Chapter 687 - Kleptra Game

After the group voted on the event they wanted to participate in, Sofia was teleported to a tiny room with white-tiled walls and floors with an horizontal blue line as the only touch of color. The room also had an open locker, a coat hanger, a bench made of a strange smooth white material, and a large metal shelf with an outfit in many sizes.

There was a single way out of the room, a blue door with a sign on it: Please get dressed, leave your personal effect in the locker.

We were separated? I don’t even feel Pareth’s presence…

Sofia was in her battle garments she usually wore under her armor, simple form-fitting clothes with multiple durability enchantments. All of her items were gone, from the admin key to her storage ring, the only things still on her were Aphenoreth’s glove, Bookie’s book form latched to her waist, and for some reason also Victory’s crown.

Need to get dressed first, huh… No need to pick a colored belt this time? Let’s see…

Sofia grabbed the outfit marked ‘Female 195cm’ and almost started undressing when she stopped herself.

Wait…

[Live spectator count - Sofia Aphenoreth : 0 (OFFLINE)]

Oh alright. Had me scared for a second there.

Her privacy ensured, Sofia put on the clothing for the event, a large white t-shirt and blue shorts.

Interesting outfit… I’ve never seen stretchy cloth like that, is that some kind of special silk? Still though, I’m going to need to move around in that? It’s compressing my chest so much I think if I flex it’s going to rip.

Sofia had to give the outfit some credit, it did not rip open as she feared when she tried pushing it a bit, but it was still not the most comfortable. She ended up discarding it and picking the outfit three sizes above labelled ‘Female 210cm’, she was swimming in the blue shorts that almost reached her knees but at least the shirt felt comfortable. She thought about changing back to the other shorts which might look better, but it would not hinder her either way so she kept the larger ones. Lastly the outfit was complemented by strange white squishy shoes that closed by themselves. 

Finally dressed, Sofia got Bookie and Pestle out.

“Time to get dressed! Here your outfit Bookie.”

“For me?!”

“What, you don’t want to participate?”

“N- no, I want to!” Bookie said, “But… I’m not good at sports…”

“Then you don’t have to participate, just be here and hold your book form for me so that I don’t have to carry it around.”

“I can do that!”

“Great. And… Pestle, what are you doing?”

The invisible fairy was currently buried in the 195cm sized outfit Sofia had left on the bench, frantically moving around like a clothing ghost, with sounds of cloth tearing echoing in the tiny room.

“Dress!” Pestle answered as she emerged from the t-shirt, her invisibility cancelled, and her tiny midenicite bones wrapped in layers of ripped blue fabric from the shorts. Somehow she had made herself something resembling a crudely cut ball gown out of the shorts. 

“Woah, I… I’m impressed you made that in so little time, but there are outfits in your size here, you know…”

“Not dress?”

“Sadly it’s a sports event not a noble’s banquet, Pestle…”

Since Pestle had been sleeping in Bookie’s pages while the group picked the event, she needed to be caught up to speed. Once Sofia explained the situation, Pestle lamented needing to take off her dress and the incoming lack of leg, and half-heartedly put on the outfit labeled ‘Female 20cm’ while Sofia helped Bookie put his clothes on.

The clothing situation dealt with, Sofia walked to the door, which opened by itself, showing a flat, sandy terrain where a lot of people in similar outfits were already waiting.

When they had all stepped out, Sofia felt the door and the room disappear behind them, and the spectator count instantly shot up from zero to about twenty thousands.

There isn’t even going to be any fighting and everyone still wants to watch? Ah whatever.

Pareth teleported to Sofia. To her surprise, he was no longer in his hellspawn skeleton, and back to his first human one, despite them not having switched him, and he was also wearing the white and blue outfit.

“It’s the first time we’re all dressed the same, isn’t it? Do I look fine?”

Pareth answered with a shrug.

“Guessed as much, oh well, we should go find the others.”

Since Sofia had been slow to dress up, she was the last one out. Kuli and Mornn quickly found her a she found them, and they met up halfway toward the crowd of people.

Mornn looked at Sofia and chuckled, “I see I wasn’t the only one who had to go a few sizes over. Saw your sister in the crowd, I think almost everyone picked this event. They’re not very friendly for the most part though, I think all the pins we have are starting to have a real effect on how hostile they are.”

“Neh, can confirm, honestly unsettling how they all stare,” Kuli added.

“That was expected, it’s surprising so many people took this though, with the mention of a Kleptra… Let’s see…” Sofia said, standing on het tip toes to watch the crowd. “Saria is here yes… Tartaros, Sen, Cloud… Oh man this is really not going to be an easy one…”

“I’ve not seen that Andarian mage’s group,” Mornn said, also looking around.

“Oh yeah I’ve talked with them a bit,” Sofia said, “I gave them pointers on how I choose which events to pick so I guess they predicted we would be here and successfully avoided us ahah…”

“One fewer competitor is good news,” Kuli commented, “But I have to say I’m still a bit apprehensive about the judge.”

“It should be fine as long as we don’t anger them,” Mornn said, “hopefully…”

Pestle suddenly turned around on Sofia’s shoulder.

“Smart Elf,” a rough, grating voice said out of nowhere.

Sofia turned around, she could not see or feel anyone from where the voice had come from, but it was pretty evident who had spoken.

“Stupid Klepra!” Pestle accused, to everyone’s absolute horror.

“Pestle!” Sofia panicked, grabbingthe fairy and putting her hand over her skull.

There was a few seconds of chilling silence, then a snigger.

“Too Young For Me, Ravager. Frail Bones. Not Worth A Toothpick,” the invisible Kleptra mocked, his voice slowly fading with the last word.

Suddenly the ground shook. A huge figure appeared far away, closer to the space were the other trialees were, impacting the ground like a meteorite. The shockwave from the impact knocked over many of them, but all the strong contenders were still standing and witnessed the figure’s curled form unfulring.

Sofia was speechless as she watched the creature, she could guess what the Kleptras were like from descriptions and Shaily’s story, but even her imagination paled in comparison to the real thing. If she had to describe it, it was like a bipedal dragon had gone through an apostle ritual to become a demon, then had stolen random body parts from every insect unimaginable, from a scorpion’s segmented tail to a beetle’s hard-shelled wings, and mixed them all together into an absolute nightmare the size of castle.

For the first time, Sofia felt that the name of Pareth’s skeleton as an hellspawn abomination was unfitting, as if anything had to be called a hellspawned abomination, it was that thing looking over the trialees with its faceted eyes and acid-dripping mandibles.

“Good Day Everyone! This Er’Gakk Is Flattered So Many Came To Play!” the abomination said, its many wings whirring behind it. It raised a three-clawed segmented insectoid leg above its head, and a purple mass started to gather above it. 

Everyone instantly felt heavier, it was as if gravity had been magnified a hundred times, and the people who were flying or hovering above the ground were instantly slammed down against the dusty sandy terrain, even Pestle’s tiny body crumpled up on Sofia’s shoulder.

“We Start Now With Athleticism! RUN!”

The trialees all understood the message clearly, run away.

Sofia grabbed Bookie’s hand, activated the second level of runeforged overlord, and ran. Her group was already a bit farther from the Kleptra than the mass of the other participants, so they had a headstart, clearly fairness was not the word of the day for this event.

Kuli was the fastest, quickly running away despite her current inability to jump, Sofia was hot on her tail, while Mornn and Pareth lagged behind a bit. 

They ran for about twenty seconds, putting quite a distance between them and  Er’Gakk, and by the end Pareth had just grabbed Mornn in his arms and continuously teleported to Sofia to keep up. That was the only teleportation that worked, apparently, as [Summon Self] completely failed to activate, and so did the graveyard, which Sofia had hoped could help pull them forward faster.

“TIME OVER!”

The bubble of purple magic in the Kleptra’s hand exploded. A strong wave of gravity magic pushed everyone down. Sofia and her group were mostly safe, their shoes sinking into the ground, their bones grinding against each other.

But the closest people were to Er’Gakk, the stronger the gravity affecting them was.

For about a third of the people, who had not managed to run far enough, the event was already over. Remained of them only gruesome blood splatters on the ground.

Er’Gakk errupted in a burst of sinister laughter, like this was the funniest sight he had ever been the give the opportunity to witness.

In the corner of Sofia’s vision appeared a tiny system window, finally given a hint on how the scores for event would work.

[Eternal Lights - Times survived: 4]