Noa stumbled back until he was nearly back next to his mentor. Chief scowled, bellowing a warcry that matched the lions, and butted one away with the shaft of her spear. She stabbed at a male, which dodged with uncanny speed. Bigger, faster, stronger... Noa cringed, pulling out his aether stones.

It was just him; the only healer, and already, an overwhelming sentiment struck his beating heart as Aud took a full claw swipe to her back with a shrill cry. Wasting no time, he reached out with his aether, shooting it as fast as his adrenaline would allow. As he began [Lesser Appeal], it snapped over one portion of the wound, and Noa growled. No!

He forced the aether to stretch, spreading across the wound as far as possible, feeding it his intent━staunch the bleeding. It took, and by the time it did, he heard Magenta shriek.

“Curses!” he yelled. The mending stopped the bleeding and ate up half an aether stone.

System [Lesser Appeal] level 22 → 24.

System [Lesser Mend] level 60 → 61.

System [Lesser Mend] level 61 → 62.

System [Lesser Mend] level 62 → 63.

Shooting a look in Magenta’s direction, he saw the man staggering as he faced one lion while Chief impressively took on three lions. There was a bite taken out of his arm, and a dead lion beside him. The arm was obviously broken, misshapen beneath the violet blood.

Clenching his teeth, Noa wrapped the arm in aether. Come on, heal bone, he told it, not sure if that helped while he pushed the aether into the arm.

System [Lesser Appeal] level 24 → 25.

Noa gritted his teeth, his aether stones rapidly depleting alongside system messages.

System [Lesser Mend] level 63 → 64.

System [Lesser Mend] level 64 → 65.

System [Lesser Mend] level 65 → 66.

System [Lesser Mend] level 66 → 67.

System Class [Mender] level 10 → 11.

For once, the messages were annoying. He didn’t have time for them!

The arm was healed, but the bleeding remained a problem.

System [Lesser Appeal] level 25 → 26.

System [Lesser Mend] level 67 → 68.

The bleeded stopped, just as Magenta braced his shaft against the lion. It shattered. Oh hell. The troll manually pushed the beast off, deftly avoiding claws and a deadly maw. He then charged it like a lunatic!

“Magenta!” Noa called, and whipped his head to Chief when he heard her cry out next. She was down on one knee, spear lodged into the head of a male lion that’d messed up her ankle. It wasn’t hard to tell it was broken by the angle it sat at, Noa shivering at the sight.

Chief deflected a leaping lion, hissing as she took a swipe to her arm, and Aud moved in with a thunderous warcry, covering Chief’s side. She stabbed at the second attacking lion still on her female companion, ripped the spear out, and butted another pouncing behemoth with the other end of her spear. Now Aud dealt with three lions and Chief the one.

Meanwhile, Noa groaned at the messages he received from healing Chief.

System [Lesser Appeal] level 26 → 27.

System Class [Mender] level 11 → 12.

System [Lesser Mend] level 68 → 69.

System Aether depleted.

That ankle was far from completely healed, and while Chief pushed herself up, she avoided putting weight on it.

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“No, no, no!” Noa yelled, and looted his unconscious mentor. He sifted through one pocket, then the next, and when neither of the two obvious ones held anything, he began patting the man all across the chest. Running across something hard, he slipped his hand under the man’s robes, finding a hidden pocket. Aether stones! Three of them!

A growl grew from behind Noa, and he twisted about, screaming as a sharp jaw of doom came barreling at him. His feet scrambled beneath him, and he leaped out of the way, eyes widening as teeth closed in on him.

Then it was violently ripped back, its maw clamping shut at air inches away from Noa’s face. He trembled as Magenta used the lion’s tail to pull it back, and pounded the beast with a fist. At least there was one thing the troll was good at━punching. Meanwhile, Noa was busy pissing himself.

He looked back at Chief just in time to see Aud take a swipe to the chest beside her. She stumbled back, ripping her spear from a recent kill, her hand moving to hold the new wound. Then Chief yelled, taking a hefty swipe across her face that completely knocked her to the ground.

“No!” Noa called. It’s too much! he thought, desperately healing Chief’s head. The [Lesser Appeal] didn’t take, and Noa cried out as the lion pounced her form on the ground. His cry turned into a bellow while he forced Aether back out, pushing [Lesser Appeal] to take to Chief’s face. It did, spreading across it from what felt to be sheer force of will.

System [Lesser Appeal] level 27 → 28.

Noa poured everything he had into the wound, anything to get her up, but it just didn’t feel fast enough!

System [Lesser Mend] level 69 → 70.

System Class [Mender] level 12 → 13.

The aether sped up, racing against Noa’s own beating heart, pushing to beat the death that awaited Chief. Just as it closed in on her, he squeezed out the rest of the required aether to complete the heal.

System [Lesser Mend] level 70 → 71.

System [Lesser Mend] level 71 → 72.

Chief thrust her spear up, bellowing as she cried out. The tip seamlessly slid into the beast’s chest, and she leveraged her good leg to push it further, ultimately throwing it off the spear right over her head with a fierce scream. Ripping the spear free, she turned as a lion crested over a boulder after her.

Noa poured heals into her ankle, clenching fists around aether stones.

System [Lesser Appeal] level 28 → 29.

System [Lesser Mend] level 72 → 73.

System [Lesser Mend] level 73 → 74.

Chief twisted her spear about, smashing the shaft into the lion and throwing it aside. It slid on its paws, then stumbled. With that ankle still not functioning, the behemoth recovered faster than Chief could get to it. It raced, mane whipping in the wind as it launched after her again.

System [Lesser Mend] level 74 → 75.

System [Lesser Mend] level 75 → 76.

System Class [Mender] level 13 → 14.

The heal was completed, and Chief chucked her spear into the beast’s wide open maw, the obsidian tip tearing through the back of its throat.

Aud cried, and Noa cursed himself for forgetting that she too was injured. Now she had another massive scratch across the other side of her chest. While she’d taken down a lion, she still was dealing with two of them.

Noa pulled out a strand of Aether, having to do a double take when Magenta raced by in front of him, fist raised. He brought blunt judgment to the nearest lion Aud was facing, his fist disappearing into the mane of the behemoth, and slamming it hard against the stony earth.

Noa blinked, and looked back at the lion Magenta faced earlier, shivering at the crumpled mess he saw. Focus! he thought, shaping the aether against Aud’s first chest wound.

System [Lesser Appeal] level 29 → 30.

Glancing down at his final aether stone, Noa used the mends sparingly, doing little more than stopping any bleeding.

System [Lesser Mend] level 76 → 77.

While the lion was down, Magenta wrapped his arm around its neck, making one quick sharp cry as he yanked on it, snapping it. What idiot gave this guy a spear? Noa thought. Clearly, he did better without it.

Aud finished off the final lion with a spear through its head as Noa emptied his final aether stone, letting out a sigh of relief when the last behemoth collapsed.

System [Lesser Appeal] level 30 → 31.

System [Lesser Mend] level 77 → 78.

System [Lesser Mend] level 78 → 79.

System Aether depleted.

System Class [Mender] level 14 → 15.

Noa wiped his brow, taking big, deep breaths, and sat down on a stone that was behind him. “I’m all out of aether,” he said.

The three trolls turned to look at him, and Noa jumped. Was it normal for trolls to have glowing eyes? He felt a heavy shift of aether moving away from him and towards the trolls. Soon, their whole bodies were glowing! Noa raised a hand, wincing as he shielded his eyes. When the light finally recessed, he dared to look again, and where he expected to see three giant trolls, he saw something... smaller.

They were now about seven feet in height, he wagered, and ultimately looked like smaller versions of themselves, except with hair. Their noses also seemed to have normalized, and, oh... yeah, they were naked. Very naked.

Noa blushed, quickly averting his eyes.

“So, uh, how are we supposed to get back down the mountain now?” he asked.