Where Are We?

Without caring for her safety, Hayley started to run towards the cow. The head, neck, and part of the body were frozen by her…

She was nervous what would happen if he managed to survive and she killed him?

"What are we going to do???"

Pinky at her side didn't know either, some of the rats kept the connection until they went into the mouth, but after that, his rats got the feeling as if they were crushed, he lost the connection with them, but he didn't felt the moment they died.

The feeling of a broken link was different from when they died… that's the reason why he thought that Spencer might be still alive.

She was standing next to the head, Blake finally was able to gather his courage and come to her. Gerhard followed, he was shinning

Blake didn't know what to say…

With the fall of the Alpha, they won the war… but he could call it… not after how it happened.

"Is it dead?"

"I-i-i… don't know he was swallowed he might have survived… if I didn't freeze him…"

Blake felt awkward… the possibility of Spencer surviving to this didn't even cross his mind, he wanted to know if the cow was dead.

"And the cow?"

…

"I don't know…"

Without waiting for anyone to say something else Gerhard stepped forward. His arms were surrounded by an orange aura different to the one he usually used. With pure strength, he grabbed the jaw of the cow he started to pull, and after a few second the jaw of the cow was torn apart from the rest of the head.

Blake could feel Gerhard's rage, and there was nothing he could say that would help either him of Hayley.

He felt sad about Spencer's and Hope's fall, but he had more people to worry about. The cow was most likely dead and if it wasn't Gerhard was going to tear it apart anyway. He moved to where Pinky was looking too.

"Pinky… help me gather the wounded in the meantime."

Without moving from the place, the surviving rats started to move and gather wounded people and rats in one side, while the dead bodies were taken to a different area…

After tearing apart the jaw, Gerhard started to look for his friends inside the mouth without success, followed by Hayley he continued his way down hoping to at least find the remains of his friends.

_______________________________________

While holding on Hope and using Adrenalin burst, I managed to jump from one place to another and dodge the teeth that tried to chew them one time before the duck-bomb exploded.

The whole place moved, but the suction force was too strong. It was impossible for them to escape. He was hoping the duck to explode sooner and use that moment to jump out. But the duck took too long to blow, and by the time it did they were already past the cow's mouth.

Was this her throat?

I always thought that the cow's throat would be a slimy and wet place like the mouth, but it wasn't…

It was a weird feeling as if I was floating, at least that's how it was at the beginning, something pressed against me as if I was deep underwater, even breathing became difficult, and I noticed Hope's pain too.

I don't know how long we have to endure, but I knew that if it was painful for me, it would feel even worse for Hope.

I didn't notice how bad it was until I saw her aura weakening. I have to do my best to focus and being able to apply an emergency Time Healing to prevent her from dying in my embrace.

[User obtained Concentration Lv. 1]

At some point, the pain ended. Hope was still unconscious in my arms, but there were no significant problems with her right now.

I was expecting to be in a stomach but what I saw was something completely different.

We were laying on the border of a lake… around us, brown soil with some small green patches of grass could be seen… leafless trees were standing on some of these patches, but otherwise, the environment was quite depressing.

On top of the soil, agonizing beasts were laying completely crushed, the same as the rats and some people that was sucked in the last attack…

I recognized the tip of a spear that one of the corpses was holding.

I accommodated Hope on a piggyback carry and walked to them. There was no aura on Zak's lifeless body, I couldn't believe that he died just like that, but he didn't have any resistance type ability. I took the spearhead from him… we don't have any kind of identification, so I took it to bring it back with me… if we manage to leave this place.

After that, I finished the weakened beasts that survived that pressure and looked for survivors from the humans and rat side. I only found a goon and a few rats… I healed the goon until he was out of danger but when I did the same with one of the rats it attacked me, and I had to retaliate.

I was hoping for it to be able to help me communicate with Pinky but apparently, just like my links, his connection with Pinky was broken too. I didn't try that again and finished the other rats.

Since I came into this place, I got a weird feeling, but I didn't recognize it until I looked the remaining of the missions. The time here moved at a different pace as outside, an hour outside would be about 5 hours here this means that I have to be here almost a day before I'm able to finish the surviving mission.

"Where now?"

I speak out loud more for myself that expecting an answer. I looked everywhere and tried to look the place from where we came from…

It was this lake?

I looked at it for a few seconds, but I had no idea if this was the right call… that pressure was no joke, and I would end in the cow's mouth, right?

I thought about jumping, but before I could do it, a voice in my head warned me.

'Don't Jump~… Run~'

There was some familiarity to it, but I couldn't recognize it…

I doubted. And that moment of doubt gave the voice the reason, my sixth sense kicked in, and a second later the lake started to emit a cold aura… I recognized it right away.

Hayley…

Hope trembled on my back, and I decided that it was a good idea to do as the voice said and run.

It didn't take much time for the lake from where we came to freeze, but Hayley didn't stop there. The whole place was being frozen. I wasn't affected by the aura, but I could feel Hope shivering in fear because of it.

"Come on Hayley control yourself!"

I yelled more for myself than hoping that Hayley heard me.

I had to run for almost half an hour before it stopped and I even had to use adrenaline burst at the end.

[Weakened state -50% on all physical stats and Esper Abilities - 1h 15m 21s left]

It has been a while since I had to use this ability for a long time.

After the freezing stopped I fell on my knees breathing heavily as I recovered… after about a minute of resting, I still felt like sh*t… and looked at the time once again.

[Weakened state -50% on all physical stats and Esper Abilities - 1h 13m 43s left]

At least the time is flowing accordingly to this place it would have been horrible having to wait for 6 hours to recover…

I looked at the place we came for, and it was the same as before, but covered with a white layer of frosting… the goon was done.

I might try to go back, but my sixth sense warned me that it wasn't a good idea. Now that I was finally out of danger I tried to think about the voice that warned me, but it was as useless as before… I have no idea who it was or where it came from.

Hope was still shivering, but this time was because the place became quite cold after Hayley used her ability. I took a cheap blanket from the system and covered her with it as I lay down looking at the sky while recovering at her side…

It had the orange and purple colors of the twilight the same as outside, there was no sun, cloud or stars, but besides that, it looked as we were outside.

…

…

[Mission Complete: Defeat the Alpha Cow with your party.

Reward: 500 System points, 10 Skill points]