Eik legged it across the trafficked agora. There were a couple more people crossing now than there had been before, but with the newfound power granted by the B-rank equivalent Inheritor of Toxin combined with the effects of Backflow and Potion of Mighty Strength class 4, he traveled so quickly across the chamber that to anybody weaker, there would hardly have been even the briefest of blurs to be seen.

That speed would not be enough to avoid the notice of B-rankers and A-rankers, let alone an S-ranker like Oru, the Devouring Maw, however. Eik needed a fresh fit to have a chance of making it out anonymously and in one piece.

As he riffled through the fabric in the same laundry room where he had found the now burnt robe, a feeble groan sounded from one of the laundry units. Was the guy he had knocked out beginning to regain consciousness?

In one fluid motion, he pulled open the lid, knuckle punched the sucker straight in the temple, and slammed the lid shut again.

"Idiot," Eik muttered under his breath as he retrieved yet another robe, this one smelling even more rancid than the one he was already wearing. These guys really needed to work mandatory showers into their religious dogma one of these days.

Pulling it over his head, he went back outside and headed for the front entrance, heart racing in his chest. Marching quickly through the narrow servants' corridors, he would walk leisurely and nonchalantly through any of the larger rooms, drawing no attention to himself among the many identically dressed cultists. Hurray for stealth missions.

The closer he got to the main entrance, the more crowded it became. The oracle had, despite his own misgivings, sworn that the main entrance would be the safest way out, however nerve-racking it might feel in the moment.

Any back entrance would be far less trafficked and thus make it significantly more likely that someone would give him a second glance or even stop him. With the size of the crowd by the front entrance, particularly around the delivery of the divine words of the Lord of the Moon by the oracle, he would probably be able to blend in perfectly.

On the stone front steps of the temple, he was forced to push his way through the devout listeners, many of them standing still as if in a trance as the holy messages flowed all around them.

Surely the oracle possessed an ability related to it, because now that he was out here, it was as if her voice was entering his ear via noise cancelling headphones. It was an eerie sensation.

Despite being dressed similarly to everyone present in the crowd, Eik felt had never felt more exposed and out of place as he did now. He was the only one swimming through the absorbed zealots and not paying much attention to the oracle or anything she had to say.

She stood on a raised stage, arms raised to the sky as she put on the spiritual show of her life.

"And as I laid there in bed, the Lord's word came to me clearer than ever before. 'I descend,' he said. 'Soon I shall descend, and when I do, I shall turn bright the darkest of nights and blacken the sunniest of days.'" she preached, pausing momentarily for effect as she gazed out over her gathered worshippers, her eyes hard and emotionless. Now that Eik knew how she felt about the cult's mission, he thought he could see sorrow deep in there as well. She wished she could speak up about her discovery, but knew it would be warped to something false in their minds.

For a second, her gaze fell on him and their eyes met. It felt like she stared for an eternity, making him feel even more exposed. Involuntarily he upped his pace and ducked down to be hidden from view by the countless hoods of the cultist robes. Shit, shit, shit!

Couldn't the damn oracle have been just a little less effective? This crowd was fuckin' endless and he had places to be! After minutes of pushing and weaving, the mass of cultists finally began to thin, gradually allowing him to march quicker and quicker.

People were still gathering on the edges to observe the divine delivery but soon he could even begin to jog along toward the fracture hall. It wasn't terribly far to the building, and Eik knew from the oracle that they had several fractures to fresh project worlds open permanently.

Those fractures were secured by the fracture specialists so that going from the other side and into the capital city, where Eik currently was, was restricted, but going from the city to the new worlds was possible. It was a measure to ensure that enemies such as the Nidafjeld Alliance couldn't launch attacks through those new worlds.

After passing a long row of identically designed buildings, the fracture hall that Eik recognized from the artificial memories inserted into his brain by the oracle came into view further down the street.

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Finally! Home safe!

"Do not let that man escape!" Eik heard the oracle's voice, echoing from everywhere at once. It was steady and authoritative. Demonstrating her own innocence, was she? Good idea… but couldn't she have given him just a little more damn time before setting an entire interdimensional cult on his ass?

Moments later, the sound of shouting voices from the direction of the massive crowd drew his attention and a glance back over his shoulder sent him into a mad dash. At least fifty people were on his heels. They were pointing straight at him and pulling more and more cultists along for the chase.

A vast majority of them would be utterly annihilated the moment they caught up to him.

"After him!" a frighteningly familiar and monstrous voice howled. Only, it sounded even deeper and more inhuman than usually. Oru, the Devouring Maw.

Just as he turned and ran into the fracture hall, Eik caught a glimpse of something that made his breath catch in his throat. In the back of the pursuers, an absolute titan of a monster trampled forward like a living tank. Long, jet black fur billowed with every powerful movement of its quadrupedal body and the fangs filling a canine-like maw clacked as its jaw worked.

"It will be the Lord's lesson for anyone who fails to get him!" the beast roared. It was Oru's voice. That fragile, old man? Was this his true form?

At the monster's words, something haunting came over the cultists. A zeal made up of half terror and half reverence sent them into a zombie-like frenzy and they chased him with even more fervor, pushing their variously powerful bodies to their limits.

Disappearing into the fracture hall, Eik thought he was good but mere moments later, monstrous claws wrapped around the door frame and ripped the entire outer wall away like paper, revealing Oru, the Devouring Maw's bestial face. "There you are, Eik Magnasen," he rumbled.

On four Potions of Mighty Strength class 4 on top of all of his other boosts, Eik was already throwing himself through the first portal he saw. Its swirling, blue surface swallowed him up completely as he was pulled through to another world.

Not.

Momentarily feeling like his limbs were being twisted and ripped from his body, Eik was spit back out onto the floor. Something, either the portal or the world beyond must have rejected his power level.

"Come here, whelp," Oru growled, pinning Eik against the ground with a single, enormous claw, the tip piercing Eik's stomach painfully. He screamed as blood poured out from the wound that was deepening with every second. This fucker was going to rip him in two. "I am going to make sure that you regret this transgression. You've defied the word of the oracle."

There was another fracture mere meters away. Maybe that one could accommodate a B-ranker.

Putting both hands on the claw, Eik pushed with all his might, his veins bulging as he exerted himself. But the digit didn't budge whatsoever. S-rankers really were something else.

S-rank was apparently far deeper than any of the previous ranks, the relative span from low to high S-rank much greater. According to Andihar Dayarunar, unlike the lower power ranks, a low S-ranker would be virtually defenseless against a high S-ranker. This span was also why so few Awakened ever reached X-rank. S-rankers were already scarce enough as it was, but not compared to the scarcity of X-rankers. Even within the Nidafjeld Alliance, not much was known about the X-rank.

So how deep into S-rank must Oru, the Devouring Maw be for Eik's full-powered effort to not even make a single finger of his budge even a little?

He conjured a blade of solid toxin and jammed it into the soft flesh of the S-ranker's toes. He didn't even manage to pierce it enough to draw blood, let alone deal damage. Pulling on Monarch's Will, he sent a torrent of blue into Oru's ghastly face, but an instantaneous flexing of an unbelievably heavy aura was enough to disperse the Profound Toxin.

Shit. It was hopeless, wasn't it?

He switched into Panacean Quintessence but the moment Oru saw him begin to heal, he retaliated by tearing a deep gash along his hip. Eik felt tendons and muscles sever as he screamed.

The fracture was so close that he could almost reach it with his hand, but in reality it couldn't have been further away. Clenching his teeth, he stretched his arm to reach for the swirling portal, but a blur passed through his fingers and cut them all off cleanly. They tumbled across the floor with dull thuds, leaving trails of blood.

He bit back a cry of pain, letting out only a groan. The blood loss was getting to him at this point. His injuries were severe and any attempt to heal himself only resulted in further harm. What the hell was he supposed to do?

Scrambling for a last resort, a Living Manifestation crawled out of the bottom of his foot which was concealed under Oru's own gigantic paw-like hand. Another followed and then another, and another, each one contributing to a single, fused individual.

"The oracle has deemed you an existence necessary to our cause so it saddens me that I must let you live," the beast grumbled, its eyes watching intently as its claw pierced Eik's shoulder, the grating against bone mixing with Eik's hiss of pain. "But that doesn't mean we can neglect to properly discipline you for what you have done."—Oru's face somehow grew even darker and more gloomy, his grinding voice sounding as if it was on the brink of tears—"You interfered with the delivery of the divine word."

Another claw came up to pierce through his liver, but the Living Manifestation, now a serpent with perfectly pronounced features, shot up from its hiding spot under his paw. In the same moment, Eik triggered a remote Accelerant.

As the violent shock wave cracked into Oru's wet, bestial nose, he reeled back ever so slightly with an involuntary yelp.

Having hoped for exactly that, Eik shifted into Toxic Liquefaction and slithered out from the claws pinning him to the floor. In an instant he was in the fracture, the dimensional forces hauling him through as he reverted to human form.

A sickening crunch preceded an extreme pain in his leg, and while his head was already inside the portal, it wasn't difficult to guess that a claw had speared his knee.

He was stuck.

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