SCC Chapter 36 Culmination(6)

  Lily (POV)

  Her spirit, her very soul, felt heavy. She couldn't sense it of course as she was still below the Nascent Soul, but there was a heaviness within her core that she couldn't quite understand, apart form the other things within it.

  Lily could still remember it vividly. The neverending pain. She had howled within her mind, leading to catastrophic waves of divine sense that had relentlessly battered the room she was sealed within. If divine sense had been capable of affecting the physical world, she would have even shattered her cylindrical prison. How long had that soul tearing pain lasted? That, she couldn't tell. It might have been seconds, minutes, or even hours before she had gained some respite. That was an ordeal she never wanted to go through again, yet she wasn't even sure whether she was going to survive. A growing void was enlarging within her, as if something fundamental to her life was being destroyed, particle by particle.

  Then there was the pickling pain. It was a pain that was constant, and one which had also made her scream out at first, but now, her body had grown numb to it. It was a pain that originated from her core. The things that had forcefully invaded her body were sucking from it, like how she always used to drink her yogurt, from a straw. It was the same feeling, yet now, it only disgusted her. She swore that if she ever got out of here, she would never drink from a straw.

  Got out of here. That was a thought that caused endless hope to bud within her chest. That green eyed man, what was his name? Rod? Ah! Reed! He had promised to get her out of here. She could never forget that emerald gaze that had the effect of drawing her in. It was the kind that made you want to simply stay within it, as it radiated an endless charm. Another pain rippled through her, making her shiver.

  She tried to scan the depths of her mind. Though she sometimes got muddle headed, she was certain that her memory was failing her, a consequence of the growing void within her. A void she had no way of solving, lacking even a basic understanding of it.

  An image, probably a memory, appeared within her mind. It was of a woman with an uncanny resemblance to her, clad in an attire that screamed noble. And right now, she was looking at her with a frown etched on her face. Lily felt her heart skip a beat under that judgemental gaze. It had been a familiar companion of hers during her younger days. And it had always had a way of keeping her on her toes.

  "Tell me, my dear daughter, Bakung... Would you really want to die in such an unsightly way? As l have always told you, you should have your chin up! Eyes forward! And back straight! We women have always been looked down upon. That's why we should have our pride show that we are greater than their thoughts and imaginations!"

  Lily's heart trembled even as her spiritual body's eyelids trembled intensely. Wasn't this supposed to be a memory? Had she started hallucinating now?

  " Why are you simply looking at me like that?! Fix your posture!"

  "We are no longer within such times, mother." she drawled out even with the full knowledge that this wasn't real.

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  "Times change, but attitudes are the hardest to change, my dear Bakung."

  Once again, the woman had uttered that revolting name. Bakung. She had never loved it. Mawar and the rest of the clan members knew that. But, their mother had wanted to stick with tradition. Even when she had come back one day and revealed the bullying that had accompanied her during school, the woman hadn't cared to mind. It hadn't devolved into fist fights and violence, but the way they had taunted her with the name had been grating on the ears.

  "Attitudes have also changed... Mom. She had wanted to call her by her names, yet they too, had vanished within the void. It seems she was losing more of them, her memories.

  'I really want to sleep.' she thought tiredly.

  -----

  Reed's frustration was mounting even as his wood attribute spiritual energy turned into massive stems that bore through the wall with reckless abandon. Lily hadn't yet been discovered. And the many others that had been found had either chosen to die, or their cores had already been sucked dry, already having left the world.

  His face was warped in a stoic mask, yet his actions were anything but. Livia and Nikolai had already been relegated to simply following along as he rampaged. And thankfully, they were keeping quiet. That was the thing that he was most thankful for.

  And then, when he couldn't get anymore enraged, they finally broke into a room, one he hadn't expected to house only a single cylinder. Yet, the person inside made every single thought within his mind vanish, with a cold rage taking over with an intensity akin to that of a volcano about to erupt. Flight was instantly discarded in favor of teleportation, as he reached the cylinder near instantly.

  She was still clad in the businesslike attire, the one she had been in, upon her abduction. Her steely grey hair had lost its luster, with some parts of her head even missing strands of the steel entirely, exposing bald pink skin.

  The expression on her face was more impactfull than anything else. It was slack, as if she was somehow under a trance.

  (Lily!)

  He shouted through his divine sense, trying to rouse her spirit. The shout drew her eyes towards him. They looked dead, without a single spark.

  (I have come.) he tried to paste a smile on his face, yet that was failing. His senses were scanning the cylinder, trying to find a way that would harmlessly allow him to dislodge the transparent tubes draining her core. He almost cursed himself for not having tried to save the others regardless of their wants, such that he could have atleast had an inkling of what he needed to do to save Lily.

  He decided to mentally run through the discoveries they had come across about the transparent tubes and the cylinder in general.

  First, were the transparent tubes. At first, they had thought that they were inanimate objects, made of the rarest of materials, but through multiple encounters, they had managed to glean out one thing. They were living things. The sucking force originated entirely from their transparent muscles, not some device hidden away elsewhere. And even as they sucked the core, they worked to keep the body stabilized and alive, though forcefully. They were akin to parasites, with many filaments branching off from them to every muscle within the body. They worked by actively stimulating the body to absorb the nutrients within the liquid around the body, within the cylinder.

  The fleshy roots holding the cylinder to the ground acted as the feeders, releasing nutrients into the tank at certain periods.

  What made all this sick was the fact that there was always an excruciating pain that never went away. Reed wanted to crush everything and be done with it, yet saving Lily required a subtle careful touch. And he already had an idea of what to do.

  Within his mind, he sent orders to his symbiote, after which, strings of matter poured out of the pores of his suit and onto the cylinder. They moved downwards, towards the roots, bore through the pores and into the root system.

  (What is that?) asked a shocked Nikolai. Though, even Livia was straining her ears.

  (My creation, a symbiotic plant. It is the only one which can help me save her.) explained Reed even as his eyes captured strings materialize inside the cylinder from the bottom, boring into Lily's body through her pores. Though he appeared calm and collected outwardly, inwardly, he was praying to the heavens that nothing untoward happen that might kill her while she was being saved.

  (What are the chances of it saving her?) asked a composed Nikolai.

  (I don't know. I have never tried such a method.) Reed answered honestly.

  (Then it looks all we have to do, is wait.) chimed in Livia. Reed would have glared at her any other time, but right now, nervousness was gripping him.

  Just at that very moment, a change occurred, with Lily's body starting to intensely tremble within the cylinder, greatly worrying him. Her steely grey core, exposed through a hole within her stomach, had its surface start to ripple even as the drain from the transparent tubes weakened, as if fighting back. With his understanding, Reed was certain that even his symbiote was being actively fought against by the core, thereby greatly hindering its task. But, it had to succeed, or else, Lily might die! Death was an outcome he didn't want to see.