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Return of the Fallen Volume 11 Chapter 25

“I need ya to strip for me.”

This was so abrupt it left Kazuki blank for a moment, but he could see that Marty was completely serious.

…

“What, why?”

Marty shrugged.

“Oh come now, my request isn’t that unreasonable. When ya think about it, it actually kind of makes perfect sense. Those worms are following ya right. They obviously are honing in on ya somehow. If it’s not you specifically, most likely it’s something ya have on ya person. So chop chop, drop the top and bottom and let’s see ya shake one good time, ya know, to make sure ain’t nothing clinging, hehe.”

Kazuki looked left and right. They were still hovering in the air on the glider. Marty leaned on the handlebar.

“Don’t worry about being in the air, after all, it’s the safest place for anybody. Better in the sky than down there, where ya might die.”

“That’s not the point. You know you can just use ki to inspect me. There’s no need for me to take things off here and there, right?”

Marty went quiet for a moment before she clicked her tongue.

*Tch”

“Ya really are no fun, are ya.”

Kazuki felt a wave of ki spread over across his body. She searched every nook and cranny and smiled like a creep as she did it.

“Hmm, ya certainly have more than ya need now don’t ya.”

Kazuki rolled his eyes. In the end, though Marty found nothing suspicious.

“I don’t get it. Nothing is out of place on your body, well besides your…advantages over other men. Clothes, nothing, pants, shoes, two rings, but…nothing. How strange, are they really just out to get ya. Maybe your body has a certain smell on it.”

Marty sniffed Kazuki’s armpit and pretended to cough and choke.

“Funny.”

“I’m sorry I’m sorry, heh. Seriously though what’s going on? From the outside in, top to bottom, you couldn’t possibly attract those worms for no particular reason so what is going on then?”

Kazuki himself was curious. He didn’t think he stood out in any way. As far as he could tell, he was normal.

(The only thing I can think of is the fact that I’m hiding my real power but that shouldn’t make these worms go wild and hunt me down.)

Kazuki really couldn’t tell because he was too new to this place. He could only go off the information he had and all of it pointed to nothing out of place.

As the two were stumped, the both of them caught a reflection in the distance.

“Is that from a tower?”

Marty nodded.

“If its not another person like you, it can only be from a tower. Lets go!”

Marty activated the glider, and its core roared, sending them flying into the distance.

“Why would a tower send any signals toward us. Surely Stez contacted the other Oasis and told them about us. They would want for us to stay as far away as possible, right?”

Marty nodded.

“For that point, you are correct, but then so why are they shining their mirrors out like that? I don’t think it was necessary to us and more like it was a call for help.”

“Help?”

“It’s just my gut but…we’ll know soon, just hang on.”

Several minutes later, the two got closer and could see a tower standing at a harsh angle sticking out of the dry sand. The sands were as still as death, so the two landed nearby. The entire island had either been destroyed or was buried beneath the surface, meaning they could not simply enter the tower. Looking around, there was scattered debris all over, mostly in a long wide line going from east to west, indicating the direction of the crash.

Marty took out a mirror from inside of her clothes and picked up a good angle off the sun and reflected light back to the top of the tower. When she did this the light on the tower suddenly flashed a few times and Marty flashed something back.

“What did you say? How many are still alive?”

Marty just took a few steps back and pulled Kazuki along with her. The tower shook for but a second before a small opening big enough only for a single person to enter.

“The answers are in there.”

Marty walked in, followed by Kazuki. The second they were inside, the opening closed as if it had never been there in the first place. As soon as they entered, it was obvious how badly this place had suffered. Corpses strewn about all over. Each of them mangled to an unrecognizable degree. Bones twisted and poking through. Skin fell from the body as if it had been melted. Blood splattered as if someone had shattered a pool of it. This was all from the crash landing. As Kazuki got closer, with his soul-reading ability he could feel that all of their souls had been eaten.

Marty walked through with a grim expression. She said nothing and simply avoided the blood.

“Aren’t you Marticia from Oasis Seven?”

A voice came out from the top of the tower. A woman who looked around the same age as Marty stepped out of the top floor and made her way down but from her staggering and pale expression they knew she was on the verge of collapse, and they rushed up to help her. When they got to her, it was a sad sight. She had deep wounds and her internal organs were nothing more than mush. A Demigod should be able to heal such wounds in seconds yet this woman had not.

The moment Kazuki grabbed the woman’s arm to help her sit down, he could sense the deplorable state she was in. With his soul-reading ability, he could tell that only a fraction of her soul remained and it was rapidly falling apart.

“We let our guard down. We grew accustomed to their patterns and we let it get to our heads. I was supposed to protect them…It’s my fault. They’re all dead because of me.”

“No, it’s not on you. Those bastards are the ones who

Marty’s words stopped there as the woman died right there in her arms. The last remaining part of her soul deteriorated and she was no more. Kazuki began to wonder about a few things. He could still feel divine power inside of her but her soul was clearly gone. This was just like Fera’s body. He didn’t know how divine energy that no longer had a soul could harm another Demigod just because it’s from a different body.

(Aunt and uncle said that divine energy inside of a corpse is poisonous but if the soul of said person is no longer there, where does this danger come from? The divine energy in the world around us can be absorbed by Marty but if it’s from another’s body suddenly it’s bad.)

Kazuki then remembered the process in which magic becomes divine energy. It goes from regular magic to mastered magic as well as a regular soul to a transformed soul, these two come together to make divine energy.

(Even if you take the soul away, something that has been mixed is no longer the same as what it used to be. It will still be tainted by the soul that was there before. So then why did beings in the many Lower Realms wish to claim her body? Maybe they knew a way to separate the good from the bad and knew of a way to only receive the benefits from it. Maybe they weren’t after the divine energy at all and were only interested in the body.)

Kazuki began to think about alchemy and the way bodies were made.

(Maybe one can not make a body equal to that of a Demigod right off the bat but if you could start with such a high-level ingredient, the type of body would be superior to any other manmade. Just like when using dragon blood or elf blood. The body you get is far superior to that of a normal human. For those who meet an unsurpassable wall and cannot overcome it. To reset with a much better base…It makes sense.)

“Jentson, did ya hear me?”

Marty’s voice called out, snapping Kazuki out of it.

“What?”

“I said we should look around. This tower may be done for but maybe we can find some spare parts or anything else that may be useful.”

First thing they had to do was remove the crystal key from around the dead woman’s neck. Some might consider this disrespectful to do since the woman had just passed but Kazuki and Marty were not living in such a convenient place to coddle such things. Marty took the key and the two first headed to the top of the tower. There was barely any energy left in the core and it was damaged but still operational. With a slight tap, another crystal flew off the panel and landed in Marty’s hand. With a thought, an image was displayed showing the map of this tower. Just like Oasis Seven, the layout was exactly the same.

Kazuki and Marty then began their search through the tower.