Chapter 50: Waking up
After reading through all the theory for the new spell and started trying it out inside my soul space, I noticed that bending space for such a long distance was harder than I thought and even if I managed to understand it in time, there was a very low chance I would have managed to pull it of when the demon attacked. It took me almost an entire day of practice to finally manage to teleport without fail. Once I finished, Ai appeared next to me and said:
"Now that you managed to cast the spell, you should enter hibernation to recover your spirit. You used quite a lot during practice and staying on low spirit can be quite dangerous."
I agreed rested for a couple of hours before waking up again. For the entire week, I spent most of my time chatting with Ai, coming with ideas for new spells together and even fooling around from time to time. She was starting to behave less like a computer and more like an actual human, or soul. I even tried to entered the dark zone a couple of time but unfortunately was unsuccessful.
Once an entire week passed, Ai materialized before me and said:
"You can now return to your avatar but remember to wait one more week before doing anything overexert your body. You're still not fully recovered."
"I understand. Send me back Ai."
As my words ended, my vision brightened and I woke up inside the inn room. The first thing I saw as I opened my eyes was a tired looking Anise standing over my body and using her mana to heal it. She was so focused on her spell that didn't even notice me opening my eyes.
A warm feeling spread through my heart as I looked at her thin face and tired eyes. I wanted to get up and hug her, but the moment I tried to move a sudden pain spread through my body that made a grunt escape my mouth. It looked like the situation of my avatar was a lot worse than I expected.
The sound broke Anise's concentration, startling her. Looking up to me, tears welled up in her eyes and she bent down to hug me almost immediately. She didn't say anything as she kept crying in my arms. I bared with the pain and lifted my arms slowly to hug her back.
Her crying also woke up Lysa, who was sleeping nearby to recover her mana. She didn't look much better than Anise. It was obvious both girls worked in shifts to heal my body continuously for the entire week.
Around ten minutes later, as she was done crying, she slowly released me from the hug and looked into my eyes before saying: "Are you all right? I was so scared."
I nodded weekly and said: "I am now. Thank you for healing me all this time." After that I turned towards Lysa as well, a grateful look in my eyes as I said: "And thank you as well, Lysa."
Lysa brushed it off and said with a smile: "What are you talking about? You are the one who saved us in the first place so it is us who should be thanking you. Healing you was no big deal compared to that."
I smiled in reply and turned back towards Anise, a gentle look in my eyes as I said: "I'm sorry for putting you through all that."
She nodded quietly and looked like she will start crying again any minute now. Holding back her tears, she asked: "What happened back there? And what happened with your eyes and hair?"
I was confused and didn't really know what she meant when Ai came to my aid:
[When you were possessed your eyes and hair turned completely black. As I expelled the corruption from you avatar they are now back to normal.]
I failed to notice that detail, so with Ai explaining what she meant, I replied: "I don't really know why they changed like that, it might be because of that spell I used back there. It was my first time using it."
It looked like Anise wanted to ask something else, but Lysa interrupted her: "Now that you woke up, I'm going to my inn to let the others know. They have been coming by everyday to check up on you and I'm sure they will be happy to know you woke up. I'll leave you alone for now."
I nodded and thanked her again before she left our inn, leaving only me and Anise alone. Seeing her hesitant expression, I sighed and said:
"You want to know why I couldn't remember you right after the fight, don't you?"
Surprised by my question, she immediately shook her hand in denial: "No, it's fine. I'm just happy you are all right."
"I told you about how my soul was damaged before. The spell I used was cast using my soul and made the injury even worse, causing me to lose myself for a moment there." I knew that it was still a blow to her so I decided to explain myself as good as I could.
"Is it that bad?" she asked, obviously worried. "We can go and search for an expert in souls. He might have a solution to your problem."
I shook my head and replied: "They will be of no help. I already know what to do. Tell me what the situation is like outside."
Anise shook her head before saying: "I don't know. I haven't left this room at all for the entire week."
"All right. My body still hurts all over and I can't really leave this room for a while, so how about we resume our lessons?"
"But you need to rest. That can wait."
"It's fine. I've rested enough. Go downstairs and grab some food to eat for both of us since you look even more malnourished than me right now and we'll start our lessons right after."
Anise agreed with a blush and after eating we started our lessons again. On the second day after I woke up, Oliver and Velor also came to visit and was finally able to find out the war situation.
The plan worked and the demons finally stopped sending reinforcements. Apparently two days ago, the army together with the adventurer guild managed to kill the last member of the enemy army, marking the end of the fighting on the battlefield of Bastion.
Our accomplishments in killing tens of millions of enemy 'soldiers' and destroying the underground teleporter got us quite a generous reward. Each of us received around 500 gold coins. The others said that they didn't really do anything and offered to give me their share of the money as well, but since I had no use for them I declined right away.
With the war currently on standby, Ai said:
[Your End of conflict series of quests has been completed.]
As her words ended, my status appeared in my vision:
[
Name: Ethan Knott
Age: Avatar 19;
Race: Avatar Human;
Experience: 3 653/800 000;
Health Points: 216/630;
Mana Points 1240/1240;
Level: 60;
Vitality: 63;
Strength: 66;
Dexterity : 64;
Intelligence: 124;
Resistance: 62;
0 free stat point
———
System Points: 413 428 350;
Spirit: 790 (Soul damaged);
]
The amount of system points I received was simply staggering and I was getting excited to return to the Nexus to spend them, but first I still had to figure out the reason this world is in danger and save it. For the next week until my body healed completely, we mostly spend our time on her lessons.
One week later, once my body healed completely, we finally went out and started heading towards Lysa and Velor's inn. On the way, I noticed that the people were no longer in a constant hurry and everyone's expressions also seemed to be a lot more relaxed.
A smile appeared on my lips as I remarked: "Things look a lot more peaceful with the fighting finally over."
Anise nodded and said: "Yeah. This is the first time the humans can say they managed to get a win against the demons and it's all thanks to you."
"Me? But I didn't do that much."
She looked at me with a weird look and said: "You took care of all the teleporters they used for reinforcement and killed tens of millions of their army on your own. You succeeded in few months where others failed for a full six years."
I scratched my head in embarrassment but inside I was feeling quite proud even if it was mostly Senna who did everything. If I didn't have her help I would have probably died a long time ago. It was also Senna's strength who served as a deterrence and allowed us to use large scale magic without any retaliation.
Once we reached the inn the others stayed in, we waked towards their room and knocked gently on the door. Oliver was the one who came to open it and immediately hugged me.
"It's good to see you walking again. As I saw you two weeks ago without legs and arms I didn't think this was possible anymore."
I returned the hug and replied with a chuckle: "If it wasn't for Anise and Lysa I'm afraid that even if I survived I would have remained an invalid."
As he lead us in, I was warmly greeted by the others as well. Once that done, we all sat down around the table and Oliver said: "What are your plans now that the war stopped?"
I looked towards Anise before replying: "We thought of returning to the Cloven Academy for Anise to have a talk with her mother. After that we don't really have any plans. How about you guys?"
"As we agreed before, I'm going to return to the Imperial Capital and take these two brats back home with me. Since Cloven Academy is on the way, how about we all travel there together?"
I looked towards Anise and seeing her nod I said: "We don't mind, but we'll not travel there by foot. I finally managed to perfect a long distance teleportation spell during this time so I can teleport us all there without problem."
"All the way to Cloven Academy?" asked Lysa in amazement. Even Anise seemed surprised since I forgot to tell her about it.
"Yeah. With the amount of mana I have now it shouldn't be a problem to teleport all of us there."
"Let's go now. I can't wait to see the spell." Said Lysa with excitement visible in her eyes, but Oliver interrupted her right away.
"They still need to claim their reward for the last quest from the guild and I have to make a report before returning to the capital. How about we delay it until tomorrow?"
Seeing me nod, Lysa had no choice but to curb her enthusiasm. After we chatted for a while longer, me and Anise took our leave and went to the adventurer guild to claim our 500 gold reward. As we were walking back towards our inn, I remembered something and said:
"Damn, I forgot to ask Oliver if he knew anything about the where the army artificer is staying."
Anise catching on my meaning, she said: "He should still be inside the city. Do you want to ask him about the device that teleported Anna away?"
I nodded and said: "Yes. Now that I can finally teleport long distances, I can return to that cave and investigate the device. I only need to find a good artificer willing to help me."
"We can try and ask the quartermaster about it. He should know where we can find the artificer dispatched to the war effort from the Capital."
Feeling that her words made sense, we changed direction and started heading towards the northern gate. As we got close, a guard stopped us and said:
"Do you have a quest north of the wall?"
"No. We would like to see the quartermaster and asking a question if possible."
"I'm sorry but you can't disturb the quartermaster without a valid reason. The war might be over for now, but there are still a lot of duties the quartermaster has to take care of."
Since the guard was not going to let us in, we were just about to turn around when we noticed Aaron walking out. He also saw us and started walking in our direction. As he got close, Anise bowed to him and said: "Teacher."
Aaron nodded and turned to look at me: "You made quite a name for yourself Ethan, so I guess I owe an apology for suspecting you back then."
"No need, sir. You doubting me in that situation was completely normal." I said humbly. I might be stronger than him now, but the old man was still deserving of my respect.
"Then we'll let bygones be bygones. Why are the two of you here? The camps north are being disbanded as we speak."
"Sir, we wanted to visit the quartermaster?" I figured that with Aaron's position in the army he might be able to help us get inside so there was no harm in telling him about it.
"What for? He's quite busy right now."
"We found out there is supposed to be an artificer inside the city and wanted to find out if we could get a meeting with him."
"Hahaha, no need to bother the quartermaster with that. If you want to see old man Cain I can take you to him. He and I are old friends after all."
Excited, I accepted his offer and Aaron led us to a small house in the eastern wing of the city. As we stopped in front of the gate, Aaron said: "Follow after me and be careful not to touch anything."
"Are we going to just walk in?" I asked when I saw that Aaron was opening the gate to the courtyard.
"Yeah, if he's working on something he will never hear us and we can be left here yelling like idiots for an entire week."
Since we didn't know the artificer, Anise and I nodded and we followed Aaron in. Once we opened the main door and stepped inside the house I was surprised by all the trinkets laying about all over the place. We sometimes even had to be careful not to step on any of them. The house was not that big and we soon entered a room where an old man was tinkering with some kind of box.
He seemed so focused on his work that he didn't even notice us walking inside. Seeing that Aaron stopped at the entrance, we stopped as well and we all started at the old man. I initially thought we were going to wait for the old man to finish, but Aaron created a small flame out of mana and pushed it under the old man's beard with a large grin on his face. It looked like it was not the first time he's done this.
As his beard caught fire, he dropped the tools he was using and quickly created a ball of water to extinguish the fire. Once he was done, he turned towards us and said with an angry look: "Aaron you god damned fool. Why do you keep doing that every time you come here?"
Aaron put on an innocent look as he said: "If I waited for you to notice us I might have died of old age."
The old man seemed even more enraged by Aaron's words as he said: "And what did you have to bother me for? The war is already over."
Aaron pointed towards us and said: "I owe this kid a favor and this girl was one of my students. They need something from you so I offered to lead them here. They just finished a big quest and are swimming in money."
As soon as he heard the word money, old man Cain's expression changed and he turned towards me and Anise saying with a large smile, the anger from before disappearing in an instant: "Young adventurers, are you in need on some magic tools? Just tell me what you need and I am sure I can help you."
Hearing the old man shameless words, I turned towards Aaron with a questioning look. He chuckled and said: "Well, my job here is done. I have stuff to take care so good luck." With that, he turned around and waved his hand to us as he left.
I don't know why, but I felt like I just fell into a trap. Sighing, I said:
"Sir, I wanted to ask if you could help me fix a teleportation device."
Old man Cain smile from before disappeared as he said: "I don't dabble in space magic so I can't help you. I can't believe I wasted my words for nothing."
As his words ended, he picked up his trinket again and started tinkering with it. I was stunned by his reaction and said: "Sir, then do you happen to know someone who can help us?"
The old man apparently didn't even hear me as he continued tinkering without any reaction. Pissed of at getting ignored so blatantly, I started converging my mana as a small flame appeared over my hand. Just as I was about to set his beard on fire again, Anise grabbed my hand and shook her head.
"There's no point. Let's go back and we can ask the teachers at Cloven Academy."
Sighing, I canceled the spell and was about to turn around when I noticed something on one of the shelves that made me stop in my steps. It was a small star shaped stone, the same type of stone that activated the teleportation device.
I walked up to it and picked it up. After looking it all over, Ai said:
[It has the same structure as the one that activated the teleportation device inside the cave. It's some sort key used inside the city of Atar to activate magic devices. It was probably recovered from some other ruins.]
With no other choice, I used the same method as Aaron and grabbed the attention of old man Cain. Before he could started yelling at me for setting his beard on fire, I placed the stone on the table and said: "I want to buy this together with information about where you found it and if you know any other tinkerer that specializes in space magic."
Old man Cain grumped and said: "300 gold and we have a deal."
300 gold seemed quite a lot. It was obvious he was inflating the price since he was mad, but since I didn't really care about money and wasn't in the mood to haggle with him either I agreed right away.
"This was sold to me by a merchant who apparently found it in some ruins on the northern continent. That happened before the demons invasion so I was able to visit those ruins but didn't find anything else in interest. If you have a map of the northern continent I can show you the location of the ruins. As for an artificer that specializes in space magic, there is only one in the southern continent, but meeting her will not be easy."
"And why is that?"
"She's also the Imperial Wizard and is always guarding the Emperor. To meet up with her you will need to get permission from the Emperor himself. Anything else you want to know?"
"No. That's all." Since he didn't find anything in those ruins, I doubted I will so I just paid him the 300 gold and went out together with Anise. After we reached our room at the inn, I said: "After we finish our business at the academy I think I'll head to the Capital. I want to find a way to meet that artificer and ask for her help."
Anise nodded and said she'll also join me before we started our lessons again. Tomorrow was the day we were going to leave Bastion city.
Weekly Power Status
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Ranking 
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