Scarlet

Deciding to put it off till later, I nod my head at Divide and then look up at the cliff, where the reporters are all standing and staring in awe at me. Their cameras flashing repeatedly.

And without hesitation, I order, “Cleanup the battlefield!”

“Yes Your Highness!” The Guardians all shout in unison.

Then I transform into nothing but blood and leave the battlefield to head back to the headquarters again.

Seconds later Divider appears in the room, only to see me reforming myself into my lycan form with a grimace on my face. And after just a brief look at my hands, I find black veins beginning to pulse on my skin as heat envelops me.

“Your Highness!” Divider exclaims while rushing over and helping me stand after I almost lose my footing.

I raise a hand to stop her worrying as I tell her, “It’s a ritual skill level corruption. And I can’t clear it without a ritual skill casting of my own.”

She gasps for a moment before frowning as if recognizing the second part of my sentence. Then she asks, “You can cure it?”

I nod my head and let her guide me to a seat in the office we’re both in.

“Before I can do that though I’ll have to figure out how to use a skill in a ritual in the first place,” I mutter, to which she quickly begins making some calls, apparently not having ever done it herself. And to neither my own nor Tar’s surprise, Amelia appears only moments later with a worried look on her face.

Makes sense that Amelia would be the first person to call in this situation.

Then Blue appears after her, which does surprise me. Followed immediately by Red.

And now I’m just wondering what happened to all their jobs, considering that they’re supposed to have missions to be completing right now.

“We finished earlier than expected,” Amelia answers the question that must’ve been plastered across my face. “You need our help clearing the corruption?”

I nod my head as I feel a pulsating sensation spread across my body from the corruption in question. And to my mixture of surprise and horror, I begin to feel pain from the corruption despite Pain Diffusion.

Pain that I recognize very well as damage to my reality.

I grunt as I cough out a mouthful of blood, startling all of them and making them worry even more. Including both Blue and Red, who normally don’t show worry over things.

Then again, Red has been a lot nicer to me ever since I saved his life. And Blue has a lot of his emotions back by this point.

Tar appears in the air, drawing everyone’s attention as he says, “The corruption is beginning to spread to her reality. If we want to save her then we have to start now.”

Amelia’s eyes widen in shock, and she quickly nods her head before sharing looks with the other Knights and then meeting my gaze.

“Scarlet, to use a skill as a ritual skill you simply need to use the skill with the intent of using it as a ritual,” Amelia says while kneeling down slightly in front of my spot on whatever chair I’m sitting on. “The System will then prompt you, asking if you want to use the skill as a ritual skill.”

I quickly do what she said and activate Bane of Corruption with the intent of using it as a ritual skill.

[The System has detected the desire to use the skill ‘Bane of Corruption’ as a Ritual Skill. Be warned that using a skill as a Ritual skill without the assistance of other users is highly inadvised and could lead to the user’s death. Would you still like to activate Bane of Corruption as a Ritual Skill?]

“Yes,” I say while coughing out a mouthful of black blood.

[Bane of Corruption is now beginning its Ritual Activation.]

All of the Knights around me immediately put their hands on my arms or shoulders, following which I feel their own mana entering my body to be devoured by the skill. A skill that makes a bright red and white light shine from my body.

I let out another mouthful of black blood as cuts leaking more black blood start opening on my skin. But they don’t last for long as each of them is immediately healed afterwards thanks to Lycan’s Regeneration. And then the process repeats over and over again until the light shining from me grows too bright to even see what’s going on with my own body.

Soon enough the pain begins to fade, and I feel relief. Then the light starts to fade as well, but not before the skill took almost half of my total mana, along with several times as much mana from the Knights.

Once I can see again I heave a breath of exhaustion and collapse deeper into the chair. As if the chair could swallow me up right now.

I close my eyes and look inwards at the sensation of my reality healing, proving that it didn’t take enough damage to be permanent. Meanwhile the wounds across my body finish appearing as well, and my blood returns to its usual red color.

But for some reason I head the others gasping and then applauding, making me open my eyes with a confused look on my face. One that grows even more confused at the celebration on their faces, and the pride on Amelia’s.

“Congrats, Scarlet,” Amelia says with a wide smile that only confuses me even more.

“Scarlet, you should check your notifications and System Messages,” Tar says, making me blink in surprise. Not only at his words but at the exasperation I can clearly hear in them.

Wonder what… wait, did I…?

“Yes, you did,” Tar says with a sigh. “Congratulations.”

A smile stretches across my face, and I immediately open my System Messages, letting them and the notifications flow.