Chapter 55

With a steady pace, both Cyrus and Denise began to climb through the elevator shaft. While Cyrus used his strength and the metallic cable of the elevator to go up, Denise decided to use her air energy to slowly levitate toward the top.

Because of this, from time to time they had to take some breaks, as Cyrus got tired and Denise used up all her energy.

"I don't know how the hell you can use the energy around here to recover; it feels disgusting to have it pass through your dantian." Cyrus began to complain when they were resting on one of the upper floors.

"I'm not using it directly. I'm making it pass through my bracelet so it converts into air energy before absorbing it. And you are right, this energy is extremely poor in quality. It would be a pain in my ass if I had to convert all this energy by myself into air energy. " Denise replied smiling, as she showed her accessory to his companion.

"Now that you are saying that, I should do the same using my swords. I'm not used to cultivating exclusively with one type of elemental energy as you are, but I'm sure it would feel much better than the one I'm already using. " He said as he unsheathed one of his swords and placed it in front of his abdomen before starting to feed it with energy.

At that sight, Denise couldn't help herself but laugh, which caused Cyrus to look at her with curiosity on his face.

"What's the matter?" He asked smiling.

"Well, you might not be aware of it, but when my grandmother first discovered the elemental energy, she did the same thing as you are doing with the arms of a mutated air-cutting mantis that she hunted down with the help of a few cultivators." She explained.

"And why is it so funny?" Cyrus asked, still curious.

"It is funny because the arms of that beast were refined and used to create a pair of air energy-infused swords. The same swords that you are using right now to recover your energy. " She said while laughing.

"Wow, I didn't expect these weapons to have such a story when your village gifted them to me," Cyrus replied surprised.

For the next few seconds, the two stayed quiet while focusing on recovering until one of them talked.

"I'm ready to continue. How about you? " Cyrus asked.

"Me too. Let's continue then." She replied.

With that, they continued ascending through the elevator shaft, and in a few minutes, they managed to reach the floor before the roof. At this point, the mist around them was dense and even had a slightly pink tone.

"Let's be careful. If at any time you feel like there is anything wrong, tell me so we can retreat. " Denise told Cyrus.

"Same for you," Cyrus said.

After that, they left the elevator shaft and began to explore that floor for the stairs, as the elevator didn't reach the roof. To make things easier for them, Denise began to create air currents to dissipate the mist around them so they would have a much broader field of vision.

Even though this technique consumed a lot of her energy, it proved to be effective, as in less than a minute they found what they were looking for.

They ran upstairs quickly, and soon they found that there was a silhouette in the middle of the roof. At first, it looked like a bigger crawler, but as soon as it detected their movements, hundreds of tiny tentacles began to extend themselves from its back, as if they were trying to reach its enemies with it.

Without thinking it twice, Cyrus took both of his swords and began to quickly release air slash after air slash as he tried to cut the tentacles that came out of the monster's back.

The crawler sensed those attacks, and before they could even touch it, it jumped into the air, evading all the danger. But that wasn't all. Its back suddenly split up, releasing even more tentacles, which he began to use to walk instead of its legs to walk, while the front of its body completely opened from the head to the lower part of the abdomen, revealing a hideous mouth filled with sharp teeth and an extremely long tongue that it tried to use to stab Cyrus directly in the chest.

If normal crawlers looked like monsters, this one looked like it came from the worst nightmare one could have.

Cyrus skillfully evaded his enemies' attacks while he continued to throw air slashes at them.

While all of this was happening, Denise stood still the whole time while concentrating energy on her hands; so much energy that green light began to shine with great intensity around them.

Cyrus continued with his fight, and while he managed to cut a few of the monster's tentacles, it managed to grow new ones in just a few seconds, while the ones that were cut were transformed into worm-like monsters in the same instant that they touched the floor. As soon as those worms came to life, they began to slide toward Cyrus, which made him have to cut them again to try to defend himself, but by doing this, he only managed to create even more and smaller worms,

"This is getting a bit more difficult than I had expected, so it would be nice if you could lend me a hand," Cyrus shouted to Denise as he continued to cut everything that came in front of him.

But Denise didn't reply to him. Instead, she continued accumulating energy in her hands for a few more seconds before extending her hands toward the monsters.

Suddenly, the air in front of her began to rotate little by little, and in a few seconds, a small tornado appeared in front of her. At first, the tornado grew in size at a fast speed until it reached more than four meters in height, at which point it suddenly began to advance at a fast speed toward the monster.

Without being able to react, the monster found himself being swept away by the tornado. The air that surrounded it began to cut all of its body parts, while at the same time, it was knocked off the building without being able to resist, even if it used its tentacles to attach itself to the building.

A few seconds later, a loud noise was heard from the street, and the worm-like monsters withered away without anyone doing anything.

"It seems like it is dead," Cyrus said while wiping the sweat from his forehead.

"Not only that, but the pentagram is also here," Denise said smiling while pointing at a corner of the roof.

After hearing that, Cyrus neared the corner that Denise was pointing to. There they found a red pentagram drawn with dry blood inside a circle composed of runes with the same characteristics, with a dim red light being released by it.

Without thinking for even a second, Cyrus released a few slashes at the pentagram, which caused the light to stop.