Chapter 614 - The Hunt (4)

I anchored the rope to the top of the roof, standing many metres above me. I made sure to avoid the windows and focused on stepping on the mismatched bricks, giving me a place to climb. When I checked the timer, I had thirty seconds left, which wasn't bad if I considered I was halfway there. As I climbed, more ideas came to my head, a backup plan of using the rope to stay afloat to avoid the ground. I could use the rope as a rappel, better than falling off the roof, which would only buy me around ten seconds.

I sighed in relief once I reached the top, the screen with the countdown starting: [Game Start: 5 minutes remaining]

My hands tightly clung onto the rope like my life was dependent on it, scanning the area for signs of the hunter. Almost immediately, a wisp of wind swirled around me, studying me to search for any weaknesses. Although I couldn't see or hear the hunter, I could feel their movements around me. My ears perked with hearing the roof slightly creaking, getting distracted that I was nearly too late to discover someone was beginning to cut my rope. It was only ten seconds in, and my heartbeat was rapidly pacing.

My eyes widened when the rope snapped, leaving me to desperately search for another anchor, beginning to fall towards the ground. Unfortunately, the window still was the only option, a floor down. I quickly tied my rope around, using most of the strength in my arms, feeling my muscles straining and slowly snapping apart. I had no time to focus on the guests, staring at me from inside the ballroom. If I managed to survive through this round, I would deal with them later.

"Isn't this much?" I yelled.

The hunter was breaking every anchor there could be outside to prevent me from using the rope. The uneven bricks sticking out was smoothly manipulated to perfectly fit in with the others, the windowsills breaking and falling down towards me. With no other choice, I swung to break the window, knowing there could be more potential anchors inside the ballroom. Oili's mansion had many tall decorations with a strong infrastructure. I covered myself with a barrier, glass shattering to fall onto the guests, muttering an explosion spell.

Some guests began running, the halls filled with bombs splattering like fireworks. Meanwhile, I threw the rope towards a chandelier in the middle of the ballroom, tying it around its chains. My rope was getting shorter each time I found a new anchor, the hunter cutting its length. However, I was fortunate there were many decorations hanging from the roof, stunning and sturdy lights to make up for the simplicity underneath them.

"Get down from there!" Alex screamed at me, full of embarrassment.

I ignored Alex as I moved onto switching my anchor after the chandelier crashed down onto the floors, destroying the marble tiles. Thankfully, Oili and his partner were already working on evacuating all their guests, leaving the ballroom relatively empty. I slightly smiled from being about to stall three minutes through this way, finding the hunter to be less dangerous than the monsters and fairies. Although all the lights had crashed down, utterly unrepairable as it crumbled into many pieces, there were beams supporting the roof a little above them.

"Are the beams sturdy?" I shouted at Oili.

"Wait, not the beams," Oili tried to stop me.

Unfortunately, it was already too late. I consumed a massive amount of mana to fly to wrap my rope towards the beams. And the hunter was cruel enough to break all the beams, making the entire roof start to crumble without any support. I shuddered as the mansion slowly fell apart like unwrapping a present. All its walls rumbled, cracking and tumbling to create a crater on the floors. There was no place to use as an anchor anymore, every one of the debris slowly waiting for me to fall down.

Tall and sharp spikes surrounded me, resembling a trap for its prey. I gulped as Oili and his partner had already escaped after taking care of the guests, watching everything from a distance away. Only they remained other than Alex, choosing to stay inside their hover cars. A bright idea came to my head, switching my aim to their hover car, floating above the grounds. Maybe the other fairies failed to survive the rounds since they weren't surrounded by advanced technology like I was.

I targeted Alex's hover car, flying towards him, muttering to place my rope around the handle. Although he steamed with anger, he began to open the door for me, stunned when the door flew off from the car. In fact, the car was hit with a mass force of wind to the point a tornado was beginning to form. The hunter was trying to shake me off the car, not wanting any interference. My barrier was cracking, being tortured by the merciless attacks.

I screamed as the rope snapped and was taken away from me as soon as my hands lost some strength. I was going to die if I landed on the death traps underneath me, the debris sharpened into blades from the wind. I stared at the timer, slowly counting down. I didn't have a choice, I had to use all my mana here. This was a fight between life and death, struggling to summon my strength to pull myself up.

[Time Remaining: Fifteen seconds]