42 Chapter 41

The journey continued silently, and after a few hours, they crossed the stone bridge that separates that part of the territory from the center of the kingdom, the royal city, Avaloria.

Elizabeth persisted throughout the journey, without taking a long break to rest, trying to enhance the stability of her aura. However, unlike what Ethan made it seem on the day they first faced each other, moving any object using only aura, no matter how small it is, is not an easy task.

"That day..."

Her body shivers instinctively with the emergence of memories, but now, fear wasn't what made her recall those bloody moments.

"He made the sword come to his hands so fast. After learning the basics of aura, it seemed like something easy to do, and I thought it would only take a few hours to learn... But..."

Her aura vibrates, and the sword in the air sways briefly. With her tongue, Elizabeth concentrates as much as possible, but she cannot prevent the inevitable.

Starting from the tip of the blade, which slowly pierced through the aura surrounding it, the entire sword fell to the ground.

"Again..."

Elizabeth sighed deeply as she reached for the sword's hilt.

Suddenly, a sticky red liquid enveloped her hand, and like the blade, the sword's hilt had been covered by the same substance.

"How annoying..."

The carriage vanished along with everyone around her, and in its place emerged an extensive red sea stretching beneath Elizabeth's feet.

"It's good to know that you were all truly the same..."

Surrounding her, numerous hands covered in the viscous substance under her feet rose from within the red liquid.

Grabbing her legs, the hands struggled to pull Elizabeth into the sea, yet her body didn't move an inch.

"After all..., trash of the same category needs to go to the same place, right?"

Imparting a sense of familiarity, a straight black handle appeared in Elizabeth's free hand. On her finger, a trigger.

"Welcome your new friends. Because if you keep this up, you'll be spending quite some time together..."

Dirtied by the liquid around them, a group of people dressed in clothes that seemed to transcend their societal positions, some in suits and others in military uniforms, emerged from the darkness, stepping over all those who had appeared earlier, and ran toward Elizabeth.

"Incredible. Not even after death do you change..."

Closing her eyes and letting her body fall onto the carriage seat, Elizabeth sighed.

"Always trampling over others..."

The red sea disappeared, and after a few minutes of silence, Elizabeth resumed her training without any further pause.

Most of the attempts resulted in failure. When they didn't, it took more than five minutes for the sword to travel only a few centimeters, at most a meter, to reach her hands.

Gritting her teeth and clenching her fists, amid so many failed attempts, Elizabeth couldn't understand why this was happening.

Her concentration had no issues, yet even by increasing the amount of aura used, the sword kept falling.

Among so many attempts, only twenty-three were actually successful. Fifteen of them took more than ten minutes to accomplish. Six times, the time needed for the sword to reach her hands just exceeded five minutes. And although she knew it was still a very poor result, indeed below what she had hoped for, the shorter times were celebrated by Elizabeth, these being attempts that lasted two and four minutes each.

And it was only the next day, when the sun reached its peak in the sky, that Ethan finally saw the great wall rising in the distance.

"A journey that should have lasted just over a day turned into one of two and a half days..."

The gates opened, pushing the snow accumulated around them.

Thanks to the letter sent by the commander, the news had already spread throughout the city. And despite knowing they shouldn't waste the little liquid in their bodies crying, everyone volunteered to welcome Elizabeth at the gates of Avaloria personally.

On the edges of the streets, crowds lined up, all people wrapped in various types of blankets. A few, those who couldn't contain themselves, shed their frozen tears as the knights and the heroine's carriage passed by.

With just a simple glance, it's not hard to notice the resemblance of the situation this city is in compared to the one they passed through earlier.

Trembling bodies and haggard faces. Probably not in abundance, but those people still had the ability to feed themselves. However, considering that all the rivers and lakes until reaching that place were frozen, it's likely that water is something they haven't consumed for some time.

Unable to bear the weight of their own bodies, some fall to their knees.

The slightly bluish skin and weakness make it obvious to those who have seen similar cases that, like in the border city, the people there, the bodies of the weakest ones, are succumbing to the cold.

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With its fur swaying in the breeze around it, the white wolf reveals its claws.

Its front paws drag on the ground, leaving marks on the ice. As it snarls, parts of its lips curl up, revealing its huge, sharp fangs.

Its eyes gleam as it watches its targets, and opening its mouth, its howl echoes beyond the peaks of the Frozen Peaks.