Thor twirled his axe. Lightning sparks flew from the blade, striking the armored men and paralyzing dozens as they jumped from one soldier to another.

He was exhausted. Sweat coated his entire body, and his essence reserves were depleting rapidly. Just as he was about to start feeling desperate, the soldiers before him suddenly evaporated into faint white smoke and disappeared.

He fell to his knees, taking deep breaths. His Deep Breathing activated, and he felt the numbness in his limbs slowly recede as he raised his axe and shouted. “We fucking did it, boys!”

Everyone around him cheered.

That damn general with his regeneration talent was the most unlucky thing he’d ever seen happen in this stupid dungeon. By all means, that should have been the end for most of the people here.

But—

Suddenly, the sky above lit up as a large scroll unfurled and revealed the results.

The number one spot, as expected, belonged to Sexy Bastard—him. With his contribution, he easily claimed the top spot.

A light sparked before him, and a long spear conjured in the air before him. He grabbed it and tested it a bit. It was pretty damn well made. With a tzenekite imbuement, this baby could compare to some of the best weapons he had in his arsenal.

But the spear was of little interest to him.

His eyes moved back up to the scroll—to the spot right below him. “Slave, huh?”

That was the pseudonym of the person who got second place. And while Thor didn’t know who that was, he had a pretty good guess.

He jumped back up to the battlements and looked down to the bailey, where he spotted the wounded man—Freddy Cliff.

The man was breathing heavily. His armor was pretty damaged, and he was coated in a thick layer of blood. Without a word, Thor dropped down to the bailey and walked to the wounded man.

“Oh, hey…” Freddy greeted him, barely eking out the words. “I see you got a spear.” He shakily raised a weapon of his own. It was a katar made of slightly blue metal. The craftsmanship was excellent—frankly, it was almost of the same quality as the weapon Thor was holding.

The difference in their contribution wasn’t that significant.

“How did you do it?” Thor asked. He had noticed the insane burst of power coming from the man and the subsequent carnage he spread through the army.

“Unholy Blessing.”

Thor sucked in a sharp breath.

The man must have sacrificed a number of body parts to extract that much power. And that was it—the man was as good as dead. The internal damage had to be immense. The man’s internal organs were most likely soup at this point. In fact, it was a bloody miracle that he was still breathing. But there was no saving him.

A pained expression shifted through Thor’s gaze.

“Hey…” Freddy called shakily as he spat out a mouthful of blood. “Can you help me back up to my feet?”

Thor nodded solemnly and helped the man up. That was the least he could do.

“Can you please take me to another realm?” Freddy asked. “Anywhere with monsters is fine.”

Thor bit his lip. It seemed that the man wanted to go out fighting. Not only was he willing to sacrifice himself, but he was a true warrior at heart. It nearly brought Thor to tears.

Travis walked over with a questioning glance, and Thor shook his head. Travis sighed and followed them.

“Hey…” a young man called from the side. He was a weak one-star, and behind him were four others. “Are you okay?”

Freddy nodded. “Yeah, don’t worry about me. I promised to take you guys to dinner. Wait for me just a bit. I’ll be right back.”

“Ah…” the young man said as he nodded. “Uhm… Sure… We’ll wait for you right outside the dungeon…”

And like that, Thor took the man outside and carried him to a nearby realm with monsters. Its surface was mostly barren, but the caverns had a number of nasty things crawling inside.

“That’s enough, thank you,” Freddy said as he nodded at Thor and separated from him. He slowly walked forward as Travis and Thor looked on with sadness, watching the man slowly limp toward the cave.

“You are a brave man,” Thor said. “You will most certainly have a spot in Valhalla waiting for you.”

“Oh?” Freddy said. “Thanks. We’ll discuss terms later.”

“No, I mean…” Thor choked back his words. “Uh… Never mind.”

Freddy quirked a confused eyebrow and walked inside.

Then, they heard the sounds of fighting. Nasty roars and growls echoed, with the creatures whining as they were torn apart by the man. To the shock of the two men, the injured Freddy was truly of formidable spirit. Despite his numerous wounds, he actually continued fighting for quite a while. Like… way too long.

But eventually, the sounds finally stopped. Yet, to their surprise, the two-star aura came crawling back out.

Freddy’s silhouette appeared in the cave, and he walked out, stretching his arm above his head. “Sorry, it took me a while.”

With Thor’s perception, even when looking through the layers of armor, he could tell that the man wasn’t perfectly healed. But the mere fact that he was capable of standing on his two feet was nothing short of a bloody miracle.

Thor and Travis stared with their eyes and mouths wide open. “You…” Thor called. “What the fuck…”

“Ah, yeah,” Freddy said with an awkward chuckle as he scratched the back of his head. “I’ll tell you guys about it one day. But for now, I’ll be honest. I’m not sure if I can trust you two. I promised those other delvers a dinner, so we’ll have to talk about it another day. How does tomorrow morning sound?”

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“Uh… Sure,” Thor agreed. “I guess that’s fine.”

He proceeded to give them a time and location and simply walked away, leaving the two men in a stunned silence.

“What in the motherloving fuck just happened, Travis? Am I seeing shit? Pinch me.”

Travis obliged.

“Ow! Not that hard!”

Travis chuckled. “How do you think he did it?”

“Man, I don’t fucking know!” He gesticulated aggressively. “Maybe a spirit ability…?” Thor suggested.

“But what did he sacrifice then?”

“I…” Thor looked at the man’s back as he walked into the distance, looking for anything different about him. Anything missing. But no matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t find anything strange. If the man had paid a price for that sudden healing, it was something that couldn’t be inferred at a glance. Thus, Thor simply shrugged. “I have absolutely no idea…”

***

Freddy’s mood was a little sour as he walked away from the two bewildered men. Thor and Travis now knew an uncomfortable truth about him. Without seeing exactly what he did down there, they could only venture guesses about the details, but still. They knew more than he wanted them to.

Details about his talent being leaked was unfortunately unavoidable. If it didn’t happen on that day, it would have happened in the near future.

Freddy had no delusions that he’d be able to keep his talent perfectly hidden forever. But, as long as he could hide the exact details on how it worked, he’d be happy. The main thing he wanted to keep a secret was the supreme-quality healing.

He had stopped short of perfect recovery to hopefully make them think that supernatural-quality healing was his limit. While that was still pretty damn crazy, it was within reason.

Once he met them tomorrow, he’d be perfectly healed, of course, but they wouldn’t be able to tell. There were many skin products that could match supreme-quality healing in efficacy, and it wasn’t like they could just take a peek at his guts and examine his organ health at a distance.

“Sorry for the wait,” Freddy said as he greeted the group of delvers.

They looked pretty shocked to see him.

Michael, the short, cowardly guy, was the first to ask, “You’re already healed?”

“Eh, it wasn’t as bad as it looked,” he lied. “I took some pills, and it brought me right back up to speed.”

“Man, you’re so fucking badass,” James, the bald guy, said. “I saw you throw the horse at the army! How the hell did you even do that!?”

Freddy chuckled. “You can do a lot of crazy stuff when you go up in power. Anyway, enough about the dungeon. I’m sure you’ve all had enough of that for the day. How about we go and have something to eat?”

“Sure thing,” Michael said. “I’m starving.”

Rather than bringing them to a restaurant, Freddy opted to bring them to his apartment and order some food.

Lucas and his mother were surprised to see the group walk in.

As soon as Freddy spotted Lucas, he invited him over. “Lucas, my friend, I need a favor.”

“Hmm?” The young man raised an eyebrow. “What is it?”

“See that girl?” He indirectly gestured at Janice. “She’s pretty cute, no?”

“Uh… I guess?”

“Do you like her?” Freddy asked.

“Whoa, slow down! Where are you going with this?”

“Just yes or no.”

“Uh… Uhm…”—he cautiously glanced at her—”yeah… I guess?”

“Good. Go hit on her.”

“What!?” he shouted, then lowered his voice as the others glanced at him. He nervously shuffled. “What are you talking about!?”

“Look, you don’t have to seduce her or anything; just go make friends. She’ll become a really important individual in the future. Now’s your chance!”

“Can you at least explain!?”

“No.” Freddy turned to face the others. “Everyone! Make yourself at home! Just tell me what you want to eat so I can make the order.” He lightly tapped Lucas on the shoulder and leaned down to whisper. “I believe in you.”

Lucas choked at those words and nervously glanced at the girl. He swallowed and slowly started walking towards her. “I can’t believe I’m actually doing this…”

The night proceeded quite smoothly. The huge couch in Freddy’s living room had enough space for fifteen people to sit with plenty of room between them. Their food arrived soon enough, and after Freddy insisted that it was fine, everyone simply ate sitting at the couch.

Lucas had somehow managed to find himself pleasantly chatting with Janice. Whether they were actually hitting it off or not, Freddy couldn’t tell.

Was this a bit manipulative? It was extremely manipulative. But the woman was in danger. Her soul construct was useful, and if someone powerful caught wind of it, things could go very wrong very quickly.

At first, Freddy was nervous that either James or Michael might already have something for Janice and that they’d get in Lucas’s way, but it seemed they were more interested in Lucas’s mom.

This was clearly distracting the young man.

Freddy noticed this and walked up to intervene. “Hey there,” he greeted Hellen, interrupting her conversation with the two men. “Mind if I talk to you for a bit?”

“Who? Me?” Hellen asked, looking a bit confused. “Oh… Sure…”

The two of them stepped away and sat together on the other end of the couch.

Freddy was convinced that Lucas would be grateful, but when he looked over at the young man, he spotted him staring with his eyes wide open in horror. He wondered why that was.

“You needed me?” Hellen interrupted his thoughts.

“Ah.” Freddy rushed to think of something. “Uh… Oh, yeah, I noticed you and Lucas were in a strange mood this morning. Did something happen?”

Her expression darkened at that. “It’s a private matter,” she said. “I don’t feel comfortable discussing it with a stranger.”

“No worries,” Freddy said as he raised his hands to placate her. “I’m not trying to meddle. I just want to make sure that the two of you know that I’m here to help if you run into any trouble. If someone is causing trouble for you, please don’t keep it a secret from me.”

She paused at that and looked away. “Thank you…” she said before narrowing her eyes at him. “About these people… Are they going to move in here, too?”

“Oh, hahahaha, no,” Freddy denied. “I met them on a delve. They helped me out a bit so I promised to treat them.” He said as he reached for a drink and took a sip.

“And is there a particular reason you pushed my son to hit on that girl?” she inquired with a sharp tone.

Freddy choked for a moment as his beverage went down the wrong hole. He coughed it out, then chuckled awkwardly. “You noticed that, I see…”

“I’m his mother. Of course I noticed it.” She sighed. “While I appreciate the help… please don’t play with my son. He is not a toy.”

Freddy looked a bit apologetic. “I’m sorry. But I have my reasons. You see the girl he’s talking to?”

“I’ve taken a good look at her, yes.”

“Let’s just say that she needs help. But I don’t have a valid reason to single her out. Approaching her will come across as extremely suspicious, and her team will most likely warn her against getting involved with me. If I want to save her from her predicament, I’ll be forced to help her entire team out. If your son likes her, on the other hand, I have a solid excuse to only help her.”

“I don’t get it,” she said. “Why bother? She can hardly refuse your help if you force the issue.”

“I have no intention of forcing anything. Just because I have the power doesn’t mean I have the right. I have my bottom line.”

Hellen remained silent at that and slowly looked away. “I see,” she whispered before taking her own drink and staring at her reflection in the still, liquid surface.

The night continued.

Eventually, the group of delvers finally had enough, and they went on their merry way.

Lucas waved Janice off, and she waved back with a giggle.

Freddy approached the young man with a grin. “So… How did it go?”

“Well… Not sure what exactly you were aiming at with this, but you can count it as a success… because I have a date.”

***

The following day, Freddy left the mother-son duo and went to the meeting he had arranged.

He walked into the rather opulent cafe and made his way up to the second floor. There, sitting at a lounge with a table full of drinks, Thor and Travis waved him over.