.

In other words, if Siva is a sharp sword able to stand toe to toe against S-ranked monsters such as a Lapis, in his condition now, he just became a sealed a sword.

All that sharpness, all that strength, that power, that all so grand ability to slay a great nemesis, gone.

Sealed in the sheathing of fear, with only himself that can help him, Siva’s Raijin is no more.