Assimilate All Talents

Chapter 279: A Nightmare

From his spatial ring, he retrieved a giant silver wolf head, causing everyone in the guild to gape in awe. Soon, cheers rang throughout the guild as the party basked in the glory.

"How did you do it?!"

"Amazing!"

"Hahaha! Congrats, lad! This calls for a drink!"

Jayce chuckled at the last comment and agreed, "Of course! In fact, it’s on me! Everyone, drink to your heart’s content!"

Even though it was still early in the day, it was too good of a reason to drink, and the adventurers gladly joined in. It didn’t take long for all of them to have a drink in their hands as they went into full celebration for the party’s success in defeating the powerful beast.

The guild employees weren’t able to partake in the drinking, but they still enjoyed the happy atmosphere nonetheless, at least, everyone except one person.

’They killed the Thunder Wolf King? But didn’t it almost kill me?’

His mind struggled to understand, as he could remember the way the silver wolf stared him down, even while his sword was lodged in its jaw. He thought his life was over at that moment, but on the contrary, it was the day everything began.

He held onto his head as these conflicting thoughts caused a massive headache. Jayce then came over and placed the decapitated wolf head on the counter.

"What do ya think, Sol? It was thanks to you that we could kill it!"

He was still on the job, so he tried to ignore the pounding headache and asked, "I helped?"

"Of course! Remember how you told us how to track direwolves? We followed them for a few days and eventually found their den! After that, we just lay in wait and attacked them while they were resting. And thank goodness we did, because even with a surprise attack, it almost managed to overpower us. You honestly saved our lives this time."

Jayce patted his back with a big smile, but Sol found all of this impossible to believe. He looked at Jayce’s party members. The two swordsmen were drinking alongside other adventurers, while the huntress was doing a few party tricks, and the wizard watched silently, enjoying the atmosphere.

’I’m still hallucinating even though I know it’s fake. Am I in some kind of slumber, or am I walking aimlessly in the pit?’

Thinking back to how he started his day in Annabel’s house and ran to the Guild, it was clear that escaping wasn’t as simple as walking in one direction until he left the pit.

He opened his status page and saw the same stats from the morning. Seeing it was of no use, he began trying to use his abilities from memory.

"[Revealing Light]!"

"[Grim Flames]!"

"[Tail Wind]!"

Casting magic had no effect, besides making the people nearby give him weird looks. Though he knew none of them were real, the gazes made him feel awkward, so he walked back into the guild and went into one of the empty rooms where he knew no one would disturb him.

From there, he continued trying everything: [Create Magic Hands], [Phase Step], [Terra Manipulation], [Basic Psychic Mastery], [True Sight (Variant)], [Polychromatism], [Umbral Domain], [Close Combat]. But nothing worked. It wasn’t that easy breaking through such a powerful ability.

After constant trial and error, he was getting desperate as he didn’t know how much time he really had. From when he woke up in Annabel’s bed until now, it had been more than four hours. He doubted the spider was marinating his body for such a long time; it was more likely that his sense of time had been distorted.

Not knowing when his end would come, he was getting desperate. This was definitely not how he wanted to die, especially because his death would be followed by the deaths of everyone else who came with him to the ancient city.

’I hope everyone is okay...’

Sol tried even more skills, even those that wouldn’t be useful in this scenario, in hopes that something, anything, would work.

It was then that he saw it.

’Tethers? Here?’