The cloak around Piere began to disappear. Its edge was unraveled like ash carried away by the wind. The shimmer of invisibility broke apart and within seconds the illusion was gone.
Now, under the acid rain's glimmering fall, his body was visible once more. Pale coat burned in streaks, hat soaked and dripping. The acidic droplets hissed against his shoulders but he didn't stop running at any cost. Because he couldn't. The shelter of invisibility was gone and with it, his advantage.
High above, Albert squinted through the thick green haze of the storm, finally catching sight of him. "You are slow." he muttered, his voice low and focused.
He leaned forward and tapped twice against the dragon's neck. The white-scaled creature let out a guttural growl, eyes flaring gold. Its wings expanded with a heavy thoom, scattering the rain in bursts of white steam.
"Go!" Albert commanded.
The dragon obeyed instantly, diving low through the acid mist, slicing through the clouds like a blade through silk.
Each beat of its wings sent vibrations across the canopy, scattering molten rain in spirals.
Piere turned his head for a split second and saw the blinding streak of white cutting down toward him. Albert's dragon.
"Persistent bastard." he moaned. He dashed between the acid-cracked trees, leaving a trail of melted bark behind. Every footstep hissed against the ground. He twisted, rolled, dodged the acid gusts the dragon's wings stirred. He could feel the heat of its divine energy at his back.
Albert stayed hidden between the dragon's wings, scanning the terrain. His focus tightened as he went further.
If he could push Piere closer to the third checkpoint, maybe he could corner him near the cliffs. He raised Pallbearer, aiming down into the glowing mist.
Piere, realizing he was being targeted, snapped his knuckle. The remnants of his burnt poker cards spun around him, projecting faint arcs of red light.
Fragments of magic, unstable but functional. "Come on, then." he whispered to himself, sprinting through the storm.
The dragon dived again. The sound cracked through the forest like thunder. Acid rain exploded off its wings in waves.
The ground beneath Piere rippled under the pressure, his boots slipped as he sprinted harder, dodging falling debris.
He could feel Albert closing in as the air grew heavier, electric.
Albert wiped the acid steam off his face and leaned against the dragon's scaled neck. The rain hissed above them, turning to harmless vapor before it could touch him.
"You were working very hard, Ragnvlar. I have something for you." he said, sliding a chunk of condensed spirit meat from his pouch and tossing it toward the dragon's mouth. The beast caught it midair with a deep rumble, smoke curled from its nostrils like satisfaction itself.
Albert adjusted the strap of his burned jacket. Patched his glove with a piece of fabric he tore from his inner sleeve and reloaded Pallbearer. "We're not done yet. Take us higher and further." he muttered, voice steady but low. The dragon rose, wings cut through the green calamity. Far below, the acid shimmered like liquid emerald fire.
Piere was still running but his stride had changed. He wasn't escaping anymore. He was plotting. Behind him, faint lights shimmered. Poker cards, twenty of them, circling in a formation that looked chaotic but was far from random.
Albert noticed it too late, enough late to counter.
Piere's voice resounded amidst the calamity, "You rely too much on divinity. Let's see how you do without it." He flicked a card into the air. It burst into a field of refracted light.
A fake checkpoint illusion glowing faint green. The dragon tilted slightly toward it before Albert pulled the reins. "Not that easy, huh?" Albert muttered.
Another trick was already in motion. The cards ahead detonated into bursts of heatless plasma. Not deadly, but bright enough to blind even a beast of purity.
Ragnvlar roared, thrashing mid-air, and Albert lost balance for a second. That second was all Piere needed.
By the time Albert steadied himself, Piere had already darted through rain and vanished between the warped trees ahead.
Piere Lal reached the third checkpoint first.
The glowing barrier surrounding him in calm green light. His breath steamed in the air as he stood beneath the guardian tree. Without hesitation, he opened the system interface and spent his tokens. A spectral door rose beside him, carved with crescent sigils.
[ Shrine Challenge: The Hunt of the Moonbane Pack ]
[ Task: Eliminate a pack of werewolves in the acidic woods ]
[ Reward: +10 Tokens, ability to skip 1,000 meters in current race anytime once ]
Piere smirked brushing the rain from his sleeves. "Perfect." he whispered, stepping into the glowing door just as Albert and his dragon cut through the mist behind him.
....
Piere Lal's face was unlike anything he had felt in what felt like ages. The world here was silent, almost painfully so, as though time itself refused to tick and went for holiday.
The acid hiss of the Canopy was gone. He was somewhere else. Above, a crystal-clear sky glimmered with silver veins of light. He exhaled and muttered, "So this is the shrine's little playground."
He walked forward through a corridor of trees that loomed like cathedral pillars. The deeper he went, the darker it became. The light behind him began to fade until it was only a memory.
A cold whisper brushed against his neck. His boots pressed into something soft. He crouched, fingertips brushed it fearlessly.
When his eyes adjusted, he something, a mound of corpses? Of human, beast or things in between? Claws, ribs, faces half-eaten, all piled together like discarded prayers. Their flesh were too disturbingly ripped and drown on one another, it was hard to tell what race it was.
Steam rose from the heap and flies the size of coins buzzed lazily. Their wings glinting faint blue in the moonlight. Piere's smile didn't falter. "Finally, some oxygen."
Dozens of yellow eyes blinked open in the dark. Surrounding him like a constellation of hatred. The werewolves stepped out—muscles coiled, fur slick with black blood, fangs dripping something thicker than saliva.
"Gentlemen," Piere said, raising one brow, "you've really rolled out the carpet."
The largest of them snarled and lunged. The sound of its jump splitting the silence. The creature soared ten feet high, claws stretching toward his throat.
Piere flicked two poker cards into the air. They spun, shimmered then one sliced clean through the beast's chest as it landed. Its body burst into ash.
The others charged. Ten. Fifteen. They came in numbers. Their movements primal yet coordinated, like an army that had forgotten it was alive.
Piere's hand moved too fast to follow. Cards whirled in arcs, flashing red and gold. Each one left behind streaks of light, burning sigils in the air before detonating with dull concussive blasts. The forest flashed like a thunderstorm.
Still, they kept coming. One beast caught his arm. Its claws dug into his sleeve. Piere didn't even flinch. He smiled, then whispered, " Take it easy, boy. Sit."
The creature froze mid-motion. Its veins turning gray, skin hardening into marble. Its expression turned feral. Piere adjusted his beret, stepped close and sang softly under his breath,
"To stone we fall, in grace we rise,
When god forgets, the devil tries."
He placed a hand on the statue's cheek and tore its head off with one motion. Stone dust swirled through the air like holy incense.
Something in him shifted. The polite smile faded. His pupils dilated, shrinking the blue of his eyes into icy rings. The remaining wolves hesitated.
He slammed one wolf's face into a tree trunk so hard it splintered. Another tried to leap behind him. He backhanded it, breaking its jaw backward.
He ripped the limb off one and used it to impale another. Blood and fur mixed into a blur of motion. His movements weren't strategic anymore; they were instinct carved into flesh.
A wolf tackled him to the ground. He let it, laughing, then jammed a burning poker card into its throat. "Playtime's over, kitty!" he hissed, twisting continuously until the creature's neck ripped off.
A single flick of his wrist sent two cards spinning. One vertical, one horizontal. They sliced through the air like twin guillotines, colliding into the creature's body with such precision that for a heartbeat, it froze mid-air. Then its chest split open alongside the space itself. The wolf dropped, convulsing as veins of gold flared beneath its skin.
"That's the Pulse Suit." Piere murmured. "Not meant to kill. Just reminds me why I should kill."
The creature screamed. Its heart beating so violently that it ruptured its own ribs.
The others didn't wait. Five more rushed him in synchronized motion, their eyes glowing amber. Piere exhaled once, centering his breath. He flicked three cards up.
Ace, Two, Joker. The air rippled.
The Ace exploded into a ring of light, slowing everything caught inside it. The Two expanded into energy strings, wrapping around claws and throats of everyone. The Joker, however, was his signature, a catalyst.
It absorbed life-force from everything trapped in the ring and redirected it back into him. His skin glowed, hair lifted in the pulse of stored vitality.
One wolf broke free, launching itself forward. Piere side-stepped, caught it by the neck, and slammed it face-first into the soil. He murmured something inaudible.
Then the ground beneath the wolf bloomed. Flowers, impossibly vivid and red, burst from the dirt, feeding on the creature's energy until it turned into a withered husk.
Piere stood, brushing dust off his sleeve. "Life takes what it gives" he said calmly, "and I'm just the one allowing it to exist!"
The next wave came....
ten of them this time, surrounding him in a perfect circle. One howled and the rest followed. Piere's lips curled.
"Fine," he whispered, "let's dance before your funeral."
He snapped his fingers. A translucent sphere burst from his body—Psychic Field. Within its range, every heartbeat became visible, golden thumps in the air. The wolves hesitated, confused.
Every beat corresponded to one strike. Punch or kick or throw. He didn't just fight; he conducted. With each rhythm, a wolf fell as its bones cracked, limbs snapped, fur torn off like paper.
He used one's leap to vault off its back, spun mid-air and drove his heel into another's skull. The impact cratered the ground.
A massive one tried to crush him under its weight. Piere caught its wrist and activated "Three" card. The creature's kinetic energy replayed instantly, reversing into itself. Its arm shattered backward, bone through flesh.
"The secret of being happy is...." he said, eyes twitched twice. "....accepting where you are in life and making the most out of it every single day. Fate doesn't change, only time does."
He darted forward, more blur than man, using Vital Surge. A burst of all collected life energy. His movements transcended time; air broke under the pressure.
A single punch sent a wolf flying through fifteen miles leaving a sound of nuclear explosion. Another swipe of his cards carved lines of pure vitality. Glowing, pulsing cuts that didn't bleed but erased the flesh they touched.
In less than a minute, the clearing was chaos incarnate. Ground splattered with glowing motes of life essence instead of blood, mountains vibrated from the energy release.
He chanted, "Live long enough to regret it."
The wolf infront froze. Not dead but its time looped infinitely within a heartbeat, forced to relive the last second of its existence forever. He went closer and held the wolf like Cinderella and kissed its forehead then threw on a branch.
Piere stepped back breathing annoyingly. Around him, forest shifted with stolen vitality. Grass rejuvenating, mist glowing gold.
He looked upward, voice quiet. "Life is a currency and I'm very, very rich."
Then, with a casual flick of his wrist, he recalled his cards, each one stained with light instead of blood and continued walking toward the shrine.
When the final werewolf tried to flee, Piere hurled a single card into the air. It didn't cut or explode it erased by itself. The beast vanished mid-step, as if it had never been born.
Piere stood in the ruin of what had once been a forest, his clothes torn, his eyes gleaming with that same detached madness. He flicked ash from his sleeve, humming the same line of poetry once more.
"When god forgets, the devil tries."