Today, I received permission to take on Class C missions. As I cannot rely on the mission and reward centers, I hired a retired mercenary who runs a potion shop in the middle of the city with my savings. When I told him I wanted to be a combat priest, he looked at me strangely. I repeatedly asked if he understood what it meant to be a member. I explained that it required absolute dedication to the greater good, confronting all enemies of the light, using my abilities to dispel darkness wherever it may be found, and supporting all who ask for it. Despite his disbelief, he agreed to a weekly payment of a silver coin.
The initial days were challenging. I had to prepare medicinal brews, learn to mix healing herbs, and create purifying compounds for poison or paralysis. In the afternoons, I focused on strengthening my body to avoid getting tired halfway through. At night, I studied incantations to help me rescue my companions. It was a demanding but rewarding experience. Once I realized this, that's when things became difficult. It seems that priests cannot wear metal armor, nor any leather, and only rarely can they use amulets. Until my faith and determination are strong enough, I cannot use any of these. However, I do practice protective spells, and while the shields are invoked, I can deflect objects. At first, there were rotten fruits, then spoiled eggs, followed by stones. After a month, it was knives, and now I am being attacked with bladed weapons. When I received the news, I was able to withstand twelve blows on my shield, but my enchanted clothing is also more durable than usual, so I will not die from one or two blows while I prepare to counterattack or raise my shield again.
In the past month, I have learned how to execute attacks using my teak wood staff. The staff has been carefully carved with spells that correspond to my power. According to my instructor, my strength is derived from my wizard ancestors, and my resolution serves as an amplifier for my magic field. However, my magic field is limited to visual contact only. I believe this is due to the goddess of virtue granting me the ability to extend her gifts beyond the city limits.
One day, I arrived to find my mentor chatting with a group of experienced adventurers, each carrying bronze weapons. He introduced them to me and explained that they were planning to investigate a cursed cemetery and could use a healer. I was surprised but grateful for the opportunity. After they left, my mentor asked me to close the store and went to the roof to celebrate with a drink.
Upon entering, I am disheartened by the sight of poverty. The group consists of five individuals: Quilt and Grump lead as tanks, accompanied by a silent archer and a warrior who is difficult to understand and insists on wearing only shoulder pads and a loincloth. When passing through impoverished areas, the group quickens their pace. Despite invitations to drink from taverns and hovels, I am unable to delay the group as I am compelled to continue our journey. Although I am moved to help the contaminated children, I must prioritize our mission.
It takes three days to reach the cemetery. I have heard rumors of deadly beasts lurking, but down here I see nothing but loneliness and pain in the trees. The adventurers walk unconcerned. They do not seem to care much about the situation in the forest. I say nothing and am content to wait. As we approach the cemetery, a pungent odor fills the air, causing my companions to draw their weapons. Before advancing, I recite invocations of resistance, strength, and protection. Although reciting these invocations requires significant physical and mental strength, I am prepared.
Just three meters from the entrance of the small, sinister place, a hand emerges from the ground. Soon, a skeletal figure, dressed in tattered clothing that once belonged to a woman, rises from the earth. The figure is clearly an entity of evil. The attackers strike, but only the tanks seem to have any effect. It is unclear why an archer would be present in this situation. When the abomination is eliminated, we can enter. Inside, there are many tombs, all of which appear to be profane. I warn my companions, and suddenly skeletons begin to emerge, some even armed. The archer aims for their heads, the tanks use thick plates for armor and strike with their mallets, and the warrior attacks with his two swords, but without coordination or strategy, relying solely on brutality.
After defeating the last of the skeletons, I noticed that four of them were still standing in the background, guarding a necromancer. I could see the immense power concentrated in the decrepit body of the necromancer. It was strange because the skeletons we had just eliminated were slow and weak, unlike this abomination that glared at us with a grimace of pain and hatred. The archer quickly launches an arrow, narrowly missing the corrupt priest's skull before it shatters into fragments. The warrior grunts in defiance and charges towards the enemy. The tanks react a bit slowly. Suddenly, a beam of black light shoots from the enemy's hand, causing the warrior to writhe in pain
.
Help support creative writers by finding and reading their stories on the original site.
The impact is significant. My protections nearly vanish while the cursed body illuminates and laughs. Then, the cursed body grimaces in pain, and the nightmare begins again. All the bones that were scattered on the floor begin to rise, creating a terrifying spectacle. To avoid running out of strength, I cast a healing incantation on the warrior, and he returns with us. He appears to be in a weakened state. It is possible that he would not have survived without the healing. The situation outside is chaotic, with arrows passing by and a couple of skeletons causing injuries to the tanks. I am doing my best to heal them. The healing spells I use do not actually heal wounds, but rather force the body to activate its natural healing process. I provide energy from my own strength to aid in this process, but I must be careful not to exhaust myself before leaving. During my last assignment, a skeleton managed to sneak in at the entrance and I had a close encounter with it. In a desperate act, I cast one of the most powerful runes I know, called 'repel evil.' It tore apart the evil without harming anyone, but it left me exhausted. Fortunately, it was the last one, and we were able to leave the area. The fetid smell lingered.
We take a few hours to recover, they take salted pork out of their saddlebags and we eat it with cookies and some water, no one talks about strategies, everyone looks at each other with a frown as if to blame each other for the failure, seeing that the skeletons do not leave the cemetery we get ready to sleep, no one assigns me a guard, they just expect me to be strong for the next raid in six hours, the truth frustrates me that they don't trust me but I can't do anything to change it, I'm still very inexperienced.
During the next day we try at least three more times, the archer takes out a foil and strikes with it to not run out of arrows, but whenever we reach the necromancer we can only hit him once or twice before he raises the fallen skeletons again and again we have to flee because we cannot face the spells of "steal life" or the curses of pain and blindness, but we fail to eliminate him.
At night, the warrior has begun to drink and the others, arguing the need to regain spiritual strength, begin to consume some things that, according to what the instructor told me, are hallucinogenic, but I can not dissuade them, finally I go to bed while only one idea crosses my mind, to complete this mission without dying anyone.
In the morning I see them ready to try again, but I stop them, I have an idea and they find it dangerous but useful, so I start enchanting the weapons to give them a +2 to holy damage, doing this leaves me exhausted, I can't put any blessing on their bodies and definitely won't be able to heal them if they get wounded in battle, I lament under my breath my lack of
strength to increase my enchantment on their armor, but I have decided to enter the battle.
Again we reach the entrance, only this time it only takes one blow to topple the skeleton, as we do so a silhouette of a fat transparent man is left floating, the poor man shouts "kill him" as we advance each time we eliminate a skeleton it remains on the ground suspended in place, the poor trapped spirit begs us to kill him, he betrayed them they say, he gave them to the bandits, my staff goes up and down quickly, we all attack without a break, at the end there are the four buried warriors, they smile after being freed from the curse and ask us to finish with the bastard, the necromancer starts howling all the time when we eliminate the skeletons, when my staff hits him for the first time behind our backs there are only spirits supporting us.
The warrior falls as he is attacked, unprotected he feels the full force of the spell but the rest of us are not here to allow him any more, we hit him with all the power we have, he staggers as he no longer seems to have the energy he has drawn from all the damned, seeing him ready to finish the warrior I call to the goddess for help and I feel it, I feel the power of the holy word:
"holy whip"
A light comes out of my hand, it surrounds the necromancer, he howls and throws himself to the ground, with one fluid strike Quilt decapitates him.
Once my head is clear (this attack of faith is the most exhausting thing I've done since I left the city) I check the warrior's condition, the magic used against him is mental torture, if I had used something stronger like lethal air we wouldn't be here, I can hear the rejoicing of all the liberated souls, I approach her and she tells me that they were ambushed by a priest of the light, that she doesn't trust me but she has no choice but to wait for a proper burial, with the blessing of the followers of the light.
As soon as it fades I turn around and see them all digging in the bodies, in the graves and in the corrupted body of the priest, I just carry each of the bodies they have cleaned to their respective holes, I pray and ask them to be protected by the light, as I go to body number three they all approach, Apparently they have gathered everything of value and leave, reluctantly Quilt gives me a +2 Spirit Amulet, apparently it belonged to the priest, none of them offer to accompany me, I do not ask them to stay, I just nod my head and they leave, I still have a lot of work to do.
It takes me more than two weeks to return to my master, the journey was exhausting, without food, without energy, if one of the mysterious slime appeared I would be a dead man, but nothing happened, I enter the city with the calm of the tomb, when I enter his tent he is waiting for me with a flask of alcohol, I snatch it from him and take a drink, the liquid burns me like fire, , He does not laugh when he sees me coughing, he just tells me that it is my first drink and it is very strong, he limits himself to telling me that this is what it means to be an adventurer, this is what it means to be a priest of warriors, I can think about it, he tells me that these men were hired by him, he explains that otherwise there are many stories of priests being killed when they finish their mission because they are the weakest ones left, he says goodbye to me with a hug, with the shame of knowing what I have chosen and that he has helped me to get it.
I go home and lie down on the straw bed, from the kitchen comes my mother's voice, "son, I hope it was a good trip, I made you a cake, happy 16th birthday", if only I knew, if only I knew what I was living! I cried all afternoon and in the evening I went to the kitchen for the cake, I couldn't let her suffer, I swallowed my tears with her bread.