Abyssal Awakening-Chapter 966: A Simple Life

With the boss entering phase 3, the group adjusted their strategy as well.

The caster was now fully responsible for covering them from large attacks along with the other frontline while Alice and Miki focused on damage.

Airia now had a bigger hitbox and so more targets could be placed.

More targets also meant more Pale Lances that would detonate inside the body.

Fighting this boss as a group, Alice now truly understood how efficient Miki’s group was.

With these tailored builds, this Nightmare became a walk in the park.

Of course, there was still the key detail of being capable in the first place, but these builds helped drastically reduce the number of deaths that would’ve been incurred.

She couldn’t help wonder if this was usable against Aldric.

Though... with how fast he was moving, it’ll be difficult to land a strike.

Not only that but her strength was temporary. Next time then enter the nightmare, she’ll have to farm up her stats again.

A fleeting power boost unless she accomplishes it in her own Zone.

Aiming up into the sky, Alice pulled her arm back as seven arrows were shot out all at once.

If the Nightmare realm allowed them to create builds that make this place easier...

Then what was their main goal?

She knew that the purpose of the siege was to harvest the fear they planted into the victims hearts.

While not everyone can pull of these builds skillfully, it gave the common person a chance to overcome said fear.

A little contradictory to what they’re trying to achieve.

Which meant that there’s something else in here that Nyer wanted to harvest, not just fear.

Perhaps fear was simply the easiest one to get, a primordial emotion that people are guaranteed to have.

Then was it hope? Faith?

To trap a man inside a confined area with no chance of getting out. Danger approaching from the distance, the grip of death tightening around their neck.

And right before their fears are made real, a single ray of light comes down from above. 𝘧𝑟𝑒𝑒𝘸𝘦𝘣𝑛𝑜𝘷𝑒𝓁.𝘤𝘰𝓂

A rope that will pull them out of the Nightmare.

The only path out.

Naturally, the man will take that rope, to escape his fears.

But once he reaches the end of that rope and the light disappears, what does he see?

What if it was not the way out but the tongue of another beast. Smiling, waiting, laughing.

He would then feel despair.

Alice didn’t know.

Everything in this Nightmare realm was urging them to rise up against their fears so that even the common man can take fate into his own hands.

Yet his desires speak otherwise.

Then... Perhaps this was a reflection of their world.

A domain of contradictions that seemingly go against one another with no hints of what’s right or wrong.

Morality lay in the hands of the victor. Should Enris take over the world, then murder becomes good. Heresy is praised and stillness is evil.

Then this Nightmare...

Alice ducked down as Miki slammed her spear into a claw that was trying to swat them away.

Pulling her bowstring, Alice’s eyes shifted as more targets appeared. More shots landed against the boss’s body as she continued to whittle down the health.

There was also the matter of Aldric becoming conscious. When he started to ask her questions.

Airia was similar in the fact that she understood that she’s dead.

She understood that this is the Grand Cathia of the future.

Alice furrowed her brows.

Was Nyer anchoring the Nightmare realm to an Inverted World? They were gateways to the ’history’ of their world.

A door to everything that had happened in the past.

Could it be possible that he wants to pull Velouria’s soul from the past?

No, if it was that easy, he would’ve done so long ago.

Living beings being pulled in from the past isn’t easy. Dead items like the mead and so on was possible to some extent.

But at the same time, it was also because a link had been formed when she entered. A door to turn fake into real appeared and Velouria would’ve taken her body.

Without that opportunity, Alice doubted she could even bring over some Ayrian mead.

In this moment, Alice couldn’t help but imagine if she was in Nyer’s shoes.

If it was Allura, Kaden, Alyss or any of her close friends, what would she do if they were to die due to betrayal?

What if they died and she had the opportunity to bring them back?

Would she dwell in the past like Nyer? Or would she keep walking forward.

Alice tightened her fingers around her bow.

*BANG!!!

Her arrow curved, piercing the boss on the back as a Pale Lance pierced its chest.

If Alyss died... Alice knew that she would try to find a way to get her soul back no matter what.

To break the loop of life and death.

After all, it was too cruel and unfair otherwise.

She has yet to find a way to properly give Alyss her own body as well. To allow her to move around freely without chains binding her every movement.

To siphon the Eldritch energy away so that she’s no longer considered a harm to this world.

But would she go as far as Nyer?

She only knew the surface level of everything he’s done.

The countless experiments over the years, the countless victims.

He watched empires rise and fall, eras pass in the blink of an eye. Sometimes it was due to his actions, sometimes it was the natural course. Regardless, ever since the fall of Ayr, Nyer has continuously walked towards that singular goal.

It was no exaggeration to say that the goal was his entire reason of being.

His desire that consumed him from the inside out.

Without this goal... he was nothing but a husk.

An empty husk who didn’t know where to go.

Is that the future waiting for her if she did the same as him?

If Alyss died and she spent her life trying to bring her back...

Then should she just accept the death and move on? No matter how unfair it may be?

Alice paused.

Allura didn’t try to bring Velouria back. She simply tried her best to make sure this world didn’t fall to ruin.

Kaden didn’t try to bring Velouria back either, he just wanted Allura to be safe.

They both dedicated their efforts to help the living while remembering the dead.

So if anyone close to her died...

Alice wasn’t sure how she’ll react. She may lose her mind, come to hate this world.

At least right now, she wanted to be like Allura. She wanted to act in a manner that will earn her praise from Allura rather than disappointment.

She took a deep breath and slowly exhaled.

This world is for the living. Those who died should rest peacefully. It is the duty of those that come after to make sure they’re not forgotten.

However, so long as the option exists, people like Nyer will always appear.

This unfairness that spreads through the world, it corrupts people. Makes them do things out of desperation.

Taking aim with her bow, Alice found herself in a moment of tranquillity.

The world slowed to a halt. A calm spread through her mind.

Perhaps it was because she took a step back in this fight that she had the leisure to think about everything that had happened.

And in these moments, she couldn’t help but ask...

What did she envision for the end of her own path?

She didn’t know what was in store for her but what did SHE want to do with her own life?

What did she want to accomplish? Not on other’s behalf. Not what they requested of her.

But simply...

What did Alice Agnelia want to accomplish with her life.

Outside of Ayr, outside of the wishes placed on her.

What did the person inside, the soul controlling this body, desire?

Alice pulled back on her bowstring.

She didn’t desire grandeur. She didn’t desire godhood. She didn’t even foresee herself as a wise ruler like Velouria.

It simply wasn’t for her, standing in front of everyone, leading them to a future.

It wasn’t a lack of drive nor was it a lack of ambition.

She had plenty of those.

If she wanted to, she could dedicate every second of her life into achieving this goal.

To learn the myriad of techniques across the world, to hunt the strongest beasts to reach Lordship.

But... the world in her heart was simpler than that.

If anything, it felt like a far cry from what people wanted her to accomplish.

But it’ll be a life she enjoys, one that she wanted to carve for herself.

A simple life. A fulfilling one.

A simple cabin on a cliff overlooking the sea perhaps. A miniature farm so that she could harvest some wheat or even raise some bees for honey.

Allura and Kaden fit and healthy. They don’t need to be powerful, Alice didn’t want them to fight world ending threats.

Alyss relaxing by a hammock by the tree perhaps.

The taste of the first harvest, some homemade mead.

Her friends will visit, they’ll laugh, they’ll talk.

They’ll look out at the sea.

Alice smiled.

Who knew such a simple dream would fill her with such satisfaction?

But it was also this simplicity that was so hard to obtain.

Alice finally understood what Nyer felt.

Should any of them be missing from this dream, should Allura be absent, or Kaden, or even Alyss...

It’ll feel incomplete. Like a part of herself had just been ripped away.

This sweet dream will become nothing but a torturous image of what could’ve been.

And that pain would’ve sent her to the pits of hell to achieve it.

’So this is the pain you’ve been dealing with...’

Smiling helplessly, Alice fired the final arrow that killed the boss of the fifth zone.