SHAMAN PROTOCOL-Chapter 115: You are theirs… Mikel Graves.

"A shan ya—" Everest stopped chanting, his eyes entirely consumed by the sclera. Yet, despite that, he could feel the darkness.

His spread arms hung motionless on either side of him, his fingertips trembling. Slowly, he pulled his cocked-back head and set his eyes on the figure a few paces away from him.

Despite the pitch-black darkness that the candles couldn’t light, the red glow meters away from him was bright enough. It was like the sun itself had descended from the sky and squeezed itself into a tiny ball of fire.

"You..." Everest raised his brows, the scriptures slowly crawling from his temple and into his eyes like an insect. His mouth twisted into a half-smirk, intrigue clear in his minimal movement.

He raised his hand, pointing at Mikel with his bleeding index finger. "...shouldn’t be here. How did you get in here?"

"I want out." Mikel pulled the Blood Chain, and his relic quickly retracted until it was once again just a bracelet. But then, his wrist started smoking as his cursed relic began tightening, almost like its beads were starting to melt into Mikel’s skin.

The scent of burnt flesh was faint, but the heat from the Blood Chain remained the same. It was just that... Mikel was used to it. This arm of his had gone through such severe training that he wasn’t even sure if he should call it trained or just numb from the heat.

"Whatever this is..." Mikel trailed off, raising his chin as molten black liquid started to appear from beneath his fingertips. "...has to end."

[System Notice: Gearing up...]

A second later, Mikel’s breathing was heavy but controlled. He wasn’t panting; if anything, he was calmer than he had ever been.

[Engaging Hyperdrive.]

Everest’s smirk lifted more, slowly reaching for his face with his bleeding fingertips.

"Blaspheme," he muttered, his fingers digging through his skin as he pulled them away.

Claw marks traced Everest’s face, and in a snap, he tore a bit of his skin and splashed the blood on the void he was standing on. His eyelids drooped, the scriptures on his skin now broken, with the other parts on the void where the blood landed. 𝒇𝙧𝙚𝓮𝙬𝙚𝓫𝒏𝓸𝓿𝓮𝒍.𝓬𝙤𝓶

"Hihi..." he giggled, as if tearing his own face was something funny. "Surely, this academy is done for."

He paused and shook his head. "Trapping you in here... is only the right thing to do. You, that on your wrist, and that book... that eye... everything you have, is never yours."

"Heh," he snickered. "You are theirs... Mikel Graves."

Everest hadn’t even finished his words when Mikel suddenly appeared behind him.

"Fast—" he paused, at the same time, the scriptures still crawling in the droplets of blood rising and forming into shadows.

One of the shadows finished morphing just in time to protect Everest and block Mikel’s attack... or so it was supposed to. But alas, Mikel’s fist, now covered with molten black, pierced through the shadow’s crossed arms, chest, then back.

His hand spread open, just in time to grab Everest by the neck.

Everest’s breath hitched as his white eyes dilated even more. He reached for the hand on his neck, prying the fingers that were almost like lava on his skin. His feet were slowly leaving the surface.

Mikel cocked his head to the side because the black figure between them was blocking him. He studied the panicked look on Everest’s face, and without a change in his cold expression, he snapped his neck.

CRACK!

The black figure sandwiched between him and Everest instantly turned into dust. And Everest? He also became dust, just like the black figure.

"You are fast."

Suddenly, Everest’s voice was heard from the side.

Unfazed, Mikel turned his head to where the sound came from. There, standing to the side, was Everest.

"You are," Mikel pointed out. "Or was it your little shadows that are fast?"

"Mikel, even if we are inside your spiritual zone, you are no match..." Everest trailed off as he suddenly sensed malevolence behind him.

His breathing stopped, eyes widening.

Behind him was a huge space split open like a portal. And crawling out of that space were hands—gigantic yet slender hands—and they were coming for him.

Without thinking, Everest snapped his fingers, making him disappear that instant, only to reappear somewhere else. But just as he reappeared in the other corner, his breathing stopped at once as Mikel was floating before him, his foot already coming straight to his head.

This time, Everest didn’t have time to move to another space in this void. And before he knew it, his jaw slid to the side as his skin rippled before the impact.

BAM!

Finally, a blow landed on him, sending him flying.

Mikel landed with a thud, eyeing Everest’s limp body roll as far as he could reach in this endless void. His face twisted into a smirk, cocking his head to the side.

"When I say I want out, I am not asking you to send me back," he said, watching Everest prop himself on his elbow as he pushed himself up. "I can get out of here because..."

His eyelids drooped as a glint flickered across them. "...you’re too weak to hold this dimension."

Everest froze, wide-eyed. Even without looking back, he could sense the look of mockery, perhaps even pity, from Mikel.

Weak? Me?

A snicker escaped him as he planted his palm on the void, letting the moving scriptures on his skin crawl out of his fingertips to the void. As the scriptures melted into the void, more and more shadowy figures emerged between him and Mikel.

Mikel raised his brows as he watched all these shadowy figures emerge, birthed by Everest from within his own anima. His molten-covered hand flinched in excitement; then, stepping into the middle was Sabel, whom Lawrence had already taken down previously.

"Doom," he let out a dry laugh. "Tell that friend of yours more imprints are coming her way."

The moment those words rolled out of his tongue, all the shadowy figures and Sabel leaped in his direction. Mikel remained motionless and watched all of them come at him all at once, so he could take them all down in one strike.

When they were close, he tapped his foot, and the black surface they were standing on switched to a large red page of the Book of the Dead.