Chapter 293 (2/2)

I walked off without another word Regis started to follow me, but I stopped him

Stay with Ezra Watch hi

‘Aye aye, captain,’ Regis said, eager to have a task to co me sit with the keystone

Five looe No matter how far I walked down that hall, I always seemed to be only a few steps away from the fountain It was like the aether trap that protected the djinn’s underground city back in Dicathen, where—hopefully—my family was still sheltered

All my life—my second life, that is—I’d been surrounded by artifacts of the djinn: Xyrus, the castle, the teleportation network…upon my reincarnation, I had accepted it all as nores’ accomplishments or make any effort to learnon ReadNovelFullonlineco me back now? The ways in which the djinn passed down their knowledge were much more complex than textbooks and tutors Even when threatened with extermination, they had not been able to teach the Indrath Clan their secrets, because the dragons weren’t capable of learning the way the djinn did

I had exhausted the capabilities of my current method It was hard to admit but, without a fresh perspective, I wouldn’t be able to learn what the keystone was trying to teachinto practice a orize everything I knew about the djinn and aether I thought through every lesson from Lady Myre, Sylvie, and Elder Rinia I relived my battles with the retainers and Scythes, as well as the aether beasts within the Relictoe replay in my mind and recalled the words of the djinn projection

The probleh about relics or how the djinn had used the up in the Relictombs, my exposure to relics themselves was entirely limited to my ti half forgotten in e rune

I withdrew the dead relic I’d won in Maerin and began inspecting the dark, unimpressive stone, but only a moment laterthe hall,approaching, both his steady gait and poise expressing a refined sense of grace despite his haggard cracked lips and sunken cheeks Re how valuable even a dead relic was for Alacryans, I quickly hid the lumpy stone away

“I didn’t think you’d be the type of person to carry around a dead relic,” the green-haired ascender said as he raised a brow, a hint of judge you use to charm materialistic nobles?”

I rolled my eyes “Yes This is what I use to seduce all of the attractive wo that your physical appearance isn’t enough?” he added with a soft chuckle

“Are you co me? I can’t quite tell,” I said, unsure whether I was a took a seat a few feet away fro uninterested in the supposedly rare and expensive ancient artifact that I held in my hand

“I’ll admit that, objectively, your facial features can draw so,” he noted before clearing his throat “Anyway, things turned rather tense earlier”

I rubbed the back of“I—”

“You were right, though I think you handled it well” Haedrig reached out, hesitated, then pattedMy apologies”

I shook my head “It’s okay I needed the distraction”

“Ezra would probably disagree,” Haedrig responded as he got back up to his feet, the corner of his lips curving into a s out a chuckle, I focused my attention back on the dead relic init, the stone was bland and uninteresting It was the type of rock a child htlessly kick out of the road

I pushed aether into the dead relic, the sa happened Next I tried to draw the aether out of it, but stopped immediately I could tell there was very little aether still contained within the dead relic, and I didn’t want to blindly destroy it for such a paltry ah, I took a glance at Haedrig, as seated back on the bench beside the fountain in a meditative state

With a flick of my wrist, I tossed the relic into the air, watched it arc up until it nearly touched the low ceiling, then snatched it out of the air as it carasp at, I slipped the relic intoain

As I next pushed through the purple wall into the realm within the keystone once ed The previously co the present and past within the eometric shapes—my puzzle pieces—had drifted apart inI could see, but there was a static charge, a sort of latent energy suffusing the atathered and sorted the pieces, hoping the sensation I felt was so achieved by e of aether Yet when I had the pieces in front of ht into the edict

Like when I followed the aetheric vibrations that allowed h space, I letin the wake of the electric hum It seemed to fill the space, to fillspot where it was clearer,aether like a pair of forceps, I reached into that node and pulled soh

The dead relic

Stunned, I watched as the unexceptional rock drifted through the air, just like the other shapes I’d found in here Instinctively, I pushed aether into it, as I had tried while sitting in the dark in the hall of h surface of the stone shattered as if it’d been struck with a haht The diamond dissolved as it spread its radiance across the keystone realht touched, I felt the dull ache of sudden growth, as if eo white hot themselves, and suddenly I understood Just like when I was building the cube that became theinto the present, the pieces practically presented theether

In , I nearlyin my mind, and my focus turned toward the cube

Theto fend off Ada, as free of her bindings She clawed and bit at hith, but hewas crawling out of the fountain,slowly as if dazed A trickle of blood from his ear diffused into the water and stained his cheek and neck red

Theand the fountain were nearly all shattered, now revealing only the void beyond

Ezra was running along the hall, dragging Riah’s dead body behind hiis was nowhere to be seen

Abandoning all thought of finishi+ng the dodecahedron now, I tried to open my eyes, to leave the keystone realm, but I couldn’t Whenever I approached the smoky purple barrier, my consciousness flicked back to the incoeo to be placed

da had rolled clu toward Ezra The young ascender pulled back his arreen-haired ascender, and Haedrig threw hiave Ezra the ti Riah’s body the rest of the way to the horned ascender’s mirror My stomach dropped as I watched him yank the corpse around and press the dead hand to thethe puzzle pieces again,as quickly as my aetheric manipulation would allow At the sa outside of the keystone

In theout of theinto Riah, just like when Ada had touched her own mirror

Riah’s eyes shuttered open and two black voids stared up at Ezra With one hand, the boy arding off Haedrig with his spear, and with the other he reached down to offer his hand to Riah When she took it, Ezra flinched, practically jerking away frohtened around his until it looked as if his bones had cracked

Haedrig dashed forward, grabbing the spear and shoving it back and up, cracking Ezra under the chin with the shaft and knocking hiy fro away and shattered several nearby mirrors

All three forms lay prone on the stone floor for a moment Riah, or Mythelias in her body, was the first to an to push hian to bubble and grow, forrenous club of a foot

Next to hi fro on his flesh, the skin around theray His face isted into a tortured, terrified screarowths rapidly subsu was left but a twisted, Ezra-shaped luis was nowhere to be found

While all this was happening, I had been working feverishly to finish the dodecahedron, unsure exactly ould happen when it was complete I knew I couldn’t leave until I’d finished the puzzle; I only hoped I would be in ti, his spear blazing ahead of hi away from the attack, Mythelias came up to his feet with Ezra’s spear in hand, and immediately became a storm of cuts and strikes that forced Kalon to fall back into a defensive stance Even then he see-quick assault

Mythelias kept pressing Kalon, but this put Haedrig at his back Whether he had lost track of the green-haired ascender or discounted Haedrig’s ability, Mythelias was focused entirely on the last of the Granbehls when Haedrig struck

The thin blade punched through Mythelias’s back, just to the left of his spine, then ripped outward through his side, half-severing his torso just below his ribs and leaving a horrific, gaping wound Before I could so ain, and a hard black scar for, Mythelias cut at Haedrig’s ankles with the edge of the spear-blade, then let the spear’sit up for a thrust to the heart that Haedrig just barely parried

Within the keystone real into place, but I was distracted by the scene playing out on one face of the pyra up to the present, and was nohat had happened onlyup and down the hall, Regis prowling behind him like a murderous shadow The boy had a nervous furtive look about hi around like he expected to be attacked at any e of the fountain, his feet in the salt water Kalon was checking the bindings on the false-Ada, so we had to do frequently to keep the phanto Ada’s body

As Ezra approached the fountain, his nervousness cemented into a look of dark determination He suddenly took a sharp step to the side and activated his crest

My heart ha across the water and head first into the edge of the fountain Kalon was tossed backwards so I couldn’t see his

The is was thrown through an open fra into the emptiness on the other side