Lord of Annihilation

Room O29.

Lucius' body which was sitting in it's meditative cross-legged position was shaking uncontrollably. Under his body, a small pool of blood at already formed. The mattress on the bed was soaked with sweat and blood.

His body looked extremely scary, with blood flowing from seven orifices drawing lines of blood across his body.

BANG!

A sudden muffled sound of an explosion sounded, from Lucius' body. The shivering suddenly stopped and Lucius' upright and straight body suddenly collapsed into the bed.

His tense body and muscles suddenly slackened, similar to a puppet whose strings had been cut.

"LUCIUS!" Ka'lor'ah's panicked scream sounded out.

"I'm alright." an impassive reply sounded out within her mind.

"What happened?!" she asked with concern.

"Nothing serious. The barrier did not allow the required energy for my advancement to pass. Therefore I had to improvise." he blandly replied.

"NOTHING MUCH?! LOOK AT THE AMOUNT OF BLOOD YOU HAVE LOST!" Ka'lor'ah seriously admonished him.

Looking at his body shiver from the extreme pain of the advancement coupled with the streams of blood that continued to flow from his body, she felt her heart wrench painfully.

"As I said. It's nothing serious. This is the result of my improvisation." Lucius did not pay heed to her concern and indifferently replied.

"You...!! Sigh." looking at him, Ka'lor'ah simply decided to give up.

'At least he's alive.' she decided to leave it at that.

After a few minutes of lying down, Lucius gathered the remaining energy in his body and slowly raised his body up. Recovering his original position, Lucius examined his body to analyze the results of his advancement.

Gathering soul power in his hands, the originally cloud like energy now resembled flowing water. It was much more condensed and fluid. The speed of the flow at also increased by a great amount.

"Stage 1 Mid Level Liquid Phase reached." Lucius indifferently replied.

To him, who was an ex-Stage 7, a mere Stage 1 mid level was nothing much to celebrate. It was simply a small milestone in his journey to power.

Circulating the soul energy in his body, Lucius healed the internal injuries his body had received during the course of his advancement.

"What did you even do to receive such serious injuries?" Ka'lor'ah questioned him curiously.

As he was healing his injuries while having his eyes closed, Lucius explained.

"The barrier was restricting the amount of energy entering this universe. At the critical stage of the advancement, I noticed that I was severely lacking in the required amount of energy. In order to avoid my soul from dissipating, I had to force that 'mysterious energy' inside my body to assist me."

Pausing here for a second, he then continued.

"Of course since we don't understand what that energy is, or how it's activated, I decided to injure my vital essence to force it out. Since it worked the previous time in 'The Pit', I took a gamble on it working this time. And it paid off." he concluded.

"Therefore, we now have another clue about it. It's something that exists within me and comes out when I face a life or death crises. Of course, it only works if I am in actual danger of dying. Not merely trying to cheat it."

Ka'lor'ah who was patiently listening to his explanation took a deep breath.

"So.....what you are telling me is. you just tried to kill yourself." a suppressed wrath was felt in her voice.

Lucius, being focused in treating his injuries did not notice this peculiarity in her voice. He simply affirmed her statement.

"To summarize. Yes."

"YOU--" just as Ka'lor'ah was about to blow up, a loud sound of sirens blaring was heard.

The sound was so loud that, Ka'lor'ah's furious voice was completely drowned out by this sound.

Lucius who had is eyes closed, immediately snapped them open and spoke. His brows were furrowed.

"Something is wrong. It's the ship's warning alarm. We have to gather at the common area." saying so, he got up from his meditative position and wiped the blood of his face using his hands.

Gathering a small amount of his newly condensed soul power, he activated [Decay] and destroyed the pool of blood and the stains that had formed on his bed.

The soul energy slowly passed through the pores of the mattress only destroying the blood, turning it into nothingness. The amount of control required to do this was simply unbelievable!

Confirming that no more traces were left behind. Lucius casually dressed himself and left his room.

'Time to see what happened.'

-------------------------

In the cafeteria.

A large crowd of disquieted students were present. Their voices were filled with panic and a look of worry was present in their faces. The loud sound of the blaring alarm was still present in the air.

The sounds of the alarms and the students blended to produce a scene of pandemonium.

Lucius walked into the the cafeteria to be met with this scene.

'Too loud.' he thought with a annoyed expression.

'Should I quieten them.' a tint of red bloomed with his eyes and rapidly started to expand.

To say Lucius was itching to test his new combat effectiveness was an understand. Slaughtering the students present here would make a perfect testing opportunity.

'NO!' alas with a furious voice, Ka'lor'ah shot down his proposal. She was already feeling very angry at Lucius' earlier actions.

Mentally clicking his tongue, he then proceeded to one of the corners of the cafeteria. He had no interest in conversing with the other students. The only reason for him coming here was to know why the alarms had been triggered.

The alert alarms in the spaceship would never be casually triggered. Therefore, he concluded that something major must have happened.

'Are we getting raided by pirates?' Lucius thought to himself.

'Using pirates as testing material will also work well.' he carefully pondered over this thought. Seeing him like this, Ka'lor'ah once again sighed mentally and gave up on lecturing him.

Leaning against the wall and closing his eyes, Lucius decided to properly get used to his new upgrade. Circulating his soul energy throughout his body, he waited for the Captain to make his announcement.

Few minutes later, Lucius felt a familiar aura approach him.

"Hey." an arrogant voice sounded.

Lucius directly ignored him.

"Hey! I'm talking to you." the voice spoke once again, only to met with silence.

The person who was talking raised his hands and neared Lucius.

"Do you want to lose your hands permanently this time?" Lucius coldly spoke. He opened his eyes to stare at the young man in front of him. A red light slightly glowed in the background of his eyes.

Feeling a threatening aura wash over him, Alex's body involuntarily shivered. He remembered that the person before him, wasn't the 17 years old youth which he looked at, but a monster with twisted world view.

"Humph! I'll only say this once so listen carefully. Our actions earlier today, let's forget about it." Alex spoke arrogantly. His words did not seem natural, but was extremely forced.

Lucius looked up at the future 'Great Commander', with a light surprise in his eyes. He then looked towards the side and noticed Olivia standing there with a helpless smile on her face.

"Are you apologizing to me?" Lucius asked in an indifferent voice.

"Who's apologizing to you,bas....!" Alex was immediately angered once again only to be held back by Olivia.

She then whispered to him in a low voice, "Mr. Alex please, do this for Reyna."

"I'm not in the wrong though. It was this bastard's fault." Alex yelled with a grieved expression on his face.

"I'm am requesting you Mr. Alex." Olivia continued to speak and followed with a bow. "Reyna looked very sad earlier today. To the point of her crying. I was a really bad friend, only to realize this later."

She then turned around and addressed Lucius.

"You too Lucius. I hope you can make up with Alex. For Reyna's sake."

Hearing her sincere words, Lucius casually shrugged in response.

"He started it. I finished it. I do not care about such matters regarding weaklings." he blandly spoke.

"SEE! This is what I'm dealing with. Normal conversation with this guy is simply impossible!" Alex screamed.

Olivia let out a helpless smile at their actions. She then spoke.

"Can we just put this matter behind us. For Reyna's sake"

"It's fine with me. I don't really care." Lucius gave his opinion.

Seeing these two people arbitrarily decide this matter without considering his input, Alex felt strangely suffocated. Letting out a heavy sigh, he spoke.

"Fine! But don't expect me to make friends with this monster." he grunted.

After hearing Alex's reply, Olivia gave a bright smile. Looking around she then spoke.

"Where is Reyna? Why is she not here? Actually why are we here?"

"Dunno." Alex straightly replied.

Lucius simply remained silent.

Just as Olivia was about to voice out her concern, the chatters around her suddenly died down and a holographic projection manifested in the center.

The image of a middle-aged man was reflected. With heavy eyes he surveyed around the room before letting out a heavy sigh.

Seeing him like this, a ominous premonition invaded the hearts of every student present.

With deep and heavy voice, he spoke.

" Most of you must be wondering why the alarms were sounded. Some of you might have some guesses. While some of you might have noticed it already, that one of your friend is missing."

"With a heavy heart I say this, but....."

"There has been a murder aboard this vessel!"

The captain gave out a shocking news. Hearing this everyone's body stiffened and Olivia let out a cry.

"NO!!" her voice cut through the atmosphere.

Alex was shocked and Lucius' relaxed body, stiffened.

The three of them had the same doubt. 'Reyna was currently not here. Could it be?' a dreadful feeling set in their hearts.

Of course the Captain did not notice this and continued.

"The student who has been killed is named, Max Patterson. The murderer had been very clever in hiding his tracks and disabling the cameras and security systems. Currently we have no clues regarding this case." He paused, giving the students some time to digest this information.

The hearts of all the three immediately relaxed upon hearing the Captain's words. Tears which were threatening to fall out of Olivia eyes immediately retreated.

'If it's not Reyna, then it's fine.' she comforted herself.

Unknowingly, maybe due to the awaken of her soul or perhaps due to Lucius' influence, Olivia's character had begun to change. If this was her previously, she would have felt concerned and worried about the death of a fellow student.

Now however, since it wasn't the death of a person related to her. Olivia's heart did not seem to care. She herself had not noticed this fact.

Alex and Lucius too had visibly relaxed. Alex did not care because he was already used to the sight of people dying in the army, since he confirmed that it wasn't Reyna, he was not worried. As for Lucius it did not have to be said. The only reason he ever showed any reaction in the first place, was because of the possibility that his target(Reyna) might have died.

The three of them, then began wondering.

'Who could be the murderer?'

Unconsciously, both Olivia's and Alex's eyes drifted to look at Lucius. They saw his indifferent and impassive expression and could help doubt him a little.

Noticing their reactions, Lucius casually said.

"Do you think I require to hide after killing someone? I can kill every single person in this room, by the time it takes you to think of an answer."

Hearing him, both of them squashed the thoughts in their heads. 'That's right. If he wanted to, who can possibly stop him from carrying out a slaughter.'

Remembering the scene of bodies being ripped apart at the warehouse, both of them shivered.

The Captain noted the expressions of the various people present and spoke.

"While it may sound cruel, please pause your grievings. Our foremost priority is to apprehend the murderer. Therefore, I implore you, if anyone suspects the person behind this murder please inform either myself or one of the teachers beehind me."

"In order to maintain your anonymity, you can send a message with your suspect to this ID. Thanks in advance for your cooperation. All of you may disperse now. Please try to stay inside your room's until the killer is apprehended."

Saying so the hologram disappeared. The students also did not stay behind and left one after another.

Lucius' group of three, however were still worried.

Olivia spoke up, "I'm worried about Reyna. She hasn't showed up here. I'm going to check on her."

"I'll follow you." Alex replied and Lucius nodded his head.

Thus, the three of them began heading in the direction of Reyna's room.