Kazen felt goosebumps rising on his skin, as a sense of horror pervaded his heart. He'd only been flying towards the Singularity a moment ago...and now he'd appeared in this eerie place?

Ahead of him, for hundreds of meters lay the reddish-black coffins with frosted glass covers, similar to the one he was in now. Those countless coffins also seemed to have the reddish black tubes attached to their corners connecting upwards, towards the gigantic reddish black orb on top of him.

He tried to turn his body around, only for his face to scrunch up in pain due to feeling stiffness. It was only then that he started shivering, as he noticed the blue smoke rising from his coffin.

I need to get out of here...need to find a way to heat myself up...

He forced his legs over the rim of the coffin, as he landed on one feet first, before clenching his teeth and throwing the other leg over the rim, landing both feet on the smooth gray-slated ground.

In his panic and confusion, he'd forgotten about what he was supposed to do for a moment, before he finally somewhat came to his senses.

Flexible...I need to find something flexible!

He remembered his abilities which held the power of converting properties to elements, then tried to search for flexible items in the surroundings. He then realized he could use the tubes coming out of the coffins. He immediately slowly trudged over to the coffin ahead of him and enclosed his arm around the pipe from the top-right corner of the coffin. As made sure to channel just the slightest bit of 'Flexibility' of the coil into 'Flame' to heat himself up, he tried to look through the frosted glass of the coffin he was at.

He couldn't notice anything since the whole glass was stained white, and he considered prying open the coffin for a slight moment.

Then the memory of him recklessly charging towards the Singularity appeared in his mind, as he dropped the thought of opening the coffin. He didn't want to act recklessly and put himself in a worse situation.

If only I'd been intelligent enough not to do something stupid like that...

He then turned his head around to look at the other side which he didn't manage to see, only to see even more coffins extending further into the distance. The only difference was that a hundred meters ahead was a walking pathway that seemed to extend through the entire hall. As he traced the walkway, he noticed that there was a huge gray door with embroidered patterns of vines with thorns jutting out in even intervals.

As he observed his surroundings, he finally felt his body heating up slightly, as the coil that was slightly flexible now had become as stiff as a rock while still maintaining its curved arc. A sense of pleasure spread through his body due to not feeling as uncomfortable as he was moments ago.

He then tried to absorb some mana to replenish his core, when his mind turned blank.

No...what the hell?

He realized...the rate at which his core was losing its mana was a lot faster than the rate at which he could absorb it.

It's this place...I need to get out of here!

Even in his panic, he could very faintly sense small bits of mana being channeled to the huge central orb in the ceiling through the tubes. Maybe, that was the reason he couldn't absorb any mana?

He immediately started walking towards the gray-door in the eastern end of the walkway. When he tried to walk faster, his entire body screamed in pain, so he did his best to walk there as much as he could, while frantically absorbing whatever mana was available to him in order to slow down the rate of mana loss.

After some time, as he finally reached the gray doors, it suddenly started opening inwards, causing a cloud of dust to fly into the air on both sides of the door as a screeching sound that indicated signs of age echoed through the hall.

Kazen...or Julius, as he remembered his name to have been, froze on the spot as he started circulating his mana slightly more quickly, as he extended his mana perception to cover the floor. He would be able to absorb its properties in case of any emergency.

And as the crack in the door was wide enough, the first thing he saw was an elegant woman with blonde hair falling to her shoulders, staring at him with her deep sapphire eyes that were barely visible beneath her cap. The black cap had an insignia in the center that displayed a spear, coiled around which was a vine with thorns, and she wore a blue uniform with black lines running across the sides.

Behind her were two groups of what seemed to be soldiers, judging by their standardized uniform of blue and black, kneeling down, pointing weird sticks that had some semblance to the 'rifles' which had recently emerged, as a product of the western Kingdom of Zassia's Mechanic's Guild branch.

The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

Kazen's heart started thumping due to his nervousness, and just as he was about to channel whatever mana he could get the blonde woman suddenly sheathed her sword. Then, she spoke, "...Who are you?"

* * *

"Alert! A Harvester from Hall E of Harvesting Facility A-24 has been released! All non-combat personnel are to evacuate the premises of the facility immediately! All combat personnel are to report to Major Aileen for further orders! I repeat, a Harvester..."

The people in the facility were panicking, as many of them rushed to figure out how to deal with this unprecedented event by trying to dig through the manuals they'd been given when first enrolling to work in this facility.

"Major! What are your orders?"

Major Aileen glanced at the dark-skinned man with white hair in front of him, as she replied with her brows furrowed.

"Gather Platoons 4 and 5 with their weapons drawn, and immediately report to me in from of Hall E. I have to go there first in case the Harvester somehow makes an early escape."

Hearing this, the dark-skinned man hesitated for a moment, but shook his head. He saluted, started to head off.

Aileen knew he was worried she might lose her life pointlessly, but she didn't have any other choice but to take responsibility, since this happened under her watch. Even if it she wasn't to blame for this sudden occurrence.

"But still...Captain Hazef?"

Hazef turned around right as he was about to exit the room, as Aileen replied with a grin, "Try not too take too long, I'd very much like to stay alive too."

Hazef's face loosened just the slightest bit, as he saluted once more and continued on his way.

Now then...I need to head to Hall E

She immediately exited the room, and started running through the hallway right as people were evacuating in a surprisingly orderly manner, given this kind of event was happening for the first time in what was probably close to two thousand years.

She channeled the moonlight through her body and into her sword, as it slowly started to resonate with her circulation of moonlight. As she ran, her mind raced with the possible reason as to why this had suddenly occurred.

Did the idiots from the Antessian Empire somehow already reach the depths of the Ancient Forest? Did they release the seal? Or...has there been some problem with the moonlight fence on the roof?

She immediately stopped for a short moment, as she identified one of the lead technicians of the facility, Jacob, evacuating as he was running her way. She immediately grabbed his collar right as he was about to pass by her, causing him to let out a yelp.

"Jacob. Go get your group and check on the moonlight vents on the roof. Make sure there's nothing blocking it right now. Is that understood?"

"But Major...the evacuation procedure-"

"Right. Now."

Jacob let out a sigh, then nodded and saluted before he ran off to gather his group.

With that done, she continued on her way, and after a minute of running, she finally turned into an alley which led to a wide pathway, and soon reached a gigantic grey door with thorn-like engravings on its surface. On the top right, outside the door and attached to the wall was a huge screen that displayed an emaciated black-haired boy whose fringes covered the eyes slowly trudging towards the entrance of the door.

He wore a white robe with blue lines around his sleeves, which came up to cover half his fist, and was making his way towards the entrance.

"Major! Platoons 4 and 5 reporting!"

Aileen nodded, and pointed a 2 with her fingers behind her. Immediately, each platoon took a single side on the back and to the sides of Major Aileen, as Captain Hazef positioned himself to the right side of the door, right below the huge screen which had a lever beneath it. He placed his arm onto the lever, as he waited for the signal from Aileen.

Aileen waited for the boy to get closer, breath by breath, and once he was relatively near the door, she waved her arms, causing Hazef to pull the lever.

The doors suddenly started grinding its gears, and slowly opened, causing dust to fly into the air. As the group stayed on alert as they held their positions with bated breaths, the door finally opened enough such that a thin figure could be seen suddenly freezing in place.

As Aileen heightened her senses with moonlight to focus on him, she felt...what she believed was mana running through his body, which gave her a shock.

Even though he definitely is losing the mana in his body by the second...how is he able to channel it without his core bursting?

Although there were certainly some Awakened in the Forsaken Continent that could forcefully channel mana, but they had to at least be B-Ranked Awakened in order to do so, and they would have to expend quite a bit of moonlight to suppress the side-effects of doing so.

As for the boy in front of him, she didn't detect a shred of moonlight within him. It was quite possible they didn't even have something called an Awakening Ceremony two millenniums ago. How was he able to channel mana within his body, when humanity was only known to be able to channel moonlight? Were the constitutions of Harvesters fundamentally different from ordinary people like her?

They weren't in Alethea, but were on the Forsaken Continent, so how was this possible?

In her heightened vigilance, Aileen was about to channel her moonlight to forcefully bind the Harvester in place. It was then that she noticed something. Although the boy was trying to hide it, his hands that were covered by his robe were shaking.

As she looked into his eyes, she could see a hint of fear in the boy's eyes, as he was staring at her with his eyes widely open.

She felt a sudden pang of sympathy.

Perhaps...might we have exaggerated this incident?

He looked like he was simply afraid as well. However, she still kept in mind that she could be wrong, and it was just an act.

She changed her mind on forcefully suppressing the boy by force, and loosened her grip on her sword, cutting of her channeling of moonlight. She sheathed her sword, and decided to just ask him and settle this incident verbally, "...Who are you?"

The boy suddenly seemed surprised for a moment, then responded, "My name is Ju...no. I apologize. Let me introduce myself properly."

"My name is...Kazen."