Awakening of the Weakest Slayer

Sezel saw the serpent-like beasts closing in from all directions, through his blurry vision he noticed some of them moving towards the corpse of the Flesh Reaper. He wanted to scream, to roar at them to get away from his prize. 'Get away from that, I killed it and the rewards are mine.' But his body was a shattered ruin, and the only sound that escaped his lips was a pained, wet gasp.

He lay broken on the cold stone, his form battered and painted with blood. Damp, white hair fell across his face, obscuring one eye, the other eye glinting crimson under the sunlight from the top of the dome, where the dust-laden glass was.

"Tsk, I don't even have my katana," he rasped, the words scraping his throat. The sword had fallen when he and the Flesh Reaper had plummeted from the corridor above. Not that it mattered. In his current state, he could barely lift his own arm, let alone a weapon.

'I need to absorb the core of a beast,' he thought, a jab of cold pain stirring across his body. If he would absorb a beast's core just like before, there was a chance his body would heal on its own, though where he got such an ability was still a mystery.

But who cares about such stuff when it can save you, and so didn't Sezel. He clenched his jaw, pushing his body with all the strength he could muster with his unbroken hand, and stood up.

"Mister,"

The voice, sweet and clear, cut through the haze of pain. Sezel looked up, his vision clearing just enough to see the girl standing at the edge of the broken corridor high above, the katana glinting in her hands. With a slow, deliberate motion, she tossed it down. It fell, end over end, and landed with a sharp clang near his feet.

A ragged, genuine smile stretched Sezel's cracked lips. He saw the stairs at the far end of the hall, "Continue forward!" he shouted, his voice echoing in the vast space. "There are stairs. Come down here!" The girl nodded and sprinted away, her small figure vanishing.

Sezel picked up the katana, still whole, its surface still pristine, without a single scratch despite the hell it had been through. He faced the advancing serpents. "Until then," he whispered, his voice a low growl of promise, "I'll clear them off."

Three of the serpents attacked at once. Sezel didn't move until the last moment. As they entered his range, he spun, the sword a silver arc in the sunlit hall. The blade sang through the air, and with one fluid, unbroken slash, three heads were severed from their bodies. They fell to the ground in a twitching, headless heap.

[Congratulations, You have slain a Fanged Serpent][Congratulations, You have slain a Fanged Serpent][Congratulations, You have slain a Fanged Serpent]

The voice announced it three times in his head. He looked up at the other ones, but the remaining ones fled, capable of feeling fear it seemed. Just two of them remained, larger and more ancient-looking than the others, their attention still fixed on the colossal corpse of the Flesh Reaper.

Sezel let the katana fall from his numb fingers and dropped to his knees beside the dead serpents. His priority was healing. He placed both his hands on the Fanged Serpent's dead body, his primary focus was to absorb their cores and to see if he would be healed or not.

The same faint light flickered under his hands and radiated throughout his body, travelling through his veins. He felt his muscles relax, a touch of cold and then hot washed over his body, a soothing experience.

The pain had lessened, but it hadn't vanished. His body was only partially healed. The beast's corpse dissolved into mist before him. 'So there's a limit,' he realized. 'The amount of healing depends on the rank of the beast. A low-rank core can only do so much.' He moved to the next corpse, and then the third, absorbing each one.

By the time he absorbed the third one, his flesh knitted together again. By the time the third serpent had vanished, his broken arm and leg were functional again, though still screaming with a dull, residual ache.

He stood, picking up his katana, and turned his attention to the two remaining beasts, who were now tearing at the Flesh Reaper's chitinous shell.

"Sorry, but you can't have him," he announced, voice echoing through the empty palace. The Fanged Serpents halted and shifted their gaze towards Sezel.

They were bigger than the other ones he had seen up until now. Their body had more girth, and their fangs were almost as big as Sezel's arms. One of them lunged, its maw wide open, its slimy body glistening under the sunlight.

Sezel dodged, jumping aside, the blade a blur as he brought it down on the creature's back. It struck with a dull thud, carving only a shallow gash before the serpent coiled away. "Too wide to cut," Sezel spat, realizing he needed to be more precise.

He didn't wait for the attack to come, instead he lunged first.

SLASH!

With a quick and precise draw of his sword, he targeted the most vulnerable part of the serpent—the nape of its neck, where the thick scales met the head. The blade sank deep, and the mechanical voice confirmed his kill.

[Congratulations, You have slain an Elder Fanged Serpent]

Sezel's eyes squinted, 'Elder?' That would mean that these two were an evolved species of the Fanged Serpents, but they were still not much powerful and intelligent. It was easy to kill them.

It didn't take long to dispatch the second one. As he absorbed their more potent cores, the last of his injuries faded away, leaving his body as good as new. His shirt however was in tatters and filled with red patches all over. He sighed, letting his body slump on the ground.

"Mister! Mister!" The girl's voice snapped him back. She came running from the direction of the grand staircase, her small face streaked with dust and relief.

'Glad, those serpents didn't attack her.'

He stood as she reached him, and she threw her arms around his waist, hugging him tightly. "Mister, are you okay?" she asked, her voice trembling with fear.

Sezel patted her head, the gesture felt surprisingly natural to him. "Yes, I'm alright. And I'm glad you're okay too." He looked down at her, at her wild white hair and tear-stained face.

He had accepted it with a certainty now, that she was not an illusion or a foul creature. She was nothing but a victim of the cruel world, the world outside of Spirit Realm. It was not so much better than here, just beasts in the form of humans.

Sezel looked ahead, in the far edge of this grand hall, lined with thrones on either side, there was a lone throne, empty, and small unlike other colossal ones around it.

He pushed the thought aside. First things first: the Flesh Reaper. A Rank-4, Enhanced beast. The potential reward made his heart hammer with excitement.

He walked to the obsidian-black corpse, the foul liquid still pooling beneath it. The sight of its crimson scythe still sent chills down Sezel's spine. He gave the beast a defiant kick. "Dumbass bug," he muttered, a final insult to the terror that had nearly killed him.

He crouched, reaching out to place his hands on the two-meter-long creature's chest. He prepared himself for the rush of power, for the surge of life force that would flood him.

But instead, a translucent screen popped into existence directly in front of his face. He jerked back, startled and confused.

"What happened?" the girl asked, her voice filled with concern.

Sezel didn't answer. He couldn't. He stared at the screen, at the words glowing, lost in the dread of something only he could see. "What?" That was the only thing Sezel's mind could muster.