Ancient War - TBATE

Regrets

A/N: Hello! It's been a while since I updated this, huh? Well, good news! I plan to start updating this again with occasional updates. I also plan to rewrite some of the earlier chapter since I've improved my writing quite a bit. With that said, I hope you all enjoy this chapter.

Arthur Leywin Pov

"This really isn't a good plan." Ellie whined, trying to move in the heavy ice armor.

"Well, it's either we go with this plan, or you go back." I glanced at her from the corner of my eyes.

"This plan." Ellie instantly replied.

My lips curled up into a smirk. "Good."

Ellie nodded and follow me from a distance. Our plan was simple, Ellie would constantly fire arrows to trick the beast while I attacked it. Thankfully, a simple sound would help me avoid making a sound.

While I could do what Ellie was doing with some wind and earth spells, I wanted to avoid that to teach her how to time and strategize. If she fired too many arrows at the aether beast without distracting it, she fails, but if she can time and plan it well, she succeeds.

'Testing your little sister in one of the most dangerous places, what did I expect?' A familiar voice echoed in my mind.

'Aurora?' I thought to myself, feeling some amazement.

'Yep! I have some news for you, so I hope this is a good time.' He replied.

'We're about to go fight a giant beast, but go ahead.' I sighed.

'Good!' Aurora exclaimed. 'But before we move on, I have to say, these are quite the thoughts you have of the little elf princess.'

I could feel my face heat up as I realized he wasn't using telepathy but reading my mind. My jaw dropped as I stammered out a bunch of excuses, and I could practicatly feel his grin widening through the link he set up.

"Arthur?" Ellie called out, seeing my face turn red.

"I'm fine." I replied, hiding my internal crisis.

'You did not have to read my mind!' I shouted through our link.

'I didn't, but Virion wanted some teasing material, so he asked me to read your mind.' Aurora stifled his laughter.

'I know you're a kid, but do you seriously have to act like one?' I rolled my eyes, pushing a vine out of the way.

'No need to be rude now, Arthur. I've lived for a good few thousand years, so let me have some fun.' Aurora presumably pouted.

I let out a sigh, confusing Ellie. 'Just get straight to the point.'

I wasn't sure why, but Aurora suddenly seemed to be in an upright mood. 'The good news is a surprise, so you'll have to wait and see.'

'Why does it feel like you're about to ruin my life?' I groaned.

'Don't worry, you'll be fine.' Aurora dismissed. 'I'll be heading out to train Varay now.'

I let out a sigh as I could feel Aurora's presence disappear from my mind and Ellie's gaze boring into me, awaiting an explanation for my constant reactions.

"I just had a conversation with Aurora." I stated before Ellie could say anything.

"Is that so?" Ellie nodded sharply, understanding why I was suddenly flustered.

"Mhm." I confirmed, not bothering to turn around.

I wasn't expecting Ellie to say anything, but to my surprise, she did, and it almost made me choke on my own breath. "Does this mean I'm going to be an aunt?"

I recomposed myself before replying. "No."

"Aww." Ellie pouted.

"We're here." I stated, deciding to stop this conversation.

Ellie looked where I was and saw the cave where the centipede lived. Ellie probably didn't feel anything, but I felt the tremondus amount of aether inside that cave. It reminded me of Aurora and his godrune but on a much smaller scale.

We walked into the large cave and started navigating through it. It was massive, maybe bigger than the flying castle, and it took us over twenty minutes to finally find what I thought was the beast's den.

"Woah..." Ellie gasped in amazement at the sight in front of us.

Hundreds of purple crystals were bunched together, radiating a purple hue similar to Aurora's. Compared to that centipede, the aether in those crystals was negligible but there were a lot of crystals with some being denser than the rest.

Ellie lowered her bow and picked up one of the crystals, studying it. Just as I was about to reprimand her for dropping her guard, a terrible roar reverbated through the cavern.

Hearing that roar, I covered Ellie in aether and used sound magic to find the source of this sound. Using wind alone would allow me to see only the outlines of everything, so using sound magic was optimal to perceive details and such.

What I saw was nothing short of terrifying. The massive centipede was slowly torturing before devouring some of Alacrya's so-called ascenders. To my horror, I could feel it somehow purifying the aether in its body using their mana, and by doing this, it grew bigger and stronger.

I couldn't hear anything over the sound of my own heartbeat. Sure, I was stronger than before, but I doubt mana would be able to harm that thing, and even my aether might not be strong enough after it grew this much.

"-Thur? Arthur!" Ellie's shouting brought me back to reality, and to my horror, I could feel the centipede shifting its attention towards us.

"Run!" I shouted as the sound of the centipede's body scratching the walls.