This was Erica's personal feeling as she woke from the coma.
Beneath her was uneven ground, not at all as smooth as the bed at home.
The blonde girl tried to get up, but found her limbs firmly bound, and even her mouth was gagged with a cloth, leaving only her eyes open.
Erica frantically checked her condition.
Her clothes were still on, showing no signs of being removed or broken, and she felt no discomfort in her body.
Her integrity allowed Erica to breathe a sigh of relief.
She carefully recalled what had happened today.
She had followed the clues step by step to locate the cultists who had infiltrated Milan, but just as she was about to investigate further, she fell into their trap.
"Never thought I'd have such a pathetic day."
The mockery lasted only a few seconds before Erica was startled to find that the group of black-clad figures who had captured her were now gathered around an altar, murmuring something incomprehensible.
The air was filled with uncomfortable magical power.
Suddenly, Erica saw numerous corpses placed in the center of the altar, and her eyes widened.
Could it be... that they were about to perform a ritual to summon a heretic god here?
A dark cave, complex magical patterns, a strong smell of blood floating in the air, and a group of black-clad figures murmuring dark incantations and performing strange dances: Erica, who had researched some magic arts, instantly guessed that these cultists were performing an invocation ritual.
In her blue vision, blood flowed under the dim light.
The crimson liquid flowed along the patterns on the altar carved by the cultists, as if alive, twisting arbitrarily like a snake.
"Damn it, am I really going to be offered as a sacrifice to this heretic god this way?"
Erica tried to struggle, but her body still had no strength.
The ancient secret arts of evil were not recorded in the Magic Society's vast library, and exorcism spells required double amplification of tools and enchanted words.
But unfortunately, she didn't even have the strength to speak now, let alone cast spells and let the enchanted words destroy the cultists' ritual ground.
Erica finally recalled the last words her uncle had said.
"Brave" or "reckless."
Judging solely by the outcome, her solo investigation into the heretic god was truly too confident.
Her uncle was right.
She, who had never been involved with a heretic god, had no idea how terrifying things related to a heretic god truly were.
"I should have called that guy to come earlier."
Erica thought to herself that at least she would have someone to chat with before being offered to the heretic god.
Kaito looked into the depths of the cave.
The nauseating feeling grew heavier, as if a huge stone was pressing on his chest, leaving him slightly breathless.
Apart from the initial illusion, there were no alarms or offensive magical traps on the way, allowing Kaito to advance unimpeded. Finally, he cautiously peeked out behind a rock.
The scene observed by Erica was transmitted to Kaito's brain in real time.
"Sect again?"
Since meeting Erica, he encountered sects more and more frequently.
Just in the past six months, the number of cultists who died at his hands was no less than five.
In the past, something like this would have been a fantasy for him, a good young man.
But sects are called sects precisely because they do things that go against the public good.
Live sacrifices, sowing terror, sowing plagues, etc...
At that moment, Kaito also discovered Erica, whose hands and feet were tied.
Her crimson dress was stained with a lot of dust and dirt, but judging by her wide-open eyes, she did not appear to have been violated.
Otherwise, what Kaito would be seeing now would be a corpse that had died beautifully by suicide.
Knowing that Erica was unharmed, Kaito's attention focused on the cultists performing the strange ritual.
Having been exposed to it, he quickly guessed it was a ritual to summon a heretic god.
Furthermore, the offerings on the altar, without exception, indicated that the entity they were summoning was an evil god.
At the very least, it was definitely not a positive figure in myths and legends.
After observing for a while, Kaito, who was about to jump out and shout, pull out his True Longinus and attack, thought carefully and then stopped silently.
In the past six months, it was rare to find a nearly successful god summoning ritual, and out of selfishness, Kaito didn't want to destroy this hard-won opportunity to kill a god.
The moment Kaito decided to stay still, the cultists' god summoning ritual had already reached its final stage.
A faint sulfurous smell floated in the air: that mountain was an extinct volcano.
In the pile of offerings in the center of the altar, more than a third were the corpses of various snakes, another third were birds and poultry, and there was also the corpse of a bull.
In addition, there were oak branches, clubs, and a small amount of gold.
There were also many things that looked like stones.
The cultists cried out at the altar and above, making it even more unbearable than when Kaito had heard the unsettling sounds before.
At first glance, they looked like a group of chuunibyous.
Finally, a hunched cultist took a clay pot from his embrace and placed it among the offerings.
The cultists, forming a circle, knelt on the ground, raised their hands above their heads, and began to shout the name of the deity.
"Typhon"
"Typhon. Typhon. Typhon..."
From the initial loud shouts, they gradually evolved into a final whisper, soft and intricate.
"Typhon?"
Kaito, who finally remembered who Typhon was, was stunned.
He had thought it was some unknown minor deity, but he never imagined that it was this.
Typhon is a demon from Greek mythology.
In mythology, he has many other names such as Demon King, Demon God, Father of Monsters, and Ancestor of All Monsters.
He is a member of the Titans in Greek mythology.
His image in ancient texts is that of a fire-breathing giant, taller than a mountain, with a hundred snake heads, bird-like feathers all over his body, and a pair of black wings.
He is a monster born from the Earth Mother Gaia, possessing absolutely powerful strength.
His power terrified the gods; he struck the sun god Apollo, kicked the moon goddess Selene, dragged Poseidon's chariot out of the sea, and even Leviathan became a good baby in front of him.
Typhon is the son of the Greek Earth Mother Gaia and the underworld god Tartarus, and with his wife Echidna, he gave birth to many terrifying beasts.
Such as Cerberus, the dog of hell, the Lernaean Hydra, the Harpies, the Chimera, and the griffin that pecked at Prometheus, among others.
All these monsters were troublesome existences in myths and legends.
He was the arch-enemy of Zeus.
The tendons of the God King's hands and feet were once broken by him, and he was eventually suppressed by the gods, and Zeus defeated him with lightning.
Typhon's life can undoubtedly be located within the history of Greek mythology.
Just as Kaito remembered the myths about Typhon, the surrounding environment gradually changed.
The air began to move; a breeze rose in the cave, which should have been windless.
And it quickly became a gale, strong enough to make adults lose their balance.
However, the cultists near the altar were all sorcerers and could completely resist this wind.
But the offerings on the altar, originally inanimate, underwent a horrific transformation.
The corpses of the snakes began to writhe, their heads swaying erratically up, down, left, and right, flicking their tongues.
The dead birds and poultry also flapped their supposedly lifeless wings, emitting strange sounds.
Blood-colored stains flowed from the ears, nose, mouth, and eyes of the bull, and its muscles and bones gradually creaked, making a sound like grinding teeth.
As for the clay pot in the center, it was enveloped by a small gray whirlwind, and the drawings on it seemed to come alive.
The scene unfolding on the altar could certainly serve as material for a horror film, even the bravest person would feel nervous and fearful upon seeing moving corpses.
The hissing of the snakes echoed throughout the cave.
The wind also grew stronger, stinging the skin.
Kaito looked at Erica and found that she was actually breaking out of the cave, using the power of the wind.
The cultists were busy welcoming the descent of the heretic god and had no time to worry about her.
Her magnificent and expensive dress was covered in gray earth, and her elegant posture and beautiful, beautiful face were also covered in dust.
She was dirty all over.
Although she valued honor and elegance, she had to survive first.
And besides, no one was watching us anyway.
Until Erica, carried by the wind, rolled behind the rock where Kaito was hiding.
"..."
"..."
The two looked at each other in silence.
Erica looked at the black-haired youth who had "kept" her and suddenly felt the need to die.
Kaito cut the ropes that bound her and removed the cotton from her mouth, helping Erica, who had not yet regained her strength, to lean against the rock to protect herself from the strong wind.
"How did you get here?"
This was Erica's first question.
She had been out of contact for so long that not even her uncle had found her, let alone anyone else.
She didn't have much hope of surviving.
I felt something was wrong here, so I came.
Said Kaito.
As he spoke, he watched the center of the altar.
And outside, where he couldn't see, dark clouds gathered, clouds in the sky, and a low rumble of thunder could be heard. A strong wind arose, like a typhoon, and even the supposedly extinct volcano erupted with hot, crimson lava, and dark volcanic ash spread in all directions.
One moment was calm, and the next was turbulent.
All these strange phenomena were symbols of Typhon.
Typhon is the anthropomorphic embodiment of volcanic power and has a strong connection to the Hecatonchires, Enceladus.
The origin of the lightning was because Zeus had once hidden the thunder fire in a cave and had gone to have sex with the nymph Plouto; the divine thunder released smoke and sparks in the cave, attracting Typhon, who was instructed by his mother Gaia to steal it.
The "Theogony" states that after Typhon's defeat, countless strong winds arose from his body, specifically damaging passing ships, and eventually evolved from a Greek word to a Persian word, so it received the meaning of "Indian Ocean storm."
"Look at our feet."
Erica suddenly said.
The ground, which should have been stone, had turned into soft sand.