Dream Beyond Life's Edge

A Future's Collateral

Olie aimed her palm at Jane. "Py-res!" A burst of fire flew towards Jane, burning the ground of ice and earth and the air around it.

"Don't!" Leo pulled down his hand and the flame hit an invisible wall before dissipating. "Now that Talia's here, she won't hold back from killing Julius!"

At Leo's warning, the attacks stopped.

"Talia, your mother is trying to kill you," Leo told her frankly. "Work with me, understand?"

Talia nodded. "Alexia will be useless. She's out of mana."

"It's fine," Leo whispered to them before turning to face Jane, glaring at her with a hostile, yet composed expression. "Jane! When Talia is in your reach, immediately release Julius!"

"Huh?!" Talia turned to look at Leo when her body became unable to move.

"No, absolutely not!" Alexia said. But as she didn't try to stop Leo, it seemed Leo also froze her in place.

"Sure," Jane said.

Leo aimed his palm towards Talia and her body slowly floated. "Incapacitate Jane the moment you're able to," he whispered to Talia.

"Ahhh... Glasi-res," Talia whispered, forming a hidden ice spike inside her fisted hand. Her body slowly flew closer to Jane. So as to not arouse Jane's suspicion, she feigned anger at Leo, screaming and trying to pull herself out of the situation.

Seemingly trusting Leo's judgement, the others didn't try to free her with the exception of Alexia who was screaming at Leo to stop. Fortunately, she had nearly no mana and was unable to move due to Leo's power.

After taking a deep breath, Talia looked to her mother. If only she hadn't tried to kill Joseph, then Talia wouldn't have gotten the resolve to kill her right here. If her mother hadn't done anything at all, this mess wouldn't have happened.

On the night of the monster's arrival, was there really a second Talia? Her mother could've just been lying about everything. It must have been Jane who turned Joseph into the monster. And to cover it up, Jane made up the story of the second Talia.

Talia couldn't even guess what her mother's goal was, but she knew for sure it would be horrible. In this one moment, she had to grasp the strand which led to her mother's defeat.

She held her fisted palm with her other hand, trying to stop the rising tremble.

Jane reached out her palm and launched a large ice spike Talia's way.

Dodging Jane's ice, Talia fell and released the ice spike she'd been holding at Jane—or at least she planned as such.

Instead, Talia had let the ice dissipate into nothingness. On the ground, she couldn't make her body move as it trembled uncontrollably.

"Get out!" Leo shouted. Talia's body flew to the side, then pain seared her left leg. She crashed onto the ground and rolled until she managed to stop.

An ice spike had lodged itself into Talia's left leg. Talia looked up to see a snapped ice spike had risen from the ground underneath where she had previously been.

"Why..." Talia stared at her limp hand. She'd willingly stopped her attack. "Shit! What am I doing?!"

As she clutched Julius' neck, Jane released a couple ice spikes Talia's way.

Talia raised her hand to block it but the ice simply fell onto the ground at the halfway mark; Leo, who was flying above Talia, had stopped it.

At the same time, Jane began freezing Julius' neck.