Transcendent Gene-Chapter 289: Treasure [1]

Bang!

"Go! I’ll follow!"

Vooooooom!

A wave of golden flames shot through a long and ornate corridor situated on the third floor of the three-story mansion.

Serene, Shiro, and Neriah reached the mansion roughly twenty minutes ago, and they’d been engulfed in combat ever since.

The mansion was shaped simply with a main area and two wings branching off to either side. It had three floors and enough space to house tens of families without being overcrowded.

As they’d only been able to investigate it from the outside, they had no way of knowing if there was anything below the mansion. However, they accounted for the possibility before ever stepping foot on the premises.

The plan was relatively concrete. When they reached, they didn’t wait a second before charging over the massive hedges and invading its grounds.

The guards on the perimeter came after them immediately. They crashed through a window on the mansion’s front while being followed by a crowd of seven people.

Vooom!

Shiro was their bane.

He sent plumes of golden flames behind him that slammed onto the faces and bodies of those climbing through the window.

As they fended off the flames, Serene released several bubbles filled with poison and sleeping toxins that invaded their pores.

The first group was neutralized easily due to the element of surprise, but it didn’t last very long. They had no choice but to be noisy if they wanted to be quick.

The first step was to check if there was any sort of basement area. By design, they could investigate the first floor while doing so.

Neriah used her senses to make sure the path was clear before leading the other two out of the room.

As they would soon find out, even the ordinary maids and butlers patrolling the halls were trained.

Boom! Boom! Boom!

None of them were able to get close. It was a wild chase more than combat. Shiro’s golden flames covered the rear and disallowed the enemies from coming too close, but he couldn’t block projectiles.

They made their way through the halls with Neriah watching the front, Shiro watching the back, and Serene handling any unknown variables that popped up along the way.

Frankly, it worked better than any of them expected.

They were used to moving behind Gio, which meant they were used to not having as much work to do. They could be carried while only contributing as much as they were comfortable with.

This was an extremely different situation. Without him covering their backs, Shiro and Serene understood just how much he’d been doing to make their lives easier.

Neriah was powerful, but she wasn’t born to lead. She couldn’t provide them the same security, but she could still get the job done.

And when it came time for slaughter, her patience was pn a much shorter fuse than Gio’s.

She was willing to kill anyone for anything. Perhaps those chasing them from behind were lucky to face Shiro’s flames, as anyone who came from the front suffered death at Neriah’s hands.

Despite the large size of the mansion, exploring it didn’t take much time. They weren’t interested in its amenities or beauty, after all.

They broke open doors and tore apart rooms in a matter of seconds before determining that there was nothing to see and moving on.

Neriah searched for any signs of a basement with her pathfinding Sequence, but there was nothing of the sort.

This mansion was built in a part of the world where basements were unnecessary.

They rushed to the second floor and destroyed the staircase behind them. As their enemies jumped to chase them, Shiro acted.

[Golden Tsunami]

Vooooom!

A tidal wave of golden flames poured down from his arms like a waterfall and splashed down onto the ground below. Those in the air were forced to retreat if they didn’t want to land on the firefall directly, however, where could they land?

The flames cascaded down to the first floor and lit everything on fire. Even when Shiro removed his energy a few seconds later, the blaze remained.

From that point onward, they were racing against not only their enemies, but also the destruction of the mansion.

The enemies guarding the place were too focused on them to care about the fire. Those from the first floor were only held off for a short period before they joined the pursuers waiting for the group on the second.

Luckily for them, they only had a few locations to check on the second floor. It wasn’t a good place to keep a vault as most of its rooms were bedrooms with windows facing the world outside.

A floor that could be completely accessed from the outside couldn’t be where the vault was kept.

Still, Neriah had to check off the boxes she could so she could narrow down the scope of what she saw with her pathfinding.

’There are too many variables.’

Currently, she was scouting "potential paths." By following them to completion, she could eliminate them and her ability could focus harder on the remaining possibilities.

The three possibilities on the second floor were all close to the staircase. The large open area at the top was the only place where a vault could be.

"Neriah, handle it!"

Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom!

Though she was the best fighter among them, she was also their pathfinder. Shiro and Serene had to take the role of her protectors while she searched.

They turned to face the horde that had gathered. They were nowhere near the staircase to the third floor, and in the brief few moments they took to follow Neriah to the first location, their enemies had surrounded them.

The paths to both wings were blocked off by several people. There were even more people down the corridor leading to the staircase down to the first floor.

"Tch!" 𝚏𝕣𝕖𝚎𝚠𝚎𝚋𝚗𝐨𝐯𝕖𝕝.𝕔𝐨𝕞

Shiro clicked his tongue as he tried to rationalize how much energy he’d need to create flames that could hold all of those people back.

As he gathered his energy, he felt Serene’s hand on his shoulder.

"Just give me cover. My power works in a quantity over quality kind of way."

Whooosh!

Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom!

Neriah heard the battle taking place behind her.

’I can’t leave those two alone for too long...’

Boom!

She broke through the wall in front of her and uncovered a secret room hidden beyond. Unfortunately, it was merely a study that had already been found by the Old Duke and desecrated. Investigating it was pointless.

The two other locations also led to nothing.

She moved as fast as she could between them and resolved the strands before turning back to where her teammates were fighting.

"Let’s go!"

She raised her arm into the air and forced the floor and ceiling together, creating a thick wall between Shiro, Serene, and their enemies.

The two of them looked back in surprise and almost immediately rushed to join her. All three of them understood that the wall wouldn’t last long.

The explosion behind them confirmed their thoughts, but by the time it happened, they were already rushing for the third floor.

And for the first time, they had a bit of time before their enemies caught them.

’The third floor is the most secure of the three, but there are barely any paths here.’

The three paths that did exist all led in one direction, completely ignoring the main halls and east wing of the building.

’But that’s better for us.’

It was hard to ignore the horde of enemies charging towards them, but that didn’t mean they had to be held back.

"We need to head to the west wing. As long as we can keep them out, we should be able to find the vault right here."

Only moments after the other two registered Neriah’s words...

Bang!

A huge sound rang out as the horde arrived.

Shiro didn’t need much time to figure out what his role was.

"Go! I’ll follow!"

Vooooooom!

A wave of golden flames shot through the long and ornate corridor. He no longer thought about conserving energy for later battles.

[Hellstorm]

The flames held back those who wanted to approach, and she always did, Serene supported them from the back.

She helped Shiro keep his energy stable by buffing him and also filled the air within his flames with toxins. Each and every breath taken by their enemies was more deadly than the last.

They could approach if they wanted to. If their lives were worth risking for the Old Duke, then they could absolutely charge through the flames.

But would they be able to stop the three intruders without paying the ultimate price? If they were going to be killed by the Old Duke for failing to contain them, was there a point in fighting with everything they had?

Wasn’t it better to use this chance to escape the mansion before something bad happened to them?

Such thoughts swirled through the minds of their pursuers as the pain set in. Their bodies stopped listening to their commands, and rather than wondering why they couldn’t stop the intruders, they wondered why they ever tried in the first place.

There was no loyalty in their hearts. They were motivated by fear and could be crushed by greater fear.

Those who were truly loyal to the Old Duke...

Neriah checked the first and second location rapidly. They were easy to find as they were ordinary hidden areas within the mansion’s walls.

The third was different.

That was the key.

What she found was not a vault, but something much more peculiar.

She took one step above the ground and her body stayed there.

Carefully, she took another and realized that she was standing on an invisible staircase that led up to a floor of the mansion that didn’t exist in the naked eye.

It wasn’t guaranteed to be the location of the vault, but if it was anywhere...

’...it has to be in the one place that’s impossible to find.’

At the top of that staircase, Neriah expected to find what they’d come to the mansion in search of.

And along with it, the strongest of the forces the Old Duke had stationed at the mansion.