The Dark Rebirth of Pandora: Revenge of the Abyss

Chapter 248: Vision in the Ravine

”Help here! H-Hyaa, those bugs are disgusting!” Yuki screams in fear of the insects, running to me frightened as she’s being chased by a spider that must be almost 3 meters tall.

”H-Hana, help!” She cries out to me for assistance.

’Tsk, why is this cowardly bitch attracting them to me!’ I use fire magic to drive the spider away and ”help” Yuki while I see that most are having problems.

There are many of them and they come like an avalanche or tsunami, not stopping for practically anything, and even though we’re killing them, they seem to never end, and practically no one has weapons since we weren’t well-informed.

The ”teacher” Pandora just said we were going to a dungeon and only later said she wouldn’t bring anything, most thought she would give us weapons and supplies, not that we would be going to the dungeon unprepared.

”SAKURA, MAKE YOUR CLONES ALREADY!” My brother yells at Sakura, who is hiding behind him in disgust and fear of the giant insects.

’It’s in moments like these that I wish I had a unique attack ability.’ I don’t have hardly anyone I control, and that’s why I don’t have people to help me.

It’s not like I could use Mind Control on the insects, so I’m practically powerless, only able to use my normal magic.

”Yuki, stop being useless and use magic!” I say irritated with this coward as I fight some kind of super-fast scorpion, barely able to defend myself, even though I see the attacks and keep up with the speed, the movements are confusing.

And there are many other insects to deal with besides this one, the quantity makes it very difficult to think clearly about what to do, and there’s a bunch of idiots who aren’t fighting due to fear or revulsion of the insects.

”...Ice?” One of the scared girls uses an ice spell on impulse, freezing the area we’re in, and this slowed down the monsters.

”Hey, Yuki, be useful! Use ice magic on them, it’s your affinity!” I say as she regains some composure.

”Okay, just keep them away from me” She says while starting to cast ice magic, freezing several of them, and taking advantage of the opening, I use fire magic if combined correctly, the thermal shock will help kill these things.

”...” Slowly, we’re managing to take ground so the cowards start helping with long-range attacks, but it’s simply ridiculous that it took us more than 30 minutes to fight properly.

If it weren’t for the constant healing, we would have been wiped out already. How can we be having so much trouble with mere insects? Professor Pandora is also a damn malicious one.

The closed-off area makes it impossible to use large magic or the ravine will collapse on our heads, and the tight space prevents precise or complex movements to go ”hand-to-hand” with these monsters.

Meanwhile, the monsters have the advantage of the terrain, moving and jumping between the walls with precision, while they don’t stop coming for even a second, not to mention the fact that they’re disgusting and repulsive.

Basically, the scenario is not favoring us at all, and although the unique abilities are undoubtedly powerful, several are not suitable for this situation.

And some could be too dangerous to use here, not to mention that many aren’t even using them, like Sakura, who can clone herself, but is too cowardly and afraid of insects, so she’s just hiding behind my brother.

Her clones would also be useless because they’d be afraid of the insects and would probably just take up space, hindering even more.

”[Storm Fangs]” I hear Kaori’s voice reciting a spell, and soon a powerful gust of wind shreds the bodies of hundreds of insects, following in a straight line.

’Not bad’ Finally, someone does something useful to reduce the number of insects wind magic is not that destructive and can easily travel through the environment.

’I also have great affinity with the wind’ I start using a spell, forming a large tornado and throwing them all up, I want to get out of the ravine, fighting in it is hindering us.

Quickly, everyone gets out of it, followed by hundreds of insects that come out of the ravine chasing after us, but now that we’re above the ravine and have space, we start destroying the insects with powerful magic.

As soon as they come up, they’re knocked down or killed with speed, barely able to maintain a pace to get out due to the constant attacks.

And after a long time, they stop coming, everyone is exhausted, and the ground has piles and piles of insect bodies, showing that we worked hard to deal with this insane amount of monsters.

”Very good, students, for complete beginners, of course,” Professor Pandora says, coming out of the air and landing on the ground. She belittles the effort of everyone as if it were nothing.

”You talk too much for someone who didn’t help at all!” Kaito says angrily.

”Of course I didn’t help, I’m the teacher, not the student. You’re the ones here to learn, not me. Besides, what kind of stupid worms get confused and scared in front of the enemy?”

”Just one of you could have already killed all those insects, but you got confused with the drop and the number of enemies. How stupid, Sakura can create clones.”

”She could easily match the numbers against the monsters and single-handedly decimate them all by having a better and more efficient mind, yet she just cowered like a coward behind another hero.”

”You didn’t know how to take advantage of the space and magic you had. If the space is limited, just take advantage of it. In an open field, each one could be attacked by at least 9 of the insects.”

”But in this closed space, each one was facing 1 to 3 of them, an obvious reduction that gave them more freedom of attack than the monsters had, since they are swarm-type monsters.”

”Isn’t it just logical? How stupid do you have to be not to understand that?”

”...” Everyone remains silent, feeling insulted because it’s true. Just look at the strength of the monsters we’re all stronger than the monsters, and yet it took us so long to win.

’I see...’ I think about what she’s saying.

”Professor, I have a question,” I raise my hand, calling her attention. I think I understand what she wants us to do in the way of fighting.

”Speak, let’s see if you’ll say something stupid.”

”...Do you want us to fight in a morbid way?” It would basically be fighting in a cruel, sadistic, and grotesque way with unnatural or even abnormal body magic and movements.

”...Oh, it seems you understand. The weaker mind is the one that fails in this world. Violence and terror on the battlefield are valuable weapons to use.”

”Monsters naturally use this to fight, using ’abnormal’ movements and magic, and having a grotesque biology precisely to cause fear in battle.”

”A frightened opponent is a weak opponent. Why do we need ethics on the battlefield? The dead cannot question the way they are killed. In a fight to the death, there are no rules.”

”And that’s what makes them unique. The one with the strongest mind will have the tactical advantage to continue.”

”Everything you saw is an example of this. In nature, your opponent doesn’t care if you think it’s wrong, grotesque, or disgusting. All that matters is who will be alive or dead in the end.”

”...” Everyone is disturbed by this. In the end, this style of fighting is no different from the monsters.

She’s just teaching us to be as monstrous as the monsters we’re facing.

”And since Hana had the courtesy to reveal the answer, let’s take the training to a more entertaining level,” Professor Pandora says with a diabolical smile.

”You must collect the corpses of the insects and bathe in their blood, as well as eat their flesh, saving some for the long journey through the dungeon.”

”What? You’re insane!” Dissatisfaction reaches everyone.

”Shut up, you’ll do exactly what I told you to do, or eating that and bathing in blood will be the least of your worries.”

The atmosphere becomes heavy, as if we’re facing a dangerous monster.

”...”

”Great, start before I lose my patience. I don’t care if you like my methods or not.”

”A-And why don’t you do it too!” Chinatsu speaks nervously.

”Of course, why not?” Professor Pandora agrees and goes to a monster that looks like a spider. She grabs the spider’s abdomen and pierces it with her hands, and green-yellow blood gushes from the wound, staining her body.

It has a strange greenish-yellow color and a repugnantly bad smell, but Professor Pandora doesn’t seem to mind the blood that stains her body as she pulls out part of the spider’s organs and chews them in front of us.

”...” Everyone is disgusted by the more savage demonstration we’ve ever seen from a ”human”. It’s even hard to call her human after this.

”Are you satisfied? This is the food you have now, and if you think it’s bad, you should find the boss of the dungeon and kill it to get out of here.”

”The scent of blood on your bodies will have two effects: first, it will keep other monsters away from you, as they will see you as a potential threat, and it will incite the monsters in this swarm to attack you if they see you.”

”Now start bathing in the blood to continue forward.” She sits on the spider’s carapace and watches as all the students give up trying to defy this lunatic and start doing it.

Obviously with great difficulty, some even vomiting in disgust at the disgusting appearance of the insects. The blood is viscous and sticky, and it smells very bad.

Those who were burned smell even worse, the heat made the smell horrible, and of course some collect it and put it in their bags, after all, it’s our ”food” and unfortunately no one has much normal food.

And the little we brought, we ate hours ago, so the only food is these things or the plants.

’This hurts...’ I smear the blood on my skin and feel a burning sensation, as well as a certain redness appearing, probably caused by the venom.

”...” Some girls are crying in disgust. I think many will come out of this dungeon traumatized. I also never want to see insects again in my life.

”...”

”Okay, students, 15 minutes have passed and I see that all of you are quite dirty with enemy blood! Isn’t that wonderful?” She says this as if it were a joke or a valuable achievement.

”Now let’s move on. If you go through the ravine, you’ll eventually reach the boss, but it will be a long and insect-filled path. However, you can try your luck going another way.”

She speaks, and everyone starts to think.

We end up choosing to ignore the ravine we’ve had enough of disgusting and disgusting insects popping up everywhere.

And since we’re not going through the ravine, we decide to follow the side opposite to it. Professor Pandora had a malicious smile when we decided this, but she didn’t try to change the direction, and we moved on anyway.