Chapter 74
“The smell of death.” Part 5
It was the second time since she had arrived in this world that she had woken up amidst a sea of the dead.
What the hell was going on here? She thought, but silence was her only answer as she stared at the thick black glass walls that she was sure had never been there before.
And in the midst of them, over sixty bodies of half-humans and elves with heavy armor, swords, shields and spears lay on the floor on both sides of the corridor.
Kalysto bent down, touching the neck of the corpse closest to her. Noticing that the body was still warm, though it had no pulse.
She grimaced, not wanting to think about what that meant.
I killed all these people? She panicked. Well, to be exact it wasn’t properly “me,” but still. But that didn’t erase the guilt she began to feel. Besides, they not only kidnapped me but tried to kill me, so it doesn’t count as murder but self-defense, right? She tried to convince herself, and after a few minutes of watching them in silence, she nodded her head. Yes, it was only self-defense. She said to herself, remembering the libidinous hands of the boss these perverts worked for.
And the guilt she had begun to feel disappeared, transforming into a cold rage.
“Time to loot!“ She whispered coldly. Observing the bodies with a different perspective, noticing the small brown leather bags tied around their waists.
And as she took a quick glance around, she noticed a small brown bag resting right next to where she had woken up. Next to another one, a couple of centimeters larger, filled with potions.
Kalysto arched an eyebrow at the sight. And she looked through them. Taking out the potions that were in the small bag and putting them in the larger one.
Though she doesn’t seem to be the most sane person on the planet, Persephone can be quite considerate. She thought, being aware that a part of her actually wanted to justify her, and that the status quo they had maintained for years would not be broken. But she quickly dismissed that illusion. She was surely saving them for herself.
And Kalysto spent the next half hour stripping the bodies of as many things of value, except for their heavy armor, as she could gather. From their swords, which she was able to stuff almost all of them into one of the brown bags, plus potions, two hundred gold coins, one hundred and fifty silver coins and three hundred bronze coins. Along with a ring that changed her hair color to ash blonde.
“All right, time to go get the books!” she said, taking one last look at the corpses. Wishing she could pick up her spears as well, but apparently they took up too much space and the enchanted bags wouldn’t take them. Besides, she didn’t have that much free space in her inventory, so she could only get hold of two of them, the ones that had the most stats and seemed the most expensive, along with a shield.
Unfortunately, none of them had arrows that she could add to her collection.
So she started walking among the bodies, almost stumbling to avoid stepping on the toes of one of the bodies, when her right hand accidentally touched the wall made of black crystal. And a violet-colored window opened before her.
[Does the user wish to absorb this dark crystal?]
[YES/NO]
Those words immediately aroused her curiosity, and she pressed on the ‘yes’ button.
And the huge wall covering the entire opposite end of the corridor, which was previously made of solid black crystal, began to transform into ashes and smoke. As the ashes fell to the ground, the smoke transformed into dark energy that entered her body.
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[Congratulations! The user has acquired 200 DMP!]
[Congratulations! The user has acquired 300 DMP!]
[Congratulations! The user has acquired 500 DMP!]
[Congratulations! User has purchased 800 DMP!]
[Congratulations, the user has purchased 1000 DMP!]
[Warning: the user has acquired too many DMPs and has exceeded her body’s capacity to hold them! It is recommended that a Dark Mana circle be created to increase its capacity.]
And before she could finish reading the warnings, she fainted.
By the time Kalysto opened her eyes again, it was night.
And a violet-colored window was in front of her.
[The Absorb skill has been leveled up to level 4!]
[The Absorb skill has leveled up to level 5!]
Yeah, good for it. She thought with some irony. Then she closed the notifications.
The light of the two moons shone in the sky and she groaned at the severe headache that invaded her. And when she tried to move, her whole body ached as if she had been hit by a truck.
“Okay, no more dark mana overdose, for me," she groaned. Inventory! -she whispered, even so in the face of the intoxicating silence that flooded the place, her voice seemed to echo against the walls.
And as soon as the two windows opened before her, she pulled out the last bottle of holy water her boss had given her upon accepting the new mission, and took a swig.
“I definitely need to level up ‘Blessing’ before I run out of holy water reserves," she whispered. And while she tried to be alert against any noise that might indicate that she was no longer alone, she walked towards the room where the merchant’s body lay. As she felt the particular itch of the holy water healing her body.
The room was much worse than she remembered.
And although she felt that it had been an eternity since she had been there, she was aware that it had only been a couple of hours. The lights from some of the lamps that had fallen to the floor were still working thanks to the glowing white crystals. Kalysto didn’t hesitate to pick up a couple and put them in one of the many enchanted brown bags before starting to collect all the books.
She ignored all the ones that dealt with history and politics. And while there were a few about economic that caught her attention, she tried to concentrate on the ones that dealt with magic or ancient languages. Though there weren’t many. So she went on to look for valuables and the strongbox. It took her more than fifteen minutes to find it behind a painting, and she wanted to bang her head against the wall for having wasted so much time looking in the hidden drawers of his desk, when it was the typical place where in almost every movie they hid the safe deposit box. Although in the desk she found another two hundred gold coins, so she didn’t consider it a complete waste of time.
She spent another ten minutes looking for the key to open the safe deposit box, which was inside the locked drawer in the desk of the perverted elf, whose key was hanging against his neck. And she took the opportunity to remove his rings, one of which had room to hold up to ten items in the enchanted jewel with which its center was decorated.
By the time she finally opened the strongbox, her jaw nearly dropped off her face.
Not only did she find a couple of books on magic in there, along with a bag full of emeralds and another with another type of gemstones that she didn’t recognize and that she was sure she would spend some time later on identifying them and take advantage of to raise her skill level, along with a couple of mithril bars and another bag with a thousand gold coins. But inside were 3 small bottles of holy water along with a good collection of high quality potions and a skill crystal.
And in the middle of it all, a solitary ring.
Kalysto stuffed everything into one of the leather pouches enchanted with semi-infinite space and then stuffed them into her violet inventory.
“Inspection!” she whispered, realizing that she had spent too much time looting her kidnappers, and it was best to get out of there before she was discovered. But she was too curious about this ring, and the obvious way it had been kept, indicating its importance over the other objects around it.
A pair of windows opened before her.
[Shapeshifter Ring. Class: Epic. Changes the wearer’s gender and appearance when activated. This item will bind to a new owner only after the previous owner has died. The new owner can assign a new keyword for activation along with the desired appearance. Spends 20 MP for every hour of use, and 100 MP when activated for the first time and the desired characteristics are assigned. You can only choose the appearance of the selected shape once, before the first activation. ]
Kalysto blinked in surprise when she read that, as she imagined how many perverted things its previous owner had done with this ring. She then purified it several times while smiling, then put it away in her inventory.
The amount of things I can do thanks to this! She was excited at the idea.
And after she finished emptying the strongbox, leaving only the documents about contracts that didn’t interest her at all, she took a last look around the room.
She picked up a couple of black crystals, and put them in one of the brown bags along with another white crystal that emitted light and then took the homestone out of her inventory as she approached the destroyed window to admire the scenery for the one last time before leaving.
But what she saw chilled her blood.
The entire city had been destroyed.