Chapter 577: Finger

Raynred's shrill cries bore into the soul of all those who heard them.

He wanted to claw at his throat, anything to get that foul blood out of his body, but without his arms, he had no ability to do so.

He wiggled against the earth, trying to use the dirt, gravel and concrete in place of his hands.

Blue veins surged through his body, crawling up his neck like grotesque worms wiggling beneath his skin.

BANG! BANG!

He bashed his head against the ground, his own face deforming even more even beneath the strain.

Aina picked her ax up from the ground, using the buildings as leverage to leap back up to Leonel who was still in the sky.

They both gazed down toward Raynred, but neither spoke a single word.

Leonel's teeth clenched hard. Even after Raynred accidentally pierced through his own throat with a sharp bit of rusted steel, he still didn't feel like it was enough.

He watched with a cold expression as Raynred bled himself dry, his convulsions and gurgling cries etching themselves into the memories of all those who heard them.

Just as his life was about to fade, Leonel reached out a hand, a strong surge of Soul Force tearing into Raynred's mind.

At that moment, shrieks only Leonel could hear resounded. Even in the last minutes before his death, Raynred experienced pain the likes of which he never thought possible.

All of his pride and haughtiness had long since vanished. If he could have, he would have begged and pleaded.

Leonel closed his eyes, watching the final moments of those he once thought of as friends, knowing they wouldn't be coming back.

'Pisces.'

Leonel's heart trembled. He wanted to see blood.

**

Hutch's body floated face first in the waters, three corpses pooling around him.

He struggled up, but his body was simply layered with too many injuries. Under the suppression, the pain he had experienced at the hands of these three was unimaginable. But, even then he managed to take one of them down even before the Puppet Master relinquished his control.

After Leonel succeeded in drawing that bastard out, the battle should have been easy. But, by then, the old man had already suffered too many injuries. He had no choice but to go all out near the end to eventually squeeze out a victory.

That final effort left him without anything left. He could hardly keep hold of his machete or even flip himself face up, let alone stand.

The old man flipped over eventually, his wounds spurting with blood. He didn't have the courage to look around, but he was sure that the death count wasn't small. Unfortunately, this battlefield didn't gain the support of The Empire like The Capital had.

'I'll just... take a nap...'

If the old man was honest with himself, he really wasn't sure if he'd wake up from this one.

"Grandfather."

"Mm."

Hutch continued to float in the water, facing the slowly rising sun. But, he didn't have the strength to open his eyes.

In contrast, Elorin was still wearing his pristine white tracksuit. There didn't seem to be even the slightest speck of dust on him.

His hands were buried in his pockets, looking up at the rising sun as though he was doing it alongside his grandfather. Whether he was aware that Hutch's eyes were closed or not was unknown.

After a while, Elorin crouched down, Hutch's weak snoring traveling to his ears.

He grabbed onto his grandfather's machete. Even in such a state, it took him no small amount of strength to pry it free.

Elorin looked from the blade to his sleeping grandfather. Though his arm and wrist were incomparably steady, his index finger's trembling gave him away.

He had always had a habit of holding onto a machete with just three fingers and his thumb, his index finger pointed parallel to the blade.

In his youth, his grandfather had tried to beat this habit out of him, claiming it destabilized his strikes. But, even after so long, Elorin had never managed to get away from this habit.

As he grew up, he found breaking out of this habit only became more difficult.

Elorin rose his grandfather's blade to the latter's throat, the trembling of his index finger only growing.

In all of this, though, he looked no different from a youth kneeling by his only remaining family. His face was expressionless, his gaze steady. However, the trembling of his index finger only grew.

The blade rested against Hutch's neck. Just a little pressure and one of the bodies most vital arteries would be cut.

As a veteran of war, it was simply impossible for Hutch to not sense something with the end of his life so near. But... there were two factors holding him back.

The first was that he was simply too tired, he had no strength to speak of left...

And the second... was that there were few people he trusted more than his own grandson...

At that moment, Elorin suddenly looked off into the distance.

A surfboard shot through the skies, a furious aura being carried along with it. The sea's surface alone seemed to boil beneath this might, the stilling water's surface suddenly beginning to churn once again.

Elorin's wrist shifted, placing the blade down on his grandfather's chest.

"Someone come and help my grandfather." He spoke emotionlessly.

In swift movements, what remained of the medical units made their way to the old man's side. It soon became obvious that Hacker Hutch had entered a deep coma, but his vitals were stable.

They couldn't help but look toward Elorin in reverence. There was no way the old man should be in such a stable situation. The only explanation was that Elorin had done something.

However, very soon, not many could focus on Elorin at all. Or, rather, it was as though their attention had been split in two directions, no one knowing who the main character of the current situation was.

The surfboard came to a grinding halt.

Leonel's fury bubbled forth.

"Pisces.. Get the hell out here."