Ashton felt like he was floating...
It was weird, you see, seeing the world like this. He never felt so calm and present at the same time in his life.
All is clear yet blurry at the same time.
He's vaguely aware of his breathing and his movements. He could hear his heartbeat and he could tell how deep or shallow his breaths are.
Ashton felt as if he could sense everything even with his eyes closed. Hell, he's in danger right now yet he didn't look like he was treating it seriously.
Casually tilting his body to the side to avoid the claw sweeping down to crush him. Jumping just high and fast enough to dodge the next attack while also shooting his guns.
In this wonderful state of calm and serenity, Ashton could feel the flow of mana inside of him. Aware of just how much he has, how much he has to use, how to convert it to achieve the most optimal result, and so on.
The Mortal Reminder, his guns, felt familiar yet also known on his hands.
How is it that it took him this long to discover that, every time he held them in his hands, a blurry set of blue vines appear on the guns and his hands? How is it that he only discovered that this is how the guns were converting his mana into bullets that he can shoot?
Why did he only discover that he could refine this connection even more? Allowing the sub-artifact to perform at a more optimal rate, making all of his shots pack more punch?
Maybe it's because of the weird state that he's in...no, it has to be the reason why.
This whole new level of awareness is something that he never once felt in his entire life. He could feel and sense everything that was in motion. He could feel the flow of his environment and the results of his every action.
Ashton could feel the imbalanced harmony of his surroundings. He could feel that it's repulsing him, pushing him away...it hates him and tells him he doesn't belong here.
The hostility surprised him. Yet after thinking about it for quite some time, he felt that it was only natural.
It wasn't the world that was telling him this, it was the Demonic Corruption around him that was speaking. Granted that he's not a demon, of course, the corruption sought to destroy him.
Weirdly enough, in this state of his, Ashton knows how to hurt this. Which, doesn't make sense at all, but it's the truth. He knows what to do to upset the Demonic Corruption even more.
'For example, if I were to shoot this way...'
Ashton didn't aim at the Undead Dragon that was trying its best to kill him nor did he aim at the mountain of corrupted treasure behind it. He aimed at a seemingly random spot, yet after shooting it...
He felt a piercing shriek shaking him.
The winds howled and corrupted harmony was interrupted. Space itself bent with the shot and a domino effect occurred.
It's as if Ashton suddenly transformed everything in his vicinity into a searing white hell. Not a single inch of the Undead Dragon's cave was spared from the hot white flames.
The Undead Dragon cried out in agony. Ashton could hear the sheer disbelief in its tone. It's as if it couldn't believe that itself was hurting.
He's vaguely aware of what the dragon was thinking; what happened there? How can this be? How did this puny human manage to hurt me with his ridiculous toys? Weren't my scales hard enough to protect me? Then why am I hurting?
Ashton would laugh really. If he just wanted to piss the dragon off, he'd say that what he did was just a lucky shot, a fluke more or less, but he didn't.
He celebrated inwardly instead, thinking to himself; finally made you feel it you overgrown lizard!
This little celebration of his was, of course, not enough to shake him out of this special state. Which he's glad for by the way because he knew that he only managed to hurt the damn thing seriously during this state.
'I need to finish this quickly while I'm still in this state. I don't know how long it lasts after all.' Ashton mused to himself as he took a deep breath and submerged himself deeper into the state he was in.
This absurd level of awareness felt so awesome yet freaky at the same time. He vaguely felt omnipotent in this state since he could tell everything that was going on with crystal clear clarity.
The faintest gust of wind, the slight tremors of the ground, he could even predict what was going to happen next! It's truly bizarre.
In this state, he could feel the inner workings of the world surrounding him, he could almost see the state of everything in front of him.
It's like looking at building blocks. He couldn't exactly tell which is which since he was new to this but he could tell where to aim and shoot which will result in a whole world of hurting for the enemy in front of him.
This is what happened earlier. His shot was aimed at somewhere that's not present in the naked eye and it caused a set of chained reactions to happen which resulted in him injuring the Undead Dragon.
And he's about to do it again...
'This is crazy...' he mused to himself, 'I could end this with this next shot.'
And end it, he did...
A pair of shots aimed at the Undead Dragon. Judging by the trajectory of this shot, this shot was bound to miss, yet that's not what happened.
The space warped around the shot, wrapping around it which effectively made the shot invisible. The next thing that happened was the shot reappearing inside the Undead Dragon's body.
More precisely, at its heart...
One bullet appeared on the right side, the other on the left. They met and clashed at the center, bouncing upon the collisions and ricocheting inside the poor thing's body.
The dragon was already injured before, now it's severely injured it is currently experiencing a whole new level of agony as it felt the bullets bouncing inside its body like pachinko balls.
The bullets were merciless, they punched holes in every single organ it has. The momentum behind them was enough re-arrange the dragon's insides! It even left a burning white trail behind.
The Undead Dragon roared in pure agony, yet it was cut short by the bullets piercing through its brain. And as a last act of brilliance, the bullets exploded like fireworks inside its body, resulting in the dragon roasting from within.
The whole cave shook upon its death. It's as if a high-magnitude earthquake occurred.
In his current state, Ashton felt a strong sense of danger screaming at him to run away as far as he could from this place.
This was something that he didn't dare to question. So he swiftly took mountains of, now cleansed, treasure into his inventory and bolted the hell out of this place.
As he ran away, he made another discovery. Using the Spell: Blink in this state, takes him farther and uses less mana. He discovered a more efficient way to cast the spell just now and automatically applied it.
Hell, he's even noticed that he's practically dual-casting at this point since he was shooting the stray demons that were chasing him as he ran away!
Everything's too much for him to handle right now so he decided to think about it later. The more important matter is that he needs to get the hell away from this place.
'There!'
Ashton saw the light of the outside for the first time in a long while. He ran faster, and he didn't stop until he was at least a few kilometers away from the massive nest.
He then summoned the mobile safehouse in front of him, blinked inside, and entered the Grand Library from within while retrieving the safe house.
Once he appeared inside his safe space, he bled his senses out of the library's walls and witnessed how the entire nest he was at, collapsed.
It didn't end there either...
The white flames that were present inside the cave of the undead dragon crept up, setting the collapsed nest into a massive ball of white flames, a thing that could be witnessed from miles away.
Ashton felt a deep sense of satisfaction as he saw the whole thing go down. The sight soothed his arsonist side, which is something he will vehemently deny having, and it also pleased his sense of duty as a human being.
These flames will spread far a wide, and the area around this place will be swept clean because of the purifying flames alone. Ashton could already see that happening.
Unable to help himself, he laughed. Feeling light and airy. He could feel himself relaxing finally as he now paid attention to a string of notifications the System ensued.
[Undead Dragon slain! Cleptomancy worked! You received...]
[1,745 items picked up. Assorting them into Inventory. See the full list here...]
[Strategic Demon Base; Destroyed! You've been rewarded with...]
[Conratulations Host! [Basic Firearm Proficiency] has now reached the 1-Star Phenomenon Stage!]
Seeing all of this caused Ashton to laugh uproariously again...
