Kevin ran and ran, however, no matter how much further he had gotten, he could still feel that he was within its blast range.
These bombs were like mini nukes, essentially a normal bomb but enhanced with mana, it meant that whoever did this had someone on their side who had this kind of skill.
It was not extremely rare, it was just rare for people to use it in a way like this, it was vile and inhumane.
Kevin sped himself up and saw a type of metro system leading downwards, that was his best bet, he could protect himself from the rubble but not the explosion itself.
He doubted it would extend downwards, it would be pretty troublesome if it did..
However, the metro system seemed deep enough and it also had some sort of shafts, it wasn’t abandoned but it was certainly empty due to the situation.
As the seconds passed and he ran down deeper and deeper, he began getting a little confused at the depth of this metro, it was certainly abnormal.
‘What is this..?’ As he was wondering that, the ground finally shook, signifying that the mana bomb finally landed.
The shaking was way more intense than he imagined and it looked like the blast was slowly heading towards him.
He collapsed the tunnel behind him, he made his shadow run in the direction of the academy, it should reach it in a couple of minutes, until then, he had to somehow survive.
As he was walking and getting deeper, the railing finally ended, ahead of him was just a simple tunnel that traveled for as long as the eye could see.
Kevin could feel the heat coming from behind him, the only reason he was not panicking was that the shadow he sent out was still alive, as long as his shadows didn’t materialize, they were practically immortal.
What was most strange about this situation was that the ground hadn’t stopped shaking yet, he assumed that the bombs were deadly, but for them to be this deadly? It seemed overkill.
As his steps grew louder and louder, the ground eventually began to feel hollow, it was definitely not normal considering just a few moments ago, it was perfectly solid.
He tried walking forward and noticed that the pathway ahead was not as hollow as the previous area he passed through.
Kevin couldn’t hide his curiosity so he walked back and tapped a few times, causing a small crack to appear in the tunnel’s ground.
He crouched down and ripped apart the hollow flooring and saw a small manhole that had a ladder leading downwards.
His senses were screaming at him to stop and turn back, however, he let his curiosity get the best of him, after all, it was starting to get difficult to breathe as there was no oxygen in these tunnels.
Kevin cursed himself for blocking it off but justified it as him not having any other choice.
Death by fire seemed more grueling, he definitely did not want to experience it.
He climbed down the ladder and was met with a small room, a single white door in front of him.
‘Not ominous at all..’ Kevin thought to himself as he approached the door and attempted to open it.
Much to his surprise, it was already open, all it needed was a little push.
He felt the heat growing more intense, it probably bypassed the parts he collapsed.
Kevin quickly got inside of the room and closed the door behind him, finally being able to breathe normally.
However, as he looked around inside, he was a little shocked, it looked like some kind of laboratory.
However, it seemed abandoned, some vials were broken and thrown all over the place, he was surprised that he was even able to breathe there.
From what he could tell, this was old, the ventilation should have been clogged by now, yet it wasn’t.
He paced around the room and noticed some strange symbols that appeared to be some kind of a runic language.
Kevin never bothered to learn it as Michael was the one who liked learning other languages, he left them all to him.
‘I should have at least got the basics down’ He sighed in helplessness and pocketed the notes on which the symbols were drawn on.
The language did seem a little familiar to him, however, he was still not able to understand it in the slightest.
He noticed more notes, however, they were all either ripped apart or basically unreadable due to the amount of time that had passed.
Nonetheless, he pocketed them, who knows what kind of information he could extract if he somehow manages to read the text.
If anything, he would get Michael to do it, he used to love learning, Kevin assumed that maybe that one part of his didn’t change at all.
‘I hope..’
He checked the lab a bit more thoroughly as he would soon be going back to the academy, his shadow was fairly close.
However, the moment he crouched under one of the tables, he saw something strange.
It looked like a giant white feather and it was enclosed inside of a glass case, seemingly being preserved.
‘Everything else is broken but this isn’t?’ Kevin looked at it suspiciously, the feather looked a bit too big to belong to a bird, unless it was some kind of a mutated bird he was not aware of.
But he believed he was good at identifying monsters, enough to know that this did not belong to one, at least not one he had ever seen in either of his lives anyway.
The glass case did not have anything written on it, however, upon a closer look, he noticed it was covered in mana.
‘Preservation magic?’ He guessed and took it with him, covering it with his shadows and tying it down to his body, the feather looked valuable.
Besides that, he could not see anything else noteworthy inside of the laboratory, no more notes, nothing, just simple wreckage that he could not bother to check through.
Kevin felt that his shadow had finally reached the entrance to the academy and he quickly switched places with it, appearing right in front of the academy.
“Ugh” The first thing that he noticed upon arriving here was the smell, it reeked of burnt corpses, he regretted eating earlier as he felt as if he would vomit all of his food out.
Added on top of that, the air felt warm and it was slightly difficult to breathe.
Kevin turned to look around him and his eyes widened, the entire sky was either black or gray and he could see many fires out in the distance.
There were not a lot of people around him as most were likely inside the academy since it was much safer than where he was currently.
He couldn’t see clearly, yet a few figures looked like they were in the sky, some fighting while others simply staring, not doing anything.
And for a moment, it seemed like his eyes connected with one of the beings up there, and immediately an incredibly strong pressure engulfed him, nearly making him kneel.
However, it only lasted for a moment, as in the next, he instinctively retreated backwards, heading straight for the academy.
‘…I’ll just wait inside.’
