‘... Hmmm… Getting the soul smashed out of your body feels surprisingly painful. What do I do now? My heart isn’t beating, and I’m flying through the air. Thank god for this tether.’

John looked down at himself, seeing nothing but a translucent light. A black thread connected him to the body he usually inhabited, which was hurtling through the air alongside him.

And a bit further away flew the giant dead body of the orange monkey. They would land close to where they had fought, much to John’s dismay. He knew there would likely be monkeys surrounding him the moment they landed.

‘The landing won’t do too much damage, will it? Terminal velocity, reinforced body… Oh, I can still control my essence! Nice!’

He hurried to spread as much solid essence throughout his body as possible, readying for impact with the ground. Of course, it was already dead, but he assumed returning to it would be more challenging depending on its condition.

He was surprised by the calm and focused state he was in considering the circumstances; he was closer to death than any living thing should be.

‘Death is rather peaceful, I guess. And there’s no adrenaline or other stupid brain stuff to disturb me… Hmm, can I control my enchantments as well? It would be nice to reduce my speed before landing.’

Once only a hundred meters remained, he gave it a shot, feeling the familiar sensation of suddenly decreasing his speed. The weight increase didn’t affect his current weightless state, though.

‘Ah, I should have tried using Larang to fly instead…’ he realized as he braced himself for the impact.

Another earth-shattering impact resounded throughout the jungle as the monkey landed, overshadowing John’s impact completely. He was relieved to see his body looking mostly unharmed, but now he was in a hurry. He wanted to escape somehow before the monkeys arrived.

But then he noticed the army standing over him, already surrounding the area. They were all demons, now silently looking at the two bodies that hit the ground.

‘Ah, of course… Suddenly, I’m grateful to be dead. They won’t wreck my body in rage, surely?’

The orange monkey garnered by far the most attention, though. The demons were quiet, but many of them made gestures with their hands and kneeled on the ground around her. That was their way of communicating, after all.

‘... Now you’re making me feel bad… But no, we released Kerchak and let him live. It can’t be blamed on us that you retaliated the way you did.’

While the monkeys grieved their matriarch, John attempted to return to his body. He knew his time was limited and didn’t want to waste any more black essence than he had to.

Floating into the body didn’t have much of an effect, so instead, he tried to focus on the connection between them. The black essence didn’t do much to heal his body, but he couldn’t complain.

‘I’ll just have to use the liquid essence to heal. But that’s going to take at least a few days. The black essence won’t last that long… Can I at least start my heart again? Maybe if I use essence to move it?’

Using the essence remaining in his core, John started rhythmically compressing his heart. He tried to be careful so the demons didn’t notice anything, fearing they would know he wasn’t completely dead.

A sudden burst of heavy footfalls and trees being crushed could be heard approaching them from the city before the other giant monkey appeared, clearly emotional. It moved a hand against its partner’s head and stroked it gently. Then, it fell to its knees and let out a heartwrenching cry, alarming every creature in the jungle.

Even in his spirit form, John felt the pain in its voice. Even the vestige of the Aasvedans seemed to react to the grief, perhaps feeling a bit of camaraderie. It had been making itself available to John since the necklace was activated.

‘No thanks, I’ll stick to my sanity for a bit longer. But if the necklace starts to run out, I know where to find you.’

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The vestige didn’t respond, or at least not in any way he could understand.

John could feel his connection to his body improving with every compression, feeling like he was on the right track. He also started circulating his essence throughout his body to help the healing process along.

‘Please just leave after grieving a bit. I’ll let you have her essence if you want it; just don’t bury me underground or anything like that.’

The blue monkey's eyes landed on him, prickling him with fury. John froze all his movements, praying it hadn’t noticed his heartbeat. And that it didn’t have any interest in desecrating his beautiful corpse.

The brief silence was interrupted by the monkey's heavy breathing, gradually increasing in frequency. It was angry, ready to lash out in its rage.

‘I get you’re upset, but just think rationally, okay?! Violence only begets more violence! And this time, that’s a bad thing!’

The monkey moved its hands up in the air, and John prepared himself for the worst. But then, a sudden knocking could be heard from a nearby tree, halting all movement.

A white monkey stood next to the tree, dressed head to toe in armor. It walked between John and the blue monkey, staring back at the horror.

‘Kerchak? What are you doing?’

Tension could be felt in the air. Kerchak started gesturing to the blue monkey, who responded with large movements, sending wind flying in all directions. It seemed to be an argument, but John had no idea what either of them were communicating.

All the demons surrounding them merely stood there, watching the two argue. It seemed clear that Kerchak was special somehow.

‘How, though? He seemed completely ordinary while we traveled with him. Is it a birthright thing? It could just be father and son arguing, I guess…’

The blue monkey gradually calmed down, eventually turning silent. Then he turned to the city and started walking back, bringing all the demon monkeys with him.

Kerchak remained for a moment longer, looking down at John. A large hand touched his chest, checking for any signs of life. Finding nothing, he released a low growl, almost like a snort of derision, before walking after the others and returning to the city.

‘Oh my god, that could not have gone any better! Now I just need to stop being not alive!’

John continued the heart compressions, again feeling his connection strengthening. He might have been able to move without it as well, but he didn’t want the necklace to suddenly run out.

After another minute of compressions and circulating his essence, John felt his incorporeal form get dragged into his body. He had no way to escape, but neither did he want to, letting the pull lead him back to where he belonged.

And then everything went black. Again.

----------------------------------------

“...ohn… John… John!”

A familiar voice pulled him back to consciousness. He felt his head lying on something soft and opened his eyes, staring up at Dennis. His head was lying on his thighs.

“... Dude…” he whispered, barely getting the word out.

“Sorry, John. I know the pain must be horrible, but just stay awake so the essence can do its work, okay? When we found you, none of your limbs pointed in the right direction.”

John stared back at him, wondering why Rain hadn’t taken on that task. But as his body started waking, he did indeed feel a terrible amount of pain shooting through him. Even breathing felt horrible.

“Rain?”

Dennis pointed ahead. “She’s right there, by the horror. I can’t believe you actually beat that thing, man.”

“... Bring me,” John asked, trying to communicate his thoughts with as few words as possible.

“To the horror? Do you need essence?”

John tried to nod, but again, his body protested. “Yeah…”

“It’s going to hurt. But I guess it should help your recovery. We also want to get out of here soon, so anything you can do to speed up the process would be good.”

Instead of replying, John summoned Larang on the ground next to him, hoping Dennis would understand his intention. If he could fly on top of it, they would be able to travel. Even if it would be horribly uncomfortable.

Dennis nodded and gently moved from under John’s head before shifting him over to Larang.

John wanted to clench his jaw to help with the pain, but that would only make it worse since it was broken. All the bones of some size in his body were broken, barely having started to mend.

‘Holy shitting fuck, that hurts! Aah, I’m not fighting a horror again any time soon, I swear!”

Eventually, he managed to support his weight on the giant sword, floating carefully over to the corpse. In the corner of his eye, he could see Rain sitting balled up with her head buried in her elbows. She seemed to be crying.

“... Sorry.”

Rain shook her head without looking up. She didn’t seem very happy about how things had gone, and John understood why.

But at the same time, he couldn’t understand what he could have done differently. It wasn’t a situation with many solutions. And overall, he was happy with the result.

‘Is there even a solution to this? I’m the strongest and most durable; of course I should stay behind to protect you. Unless you show me a reason not to, that won’t change.’