Waking up Jinhyung was quite easy, I punched him really hard in the guts. Once he woke up, I briefed down my conversation with Lillian to him.

"You say the master of vampires saved us so that we could become strong enough to kill her?”

“Exactly.”

He unsheathed his sword slashing the wall leaving a deep scar. He then stretched his muscles and sighted in satisfaction.

"Good as new, well, let's go!"

As expected of Jinhyung, he quickly grasped what was necessary and didn't bother with the rest.

Again, I summoned the light ball via the grimoire since the castle was still submerged in an unending darkness. Was there even a 'day' here?

"We still have 16 vampires to kill,” stated he as we walked.

“You counted the trolls as vampires? Also wouldn’t the ghouls also count?”

“Better ready than sorry, I would rather kill a few more monsters than restart the trial.”

After all, he was doing most of the killing anyway.

"Hey, next time we find a mage, can you let me deal with him?" and

"Do you want his technique?"

He saw right through me. This wasn't a secret, but sometimes he surprised me with his wits.

"Yes, I need a damaging spell."

"Alright, but If I sense that your life is in danger, I will intervene."

He really was caring; this was pretty sweet.

Numerous armours were displayed by the walls, and of course, they had the same metallic eyes symbol on their helms. Did Lillian watch us through them?

Since I took back my items, the Witchstone pendant appeared to be warm again. My best guess would be that Lillian recharged it, although it could've happened by accident.

"Beware! To the front," whispered Jinhyung blocking my way with his arm.

Jinhyung sensed foes? I immediately closed my eyes, but I saw no magic. Were they hiding?

"I can't see them."

"I know, they may be using an artifact to hide their presence, but I heard something. Can you flash them with the light sphere?"

I extended the reach of the light to about 200 meters and my energy started to disappear quickly.

"Where are they? Quick, I can't keep up for long.”

A halberd flew before my eyes; I lost balance and was pushed back. I looked around, about ten; we were surrounded.

At first I thought the armours moved by themselves, animated by some sort of spell. Next, I saw faint smoke coming from inside accompanied by painful grunts. There were vampires inside; they burnt away under the light.

"Do you have a plan?" I wondered, standing back to back with Jinhyung.

If he used the dawnbringer stance, he could win at the cost of his life, but this wasn’t an option. Meanwhile, I reduced the light to our immediate area; I had to save every bit of magic that I could.

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"Getting away!"

The armour hindered their movement, that allowed Jinhyung to behead those that blocked our way.

This won us time. We exited their blockade and entered a random room. It appeared to be a large bedroom with a double bed. We tried sealing away the entrance placing the bed before the door.

"What's the plan now?" I asked with tangible irony.

The injured vampires would be completely healed by now; we still had the same problem. We couldn't run further from this room; we cornered ourselves—not even a window was there.

"They cannot enter all at the same time, we can try taking them down one by one."

Well, he was right, but there were still ten vampires outside.

"Hey, do you still have your knife from the starter pack?"

Using the knife seemed more effective than exploding my own fists.

"Here."

He threw me the knife. I took out some rope that we got in the starter pack and attached them together. This way, I could throw it stronger by accelerating it in a circular motion.

The door was cracking under heavy hits of halberds. I rotated the knife, filling it gradually with magic and compressing it. Sparks were flying around it, the blade started to glow due to its rising temperature.

"Now."

As the door broke into shambles, I threw the knife. It landed between the neck plates of the first vampire. Slicing off his head, Jinhyung followed my attack by piercing the core.

The knife then exploded, damaging the plates of the remaining monsters. We backed off; we had to get them one by one; if any of us got caught, death would be inevitable.

But then cracks appeared throughout the whole wall; we jumped away further; the wall collapsed shortly after. Another foe joined the battle; he was dressed alike to the mage earlier.

By freezing the moisture between the rocks leading the expansion of the water. Creating a strong pressure within the walls. Such a multifaceted technique; I had to get it. But right now, there were nine armored vampires rushing at us, we had higher priorities.

"Jinhyung, can you please get me some time?"

If I wanted to win, I had to widen the interpretation of my tools.

“Go for it, you have half a minute.”

Small ice shards flew toward Jinhyung; he easily parried them before engaging in a fierce, losing battle.

They fought in the middle of the room, just under my light sphere.

This challenge was made to be accomplished with 1000 coins. I had to be more creative with what I had.

Last time, giving the light sphere a third of the witchstone's energy was enough to stun the vampires. What if I gave everything I had? I grabbed the pendant.

Sparks grew around me and the air became heavy.

"Jinhyung, your eyes,” Yelled I at the top of my lungs.

Before I lost control over all of this energy, I sent every bit of it to the light spell. Of course, I protected my eyes before doing so.

In a moment, a loud, high-pitched explosion detonated. Hot air was pushed away, I felt as if my skin was burning away.

After the short moment of feeling all powerful, my body became heavy and tired. I used up everything I had within my spirit. I slowly opened my eyes and looked around.

Wood debris near the spell caught fire, as well as Jinhyung's clothes; luckily his body wasn't too chared.

Every bit of vampire flesh that my light reached withered away; since they had armour, only the one nearing the sphere received lethal damage.

About four of them could still move, although heavily disoriented. Jinhyung easily took care of them.

"The mage, is he still alive?" I was heavily panting.

The mage remained pretty far back, but he only wore a cloth tunic; if he died, I couldn't get the ice spell. Jinhyung leaped to him and checked his vitals.

"Yeah, I think he deflected part of the light with an ice pillar; there is water spilled in front of him."

"Bring him here; I can't move right now."

Even speaking required the utmost willpower. He quickly brought him and dropped near me. I took his hand and concentrated on his magic flow. He was asleep, I needed him to be using ice manipulation to be able to copy it.

"Wake him up."

I opened the empty grimoire at the second chapter and readied myself to transmit magic instructions.

Jinhyung started to stab his limbs. Once the blade penetrated his flesh, he screamed, and instinctively, a slight rim started to appear within his palms.

Once I finished copying his spell, my companion disposed of him.

Jinhyung then assembled some of the debris into a campfire and brought remaining scraps of the blanket to cover me. My body shaked a lot due to heavy exhaustion.

"You can rest now; I will guard you. You did really well; you saved our lives."

For the first time in my life, I felt proud of myself. I felt like I had done something meaningful. And also, being praised by Jinhyung felt really good. He leaned against the wall near me; he too was injured and tired. We both deserved some rest.

"Really, thank you."

These were the last words I could utter before passing out.

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"Impressive, splendid even. They earned some rest; I could give them some time without worries."

Lillian smiled, waived her hand, and exclaimed,

"To all subordinates of Vingram, stay away from the intruders for the next three hours."

Lillian sat on a rather large seat stuffed with dozens of pillows. It faced a small fireplace quietly crackling on its last breaths. Her gaze fell upon a large body tall mirror displaying a view of two men round a campfire.