Solflare: The Painter's Secret

Chapter 221: Nine Hundred and One

The crashed Triarch came into view nine minutes later. Its hull was split along the middle, one of its wings buried deep in the rock, while the other pointed at the sky like a broken arm.

Leon lowered their Triarch down sixty meters out, which cut through the flames and landed, blasting dust from the earth’s surface.

"Thirty-four minutes," Gia said before Leon could even ask.

He stood up, turned, then scanned through the faces of the others. "Eun-woo, come with me. Kim, Seo-jun stay on the craft, in case something happens."

The moment Leon moved from the control, Kim stood up and walked to it. "I’ll have Gia run continuous deep scans. If that thing accelerates, I will let you know."

Leon looked at her for half a second, then nodded once before dropping down from the ramp.

Eun-woo landed beside Leon and instantly squinted at the wreck. "That imposter! I will kill him with my bare hands if he were to come back to life."

Leon gave him a side eye, then smiled. ’As if he can kill a fire manipulator that easily.’

The more they neared the wrecked Triarch, the more the ground became denser. Eun-woo stayed half a step behind Leon without being told.

When they reached the Ghost Squad Triarch, Leon ran his palm along the hull seam until he found the manual release panel. He popped the cover and hit the override button, which made the ramp descend with a low hydraulic groan.

Sweat, dust and the Opal stone gave the inside the same smell as the three days they’d spent outside the Heart of Tartarus.

The sacks were exactly where they’d left them before Demon flew off. Stacked against the storage wall, just that it was now upside down.

"There." Eun-woo said and moved straight for the sacks without breaking pace. He grabbed two in each hand and started going in and out of the Triarch.

Leon remained standing, watching Eun-woo, then moved toward the control section. The panel was still live on emergency power when Leon stopped and placed his hand on the screen.

"Leon." Eun-woo’s voice came from outside. "We’ve got everything."

Leon removed his hand from the screen, then tilted his head slightly to the left, where he had made them keep Liu Yan’s body. "Not everything."

"Not everything? I have all thirty sacks of Opal stones, which sum up to the nine hundred stones we gathered earlier." Eun-woo said while pointing at the sacks.

Leon didn’t say a word. He simply moved to the resting room, unlocked Liu Yan’s body from the belt that had tangled it, then carried it in his arms like a newborn baby.

Eun-woo’s face turned pale. He stumbled two steps back, then swallowed hard while Leon slowly walked past him with the wrapped body in his hands.

Seo-jun stood up when he saw Leon approaching with the wrapped body, then closed his eyes slowly. When he saw Eun-woo carrying the sacks of Opal stones, he jumped off the ramp and helped him until the last sack was brought to the front of Leon’s Triarch.

"Something is moving," Kim said as she stood up abruptly and moved to the ramp with wide eyes.

The moment Leon looked to the east, his expression shifted when he saw the ground rising and falling like a tide.

A few seconds after, he blinked and turned. A long bulge pushed upward like a breath being drawn in from underground.

"How long?" Leon asked as he turned to Kim.

"Just started. I didn’t see anything unusual in all five scans I did." Kim said in a steady voice, but her jaw was tight. "Maybe two minutes since I noticed it."

Eun-woo and Seo-jun hit the ramp behind them, then dropped the sacks inside.

"Hurry." Leon said in a loud voice, then moved toward the controls.

The blue flames flared to life the moment Leon grabbed the steering wheel. The Triarch lifted off hard and fast, banking west and climbing.

Below them, the bulge continued its slow, enormous rise with no sound or explosion. Just the ground peeling back like it had been waiting long enough.

Leon watched it on the scan as they climbed higher.

Two massive hands broke the surface and pressed flat against the earth. The ground cracked outward in every direction and kept on cracking while the Triarch became like a mosquito in the sky.

"Gia," Leon said, staring at the running numbers on the screen.

"Already at maximum speed, Leon Storm."

When the craft punched through the dead cloud layer, the smoldering liquid fire of the upper atmosphere appeared one by one, followed by blinking eyes that seemed wrong.

Behind them, far below, the massive being that had risen from the Heart of Tartarus remained in the dust and heat, and did not chase. It only watched.

Rocks from above the narrow tunnel began slamming on the Triarch as it seeped through the first passage and entered into the second.

Eun-woo sat against the wall with his arms resting on his knees and stared at the ceiling for a moment, then turned to Seo-jun.

"So," he said quietly. "We are never going back there, right?"

Seo-jun remained quiet. Kim turned her gaze away when she saw Eun-woo’s eyes shifting to her.

Seo-jun looked at the sacks of Opal stones piled against the wall and counted them slowly, then looked at Leon.

"We’ve failed. We couldn’t reach the one thousand stones that were requested."

Leon smiled with his eyes, then pulled up the stone count on the panel. "It’ll have to be enough. It’s better than losing our lives without getting anything."

Seo-jun nodded once, then leaned against the wall, clutching his face in his palms.

Grey smoke rushed out of the narrow path in the shallow earth when the Triarch bounced out and entered into the night sky above the dead land.

The moon shone bright and graced the craft as the Triarch flew by it, while night birds flapped their wings, bouncing the clouds downward.

Inside the Triarch, Eun-woo looked at Kim, smiled, then took in a deep breath before closing his eyes and entering into his sleep mode.

Kim stretched herself on the seat she sat on, folded her arms on her chest, then closed her eyes as well, calming her breath.

Seo-jun remained seated behind Leon, watching the constellations of the stars streak past them while he slowly tapped on his lap, recounting the stones in his head.

Gia waved in but didn’t say a word. It only brought out a congratulation message on the screen, then began playing Mozart’s Requiem in D Minor, Sequence III: Rex Tremendae Majestatis.

Leon looked at the smiley emoji on the panel, then smirked, while pushing the steering wheel backward until the Triarch reeled above the clouds.