Summoned to a Fantasy World With a Modern Military System-Chapter 72: An Unfortunate Choice

Randolf's cheek was pressed flat against the cold hard ground. It was much colder than one'd expect, for perhaps it just felt that way for him.

He could feel the warmth of his own blood pooling under his chest as he tried to move his legs but couldn't do anything. They just didn't respond.

He tried to push himself up but his arms wouldn't obey him either. A terrible and paralyzing numbness was spreading throughout his body, it was a pain he'd never felt before.

The sounds of the fight, of Luna's sword and the screams of his men, all of it seemed to just fade away in the background.

They became a distant and muffled roar as if his entire world was narrowing down. It was shrinking down to this single small spot with him lying in his own blood.

It was just him and the dark figure standing over him.

He was going to die here. On this cold and hard ground.

He strained his neck as he managed to lift his head just an inch, looking up at the soldier who had shot him. The man was just a dark shadow against the raging golden fire.

The soldier stood over him with a strange and black weapon in his hands, the one that had made the loud crack. However, just the next moment it vanished from his hands and just dissolved into faint light, like it was never there to begin with.

Randolf's fading mind couldn't even process what he had just seen.

Why was this happening? Who was this person? What the heck had he used to against him?

The soldier reached up with both hands that were covered in dirty leather gloves and with them he unlatched the heavy, stolen helmet.

He pulled it off his head and then tossed it aside with a careless motion. The helmet hit the ground as it rolled with a loud metal noise.

The firelight lit up the soldier's face.

It was not a face Randolf recognized. It was not one of his men, or well even if it were he wouldn't really remember. But he was sure that he wasn't any kind of bigshot from the Preservence knights. Otherwise he would've recognized him in no time.

It was a boy. A young man who looked maybe not even twenty years old. His face was calm and his eyes were relaxed as if he was just taking a walk in his own garden.

He looked down at Randolf, with his expression as blank as a stone.

A final and horrifying realization clicked in Randolf's mind. The reports. The chaos. The "ghost" his men were talking about. The one who were killing their men with some invisible force and was reported to be as destructive as Luna Revoltstar.

It was him. It was this boy. There was no other explanation for it.

"I... see," Randolf rasped as blood bubbled at his lips. He coughed, and a spray of red hit the dirty ground. "You... you're the one."

He tried to breathe but it was getting harder and his lungs felt like they were filling with liquid.

"But how?" he choked out. "My magic. I... I didn't sense you. I couldn't feel you. You have no presence, this is strange. I should have sensed you coming near me. How?"

For a man like Randolf or for any magic user in general, their magic sense was like sight. It was a fundamental part of how they understood the world.

So for someone to exist right next to him and for his senses to report nothing was a terrifying and bone chilling thought. It was like a man being stabbed by something he couldn't see.

After all, if he couldn't even trust his own senses then what would he rely on? Nothing.

Allen just looked down at him as he watched the man choke for a moment. He saw the panic and the confusion along with the fear he had caused.

However, his expression didn't change at all and his face remained a blank mask in the firelight.

"Well, don't worry about it too much and don't take it personally," Allen said, with his voice hollow and devoid of any feelings.

"Even that highlander couldn't detect my presence, so it only makes sense for you to not be able to do it either."

Randolf lay paralyzed on the ground and didn't respond to Allen's comment. Instead he stared up at him with a look that was not angry anymore.

It was not hateful. It was just... strange. It was a look of profound and chilling pity. He let out a long and wet sigh.

The sound was bubbly with the blood in his lungs visible.

"This is truly an unfortunate decision," he rasped. "The fact that things have come to this... it didn't have to be this way."

Allen just stared back with his pistol appearing back in his hands as he held it tight in his hand. He didn't understand what this dying man was saying but he didn't want to take any risks.

"What the fuck are you talking about?" he asked. His voice was flat.

A weird and bloody smile touched Randolf's lips, morphing his expression into a terrible sight to be seen.

"It's such a bummer," he choked out. "A real bummer." He coughed and a fresh spray of red blood hit the ground and the soil.

"But it is still better than dying in vain. It's better than just... ending. Than just me dying alone."

He looked up at Allen with his eyes that seemed to glow with a new and strange light. "At least, this way... if I can't be out and live my life like I want... then none of you can either."

As he spoke those last words, his voice started to change and began to distort in an extremely weird and unnatural way. It was like two voices were speaking at once and were stacked on top of each other in an extremely messy manner.

At the same time a faint red light began to glow on his forehead.

Allen took an involuntary step back with his eyes a little wider. He didn't like where this was going. He didn't like this at all.

The glow on Randolf's forehead grew brighter as it turned into a complex swirling symbol which radiated a golden hue. It looked like one of the ancient runes Lishia had mentioned as it burned with a light that was pulsing like a heart.

The symbol seemed to be drawing power from the air since the air itself felt like it was getting heavy and pressing down on them.

Fucking hell this is the worst thing that could happen at this moment? Why the fuck is he getting a power up like he's some kind of video game boss?

Allen dashed a few more steps backward and kept a safe distance between himself and Randolf.

He watched as Randolf's whole body began to tremble and pulsated in a weird rhythm.

It was not the shiver of a dying man. Dead men didn't behave like this at all, this was something else entirely. Something which Allen was very, very unfamiliar with.

The glowing red symbol on Randolf's forehead pulsed faster as it burned with a dull light and the low humming sound coming from within him became a deep, vibrating groan.

It was coming from inside his chest.

Then, Randolf's body began to change.

It started to swell really fast. His paralyzed limbs twitched and jerked as his skin stretched, looking thin and pale like old parchment.

A wet and tearing sound began as the seams of his tunic split open with his armor creaking and as the metal plates started to bend as they were getting pushed outwards from within.

The leather straps snapped one by one with their snapping sound lost in Randolf's unnatural groan. 𝘧𝘳𝘦ℯ𝓌𝘦𝒷𝘯𝑜𝑣𝘦𝓁.𝒸𝘰𝓂

His body just kept getting bigger like a grotesque, inflating balloon. It was losing its human shape and turning into something that resembled a mass of flesh more accurately than a human being.

His face began to deform as the skin pulled tight across his skull with his eyes bulging from their sockets. His pupils rolled back and showed only the bloodshot whites as his jawbone snapped, dislocating with a dull pop.

His mouth stretched open wider than what was humanly possible and let out a dull but bone chilling screech. It was like rubbing a chalk on a blackboard, not extremely loud but strong enough to shake someone up from within.

A loud, wet tearing sound came from his chest and it was not his armor this time but rather his own skin.

The silver breastplate that was already full of holes ripped apart like paper and the skin beneath it split open. A long, bloody hole tore open from his neck down to his stomach.

Steam along with a foul and coppery smell rose from the wound as dark fluids and ruptured organs were visible inside the open cavity, with blood flowing out of him.

One by one the bones in his rib cage snapped they broke with a sound like thick wet branches being snapped in half. They bent outwards and were forced apart by the pressure inside him.

The sharp and broken white ends of his ribs pushed through his ruptured and bloody skin and were pointed at the sky like a cage of bone.

Then, two new things pushed out from the open wounds. Things that were not supposed to be present within or anywhere near a human being.

They were long and dark red, and wet. Long tentacles like an octopus.

They were covered in a thick and pulsing, yellow-black slime as they uncoiled from inside his chest cavity. slithering out and pushing aside his lungs.

They unfurled and writhing in the cold night air like giant, newborn snakes. They were thick at the base, and tapered to a sharp, bony point.