Chapter 130: Farewell 2
The hallways of Athena's underground sanctuary pulsed with quiet life mana-infused walls, glass corridors overlooking ethereal data streams, and silent drones patrolling with surgical precision. The air was cooler here, laced with sterile ozone and the hum of deep magic tech. Dim blue runes glowed faintly across the ceilings and floors, casting long, shifting shadows.
Philip appeared at the core lift with a crackle of compressed space. His arrival didn't trigger alarms. The system knew him.
Athena was in the strategy chamber, suspended above a translucent platform. Dozens of mana-glass projections floated around her like orbiting moons maps, reconnaissance notes, coded letters from various factions. Below the platform, a chasm of glowing circuits pulsed like the arteries of some sleeping god-machine. She was giving instructions to an AI interface when the air warped behind her.
"You sent him to UR?" Philip's voice was low but laced with fury, a deep rumble that made the glass projections flicker. Even the AI stuttered to a pause.
Athena turned, her expression shifting from surprise to guarded caution. "Philip "
His eyes flared, irises glowing with unstable mana. "Answer the question."
"Yes. But it wasn't my "
Before she could finish, Philip crossed the chamber in a single blink of space, his hand clamping around her throat with terrifying precision. He lifted her off the ground, slamming her back against the pillar of the central display. The glass cracked with a spiderweb fracture as runes on the pillar sparked in protest. Static arced off his shoulders.
"You sent Frank," Philip growled, "to the UR filled with dangers even high gods' beasts roam the planet. With demigods plenty about."
Athena struggled, her legs kicking slightly as her hands clawed at his arm. Her vision blurred, her throat crushed under pressure far beyond any normal force. The mana-charged air pulsed erratically, reacting to Philip's rising wrath. Even the chamber's ambient shielding shimmered like it was on the verge of collapse.
"It wasn't me," she choked out. "It was Frank's decision... he insisted he's been there before... I tried to stop him !"
Philip's hand lingered for a second longer. The chamber groaned under the pressure of converging forces. Then, slowly, he released her.
Athena collapsed to the floor, gasping, one hand on her throat and the other stretched out to brace herself. Her face was flushed, sweat-drenched, her lungs working violently as she coughed and wheezed. She looked up at him, eyes wide not in fear, but in grief.
Philip stepped back, breathing hard. The mana around him crackled dangerously. The walls shimmered like they were underwater.
Athena coughed again, wiping the blood that had crept to her lips. "You know Frank… You know he wouldn't be stopped."
"That doesn't mean you enable him."
Silence fell like a guillotine.
Athena managed to sit up, still catching her breath. "We believed he must have found something there."
Philip turned, his tone sharp. "We? We who?"
"My family," she rasped. "We investigated... when he came back as a master. And noticed that during his time there, the resources he dropped as his quota were some vines imbedded with mana. And later, when he met with Dr. Remi..."
Before leaving, he stopped at the doorway, not looking back. The room was still trembling faintly from his presence.
"If anything happens to him… if he dies in that hellhole... I will come for you. There won't be a second warning."
With a blink of light, space folded, and he vanished.
Athena remained on the cold floor, silent, cradling her throat. The AI interface blinked above her, casting distorted reflections across her pale, shaken face.