At that moment, Shiya happened to turn her head and saw Leonora frozen in place.
She blinked, revealing an expression that said, “I knew it.”
Caught red-handed, Leonora’s face flushed crimson.
She gritted her teeth in anger.
What does this woman mean by that?
Does she really think of me as some petty, thieving rogue?
Leonora simply stepped forward.
Amidst Shiya’s surprised gasp, she grabbed Shiya’s uninjured shoulder and pressed her down onto the desk.
The medical cotton swab was soaked in alcohol.
The fingers holding it applied pressure with almost all her strength as she swabbed the wound.
“It hurts!”
“That won’t do, young lady. If you do that… the wound will reopen.”
Ten minutes later, Shiya, using one hand to hold the hospital gown over her chest and covered in a light sheen of sweat, looked at Leonora with a resentful gaze.
Leonora, however, acted as if nothing had happened.
She tidied the disheveled maple-red hair at her temples, tore a clean strip of cloth from her own dress, and tossed it into Shiya’s hands.
“Don’t look at me like that. Use this to bandage the wound. We should go.”
After waiting a moment, seeing that Shiya had finished dealing with it and had put her hospital gown back on properly, Leonora stepped forward directly and pushed open the room’s door.
But the scene that greeted their eyes made both their hearts sink.
More than half of the black mud monster corpses that had been lying haphazardly on the floor just moments ago had now disappeared.
This wasn’t because they had naturally dissipated after being destroyed, but rather…
Crunch, crunch—
A bizarre sound of flesh and bones being chewed together reached the ears of the two girls.
A black shadow, its face almost indistinguishable, was crouched beside Toby’s corpse, holding the head and devouring it in large mouthfuls.
An ominous, calamitous aura spread outwards from it, fanning out wildly in all directions.
Leonora’s gaze sharpened.
Before the monster could look up and notice them, she grabbed Shiya’s hand and sprinted towards the other end of the corridor.
But they were ultimately a step too late.
Shiya could clearly feel that dark shadow closing in bit by bit.
The entire hospital building trembled with its footsteps.
The emergency lights around them flickered erratically before finally bursting with a series of pops, shattering completely.
Darkness once again enveloped the two girls, carrying with it the impending fate of death.
Shiya shouted towards Leonora:
“Young lady! That monster is the Mud Man that caused all of this today! That shadowy exterior is actually high-density black mud! And… it’s basically immune to all fire-based magic!”
Shiya once again chose to tell Leonora everything she knew from the game.
But as she spoke, she suddenly stopped.
Her face first showed confusion, then was quickly covered by a dense, inescapable terror.
At that moment, Leonora also stopped running and turned around.
She and Shiya simply couldn’t put any distance between themselves and the Mud Man.
Continuing like this would only lead to them being caught.
But that didn’t mean this proud young lady of the Celestine Ducal House would just wait for death.
“What do you mean, immune to fire magic? In the end, it’s just that the magical output power isn’t sufficient.”
She snorted coldly.
A fireball danced back and forth between her palm and her staff.
Immediately after, the fireball flew upwards, transforming into a giant dragon’s head.
Clenching a furious, super-sized pillar of fire in its maw, it completely enveloped the Mud Man in an instant.
Yet the Mud Man stood motionless, bathing in the dragon’s fiery breath.
Every inch of flame that burned on its skin extinguished itself in less than half a second.
Leonora’s brow furrowed tightly.
She nimbly dodged a tentacle the Mud Man shot towards her, withdrew the fire dragon, and struck her staff against the ground.
Twelve explosive fireballs, each half a person’s height, materialized in the air.
Boom Boom Boom Boom Boom Boom Boom—
Fireballs as scorching as the sun rained down on the Mud Man in an orderly, relentless barrage.
For a moment, the Mud Man’s body was blasted into pieces, its shattered form sent flying into the air.
But when it landed again, in less than half a second, its shattered body had already restored itself.
This scene made Leonora, whose mana was nearly depleted and who was now panting heavily on the opposite side, look like a joke.
Seeing that all her attacks were utterly ineffective, the usually proud and arrogant young lady was thoroughly enraged.
For the first time in front of Shiya, she began chanting an incantation.
In an instant, a huge fissure split open in the ground.
But before she could utter the final line of the spell, the Mud Man planted its hands behind it on the floor, gave a powerful leap, and its entire body shot forward like a cannonball, crashing violently into Leonora.
With just that one strike, Leonora vomited blood and was sent flying backwards, smashing hard into the wall behind her.
The Mud Man swung its arm, which stretched like putty, aiming to cleave the immobile Leonora in two.
At this critical juncture, a scalpel gleaming with a cold light stabbed directly into its left eye.
This couldn’t cause any real damage to the Mud Man, but it did make its movements halt abruptly for a moment.
Seizing this fleeting chance, Shiya rushed to Leonora’s side, hoisted her onto her back, and desperately sprinted away.
The Mud Man stood rigidly in place for a moment, then raised its arm to impale both of them through.
But beating it to the punch was a fireball released by Leonora, which instantly shattered the ceiling above the Mud Man’s head.
Rumble— A cascade of stones and debris came crashing down, completely burying the Mud Man.
But soon, black mud began seeping out from the pile of rubble, reforming once again into a standing black humanoid figure.
Its featureless face scanned the surroundings.
The two girls had long since vanished.
Inside the records room.
Shiya passed row after row of bookshelves and settled Leonora in the innermost corner.
But just as she was about to let go of the arms holding Leonora, Leonora, whose body was still trembling, grabbed Shiya’s hand in return and held on tightly, refusing to let go.
The battle that had ended in mere moments had completely shattered all the pride of this young lady from the Celestine Ducal House.
Born a prodigy, Leonora had rarely experienced setbacks, let alone a crushing defeat like this.
A pang of heartache flashed in Shiya’s pale golden eyes.
Shiya had no choice but to let her hold her hand.
Even as her hand was pinched until red marks appeared, she remained patient and didn’t pull away.
Shiya lowered her gaze.
The emergency lights had long gone out by now.
There wasn’t a single speck of light around them; she couldn’t see the expression on Leonora’s face.
But she could hear the girl’s sobs—very soft, very faint, yet each one felt like a large raindrop falling heavily onto her heart.
Perhaps only in this pitch-black darkness could Leonora tear off all her arrogant disguises and return to being that stubborn, strong-willed girl.
But Shiya didn’t know how to comfort her, and she dared not make too much noise.
She could sense that the Mud Man was still lingering nearby.
The long-untended files on the bookshelves continued to tremble, sending down puffs of dust.
After thinking it over, Shiya had an idea.
She took the initiative again, gently prying open Leonora’s tightly clenched fingers one by one.
Then, amidst Leonora’s short, stifled sound of surprise, she placed Leonora’s palm gently on her own forehead.
She guided it slowly downward, letting it trace over her eyebrows, eyes, the tip of her nose, her earlobes, every inch of her face.
Finally, Leonora’s fingertip lightly touched Shiya’s moist lips.
Shiya hesitated for a moment, but in the end, she took Leonora’s hand and traced it over her own cherry-pink lips, using it to draw a smiling face on Leonora’s hand.
Her slender fingers traced on the back of Leonora’s hand, conveying the thoughts the girl couldn’t yet voice.
Don’t be afraid. I’m still here.
Beside her ear, Shiya could clearly hear Leonora’s almost imperceptible sniffles stop.
Immediately after, the soft flesh of Shiya’s cheeks was pinched hard by Leonora, who then proceeded to knead and squeeze them with mischievous delight for a good while.
Shiya instantly puffed out her cheeks in a huff, feeling that all her delicate, feminine sentiments had been trampled on by this woman.
But this soothing, slightly pink-tinged atmosphere didn’t last long.
A murky, flowing water sound came from outside the corridor.
Black mud was seeping in through the gap under the records room door, bit by bit.
Shiya’s heart instantly tightened.
She immediately understood.
The relentless Mud Man was searching all the rooms on this floor at an extremely fast pace.
Once this black mud flowed past the rows of bookshelves and reached their feet, it would only be a matter of moments before the Mud Man broke down the door and killed them.
Without a moment’s hesitation, Shiya scooped Leonora up in her arms, intending to stuff her into an empty filing cabinet nearby.
The Mud Man had grown too powerful for them to resist at all.
Since they had already fallen into a hopeless situation, then at the very end, Shiya wanted Leonora to survive.
Just as Leonora had protected her several times before.
But Leonora in her arms seemed to realize her intention and began struggling violently.
Although her strength was much diminished, it still prevented Shiya from safely placing her inside the cabinet.
Leonora’s staff glowed with a faint light, pressed against Shiya’s chest.
It illuminated their immediate surroundings and also reflected the flash of stubbornness and unwillingness in Leonora’s pale red eyes.
A bit of stubbornness rose in Shiya too.
Today, she was determined to oppose this young lady of the Celestine Ducal House.
She pushed the staff aside and, under Leonora’s furious gaze, insisted on pushing her into the cabinet.
Just as the two were pressed close together, locked in a silent struggle, a sudden change occurred.
A clear, bell-like, delightful little girl’s laughter came from the distance, seemingly piercing through all the rooms on this floor.
Shiya immediately recognized it.
It was the pink-haired little girl who had mooched a meal from her earlier.
But what she couldn’t figure out was, in such a dangerous environment, why would that girl come to attract the Mud Man’s attention?
Soon, the black mud that had spread over half the records room receded like a tide, vanishing rapidly.
The familiar, heart-pounding footsteps of that dark shadow also gradually faded into the distance.
But before Shiya could even relax for half a breath, her abdomen was lightly kicked by someone.
The young lady’s voice sounded softly in her ear:
“Your courage has grown quite fat, hasn’t it? Daring to defy me and make decisions for me now?”
Leonora tried to prop herself up, but failed.
Resigned, she bent her jade-like legs, clad in black stockings, and rested her feet on Shiya’s arm.
Shiya instinctively looked down.
Through the hem of the dress, the lines of her long, straight legs extended downward.
That piece of white fabric embroidered with tulip patterns was displayed before her eyes, completely unguarded and in full view.
Shiya’s breath hitched in her throat.