Chapter - 16 - Devil's Trap [3]

The swordsman who had burnt marks all over his body drank a health potion while looking at Joshua's direction. He saw the woman running to the child like a crazy person.

'Fuck..'

Holding back a swear, Joshua tried to move his body to put some distance between him and the two but unfortunately for him, the woman was already in front of him before he knew it. Without holding back at all, she started to beat the crap out of Joshua left and right. With every one of her punches making Joshua feel like he was hitting his head to an iron wall, his consciousness started to drift away.

Aggrieved, Joshua bit the insides of his mouth. When he felt the hot, metalic taste of blood, the fog that clouded his brain cleared up a bit. Lifting one of his hands with the very little energy he had left, he touched the woman's arm. His actions were met with a sneer from the woman as she hastened her pace between the punches.

'[Mana Drain]!'

The moment he thought these words, just like whenever he used his [Observation] or [Stealth] skill, the system answered his call.

Both Joshua who was near the death's door and the woman who was lost in her anger couldn't notice the change but the swordsman who was walking up to the two saw the veins in Joshua's arm turn bluish. He didn't know why but when he saw that, he felt a chill ran down his spine as he stopped in his tracks. As if that wasn't enough, the colour on Joshua's veins started to spread through the woman's veins as her arm froze.

"What?! What did you do, you rat?!!"

The woman shouted at Joshua crazily. She was just giving this kid his pay for what he did to her man when her arm suddenly froze in place! After seeing him do his little tricks like the barrier, water waves and the electricity... she was sure this was also done by the brat.

She kept barking until she felt her control over her upper body lessen. When this weird feeling of something blocking her movements in her own body reached her heart, her eyes shot open before freezing just like the rest of her body. She felt like her soul was being forcibly separated from her body.

"Ahh... hn..."

Her whole body was pale as her flesh became thinner. With wrinkles forming on her body, she looked like she aged at least 10 years before she fell to the floor as still as a statue.

"Haa.. haa..."

Joshua stood up from his seat as his injuries started to show signs of recovery. He felt this disgusting feeling of something entering his body that made him uncomfortable as his hair stood on end but when it was over, he noticed that his mana was full again.

He glanced at the frightened swordsman for a second before taking out the second [Requiem Twin] and stabbing the woman on the floor. Even though his mana was replenished, his body was still as wrecked as ever. So naturally, his attack wasn't lethal.

Annoyed, Joshua directed his needles to the swordsman who finally gathered his courage through his bloodied vision. The swordsman noticed half of the needles on the last second as he evaded them. The five needles which managed to attack him also weren't that big of a deal other than slowing him down a bit.

When he became aware of no matter how much he evaded or blocked the needles, they would attack him back with more speed and force, he turned his attention back to Joshua who was still stabbing the woman on the floor. He ran to him with all strength he could muster.

"Huh..?"

Joshua who noticed the man's movements a step late, couldn't evade the attack as the sword slashed his abdomen. Before he could even react to the pain, a system message appeared in front of him, covering all his senses.

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<[The user's HP drops to below 10 points! It is advised to use a health potion before HP drops below 5 points!]>

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Joshua couldn't even think straight at that point, much less why keeping his HP above 5 was important... He took out as many needles as he could and directed them to the man. His hands were scarred in the process with the needles piercing him.

He had no idea if his needles really hit the man but he kept taking them out without a break. His vision was blurry and his sense of hearing was also becoming fainter by every passing second.

'hurry... hurry..!'

Biting himself again to focus his mind, he poured nearly half of the total amount of his mana to his needles. When he raised his head sluggishly, he saw that the man was long since dead with needles flying through the air without any specific direction as they hit each other.

"Finally..."

[00:00]

Murmuring as a sense of relief washed his body, Joshua took out a low-rank health potion from his bag. He put the bottle tap in his dried lips but he couldn't drink it. After fixing his position and numerous more tries, he finally managed to drink the potion. He noticed that the potion wasn't as effective as the one he bought from the system so he drank another one and waited for a while for his injuries to heal up.

His [Resilient Mind] skill also wore off at one point, making him feel even more exhausted than before.

While trying to stand up, Joshua's eyes caught the corpses at his feet. With the fog clearing up, it wasn't that hard to spot all eight of the corpses but ironically, no one in the buildings were looking out even after hearing the commotion.

Joshua looked at the corpses for a while before turning back at the woman right under his feet. He alternated his gaze between the Requiem in his hands and the holes in her chest. It took him a while to register the things he did when the skill was activated.

Initially, he thought that the [Resilient Mind] skill was supposed to... you know, cool his head and help him make the best out of the situation, just like its description but looking at it like this, he now knew that system meant every word of it completely.

"I should be more careful from now on..."

Unlike his words, his voice was so shaky and weak that even Joshua didn't believe himself to be the one who said it. Trying to calm his uneven breaths and chaotic mind, he walked towards the entrance of the alley after picking his weapons back up. Seeing the corpses right in front of him wasn't helping him at all.

After walking through streets without being aware of it, Joshua came across a bus station. The light above the bench kept flickering. With the gray buildings behind them, it really looked like a scene from a horror movie.

Without a care, Joshua sat down and opened his telephone. Thankfully, his phone still had signal. He was about to check where he was before noticing that 'Kaitlynn' had sent him a message a few minutes ago.

Trying to keep his mind calm as he exhaled, Joshua opened the chat room.

[Kaitlynn: My bad. I accidentally sent you a completely another location.]

[Kaitlynn: Here. Sorry for the inconvenience, haha ^^.]

[Kaitlynn: ***shares a location***]

"..."

What.

The.

Hell.

Closing his eyes and inhaling a deep breath, Joshua waited for the bus as he checked the new location.

Even though he was healed up, he was so mentally exhausted that he wanted nothing more but to go to the said house and sleep in bed without a care of the world.

Unfortunately for him, the second location Kaitlynn sent also proved to be wrong as six people ambushed him this time.

"For fuck's sake..."

Cursing under his breath, Joshua directed the anger he felt towards Kaitlynn to the enemies in front of him. Unlike the last bunch, these guys all looked like close combatants as they bounced on him at the same time.