SSS Awakening: I Can Create Skills By Will-Chapter 103: The Hidden Hand

Captain Veylor shouted new orders, and the others followed without hesitation.

Their attacks struck with renewed force.

Hope returned once more.

Arthur, however, barely noticed the reactions.

His attention remained fixed on the forest.

The distortion was growing stronger.

The pull he felt earlier had intensified, dragging at his awareness like a hook.

If that source remained untouched, this would never end.

This battle would become nothing more than a slow war of exhaustion.

He made his decision.

Without hesitation, he moved forward.

His body shot through the battlefield, cutting through monsters that stood in his path. Fire and steel carved a clear route ahead of him.

The explorers watched in disbelief as he advanced.

A visible trail of destroyed monsters marked his passage.

He wasn’t just fighting.

He was leaving.

Ryn noticed immediately. After blocking a heavy strike, he shouted, "Arthur! Don’t act alone!"

Arthur paused briefly, glancing back.

"I’ll be quick," he said calmly.

With no hesitation and fear in his voice or movement.

Just certainty.

Before Ryn could reply, Arthur turned and continued toward the forest, heading straight for the source of the corruption.

Behind him, the battlefield raged on.

And ahead of him, the distortion waited.

Arthur could feel the distortion long before he reached the forest.

The deeper he moved, the heavier the air became. The tainted mana spreading from within the trees pressed against his senses like thick smoke, choking and suffocating.

A low ranked explorer would have collapsed here as even breathing felt wrong.

The energy carried a rotten weight, sticky and invasive, crawling along the skin and trying to seep into the body. It made the stomach twist and the head ache.

Arthur felt the pressure too.

His chest tightened slightly and his mana pathways resisted the foreign energy, pushing it away like a body rejecting poison. The strain was there, sharp and uncomfortable, yet it wasn’t enough to stop him.

He kept walking.

"If this alone could stop me," he muttered quietly, "then there was no point coming here."

The forest grew quieter the deeper he went.

No insects.

No wind.

Even the leaves barely moved, as if the land itself rejected what was happening within it.

Soon, his steps slowed.

As a clearing appeared ahead.

The moment Arthur entered it, the distortion surged violently.

His Sovereign’s Perception sharpened on instinct, as he finally saw what lay before him.

Marks.

Dozens of them.

The ground had been carved with complex symbols arranged in wide circular layers. Strange patterns overlapped one another, forming channels that linked together like veins in a living body. Each line pulsed faintly with dark energy.

At several points around the circle lay shattered monster cores, some still glowing weakly. Others had already turned black, drained completely of their essence.

Metallic spikes had been driven into the earth at fixed intervals. Chains connected them, and strange talismans hung from the links, each covered in twisted inscriptions that seemed to shift when observed too closely.

The entire formation breathed.

Mana flowed through the markings, moving from one core to another, then sinking into the ground before rising again in heavy waves. The rhythm matched the pulse Arthur had sensed feeding the massive vine beast.

He studied it carefully.

A ritual formation. It wasn’t random. But carefully prepared.

The monster cores acted as fuel, their energy extracted and refined through the carved channels. The seals stabilized the flow, preventing the violent mana from dispersing. The chains and talismans anchored the process, forcing the surrounding land to act as a conduit.

The corrupted energy was being shaped.

Directed.

Fed outward.

Arthur slowly exhaled.

"So this is how they’re doing it."

The mutation of the monsters.

The endless regeneration.

The dungeon break.

All of it was connected to this.

His gaze moved across the clearing, noting the traces of activity. Footprints. Burnt incense remains. Dried blood marking certain symbols. Signs of repeated rituals carried out over time.

Someone had been working here.

Or rather, many people.

A group.

A cult.

Abyss worshippers.

Arthur felt his skin crawl.

The tainted mana here was far denser than anywhere else. It pressed against him constantly, trying to invade his senses, yet his body rejected it instinctively. His mana pathways resisted the corruption, pushing it out again and again.

He could not fully understand how the ritual caused such large scale mutation. The process was complex, far beyond simple mana manipulation.

Yet something about it reminded him of a conversation he once overheard.

A gold squad member speaking with Commander Lyra during the first mission.

Corruption.

External influence.

Controlled mutation.

Even they had not fully understood it.

Arthur stared at the formation again.

"So this is what they meant."

Curiosity flickered within him, but it faded quickly.

Understanding could wait.

People were dying.

The vine beast continued advancing toward the civilian camp, and every moment wasted here meant more lives lost.

He only needed to destroy the formation.

Arthur raised his hand.

Fire gathered slowly in his palm, condensing layer upon layer as he activated his fire layered manifest intent. Heat compressed inward until the flames turned dense and heavy, glowing with intense brightness.

The fireball grew larger.

And larger.

Larger than anything he had formed before.

The surrounding air warped under the heat, the ground beneath his feet cracking slightly from the pressure. Flames spiraled inward like a collapsing star, violent yet completely controlled.

Arthur’s eyes remained calm.

"No need for finesse."

He thrust his hand forward.

The fireball shot across the clearing.

BOOOOM!

The explosion swallowed the ritual formation in blazing light. Fire erupted outward, devouring the carved symbols, melting the chains, and shattering the remaining monster cores.

But..

Something moved.

A blur flashed through the flames just before the impact landed fully.

Arthur narrowed his eyes.

Dust and smoke spread across the clearing.

The ground trembled from the force of the blast, and burning fragments scattered in every direction.

When the dust slowly settled, a figure stood at the center.

Bruised and burned. But alive.

The man’s body looked human at first glance, yet something about him felt deeply wrong. His skin carried dark vein like patterns that pulsed faintly with corrupted mana.