My Bugged System Made Me Too OP!-Chapter 51: Glowing pattern

But the crack did not fade.

Instead, it slowly widened.

The space around it distorted slightly, as if reality itself had been scratched open.

Crk... crack...

The fracture expanded further, like glass under pressure.

Then—

SHATTER!

The air itself seemed to break apart.

The space within the crack collapsed inward, revealing something beyond it.

Something completely unnatural.

Behind the shattered space was darkness.

Not the natural darkness of night.

But a deep, endless pitch black void.

A hollow space that seemed to swallow the surrounding light.

For a moment, the dark opening simply floated there.

Then something moved inside it.

Slowly, a hand emerged.

It was long, unnaturally so.

Its surface was covered in dark red scales that glistened faintly in the dim forest light.

Each finger ended in a long, curved black claw, sharp enough to tear through flesh like paper.

The hand stretched outward from the pitch-black space.

Then it slowly lowered.

The clawed fingers touched the ground.

Right on the patch of soil Noah had dug out earlier.

The claws sank lightly into the loose dirt.

Then—

A voice came from within the dark portal.

It sounded distorted, as if multiple tones were layered together into something unnatural.

"...Someone was here..."

The voice echoed faintly through the quiet forest.

"...Someone took it..."

The clawed hand tightened slightly against the soil.

"...Who is that person?"

The voice paused for a moment.

Then continued, its tone growing colder.

"No one should have been able to find this place..."

The words carried faint disbelief.

"...Talk less of actually locating the egg... and taking it."

A dry chuckle echoed from the darkness.

Then the voice spoke again.

"The mana here has reduced also..."

The clawed fingers slowly brushed against the ground, feeling the faint traces of energy lingering in the area.

"...I’m sure I prepared more than this."

The warped voice chuckled again.

Just as the sound faded, something else moved within the forest.

Hissssss!

A long shape slithered forward from the bushes nearby.

The leaves rustled as a massive creature revealed itself.

It was a huge black python.

Its body was thick and muscular, covered in dark scales that blended perfectly with the shadows of the forest.

Along its spine, several jagged spikes protruded outward like natural blades.

The enormous serpent slowly slid forward until it stopped a short distance from the floating black space.

Its long tongue flicked out.

Its head lifted slightly.

Then it hissed again toward the portal.

The massive mana beast radiated a faint but powerful aura.

Clearly, it wasn’t an ordinary creature.

But the reaction from the portal was immediate.

From within the pitch-black space, a pair of bright red eyes suddenly appeared.

They opened slowly.

Glowing like burning embers in the darkness.

The moment those eyes focused on the massive python—

The mana beast froze.

Its body trembled violently.

A deep instinctive fear gripped it, and the creature’s scales began shuddering uncontrollably.

Its body twitched.

Then something horrifying happened.

The python’s thick body suddenly began swelling rapidly, its muscles expanding and its scales stretching.

The creature thrashed violently as its body continued inflating.

The spikes along its back bent under the pressure.

The python let out a final, distorted hiss.

Then—

BOOM!

Its body burst apart.

Flesh tore open violently.

Blood and fragments of meat exploded outward in every direction, splattering across the surrounding bushes and tree trunks.

Then silence returned.

Above the carnage, the broken space still hovered in the air like a wound carved into reality itself.

Within that endless darkness...

The pair of bright red eyes remained open.

They glowed steadily inside the pitch-black void, unmoving.

But if one looked closely, there was a faint change in their expression.

The eyes seemed to narrow slightly.

Almost as if the unseen being behind them was... frowning.

The warped voice echoed again from the depths of the black space.

"...The egg...was what warded mana beasts away from this place." it said, its tone filled with irritation.

The clawed hand still resting on the ground slowly tightened, its long black claws digging into the soil where Noah had dug earlier.

"...Now that it’s gone..."

The voice trailed off for a moment, before continuing.

"...they’ll start flooding back here."

A low hiss escaped from the darkness.

It was sharp.

Cold.

Unpleasant.

Then, suddenly—

The warped voice chuckled again.

A distorted, almost playful sound.

But there was something deeply unsettling beneath it.

"Don’t think you’ve escaped me...You’re mine..."

The voice lowered slightly.

"...mine alone."

The clawed hand slowly lifted from the ground.

For a moment, the long fingers hovered above the soil where the egg had once been buried.

Then the hand began retreating.

Slowly sliding backward into the pitch-black space it had emerged from.

The red scales disappeared first.

Then the black claws.

Finally, the arm vanished completely into the darkness.

The glowing red eyes remained visible for a few seconds longer.

Then they too began fading.

The broken space hanging in the air also began shrinking, the edges of the crack slowly drawjng closer to each other.

Like a wound closing, the shattered space eventually closed itself, and the forest returned to normal.

All that was lest was the scattered remains of the python.

*

Several minutes later.

Noah sat on the edge of his bed, leaning slightly forward with his elbows resting on his knees.

His gaze remained fixed on the object lying beside him on the bed.

The black egg.

He had taken it out of the bag the moment he returned to his room.

And ever since then... he had simply been staring at it.

His expression was conflicted, because the truth was...

He had absolutely no idea what kind of egg this was.

Or what kind of mana beast had laid it.

And that bothered him.

Noah had read plenty of material about mana beasts.

He knew many of their habits.

Many of their types.

But nothing he had studied matched the strange object resting beside him.

Which meant one thing.

This egg belonged to something unfamiliar, possibly something rare or undocumented.

His gaze shifted briefly away from the bed.

It moved toward the table across the room.

Specifically toward the space beneath it.

That was where he had hidden the bag earlier.

He had slid it beneath the table so it wouldn’t be easily seen.

Then he had placed the chair directly in front of it.

That way, if someone entered his room, the bag wouldn’t immediately catch their attention.

It wasn’t a perfect hiding place, but it was good enough for now.

Satisfied that everything was still hidden, Noah looked back toward the egg.

He reached down and picked it up again.

The smooth black surface rested quietly in his hands.

Once again, he studied it carefully.

Noah frowned slightly.

"So what exactly are you..." he muttered.

Suddenly, thin yellow lines suddenly appeared on the black surface.

They were faint at first, like glowing veins forming beneath the shell.

Noah’s eyes widened slightly.

The lines slowly spread across the egg, branching in multiple directions, until they formed a strange pattern over the shell.

He didn’t know what was happening, but whatever was inside the egg seemed to be waking up now.