[Attribute: Avatar of the Records, feels sleepy.]
'Sleepy?'
Knowing someone was likely behind him and going to strike, he instead put his foot on the Reader of Dreams' abdomen, using her as leverage to pull his trident out.
Using his superhuman strength, he managed to rip it out of her body, causing a waterfall of blood to begin pouring out of her.
Smiling amicably, he spun around to see another shadow soldier. He seemed calm and collected while slashing towards him with a dark steel longsword.
He parried it using the gap between the two prongs of his bident, before twisting it clockwise with all his might, essentially wrestling the longsword out of the man's hands.
However, the man didn't stand idly by and continued struggling. Taking the opportunity while they were busy in their "tug of war" to kick William in the chest. Sending him backwards, straight towards the invisible blade of the Reader of Dreams. Before he had a chance to react, a bout of intense drowsiness washed over him, just like before.
'Sleepy...Hold on.' An idea came to mind.
[Skill: Author's Note has been activated.]
[Reader of Sleep]
'A...ha..' He barely managed to get another thought out before he was stabbed in the lower back by the Reader of Dreams. However, the pain managed to bring him a few moments of clarity.
Despite his rather severe wounds that were gushing out blood by the second, his coat proved unresponsive, as if unwilling to comply with William's demands.
It was then that he thought he understood Linen's words. That each vestige still had a piece of their owner's will left behind, and was conscious enough to know whose side they were on.
Not having the time to waste, he languidly used his free left hand to begin wrestling the dagger from his back. Essentially becoming stuck in two separate games of tug of war, with his conscience rapidly fading.
He summoned beams of moonlight and solar flames to attack the two, which fortunately would hit them both and cause red, swelling burns to appear on their skin, which would be followed by grunts of pain.
A greyish-black energy emanated throughout William's body as he channeled the bane of existence into himself to enhance his damage output.
He clenched the dagger with all his strength and crushed it. Then, he used his now free arm to grab the head of the longsword and dent it with a strong clench of the fist.
Then, he manifested an Ingenuity construct in the shape of a blade that extended from the back of William's elbow, before ramming it backwards into the Reader of Dreams with his right arm, pulling the Reader of Sleep with him.
The blade went straight through her upper chest, causing her to bleed even more profusely than before. It seemed that she'd die of blood loss extremely soon. What mattered now was surviving until then.
So he continued to ram the back of his elbow through the woman, while simultaneously counterattacking the man in front and maintaining concentration on the Ingenuity construct. Guaranteeing that the woman would become incapacitated as fast as possible so that he'd have one less enemy to fight here.
Suffice to say, this move was rather successful and rendered the Reader of Dreams unconscious for the time being.
But, not before she used her strongest move.
[Skill: Dream Materialization, has been activated!]
As the temperature inside the caravan began to rise, William had a sudden realization.
'The reason the Reader of Sleep's ability is so potent, that it can render a being on the same level of strength as it unconscious near instantaneously, is because it only has one facet of usage. However, coupled with the Dream's ability, the potential combinations could be disastrous.'
Given that the caravan was made of oak, and by proxy, extremely flammable due to how dry it was, flames began to coat the halls of the caravan, inching towards the unconscious soldiers who were clueless to what was occurring outside of their fantasies.
'Whose dream...Oh.' William thought of the conquering heartbeat he had heard earlier, which had rapidly diminished, and the appearance of the Reader of Sleep soon after.
'They likely took advantage of the momentary weakness in mental strength that occurred from waking up, to induce a level of slumber in the King. This is a real pain...'
Suddenly, two imp-like creatures, with devilish wings and dark grins, wielding glowing red-hot pitchforks, materialized out of thin air and began charging towards Lian while shrieking inhumanly.
Still in a brawl with the Reader of Sleep, William dismissed the Ingenuity blade and stepped to the side with his bident in hand. He twirled it around his fingers before forming a thin cage of Ingenuity around the Reader of Sleep, which he would certainly be able to break out of in a moment.
However, that moment was all William needed to fight through his drowsiness and blast solar flames at the imps, purifying them under the sun's holiness.
As the imps began to burn and dissolve while hissing, he further slashed at the imps with his soul-slashing bident, piercing their souls and putting them down for good before they could do any damage to Lian.
'I'm not merely doing this for her, you know? It's just a common interest of survival. You don't have to make it out to be like I'm some kind of benevolent savior.'
Afterwards, the short-lived imps fell to the burning floor, returning to whenst they came.
William really had to thank that title he had received from facing Helios, or else he'd be in pretty rough shape right now. Though his clothes were getting a bit toasted, he needed to put this fire out fast, and the fastest way to do that would be to kill the Reader of Dreams as fast as possible. He stood in front of the bed where Lian lay, ready to protect.
Sadly, the Reader of Sleep had long since broken out of the Ingenuity cage and had taken stance in front of the Reader of Dreams, standing guard while his legs burned in the flames, though, because of his rather high endurance stat, it'd take quite some time for him to buckle under the heat of the fire just like William.
So there the two stood, each protecting someone they held dearly, with their weapons drawn. Though one weapon was in better shape than the other, clearly.
The Reader of Sleep then applied the sleepiness effect onto William with all the Ingenuity he had remaining. Forcing him to basically knock him unconscious instantaneously on the spot.
As he toppled over, his last thoughts were.
'C..he.a..te..r...' He criticized internally.
With their main enemy incapacitated, the Reader of Sleep hoisted the body of the Reader of Dreams into the air, holding her in his arms like a loyal knight carrying his princess.
"It's over now, you can relax."
From the information sources that were available to them, they had already deduced that the Truthseeker's coat had some sort of healing factor to it. Which is what he so desperately wanted at that moment.
His hand extended towards William's unconscious body that was lathered in flames, and clutched his coat in his right hand while holding the Emerald-Haired woman in his left.
He picked it and placed it on top of the woman's body, which would then promptly begin to heal.
Heaving a large sigh of relief, he prepared to finish the job on their enemy. Lifting the sword into the air, he silently prayed for the man's well-being. After all, he didn't seem like that bad of a guy; they were the ones in the wrong here, but orders were orders, so he complied.
Then, he brought the dark steel longsword down on the man, with everything that he had left.
Krrssck!
The sound of flesh being pierced and bones being crushed echoed throughout the caravan.
[437 Victory Points have been acquired!]
The girl looked at the previous three messages from the Library, as well as the locket she had just received and the katana in her hand.
[Epic]
[Legendary]
The paralyzed body of the Reader of Sleep fell to the floor with a loud thud as a sharp steel blade pierced through his neck, cutting off connection with his body from the neck down. He looked fearful of death, and yet, had come to terms with his imminent demise as long as the one he cared about was alive. As he slowly choked to death on his own blood, he uttered his last words.
"How...did..you...wake...up...my..ability...isn't.....sustain...based.."
The young woman with long black hair and purple highlights stared at the dying body with a grim expression.
'Murder...What a terrible thing...'
"I just made a deal."