Chapter 286 – Graveyard

The stone fingers loosened slightly, exposing the woman’s sternum. Unable to resist, Micky pounced toward the opening.

He was about to rip the core from her chest when another hand – a much smaller one – suddenly emerged from his own body, grabbing his beak. It was cold, made entirely of mana, not unlike Acton’s spells. Its grip wasn’t very strong, but it didn’t need to be. His own hesitation did the rest, allowing the hand to slam his beak shut.

“What the hell?” the Holy Child blurted out in shock.

The boy’s surprise was justified. By all rights, Micky shouldn’t have been able to fight his command. Even more baffling was the nature of the construct. It had sprouted from his own body, yet not from his cores. In Acton’s Mana Sense, it had seemingly appeared out of thin air, fuelled by some strange affinity that Micky didn’t even possess.

And that was only the beginning.

More mana surged through his channels – this time his own. Pale blobs seeped from his pores, blooming like frozen flowers along his joints. They quickly solidified into blocks of ice, inhibiting his movements.

“How dare you defy me?! You are nothing more than my servant! Stop whatever you’re doing!” Acton snarled.

But the mana continued to rush through his body uninterrupted, forming a thin shell of ice over his plumage. At first, it almost emptied his second core, but the constant circulation of water and air mana flooded the organ, mixing together to replenish his reserves.

At the same time, more fused mana gushed through the cord, a second teal arm sprouting from his chest, mirroring its sibling. It clamped down on his beak too, struggling to buy a few precious seconds for the ice mana to do its job.

Even better, Micky was given a moment of reprieve. Acton’s poorly worded command had allowed him to briefly stop fighting his own body. After all, the only thing he had done was to follow the boy’s orders. Everything else was all Percy.

“Just kill that woman already, or I’ll kill you both myself!” the boy yelled, probably realizing his gaff.

This time, Micky was forced to comply, his muscles ripping themselves apart as he fought against his binds. The ice around him cracked and crumbled in several spots, the magical fingers holding his beak snapping one by one.

Noticing his pain, Percy hesitated, the mana easing slightly.

‘Don’t stop!’ Micky hurriedly said. ‘Don’t worry about me! I can handle it! Besides, I doubt he’d let me die!’

Percy nodded, doubling down on his resistance. Sending more of his mana, he forcefully seized Micky’s cores too, reforging the hands and the ice shell once more. Of course, Percy was fighting an uphill battle, despite his initial success. Stopping a Yellow beast with some Orange constructs wasn’t easy. Let alone doing so from afar, with mana that didn’t even entirely belong to him.

Thinking outside the box, he grabbed hold of Micky’s beast mana too, slowing down the passive flow in his veins, to weaken him.

But the pressure in Micky’s mind only increased as his muscles drank his beast mana against his wishes. The opposing flows collided violently inside his body, ripping holes into his vessels. Blood spilled out of his orifices, as he felt like his flesh was on fire.

Sadly, he won out in the end, managing to extricate himself from the binds half a minute later. The immobilized woman trembled as he stepped on her shoulder with his talon, crimson rivulets dripping from his cracked beak, splashing ominously on her neck.

“NOOO!!! Please… don’t hurt my mom!” a boy cried.

Micky couldn’t even turn his head to look at him. Judging from his voice, he had to be young. Younger than Acton. Probably younger than he had been, back when his own mother was murdered in front of him.

Suddenly, the frozen wasteland flashed before his eyes once more, the dim glow of Huehue’s red sun blending with the bloody pool beneath the two corpses.

‘Percy… kill me if you have to!’

His friend paused again, clearly unwilling to go through with it.

But there was no time to think it over.

‘Don’t let me do this to him! I don’t want to be a monster!’ Micky pleaded again, bloody tears rolling down his face.

Percy acquiesced, sending more foreign mana into his body. Unlike before, it spread through Micky’s frame, slicing countless tiny incisions into his soul. It hurt a hundred times more than the physical wounds, causing him to almost fall unconscious as his vision blurred and his brain throbbed.

Yet, a wave of relief rushed over him. It worked! He lost control of his body at last, falling powerless on the ground next to the woman.

‘Thank you.’ he sent back, though he didn’t get a reply.

Percy was already doing his best to stitch the wounds up before his soul deteriorated any further. Healing him was probably harder through the cord, but he’d been careful when injuring him.

Oblivious to his thoughts, the woman next to him shifted. Her head was close to his, her lips moving as she tried to whisper something. He couldn’t make out her words, but her gaze was filled with more than just fear this time. There was gratitude. And pity.

Micky was about to respond, when a spear jutted upwards. The sound of ripped flesh echoed through the stone cage, a bucketful of blood splashing onto his face. This time, it wasn’t his own.

The woman’s pupils shook for a second, before glazing over. An oppressive silence followed, but it only lasted a few seconds until the boy’s wails pierced it.

A hand painfully grabbed the back of Micky’s head, pushing his face into the woman’s body.

“I said… EAT!” Acton growled as the scent of iron filled Micky’s nostrils.

But he didn’t open his beak. Not because he could resist the boy’s command, but because Percy had deliberately avoided repairing that part of his soul.

“Hahahahaha!” the boy laughed sardonically, struggling to conceal the rage in his voice. “You think you can do as you please, huh?! Very well… It’s time for you to learn what happens when you defy your master!”

Pulling his face out of the woman’s corpse, Acton forcefully turned him around, to look at the other people pressed on the ground under his constructs. Closest to him was the newly orphaned boy, struggling to breathe between sobs. He couldn’t have been older than 5 or 6, his curly hair caked in mud, his cheap clothes full of holes.

With a flick of Acton’s fingers, a second spear emerged. Micky wanted to look away, but the Holy Child didn’t let him move an inch.

“This is what happens when you don’t do as I say!” Acton hissed.

He turned Micky’s head again, to look at a burly guy farther away. He was bald, an eyepatch covering his left eye. Micky recognized him as the Green from earlier. Unlike the others, Acton must’ve attacked him at some point – when he wasn’t looking. He was covered in wounds from head to toe, two stone hands having joined forces to hold him still.

“I have no idea why you even care about these people, but you’re gravely mistaken if you think you’ve done them a favour.” Acton spoke again, sending a third spear, this time through the man’s skull.

Next, he turned his head again, to face another woman. A petite brunette who looked like she was pregnant.

“You could have just eaten a bunch of them to quell your hunger.”

Two spears rose this time, for good measure.

“Now, I’ll make sure to kill more of them, just for you.”

Another spear. And then two more…

It wasn’t until a couple of minutes later that everyone inside the cage was dead, the stone walls already crumbling. There was nobody outside, the others having long run away.

But Acton wasn’t done, apparently.

More spears emerged, this time beside him. With a flick of his hand, he sent them flying to the nearest house, piercing through the walls as if they were paper.

And that was merely the start. The Holy Child repeated his actions again, and again, shooting barrage after barrage through the buildings. Micky didn’t think the boy even bothered to check whether there was anyone inside. Not before his attacks, and certainly not after.

Dragging Micky’s limp body across the town, Acton ravaged everything in his path. Occasionally, muffled screams echoed through the holes. A few times, people rushed out on their own before he attacked, grovelling before him. Begging for him to spare them.

He never did.

The Holy Child stopped at some point. Not because he’d suddenly grown a conscience, nor because he’d killed everyone in the town – he’d barely decimated a little over half. As far as Micky could tell, the boy had simply grown bored of the carnage.

His heart felt heavy, as if it had turned to stone. Neither his physical wounds, nor the injuries to his soul bothered him anymore, his gaze dull and lifeless. Just like that, dozens of innocent people had lost their lives.

‘And all of this over nothing…’ he thought bitterly.

The cheerful crowd that had welcomed the Holy Child with open arms had paid dearly for their respect, their town now a bloody graveyard…