The SSS class adventurer is a divine cleric-Chapter 77: Escaping the spirit realm

Derek’s fists were bloodied. His breath came in short bursts. His legs burned with every step, but he kept moving.

The spirit came at him again. She swung with deadly precision, her hands like blades. Derek blocked the first strike with his forearm and ducked under the second. He stepped in close and drove his knee into her gut.

She staggered, but only for a second.

The spirit hissed and lashed out with a backhand. Derek took the hit and rolled away, landing hard on his side. He spit blood and got back up.

He glanced at the glowing necklace in his hand. Its light was fading.

"Not yet," Derek muttered. "I need more time."

The spirit ran toward him again. She threw a flurry of punches. Derek blocked some, dodged others, and took a few straight to his ribs. The pain was sharp, but he didn’t stop.

And when he saw an opening. He grabbed her arm and twisted it behind her back. He slammed her into the ground.

"Where is she?" he growled.

The spirit screamed and shoved him off. She kicked him in the chest, and he rolled across the floor.

Derek stood again, wobbling slightly. Blood dripped from his chin.

The necklace glowed brighter for a moment.

That was all he needed.

With a slow, deliberate breath, Derek closed his eyes. The world narrowed to the rhythmic pounding of his own heart, to the faint glow emanating from the necklace clutched in his palm.

Around him, the air hummed with restless energy, the spirit’s presence like a blade pressed against his throat.

He took a step forward.

Then another.

The spirit lunged, a blur of spectral fury, claws raking through the space where he had been a heartbeat before. But Derek didn’t strike back.

He didn’t even flinch. Instead, he twisted aside with the barest tilt of his body, the movement so precise it was less a dodge and more a refusal to acknowledge the attack at all.

He walked straight past her.

His gaze remained fixed ahead, locked onto the shimmering thread of light that pulsed from the necklace, a beacon in the dark, a lifeline.

"Where do you think you’re going?" the spirit shrieked, her voice a chorus of fury and betrayal.

Derek didn’t answer.

Words were a luxury he no longer had. Time was a fraying rope, and he was clinging to the last fibers.

Ten seconds.

The swirling mass of light loomed before him, its core throbbing like a living heart. Radiance spilled from it in waves, casting jagged shadows across the ground, across his face.

Without hesitation, he lifted the necklace, its glow intensifying, as if recognizing its rightful place and pressed it into the center of the maelstrom.

For a suspended moment, nothing happened.

Then.

The light detonated.

A shockwave of brilliance erupted outward, scorching the air white, swallowing shadows whole. It tore through the spirit’s form, through the remnants of the battlefield, through Derek himself, a cleansing fire, a rebirth.

And in that blinding instant, everything changed.

Somewhere in the spirit realm.

Alira was trapped within a cage lost in the hollow darkness of her own mind.

She lay curled in the dark.

It was cold but not physically cold. The kind of chill that eats into your bones, numbing your thoughts and makes even hopes shrink away.

There was no floor beneath her nor a sky above, an endless abyss of darkness and silence.

And within the dark silence a voice keeps haunting her.

The vicious, slithering whisper that circled her like a vulture.

"They didn’t come for you."

"They always leave."

"You watched them die. Your parents. Screaming. Bleeding. And you did nothing. You were too weak then... and you’re still weak now."

"They all died because of you."

"No..." she whispered.

"Useless and pathetic!"

"I’m... not..." she whimpered, curling tighter.

The voice leaned in, closer now, sharp and poisonous. "You couldn’t even cry for them properly. You forgot their voices. You forgot their warmth."

Alira shook her head, biting her lip. Tears ran down her cheeks.

"I didn’t forget..."

"Then why didn’t you save them?"

She screamed. But no sound came.

Her knees were drawn to her chest. Her arms wrapped tight around them. Her eyes squeezed shut.

"Stop..."

"He didn’t come either. Derek deserted the kingdom, he only saved you to justify his desertions. He left the kingdom to rot. And now he’s too late again because you have no value to him, not anymore."

Alira screamed at the voice to stop. "Shut up—!"

The voice did not listen to her pleas and kept haunting her. "Neal? He’s stronger than you ever were. Better and He’d never need saving."

"And Kaelen? Hah. Even he’s done pretending to care. He almost killed you. You saw it."

Her breath hitched. The memory of Kaelen attacking her surfaces, Kaelen’s skills, his spells, the endless lights that all came crashing down on her, burning her alive.

Was he trying to save her? Or... end her?

She didn’t know anymore.

She couldn’t hear their conversations. She couldn’t feel their warmth. Only the darkness and this voice that would not leave her alone.

She trembled. Tears spilled silently down her cheeks.

The shadows twisted around her, laughing.

"You were born broken. Always weak. Just a vessel waiting to be used."

And as she was trapped unable to move on, held back by the voice of this evil spirit.

Sudden she heard another voice calling out for her. At first it was faint and distant but it kept getting louder and louder with every passing second.

Then.

Came a warm light. Small and gentle at first. So small that its presence was almost undetectable, but in the dark void where there is no light, even the faintess light was like the mid-day sun, shining through the darkness.

And then... something touched her hand. It was warm and the comfort it provided was soothing.

A pulse. A rhythm. A heartbeat.

The necklace.

It had followed her here.

The one that had always glowed faintly, barely noticeable until now.

The light surged again, but brighter this time.

The warmth grew, pulsing once, then again, stronger with each beat.

The voice recoiled.

"No...!"

Alira lifted her head.

The dark was still thick around her, but in the far distance she could see a soft light. It was faint but the warm was there, undeniable.

She reached out and tried to embrace the light.

Her body refused to move at first. Still frozen in fear. But the light pulsed again. This time much closer.

They’re calling me...

Kaelen. Neal. Derek.

They’re still out there... fighting. For me.

The malicious voice screamed in rage, twisting the shadows tighter. The cold surged.

But she moved.

One step.

Then two.

She ran, barefoot, across the darkness, towards the light. Towards the warmth and freedom.

And the void behind her began to crumble.

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