Over the course of the next three months, I suffered in a perpetual loop of recovery.
Every time I woke up, I would clean myself, fix my bandaging and gather supplies like food, water and fabric for fresh bandages. Afterwards I would immediately fall back asleep with a fever.
My recovery was incredibly slow, largely due to the lacking suitable medical facilities in the apocalyptic world.
It took about two months for me to successfully remain awake for an entire day from sunrise to sun fall. Before then I would always collapse in a state of exhaustion at some point.
My wounds healed up poorly as well. I miraculously managed to avoid an infection, however, the scabbing and scar tissue couldn’t be more obvious. Even my smaller wounds looked like severe life-threatening injuries when one looked at the scars.
My body literally resembled a patch work doll that was thrown through a warzone before being stitched back together again by an amateur.
The only place on my body that wasn’t littered in scars was my face and the area around my heart as I had protected these areas incredibly well due to their importance.
Oh, and my jewels were unharmed as well.
After I could remain awake again for the full day I was also able to look after myself properly.
Hunting was difficult for a while because any sudden movements could open my wounds causing me to bleed profusely.
Therefore, food was a major issue for a while as hunting was incredibly dangerous. On more than one occasion I accidentally opened a wound which resulted in many days of hunger and light-headedness.
Now that I could stay awake more easily, taking my time hunting and looking after myself became much easier. My recovery rate accelerated due to this and it only took another month for me to fully recover.
I still felt a little tight in some areas with particularly bad scars but that was just the new skin wearing in.
My right arm is effectively useless, but I figure I can fix myself a pirate hook or something later.
My injured foot was a bit deliberating at first but I quickly got used to it as I could move around more.
I lost three fingers but still had my thumb and index finger allowing me to still pick stuff up.
God, I need to protect these fingers. Naturally, everything is way slower trying to do it with only two fingers, but, what can I do.
During my recovery a few things changed with [Soul Manifest] as well. Not to mention the results of killing so many corrupt creatures.
[Soul Manifest]
[Name: Rey Stein]
[Race: Human (Awakened)]
If you spot this story on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.
[Constitution: Sloth]
[Soul Level: 58]>
[Physical Level: 34]>
[@###%$^()!@#!@$#$%^#!@]
[Karma]>
[Luck: ?]
[Martial Affinity: Reaper’s Harvest]
[Spells: Rubius, Accel, Incras]>
[Domain: Minor Flame]>
[Abilities: Spark, Soul Manifest]>
[Soul Level: 58]^
[Mana: 14 000]
[Intelligence: 264]
[Physical Level: 34]^
[Strength: 252]
[Agility: 304]
[Stamina: 288]
[Ki: ?]
[Karma}^
[Protectors Presence]^
[Level 1]
[Exp: 5201 / 10000]
[Corrupt Resistance]^
[Level 1]
[Exp: 31/10000]
*Author: [Soul Manifest] is getting ridiculously long so from now on I will shorten it to only include important things*
Apart from some significant changes to my soul and physical levels not much else changed. [Incarnat] however did disappear, and something called [Domain: Minor Flame] appeared.
At the moment I don’t really understand this change as I can still use [Incarnat].
Moving on, once I was fully recovered, I began preparing for a second journey to that mysterious light.
However, I had a new plan this time. Rather than avoid every territory on the way there I am going to kill every corrupt creature to make the path there as easy as possible. This is with the exception of that humanoid creature. I’m not going near that thing again.
Once my preparations were complete I set out for my first slaughter destination.
The Gazers’ School.
I want revenge.
Of course, I am not dumb enough to go back inside the school. I have a plan.
Upon arriving near the Gazers’ territory, I set up on top of a building a few hundred meters away. I inspected the school for hours, counting every Gazer I saw, trying to get an accurate estimate of there numbers. This isn’t because I’m worried about how many of them there are. This is so that I now if I’ve killed them all once, I’m done.
After checking my estimate three times I stood on the roof of the building and held my right stub out in front of me with my eyes closed. I began flowing all of my mana into my stub and focused on my control.
This is my first time using so much mana at once so the difficulty of keeping control rose exponentially with my mana output.
Once all of my mana was prepared I began the first stage of my attack.
‘[Minor Flame Domain]’
Instantly my mana caught alight and crimson flames burst from my arm. The heat was intense but not unbearable for me because its my spell. The environment around me however quickly caught on fire from the heat.
For the next few seconds, I waited patiently as all my mana was set on fire. Burning like a second sun I moved onto the next phase.
‘[Sea of Flames]’
This is something I only felt like was possible after testing a few things out with [Minor Flame Domain] but to my great glee it worked like a charm.
The flames surrounding me spread out like it had a mind of its own. Everything it went near was set on fire. After mere moments everything within a hundred meters of me was on fire and I was its epicentre.
Once I was satisfied I opened my eyes. I could see the Gazers in the school staring at me, or more specifically, the massive sea of flames before them.
With an evil grin from ear to ear I finally enact my revenge.
“[INCARNAT!]”
With a shout I released all of the flames and sent them flying at the school. Like a raging tide the flames quickly engulfed everything in their path and approached the school.
The seemingly unfazed Gazers eyes widened slightly when they saw the flames approaching them.
In mere seconds the entire school was engulfed in flames.
The torrent of flames raged and burnt everything to a crisp.
The buildings melted.
The Gazers burnt alive.
The whole thing was music to my deaf ears.
[You have slain a Corrupt Gazer]
[…]
[You have slain a Corrupt Gazer]
[…]
[You have slain a Corrupt Gazer]
[…]
[You have slain a Corrupt Gazer]
[…]
[…]
The messages appeared before me hundreds of times before slowing down.
The flames continued to rage even after the Gazers were seemingly all dead. The heat was so intense that the wind picked up and a fiery tornado started to form.
Satisfied with my revenge and not wanting to get caught up in the tornado, I turned around and returned home.
[Incarnat: (Mastery 2) allows the user to produce a crimson flame at will. This spell costs 500 mana to use. The flame can be empowered with additional mana at 25 % the cost]