I regressed and became the Sword Ice King-Chapter 422- Festival 153- The Sun Comet 2

Chapter 422 -422- Festival 153- The Sun Comet 2

Her gaze was heavy with concern as she slowly sat up. A light energy dome warping into existence under her movement.

Raph’s gaze sparked in surprise.

“Oh? You still had an artefact with a shield function?”

Thalia glanced at him with a raised brow, then scoffed.

“What do you take me for? Obviously.”

“Hmm~” Raph mused.

‘Must be one of Elder Sister Fiona’s tower artefacts.’

Glancing to the sides, he identified the unconscious bodies.

‘Monica Lorientt, Felicia Dreau and…Sophie..’

He tilted his head at Thalia.

“Interesting line-up.”

She glanced around with a shrug.

“Sometimes, you fight with what you’re dealt, not what you planned.”

Raph’s brows twitched slightly as he folded his hands. “True.”

The flow of the battlefield was one thing that was difficult to predict.

Sometimes we’re thrown into situations where we may have to forage for a victory for ourselves.

Other times, we face opponents with partners we never thought could synchronise.

‘Though, there are other reasons for battle synchrony.’

He thought to himself as he sat next to his sister.

“Let me guess, Battle Synchronisation?”

In his past life, during the first semester of his third year, the topic otherwise referred to as the Battle Arts Synchronisation was taught.

There was nothing to it, just a form of exercise where the Lecturer picks random students to fight with each other against other random students.

It helped foster camaraderie without the usual status quo.

An effective method that helped push students past their limits.

With Thalia and two others from Class Three, it was no surprise that they were able to work together against Mila.

Though….

“How did Sophie perform?” He asked, his attention drawn towards the sleeping lilac-haired.

From his observation, he could tell she was completely spent.

How so, he wasn’t sure.

After all, it was a battle he didn’t get the privilege of witnessing.

Thalia followed his gaze, her lips parting open just before it closed. Before she turned away with a sigh.

“She fought well. Mireso than you would think.”

Raph’s head snapped towards her. His eyes were wide in bewilderment.

“Really? I mean, I’ve fought with her so I know how much flow she’s capable of entailing in a battlefield…but hearing this from you…”

Thalia remained silent for a moment.

As if contemplating her words before they came out.

“Hmm…” She muttered silently. “She shows promise. Especially since she’s a 10th Circle.”

Raph rolled his head backwards with a silent chuckle.

“I figured.” He said. “She was too skilled for that.”

At that moment, Thalia’s gaze sparked.

A brief pang of interest bloomed in her chest as her gaze met his.

“How skilled?”

Raph shrugged slowly.

“The usual. Fighting style, choice of weapons, footwork, dark Mana….everything about her screamed more than what meets the eye.”

Thalia’s ears pricked at each word he said, her brain spinning on overdrive.

She had been swallowed by the moment, frozen in place as if she were calculating the most difficult calculus problem she had ever seen.

Yet, her expression was as poised as ever.

It should have fooled people into believing she was fine. Giving the impression of a calm island in the middle of a heavy storm.

Sadly, it couldn’t fool her brother.

The moment she got stuck in the clung of her thoughts, Raph raised a brow of curiosity.

Concern slowly taking root.

“Is there more to it?” He asked.

Leaning in closer to her.

Until their backs touched.

She flinched, shook her head and cleared her throat.

“It-it was just an observation…but Sophie isn’t….she’s not just any random Non-system user.” She said,

“What?” Raph repeated with a low tune, tilting his head slightly while his gaze narrowed.

“Well, yes. I assumed so as well. I didn’t bother to find out her roots since she hasn’t caused any trouble….” He stopped. Glanced at Sophie and then turned to Thalia.

“…Is she perhaps…a threat?”

He raised his arm in the air and a cold wind shook the earth.

A double-edged katana formed from the mix, cold as it was lustrous under the moonlight.

Thalia immediately turned around.

“What are you doing?”

Raph froze. His eyes darted about their sockets from confusion to startlement.

“Is she a threat, sister?”

Threats were inevitable figures who would cause harm in the future.

Though they might be redeemable if they go through life on a different path, their choices were usually something.

Still, accusing someone of being a threat came from action.

The action that proved their role as a threat.

“Silly. We haven’t confirmed anything. And you haven’t even heard what I was going to say.”

“Thalia….I’m not blind.” Raph muttered slowly.

“I know when you’re worried. When you’re overthinking….I can see it.”

He glanced at Sophie once again.

His words were lost in his mouth, lining up in order before it was finally found.

“Sophie is….a question. She came to the Academy– no surname, no background.

Her strength rivals ours, and I find that…intriguing, more so than a problem.”

He took a breath, then turned to Thalia.

“If she is a threat, then I understand we will have to take drastic measures now or later…but from your action, I can tell you’re at an impasse like me.”

Thalia shook her head slowly.

Confusion bearing fruit.

“An impasse?” She muttered. “What do you mean?”

“A threshold to say. So far, I’ve watched her…observed her, and I can tell you have too. Sophie is suspicious, but her actions speak louder than the name itself.

She has done nothing wrong.”

Thalia sighed, rubbing circles on her temples as she lay back on the ground.

“That’s the thing, Raph.” She said, “Yet…..she is yet to do anything wrong”

The moonlight diffused through the air between the two.

Enriching the lives of the five figures which stood underneath it.

It’s calm and collected breeze that blew across the cleared skies was a tranquillity amidst the powerful currents. One that could never be bought.

Raph watched his sister sigh slowly, and place her hand over her forehead.

His thoughts reeled in. Plunging into a state of more confusion.

In that state, images flashed through his mind.

The brazen night of his demise.

The curse that bound him as a result of his inadequacy as the sole son of the Jun household.

A past life worth burying in the deepest of ashes.

Burned under the fiercest of flames.

It resurfaced like an old wound– fresh, searing, like a reopened scar.

The emotions once abandoned began to creep in as well, slowly, visibly.

The core rage that plagued him for the first seven years of his life. Washed away by the brilliance of his childhood.

A cloud of cushion in a world of thorns.

He had learned to think before he acted.

To bring judgment upon those who deserved it, and free the ones bound by unjust chains.

To weigh actions, not suspicions.

To see reality, not fear it.

It was always easier to let worry lead.

The thought of betrayal burned like molten iron in a bowl of water—heavy, scalding, impossible to ignore.

The urge to cut down a budding tree for fear of rotten fruit was a temptation he knew well.

And in many worlds, that would be enough.

A justified reason to kill a threat before it ever blooms.

But not in theirs.

“That is far from what we uphold as the Juns.”

They were proud—sometimes foolishly so.

Letting a rat grow into a dragon just to prove they could slay it at its peak.

Not because they had to.

But because they could.

Yet even that arrogance wasn’t what fueled his restraint now.

It wasn’t pride.

It wasn’t patience.

It was judgment.

The choice to wait… or not.

The question: Would this one become a threat, or not?

And Sophie…

She walked a fine line between the two.

A long breath escaped his lips.

He rolled his shoulders with quiet resignation.

And in the silence that followed, they contemplated.

The world wouldn’t allow them to make a decision though.

There was never enough time, really.

You just go with the clock set for you.

He would have to make a choice. And in this case, he may have to do it soon.

Soon, a long moment had passed before he turned to Thalia.

“We need to find the others….and round up the series of events, quickly.”

Thalia sat up nearly immediately.

A brief nod of her head as she rose to her feet.

“A little rest would be nice…after all that…”

Raph chuckled.

“We both know that now isn’t the time….not when many are likely to die or fall sick with these conditions.”

Thalia’s expression grew stern.

She had realised for a while that the consequences of the explosion would bear its fangs at them. Ridiculously so, too.

They had done it to protect themselves, but here they are causing harm to others.

‘Mana Reflux.’

It was a double-edged blade.

And it would become sharper if they didn’t act now.

Though…

“I don’t think we have to worry about the others…” She said, “They still have the buildings to shield them from the rain.”

“True, but…”

In his past life, during the start of the rebellion of the System Uprisers, though, a lot milder than there’s.

They had brought down two Lecture buildings.

Now that the conditions were a lot more favourable for them at the beginning…

“Let’s not put our hopes in that. We should go either way…”

He turned to the girls. “They need somewhere to recuperate as well. If I’m guessing, Sophie had to expend the most so she especially would need her rest.”

“Here is as good a place as any other, Raph.” Thalia glanced down at him with her arms folded. “Don’t forget that the rain here has stopped. The clouds won’t form at this part because of the raging mana storm upwards.”

“Mana storm?” Raph repeated with a muse.

A light whistle escaped his lips.

“You’re talking about the molecular collisions of mana particles….that make up the Mana reflux, right?”

A moment of silence hung in the air.

With Thalia raising her brow at her younger brother.

‘I forgot how suspiciously informed this boy was for his age…’

She thought to herself as she glanced up.

“Yes…those patches formed are the mana storms. The phenomenon where mana is stripped from our circles is what we refer to as Mana Reflux.”

“Hah…” Raph nodded in understanding. “Makes sense.”

He stood to his feet and dusted the back of his trousers in a lazy motion.

“So we leave them here under the protection of the artefact you hold?”

“Yes,” Thalia replied curtly, walking forward, where the rain commenced. “They’ll find their way when they’re up.”

Raph lingered behind her.

Glancing at the girls who graciously slept from the strain of a battle that should have killed them.

The irony made him smile. Satisfaction in its purest form.

‘One down.’ He thought as he turned away and walked after his sister.

Leaving the girls to their own devices– sleep.

Or so they thought.

A few seconds had passed, and the Jun siblings were gone when one of the figures flinched.

Just a nudge of her head which soon led her to open her eyes.

Purple. Sparkling, yet dark.

A malevolent hue hides in its depths.

It blinked once. Then twice.

Updat𝒆d fr𝒐m freew𝒆bnov𝒆l.c(o)m