Hearing the noise, the purple-haired woman stiffly raised her head. Looking at War Freya hovering before her, the corner of her mouth twitched slightly, and she forced an awkward smile. “Um... is it too late for a truce?”
War Freya hadn't expected those words from her either. Pausing for a moment, she said, “Surrendering now? Isn't that a bit too late?”
Hearing this, the purple-haired woman instantly gritted her teeth, her expression twisting into a savage grimace like a mask change. “Then you can—”
Before she could finish her sentence, War Freya kicked out first, her seemingly soft, delicate foot striking the woman square in the cheek.
Smack!
Without the slightest suspense, the purple-haired woman's head burst like a watermelon. Her headless body swayed on its feet for a few seconds before collapsing to the ground.
After dealing with this person, War Freya slowly floated back toward where she had come from. As she passed the cells, she casually took hold of the iron bars and pulled them off with a gentle tug, calling out to the trembling people inside, “Stop hiding. Follow me, I'm getting you out.”
Hearing her words, the people in the cells slowly looked up. War Freya was in no rush, waiting silently. After a moment, they slowly got to their feet and tentatively stepped out of the cells.
There were seven people imprisoned in total—or more accurately, seven still alive. Once she had gotten them all out, War Freya returned to Victor and David's side. With the purple-haired woman dead, all the occult arrays in this place had ceased functioning, including the one that had constantly weakened them and inflicted disease.
However, that did not mean the illnesses already inflicted on them vanished instantly. Both men still felt miserable; once this ordeal was over, they would need time to recuperate slowly.
Victor coughed a few times and asked, “Now... what do we do now?”
War Freya replied, “Let me escort the two of you and these seven out first. The Holy Blessing Society's home base is right here anyway, so they can't run away. I'll come back by myself afterward.”
As they spoke, footsteps approached. Needless to say, it was those lingering cultists again. War Freya said, “I'll take point and clear the way. Stay close behind me.”
Yet in the very next second, War Freya, Victor, and everyone else present heard a strange noise. At the same time, a shower of fine gravel and dust rained down from above. Victor looked up and saw that the ceiling of the cell block was already covered in a dense web of cracks!
This place... was about to collapse!
The reason was simple: when War Freya had fought Tarik earlier, hadn't Tarik tried to crush her by collapsing the earth? Even though he had been killed in an instant before fully unleashing the ability, it had actually triggered just a tiny bit, compromising the underground space's structural integrity.
On top of that, War Freya had kicked her way through everywhere she went afterward, shattering who knew how many walls and further degrading the stability of this underground space. Now, it could finally hold out no longer and was giving way.
Seeing this, the seven people who had just escaped the cells wore expressions of utter despair. “It's over! It's all over! We're going to be buried alive here!”
“We're all going to die! No one can escape!”
After all, they were currently ten meters underground. A person wouldn't even be able to move if buried under half a meter of sand, let alone ten meters of soil.
Still, there was an upside to this: they would probably die instantly the moment the cave-in happened and the earth crashed down, so they shouldn't feel much pain.
Although Victor and David weren't as despairing as the seven, they also looked at War Freya in panic. “What do we...”
Before they could finish, War Freya ordered, “Everyone, stand right next to me immediately, as close as possible!”
As she spoke, she found a section of ceiling that looked relatively flat and solid, flew up slightly, and braced both hands against it. Seeing this, David stammered in disbelief, “Y-You... you can't possibly be planning to...?”
Even while shocked, he sprinted toward War Freya without hesitation, and the others did the same, clustering around her.
Rumble, rumble, rumble!
Five seconds later, the cave-in began. In the movies Freya had watched in her past life, cave-ins always seemed to take quite a while, chasing right on the protagonist's heels to create that thrill where a second too slow meant being buried alive, yet they made it out just in the nick of time.
In reality, however, this collapse took only an instant. The ceiling all around War Freya crashed down with a deafening thud, slamming into the floor and settling instantly, as though four stone walls had dropped out of thin air to box them in.
As for War Freya, she could indeed feel the immense pressure bearing down from above, but it was well within her tolerance. She said, “All of you hold on tight to me. I'll carry you up.”
“H-Hold tight?!” David gulped. Because War Freya was currently hovering in midair and holding up the ceiling slab, David, looking straight ahead, happened to have a direct view of her calves and bare feet.
Under normal circumstances, this would have been quite a feast for the eyes. But lest one forget, War Freya had fought and slaughtered her way through here. She was drenched in blood from head to toe, not to mention having just kicked that purple-haired woman's head off, leaving her feet splattered with a sticky mess of red and white gore.
Seeing them frozen in place, War Freya urged, “What are you doing? Hurry up! Do you want to die?”
Hearing that, Victor was the first to leap up, wrapping his arms around War Freya's waist. David did the same. As for the other seven, they latched onto Victor and David, clinging to one another in a human chain. Once she saw everyone had a firm grip, War Freya applied force and slowly flew upward.
The surrounding soil and rock groaned with a tremendous rumble, but it couldn't slow War Freya's ascent in the slightest. She hauled all nine people upward at a steady pace.
From the perspective of people on the surface, a large section of ground near the docks suddenly caved in. Immediately afterward, a mound bulged up right in the middle of the sinkhole, swelling larger and larger.
Before long, War Freya burst out from underground and casually tossed aside the slab of rock she had been holding up.
Thud!
Finding a level patch of ground, War Freya touched down gently. The people clinging to her let go one by one. The seven from the cells in particular gazed at the night sky, overwhelmed by the feeling of being given a new lease on life.
“We're out... We really made it out!”
“Thank goodness, thank goodness!”
“Oh God! We're alive!”
War Freya, however, looked off in another direction, knowing full well that this matter was far from over.
...
Rate on N.U.
