THE LAST KEEPER

Chapter 131: 131. TRAP

The tunnel went deeper and deeper, the deeper Sagiri went, and then suddenly it gave way into a cave with a pool of water at the centre. It looked like a bridge used to be on top of it, but it had been broken moments before he got in. Apart from the sound of the water, there was no other presence in the cave.

”Hey sagiri?” suddenly came a voice from beyond the cave. So the way beyond the cave was coated with the same material as the fortress and the shadow colonnade. Then, beyond the opening opposite the water, came the two faces he had not wanted to see ever again but needed to see so he could pay them in full for what they had done to him. Their hate had grown deeper if that was even possible, and he could now see it surrounding them with his right eye. It was like a black cloud surrounding them, and the hate was like a disease eating them from the inside. So the right eye could now see auras, and he did not perceive them anymore.

”Took you long enough,” they spoke in unison like they always did, and it was creepy just like always. Sagiri could finally understand why the people who shot Eight stayed out of range.

”I think I’m just in time to kill you,” sagiri said in a calm voice, but all he could feel was the fire of the archive powering the ice in his heart.

”I think you are the one who is dying here,” Makea answered this time.

”We have been plotting our revenge since the day we escaped from the academy. Do you know how many days we had to hide to be able to even get out of the north? Just because of you, we had to run and hide from that damned salka because he is relentless. Why did you have to come to Galka? You are a monster, yet you are allowed in the academy, and we are not!” Nakea snapped the hate surrounding him, growing even bigger.

”Is that why you killed an innocent man?” sagiri did not feel fazed at all by the accusations they were launching at him. How delusional could the pair get? They could have just avoided him, and they could have been just fine. But they just had to go and start a rivalry that they created in their head and try to kill twice, and the missed arrows were the third.

”Well, if you had just remained still and taken the arrows to your heart, then he would have died, so this is your fault for refusing to die,” Nakea said. Sagiri could have been wrong, but they looked even skinnier now. They must have suffered after they had run out of the academy, but it seemed they had not suffered half enough to snap out of their delusion.

”Are you going to talk all night before you find an opening to backstab me again?” sagiri asked calmly. The cold in his heart always did away with all his ability to feel, and right about now, he wanted them to stop talking and do what they planned to do.

The twins seethed before making a hand signal, and arrows were suddenly released from five different crevices in the wall. He did not even have to move much, but just swing Nokai around, and in a flash, all the arrows were in two pieces or more on the ground.

”How did...” Make looked taken back but Nakea was now pulling back an arrow far back on his bow. At first, he was aiming it at sagiri but soon, when it was fully charged, he pointed it up, and right then sagiri realized something had been on top of him the whole time. Mountains of rockets enclasped in some metal net.

The only escape could be to jump into the water. Sagiri had to think first, but just then the five released arrows at him again. So they had set up a trap for him. He knew they could for sure set up traps, but he had not known they’d want to bury him under a mountain of rocks. Even with Nokai fully cackling with intent. It was going to be hard to fend off both attacks and avoid being buried. He could only do one. And barely escape the second and hope not be crippled.

No time to think, Sagiri swung Nokai around and cut the arrows just like the first time. A whisper of a second before the rocks could fall on him, he jumped into the pool, and half the rocks followed after him. The biggest hit him in the back and sent him to the very bottom of the pool. The pool was not as deep as the hellpool, but it still was deep, and half the rocks buried him at the very bottom.

Even with the archive fully powering his body, he still managed to feel the hit, and for a moment, he almost lost consciousness as the rocks piled on him at the bottom of the pool, burying him beneath the heap and beneath the water.

He had not been able to hold his breath with the heavy hit, and even with his being good at holding his breath underwater for long, he knew he could not stay underwater for long. The rocks were heavy and crushed him with every second he was pinned down.

His head was lucky not to be covered, and he could see with his right eye all the way out of the dark waters. The twins were staring into the pool, and their lackeys had come to join them and look into the water. They were now, for the first time, not radiating hate, and in fact, they were radiating with triumph. It was the first time he had seen them radiate with so much joy. Joy at killing someone they had deluded themselves into thinking was taking their spot.

Just watching them for that moment sagiri suddenly felt some emotion break through the ice in his heart.

pity.

The twins had been born twins and firstborns in a tribe that considered them a curse. They must have suffered in growing up, and perhaps that had turned them into twisted individuals. they instead of trying to escape the system that had made them out to be less, had been turned into monsters. All they have ever known is hate. They had let that hate feed on their every bone and turned into what they hated and became hate themselves. So much so, they only managed to feel joy after killing someone they considered a rival and an innocent man.

They were the sort of people who needed to be eliminated. They were like a wildfire eating everything in its wake with no exception. What a wicked turn of events. The world had made them monsters, and now the world had to spit them out and cull them because they had turned. If they were not stopped, they could never stop.

It was not revenge for him anymore. It was a necessity.