"Erik," Amelie said in a whisper, as she looked at Erik.

The structure of light Erik had casted unleashed a light beam attack from all sides, filling the entire cage with radiant light. The brightness was too intense for the other adventurers to see, but Erik continued to watch it unwaveringly.

He observed as his binding spell dissolved in the cage. He watched as the possessed adventurer was brought to his knees, hearing the loud scream of the adventurer or more precisely, the scream that monster let out.

"Finally feeling pain, eh," Erik said with a small smirk looking at the possessed adventurer.

As the light disappeared, Aron was lying motionlessly on the floor. Erik moved quickly, crouching to place his hand on the adventurer's neck.

He's alive, Erik assessed as he felt the pulse.

Amelie, Noelle, and Rick ran toward Erik and Aron, their wands and swords in hand.

Noelle grabbed Erik's collar and pulled him up. "Explain yourself," she shouted, her anger fuming as she glared at him.

Amelie focused on Aron instead. "You’ll be fine," she said as she tended to the wound on his right leg.

Rick stood next to Noelle, glaring at Erik with one hand on the handle of his axe, ready to act if Erik tried anything.

"First of all, relax and hear me out," Erik said cautiously. "He was possessed, and he likely attacked you all under that possession."

Noelle loosened her grip on Erik's collar. "Wait, it wasn’t some kind of illusion?" she asked, glancing down to see her armor broken near the right side of her torso.

Rick and Amelie, reminded of their injuries, noticed their torn clothes, which made Erik’s claim even more believable.

"I fought him when he attacked me. My main motive was to immobilize him. I tried to hit him with my light spell on his right leg to do just that," Erik explained.

"I remember getting hurt by someone," Amelie added, her attention still fixed on healing Aron.

Amelie’s healing spell flickered as she ran out of mana, leaving Aron’s injury still not fully healed. Erik noticed it immediately.

Not now, the healing isn't over yet, she thought to herself, feeling her hand begin to shake due to exhaustion.

Grabbing Noelle's hand, Erik freed his collar from her grip and moved toward Aron. He glanced at Amelie. "Let me handle this," he said firmly.

Amelie gave a small nod, her expression tinged with disappointment on herself. She stepped aside, coming to stand beside Erik.

Erik clenched his wand in his left hand, and murmured, "Intermediate healing," causing the wand to glow. He hovered it over Aron, and as he did, light magic surrounded Aron’s right foot, gradually healing the wound and sealing it from the outside.

Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

"He can still use mana after that spell?" Noelle exclaimed, a shocked expression evident on her face.

As Erik completed healing Aron he turned his head to look at Amelie

"Now Amelie," Erik said.

Amelie, looked at Erik as he continued.

"I think we should move. If monsters attack us here, we’ll be in huge trouble and I am nearly drained of mana," Erik added.

He turned to Rick, "Sir, if you don’t mind, please carry your teammate." Erik said as he pointed at Aron.

Rick nodded, crouching to pick up Aron and placing him over his shoulder.

Noelle walked toward Amelie, who was standing beside Rick and looking at Aron. Leaning closer, Noelle whispered, "Can we trust him?" Noelle asked in a doubtful tone.

Amelie nodded. "There’s no way he’s lying. No one would use such a high-level purification spell without a reason," she whispered back. "And I believe in him too. He’s a good kid," she added quietly.

Noelle nodded at Amelie’s words. She believed Erik’s story as well, but after being stabbed by someone she looked up to as a teacher, her doubts were natural. And being cautious wasn't a bad thing according to her.

"Can you pick up my bag? Since I’m carrying Aron, it might be hard for me to carry it," Rick said, looking at Noelle, who simply nodded and ran towards the position where they were stabbed.

Rick carried a simple brown-colored bag with food essentials and mana potions. Noelle carried the bag on her back and walked towards the group.

"I think I have mana potions in the bag," Rick said. "You guys can use them, they help with mana overuse," he added.

Noelle took out three bottles of mana potions, giving one to Amelie, one for herself, and offered one to Erik.

"Here," Noelle said as she stretched out a hand with one mana potion glass bottle to Erik.

"I don’t use these," Erik said, refusing the offer.

"Hey, I haven’t poisoned it! Are you doubting my intentions?" Noelle shouted, slightly pissed.

"Nope, I’m not doing any such thing. I’m a student, and using the potion might cause me mana sickness and force me to skip school,"

Erik said as he looked towards the 17th floor’s exit. He began to walk towards the exit. Amelie and Noelle chugged down the potion and followed Erik and Rick, who were walking in front to the exit of the 17th floor.

"I didn’t know he was that young," Noelle said, looking at Amelie in surprise.

"He is. He’s from Celera, isn’t that right, Erik?"

"Yup, that’s true." Erik admitted.

"Celera…" Noelle added with a dumbfounded look. "Wait, he’s from Celera Magic Institute!" she exclaimed.

Amelie nodded at this.

"He’s from Celera. He works part-time as an adventurer to support his family. Kind of responsible, isn’t he?" she added with a smile.

"That explains why he is so extraordinary."

Hearing these words, Erik’s expression changed to a slightly irritated one. No that's not true, It doesn’t explain why I am strong, he thought to himself.

"That’s not true," Amelie scolded Noelle. "He works hard. Just being in Celera doesn’t make you an A-rank adventurer," she added in a angry tone.

"Ah, I didn’t mean to… Sorry, Erik, I—"

"That’s fine," Erik mumbled in his usual tone. At least she can apologize, that’s more than enough, he thought to himself as they reached the 16th floor. He and Rick moved out of the way as they reached the top, Amelie and Noelle joining a moment later.

Erik looked around, observing the area where there were no monsters in sight.

Is it somehow related to the monster who possessed him? Erik thought as he glanced at Aron.

Disregarding his thoughts, he looked at Amelie. "Do you know any basic spatial spells?" Erik asked.

"I could do spatial magic," Amelie replied. She placed her hand on her chest. "Leave it to me," she added with a confident tone.

With that, Amelie closed her eyes and took hold of her wand. Her wand was similar to what Erik had seen earlier in Elyza’s possession—a large tree-branch-like wand with leaves emerging at even distances and wrapped in a special vine across the wand.

"Illuminate the surroundings, make it my domain, show the path to the wandering traveler, light elemental spatial magic," Amelie chanted.

As she spoke these words, a single spherical wave of light emerged from her body and spread in all directions.

Advanced spatial awareness spell, Erik thought to himself, thoroughly impressed with it. "I should ask her to teach it to me," he added aloud.