[Psychokinetic] Eyeball Pulling - Chapter 231:

The barrier shattered. And yet the mage who was responsible for creating the almost impenetrable domain didn’t so much as twitch his eyes. His entire mind was focused on one job; to keep his mana channelling into the impervious shield.

Astrid hopped forward in preparation for the horrors approaching. If the mage broke his concentration and instead focused on attacking her, she would be caught by both sides with nowhere to run.

She tensed. But the approaching monsters stopped with a grim snarl. They didn’t dare approach. Whatever had happened here had taught them not to interfere with the mage’s magic. Whatever had commanded that obedience was obviously far stronger than Astrid.

Astrid summoned a purple energy in her palm. Block this, she thought as she fired a mass of chaotic void energy to the man’s body. It engulfed him entirely. The man had no defence. Instantly, his body crackled. Then he screamed. For the first time, his eyes opened. A golden figure with a gilded mask and golden eyes gazed at Astrid from within.

He wasn’t alone.

Together with him, was the Leviathan in the middle. Seven individuals on its right, and at least a dozen black robed figures to its left. Astrid recognised them; they were the Order.

Those are the same golden eyes I saw when in Darcy’s mind. The one who severed the connection.

In the next moment, the man responsible for the unbreakable barrier died in a blaze of void energy. The quality of the void made it look like the man’s body was shoved through a grinder. In moments, he was erased.

With the man dead, the horrors looked at each other in confusion. Shit, Astrid thought as the monsters realised something. They weren’t an intelligent bunch, given that Astrid’s illusions could so easily redirect their ferocity to her clones. But they were smart enough to sense that the situation had changed. The man that they were feared of interfering with was now dead. And the woman wasn’t as scary.

They pounced at Astrid.

Astrid tore up into the sky and blasted them with copious amounts of Crashes. She took out chunks of heavy voidbent metal and pushed them downward. Thwum. They shot down like boulders from a ballistae. They struck the Horror’s, smashing their body with a dense thud and a crack.

Astrid didn’t focus on killing them. Instead she averted her entire focus to crippling them. Her target was the wings. And they weren’t as strong as the thick bones supporting their frame.

There were eight of them in total. It was enough to weigh panic down on her heart. She cut the wings of five of them as she dodged in the air, but the strongest of them were also the fastest. Evading her psychic attacks, one of them slammed its fist against her barriers, shattering them all in a single strike. The monster’s fist continued, colliding against the golden armour hugging her chest like a second skin. Pain blossomed. The hit was absorbed, mostly, but Astrid didn’t escape unscathed.

She hurtled through the air as another approached. She dodged, blinking to the side, blasting its wings off with another Crash. Her attack was unavoidable.

There were two left now. The one that had struck her fist was rushing forward. But the other was already at her side. It swiped its claws, noticing that its companion had failed with blunt force. It raked against Astrid’s shoulder, tearing through her flesh. The claws continued, scoring her flesh deep until they met with the golden armour. Sparks flew, the hit was absorbed, but pain gnawed at Astrid.

She snarled and blasted its wings apart. Astrid then blinked, finishing off the other monster’s flight capabilities. They all fell. The first of them had finally struck land. Without wings to save their fall, Astrid was awarded the kill confirmation. She gained Levels, but Astrid was in no mind to gaze at her System.

Returning to the island with the strange markings, Astrid summoned an expansive illusion field. Whatever entered would come out on the other end confused.

She had to, because whatever was powering the sigils on the middle of the island was still running. Astrid could feel the connection still being made to the barrier back in the bubble. Her work was unfinished.

I need to hurry, Astrid thought with worry.

Entering her Psych Domain, Astrid crouched down and touched the sigils on the ground. They were still pulsating with pure mana, guiding it to the dungeon gateway, somehow. Astrid didn’t understand it, but all she needed to do was to destroy it.

At first she tried erasing the lines with Crash, blasting holes in the island. But the lines remained. They weren’t drawn on with chalk. Instead they floated in the air. Even if she erased the entire floating island, the sigils would still remain.

She didn’t even know if her own mother was still alive. Or Leena, Lisa–Astrid shook her head. She reminded herself to focus. If she couldn’t destroy it with force, then there had to be another way.

Using Psych Domain, she followed the lines of mana and looked into the distance. It was where the dungeon entrance was. Astrid ignored the lines heading off into the distance and deployed her entire focus to the sigils instead.

A thought blinked into her mind. She got to work at once. Just like she had done with Matter Absorption and the corruption back at Mount Hullbeck, Astrid used it to gain an understanding. At first she didn’t expect it to work, but thankfully, the sigils turned into a map within her mind. Six points surrounded the centre.

And in the centre was a container. A mana container. It was the source of the abundance, never ending stream of mana. She touched it, sending her mind within. A new world met her eyes. It was a vast world of pale, ice blue; the colour of mana.

Although Astrid didn’t understand the fundamental workings of the magic sigils, she was now connected to them. Now that she was within the inner workings, it was easy to remove the foundations. It was like removing a brick from a building, one Crash at a time. The walls crumbled. The mana escaped. If there was a powerful mage in the vicinity, they would see an enormous vortex of mana tower in the sky. It lasted two minutes before there wasn’t a spec of mana left.

Astrid finished her work and found herself back into the dungeon world.

She checked Psych Domain once more, and just as she had hoped, she had erased the lines of mana leading to the dungeon gateway.

Please, be okay, Astrid chanted as she moved at high speed for the dungeon entrance. As she approached, the fighting was becoming ever more fierce.

Her mother was badly wounded. She was clinging on for dear life. The flames around her legs flickered weak like a candle light without oxygen. Despite that, she was still fighting against four high powered horrors. They were frightening and nothing like the ones Astrid had to deal with.

They were enormous; the size of a two storied building. Thankfully, they were slow. Eli dodged to the side, then leapt up, shoving her knee into one of the monster’s eyes. Blood spurted, but she couldn’t move in time to avoid another horrors savage fist.

It caught her true, slamming her into the rubble of the floating island.

Astrid screamed, blasting whatever attacks she had in her arsenal. In a second, she used up fifty percent of her mana, sending the hulking demon off balance. But there were three of them. And now they glared at Astrid. They roared. The smell of rotten corpses wafted toward her.

“Retreat!” her mother’s weak voice sounded from the rubble. She clambered out, her robes covered in blood and dust and tears. And then she sprinted to face the giants again. She was buying time for the others.

Leena, Brett, Rachelle, Lisa, Rob, Losef, and Bellona were also barely hanging on. The fight had gouged deep wounds into their bodies. Losef had even lost half of his spear. The rest he used like a sword.

Brett was cold. Too cold. Astrid shivered as she gazed into his eyes. Darkness gazed back.

Havel charged with Eli. The crazed berserker had his chest caved in. His jaw was broken. All of his men were dead apart from two of the strongest. The others belonging to the Wayfarers, Seafarers, Humanity Corps, and pirates had their ranks ravaged. Of the fifty or so that had entered, only eight of them remained.

Their losses were nothing short of devastating. If Astrid had taken any longer; everyone would have their breaths cut short.

“Astrid–” Leena held her stomach as blood seeped through her fingers.

Astrid bit her lip. Her eyes turned raw, but her mind was filled with battle. She couldn’t turn emotional here.

“I’ll watch your backs,” Astrids shouted. “Get through the gateway!”

Astrid joined Havel and her mother. Although she couldn’t deal damage to the giant demons, she helped in other ways. Shields, illusions, throwing unbreakable voidbent metal ore at the horror’s feet to unbalance them. She did what she could.

They were ready to retreat. Eli kicked the chest of the demon, somersaulting backwards. The ground trembled. Then violently shook. Haavel looked back at his two renaming men. He was caught in the middle of the tremor.

A titanic hand broke through the earth, sundering the floating island in half, and Havel along with it. It grabbed hold of him, but his fighting desire blazed on. He thrashed around, trying to free his axe hand, but he was unable to move. Next, he resorted to using his teeth. He bit into the monster’s flesh, but it was too tough. His teeth shattered under the impact. It was hard to tell if blood fell as his entire being was already painted red.

“Havel!” One of his men shouted in pain. His name was Korf.

“Get out of here you dipshits,” Havel screamed.

Astrid tried to help, summoning what was left of her mana, but a violent tug of her robe pulled her hurtling toward the dungeon.

“You can’t save him,” Eli said as she followed.

Astrid grit her teeth. Her nails dug into her palm. The world turned dark. Her eyes blinked open the next second. The crater around Astrid wasn’t what it once was. It was burned. Electricity scored the earth, and new, giant holes plotted the soil and rock underneath. It looked like hell.

In the distance she could see the cataclysm fight around the Leviathan. The mountains around the city and the city itself were no longer there. They were gone. Evidence of the long lost civilization of Ruitera was erased from the result of superhuman powers.

The Leviathan opened its mouth. Astrid was too far away to see what was happening, but she swore she could see a figure leap straight for the gargantuan nightmare. The figure entered the mouth of the Leviathan. Then the monster closed its dark maw. And then the person disappeared.

They were swallowed.

For some reason, Astrid’s heart palpitated. Smash. Smash. It banged against her chest. She listened to her own heartbeat.

“Who was that?”

Astrid mumbled. Fearing to know the answer.