The moment my boots pushed off of the ground, the first armored guard made of swirling mana reached my position in an instant. It raised its blade of black steel, flaring with Mana down upon me in an instant, causing my instincts to react on its own.

A burst of wind shot forward from my palm and collided with his blade, causing a brief moment for me to adjust and avoid it. But he was far from done, as its arm pulled back for another swing as quickly as before.

Without a chance to respond, my instincts sent a sharp pain through my side, alerting me that the second guard joined the fight. The first swing grazed my arm, and the second slice missed my face by a hair, but I still managed to dodge their combined attack by mere seconds. “so this is the kind of guards you get in a dungeon, huh... I think I’ll stick to upsetting those ridiculous Clans who think their special and above everyone else," I mused with some amusement as my boots tapped against the ground once more.

As I regained my footing, the two armored guards closed in on me once again, I knew the odds were stacked against me. Their synchronized movements made it clear that this was no ordinary encounter. I had to find a way out of this situation as I adjusted my stance in an instant, preparing myself for them again.

The first guard fixed its eery attention on me before the black blade of its sword flashed overtop me in a downward motion, while the second guard made its move to impale my back with its black blade. Both were an unrelenting force of strength and mana far beyond anything I had ever seen, as their attack initiated, I barely managed to dodge in time as my instincts felt the lethal threat of the incoming blades, but yet again, their blades connected into the empty air.

I took a moment to adjust to my new position. Their coordinated attacks were testing the limits of my agility.

Every moment counted, but the armored guards never gave me a second to breathe. Every slash or thrust, they were always ahead of me "Guess I've stumbled into quite the challenge," I muttered to myself, running thin on ideas before I felt a small smile of amusement tug on my lips, “There’s no doubt Kairo knew about these things. I really have no choice but to jump…” I said in annoyance.

My hand reached into my satchel and grabbed the artifact from Kairo, as the two guards moved in on my position for the last time. I wasn’t about to continue to play on their level, they had every advantage, and they were clearly too fast for me to avoid their blades at this point.

Without delay, I ran toward the side of the bridge, where a void of darkness awaited. I felt a moment of hesitation before jumping to my demise. A grin overcame my features as I leaped into the darkness.

I was in a free fall of darkness for a brief moment before my eyes were filled with a silver light, which came from the Artifact Kairo provided me with. I only felt a chill as the energy that radiated from this object began to engulf my body, but what really made me feel a sense of unease was the undescribable manifestation of power that began to take shape in front of me.

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Like a tear in reality, a hole that pierced my instincts with dread and unease, something I wasn’t used to feeling. It wasn’t because this hole was something unknown to me. It was simply that the source of it was disgusting, and my instincts screamed for me to stay away.

But the silver light from the Artifact remained unchanged as the hole in reality swallowed my being for a moment, there was no sense of gravity or time. I only felt unease like I was tangled within a web of time that wanted me to stay still for eternity.

That ended with a sudden jolt forward and onto the ground as I fell out of the Artifact and onto a cold floor with a small thud. I groaned at the sudden impact, where I was only met by a dark atmosphere that surrounded me.

A wave of mana from all directions could be felt, I wondered if what I had just experienced was a form of teleportation, but there was something off about it. My new surroundings were no different as the air itself felt thick, and the darkness gave me the feeling of suffocating.

I stood up and dusted the dirt off of my pants before my eyes adjusted to a Topaz like gem that seemed to float in the air with an orb of light surrounding it.

“…”

I could only give a blank stare at this object, but the sense of familiarity pierced through my senses, it was almost like déjà vu, that seemed to trigger something within me, but I wasn't quite sure what it was.

My footsteps approached the object that sat on a pedestal, I couldn’t sense any danger here, yet it called to me. Something urged me to grab this object. I knew somewhere within me that this was no doubt the Artifact Kairo wanted, it made sense after all I went through to suddenly appear in this strange place.

While I approached the pedestal, it wasn’t hard to miss the Runes faintly glowing on the ground all around it, and this place didn’t feel like reality. It felt as if I was standing in a pocket of time that was frozen in place. A place sealed away from the rest of the world.

My steps reached the pedestal, and the Artifact of Topaz waited for me to take it, the second I wrapped my hand around its warm surface, the runes of this place lit up and began to glow intensely, and in my palm, this Artifact felt like a slow pulse, warm to the touch with a powerful rhythm, almost like it were alive.

My body began to ache and pulse with this rhythm, as if I were consuming it. No it was like it was forcing itself back into my very being, coursing through my body as a pain overcame me, increasingly becoming more intense until I fell to my knees, with blurry vision fixated on the topaz artifact in my hand, unable to do anything but watch as my body became engulfed by it. It felt strange yet so right… familiar.

In my daze, I felt something that calmed every inch of my body, it didn’t come from the Artifact or the Topaz gem but a presence I could sense, it was soft yet powerful and seemed to be telling me that everything would be okay.

This presence was no doubt someone I knew, yet I couldn't place who it was, all I knew was that I felt comfort as a golden light basked my entire being. In the end, I wasn't left with the answer to any of this. My eyes fluttered shut, but the moment before the world faded, I felt a sudden wave of power and knowledge surge through my mind like it was always meant to be.

This was a core overflowing with Mana. A core that once shook the world.