But although their bodies had stopped responding, it didn't mean the threat had stopped moving.
No, it was quite the opposite
Seeing its attack had worked, its mouth popped back into place before the edges quickly started to move upwards, bringing the tar-like skin that was starting to melt again with it.
Allowing its face to slowly start to reveal a massive, grotesque smile, or at least what appeared to be one.
As it began to move even faster after seeing that they had been frozen thanks to its scream
Seeing that the creature was fast approaching, they tried to move, but the fear paralyzed them down to their very cores, not even allowing them to draw in the mana they needed from the air, much less move.
And it was at that critical moment that Oliva finally forced herself to move, grabbing Azrael and throwing him over her shoulder as quickly as she could before she began their retreat once again.
Seeing its prey had started moving once again, it let out an even louder sonic dread attack.
Ahahhahah!!
Although this time it wasn't nearly as effective as before, seeing that Oliva had only halted her steps for a second before she began moving again, with blood dripping from within her mouth, and Azreal slung over her shoulders.
"Sorry, Az, but this has to hurt," she muttered, her voice straining
Before laying her fingers on his broad, muscular back, she ripped a straight, clawed line through it, drawing blood. She had pierced just deep enough below his skin that it would hurt but just shallow enough that it wouldn't cause him any long-term harm.
Feeling the slight pain radiating from his back, Azreal jolted up, finally being able to move his body.
"Thanks, Liv, you can put me down now," he said as he watched the creature screaming while tearing through the snow and itself, determined to get to them.
It was truly a sight to see the thing breaking apart only to reform seconds later.
"No problem, Az, you were starting to slow me down anyway," she said mockingly as she threw him off of her and into the air in front of her, all without stopping her sprint.
She couldn't afford to stop now, not with that thing right behind her.
As he was thrown into the air he quickly made the gravity around himself lighter before spinning his body allowing him to reposition himself midair
Before quickly returning gravity to normal as he quickly discerned from the air crash landing into the snow feet first
While altering the gravity around once more for a second as he quickly anchored his feet onto the snow before exploding into a sprint as soon as he landed.
Olivia wasn't far behind him because as soon as he landed he decreased the gravity surrounding her allowing her to catch up to him.
And before long they finally spotted what looked to be the boundary that led to the next floor.
A gigantic thin translucent blue wall which looked to have a staircase made entirely of ice, going down into the depths of darkness, just like the one that took them to this floor.
Seeing this they started running as fast as they could, with the gravity around them descended by nearly four times allowing them to go even faster.
But the creature behind them wasn't ideal either as it started to throw itself forward into the air by digging its claws deep into the snow and launching itself body into the air before landing with a
Boooom!!
Before quickly doing it again, managing to quickly catch up to them before they could reach the boundary which they believed would keep them safe.
But even as it landed right behind them shaking the ground around them making it harder for them to run it was still too late as they managed to throw themselves through the thin blue boundary landing right beside the staircase.
They were safe or so they believed, but that belief was quickly shattered a few seconds after it set.
As they saw the monster that had infested their minds and bodies with dread reach forward towards the boundary, the monster they had been running from for nearly an hour & a half pushed its hand through
It was not contained within the floor, why would it be, when it was obvious that it was the very same creature that had killed all the mana beasts on the last ten dungeon floors, it wasn't contained to a specific floor then so why would it be now?
And as this realization set in, that was when they felt true dread.
Their bodies were drained both mentally and physically which resulted in them passing out, but even as their bodies slumped onto the cold snowy floor that didn't stop the thing from reaching through the barrier.
But before it could get half of its body through, it sensed a familiar presence standing a few meters beside it.
The very same presence that had brought it here in the first place.
Turning its grotesque head towards this presence it only caught a glimpse before… before it began to hurt, to burn.
Its entire body was engulfed in fire, a deep purple fire which seemed to burn even the smoke rising from its body
It couldn't even let out a single sound as it burned
There was truly no escape.
"Good, you did well little thing I knew you were the right one for the job but even so I can't have you killing them can I?, Not when he is so close to the end, he did well evading you shows he can think and even his partner has potential. Truly he is the only one worthy of becoming the Heir."
"Now let's see how they do in the final test, oh I can't wait"
And with that, the presence disappeared leaving behind no trace it was ever there except for the burning corpse of the creature which would be reduced to ash soon enough.