Looking at the corpse in front of him formed a deep frown on Clay’s brows. The chest of the corpse was completely cut open from bottom to top, creating quite the gruesome scene, especially with the heavy internal rotting, but he had seen worse.

The thing that made him frown was the thick root that bore itself into the heart and clasped on to it like a hand. That was enough for Clay to realize what was going on her. The only valuable thing in the heart was the liquified essence it stored.

That at least explained why there was so much poison in the area, supernatural or not, it was suspicious how much lingered in the region. If the poison really originated from Mia – which Clay now knew was true – then the amount of essence needed to produce such a quantity would be tremendous.

Well, looking at the dozens of corpses surrounding him knew Clay where all the essence came from. The strange thing was that one normally couldn’t absorb the liquefied essence stored in a body, it would change your body, transforming it into an abomination of both species. Well, at least that was supposed to happen, he only ever witnessed someone drinking the liquefied essence of another beast once and that ended in a gruesome death.

Remembering the scene caused a shudder to run down Clay’s back, he wasn’t fond of the memory. The death was quite disturbing to witness, and the fact that the essence was forcefully fed didn’t make the situation better. It was always so troubling to interact with humans without causing some kind of conflict.

Truthfully, was Clay quite awkward around people. Well it didn’t matter now, it was only him and Mia from what he could tell, quite the challenge in itself. Mia seemed to be still very young, maybe twelve or even younger. But her age didn’t matter much, he first had to awaken her, as simply shaking the body proved to be futile.

Separating her from the main root, could awaken her, but also possibly kill her instantly. It seemed like the root was somehow able to give her liquefied essence without initiating a transformation in her body, which was quite a useful ability, one he would like to study, but can’t without possibly harming Mia. How unfortunate.

Stroking over his chin, he first decided to observe the situation. If her health seemed to decline in any way he would try to separate her from the tree, if not he would carefully study it to hopefully find a way to free Mia without harming her.

***

There was a rush of pain as the wolf bit into Clay’s shoulder, weakened by his aura shield but still powerful enough to penetrate his skin. Grunting, he threw it with another burst of strength from his shoulder, causing it to yelp on impact. Stepping after it, he buried his sword deep into its stomach, it still wailed on, but Clay twisted his blade until it stopped moving, similar to its five brethren that littered the forest ground with blood.

Panting heavily, he looked over his shoulder, not worried by the wound, but rather sad about his torn coat that he had to patch up again. The bleeding on his shoulder had, already, stopped while essence inside his body gathered around it. The usual burning sensation of regeneration followed, indicating its work.

Hissing in pain, he gritted his teeth. He never got used to the feeling of regenerating flesh, not matter how often he experienced it. Especially since it became so powerful. He had found out rather quickly that the immunity to Mia’s poison had a far more significant impact on his body than he initially expected.

While it was true that body enhancement helped in recovering the body, the amount of wounds Clay healed over the past three weeks would have killed a dozen men over. No matter how severe the wound, with enough essence, it healed without leaving a single mark.

His pale skin was still as pristine as he found it after his first awakening from Mia’s poison. Whenever his body got injured moved his essence on its own, moving to the spot, clotting around it like some slime, that stopped the bleeding almost instantly. It depended on the wound and amount of essence in the surrounding area, but if he had enough it would stop after only a single second or a few at its worst.

The slime then began to burn, similar to the poison of Mia, and rapidly healed the wound. Originally, he feared that it would take too much essence to heal, but it turned out that even the energy released from the embers that always burned inside him were enough to heal wounds similar to the one he just got in a few minutes.

He discovered this ability at an accident where had cut his arm while savaging some old cellar, that had an old nail protruding from one of the shelves. When he had checked on the wound, it was already closed.

This ability was as one could guess immensely useful. There were not a lot of alternatives to quickly healing wounds besides just burning essence, so it was a real blessing that his body awakened this regeneration.

It gave Clay the leeway to fight way riskier than usual, which he was forced to do anyway because of the restriction of only having one arm. In the past, he was able to use a shield, but that proved to be rather difficult if not borderline impossible in his current state.

Walking over to his bag, he had thrown away once he realized he was attacked, he searched it for a while before retrieving a syringe and several vials. He then proceeded to slice the closest corpse carefully open until the heart was revealed. Piercing the syringe with care into a specific spot at the heart, Clay soon drew blood until the vial was full and changed it with another one.

Each vial could hold ten milliliters, and after he was done with each corpse he had six and a half filled with blood, or how Clay now called it heart blood. This heart blood carried the liquified essence in it, even if it’s hard to distinguish from normal blood. He could feel the foreign essence residing within it when he used his aura.

It had cost quite a few of tries (and lives) before Clay found out where exactly it was stored and how he could harvest it. This small pack of wolves was the largest he had come across in days and should hopefully suffice for his operation.

The past three weeks were a constant struggle to find enough heart blood, to keep Mia alive, and he now should have enough to proceed with the operation to separate her from the tree. After studying her for the past few weeks, he came to the conclusion that the tree and Mia somehow ended in a symbiotic relationship.

The tree provided Mia with the heart blood she needed to survive, while the tree used some of the poison and heart blood to grow further and terraform its surroundings to something more suitable. That worked well in the beginning where many beasts roamed the city, and it had more than enough heart blood to harvest, but times have changed.

Most beast have either abandoned the region or realized its dangers and avoided it entirely. All the surroundings corpses were dried up by now, and without Clay’s constant supply of heart blood, would have both of them been ‘starved’ to death.

By now, the tree grew to such a size that it drew too much heart blood away from Mia and would eventually consumer her, so they had to be separated.

Just to be sure, he had prepared a stash of heart blood to supply Mia with so she could survive and adapt to live without the tree. Thinking about this escaped, a small chuckle from Clay. If he told this to someone, they would declare him crazy.

He was really harvesting the blood of several beasts to feed to a girl that fused with a tree so that she wouldn’t die. How truly fucked up the world became…

***

With a rush of essence, burning inside him, struck Clay with his blade down, separating the main root of the tree from Mia’s chest in one clean cut. The moment it got cut, it flailed about in the air for a few seconds before losing its purple luster and falling lifelessly to the ground. There still remained a stump in Mia’s chest, but it had to remain there for the moment, Clay didn’t want her to die of blood loss.

Carefully moving the other roots, aside, he wrapped her naked body into a blanket before moving her in a princess carry out of the toxic area and into his home that had changed quite a bit over the past few weeks.

He had never bothered to move anywhere else, as it was more than enough. It was a house with just a single floor, so it was easy to defend, which the heavy barricades and spike surrounding it proved. He was only attacked once during his whole stay, and that was more of an accident than a planned action.

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An injured boar came rushing from the forest and didn’t stop before the spikes, running straight into them with its whole momentum. It didn’t win that fight. They were not just some small branches, but whole tree trunks from young trees Clay fell. It was good exercise and one of the several things he did to pass the time.

Carefully laying Mia on the bed, he dressed her with the clothes he prepared beforehand. Fortunately they fitted, he wasn’t sure he would get the measures right just with his eyes, but it was sufficient.

He chose gray sweatpants and an oversized pink hoodie. He guessed comfortable clothes would be best when she would eventually wake up. Afterward, Clay went about his day as usual, just sorting some stuff in the house from all the loot he had gathered, before he heard a weird sound coming from the room he just left Mia a few hours ago.

Rushing in, he saw her sitting on the bed, watching her surroundings in utter confusion. She had deep purple eyes that remembered Clay of the purple patches from the corpses, while her long black hair curled around her face, resting on her shoulders.

Seeing Clay, she directly crawled away into a corner, putting as much distance between herself and him as possible, fear visible in her eyes, her hands cowering her mouth and nose. Her eyes were teary, and she seemed to be panicking.

Putting his hands in a calming motion, Clay didn’t move from where he stood, less he scared her even further. “Mia, I don’t want to harm you–”

“Leave!” Mia screamed, her voice muffled between her hands, closing her eyes as if afraid of something. She seemed like she didn’t even listen to what he just said. At first, he thought she was scared of him, but her reaction was strange. She didn’t seem to fear him but something else, something he couldn’t see…

Right! Due to her condition, she couldn’t have had many interactions with humans without harming or even killing them. Putting his hands down, he explained, “Mia, you don’t have to be afraid I’m–”

Not listening, Mia interrupted him with a scream. “Run! Leave! You can’t stay here!”

Seeing no other option, he went over to Mia, held her arms and rested his forehead on hers. She resisted strongly against the touch, but wasn’t able to muster a lot of strength. Her screams and fighting grew weaker over time, until she sat silently down on the ground and finally dared to open her eyes.

Looking at her deep purple eyes from, so close, saw Clay that a tint of blue shimmered in them, looking like a small galaxy of stars. Her eyelids were red from all the crying and her face flushed in a lively red. As they looked each other into the eyes, she seemed to calm down, her arms moving away from her mouth.

She watched a while longer before suddenly lunging herself at Clay, startled, he wasn’t able to react to the sudden hug. His arms were still behind her back, frozen in place, Clay had yet not processed what just happened. He was at a loss for words, debating with himself before returning the hug.

Mia soon began to cry on his shoulders, and Clay couldn’t stop himself from cringing. He really wasn’t good with kids, hell, he wasn’t that good with any person. It seemed like the poison would be the least of his worries in the near future. Just to what did he agree to? He wasn’t the person to care for a child, but what other option was there? He made a pledge, and he fully intended to keep it.

Mia eventually calmed down and let go of Clay’s, snot covered, shoulder. Holding his hand for a handshake, he said, “Hey there. I’m Clay, nice to meet you.”

Gently giving him his hand she responded, “I’m Mia,” she fumbled with her hands for a moment before asking with deep worry, “Are you fine?”

Needing a moment to understand the question, Clay asked, “You mean the poison coming from you?”

Heavily nodding her head, Clay had to chuckle, it looked quite cute. “No worries, I’m immune to your poison.”

Having a sigh of relief, she slumped to the ground exhausted, causing an awkward silence to reside in the room. Scratching the back of his head, Clay just decided not to think too much, it couldn’t be that hard to talk to a child. “Tell, how old are you?”

Mia crooked her head to the side looking lost in thought for a moment before saying carefully, “I’m… eleven years old,” saying it she grew more confident with her answer. “Yes eleven years.”

Nodding, he said, “That’s good, I’m seventeen years old. Say, do you remember what happened?”

There was another moment of silence as Mia thought for a moment, “I met my brother. He said goodbye for some journey, but that he would return in a few days, so I waited. Day for day, but he never came…” There were tears welling in her eyes. “Brother, why didn’t you come?” She asked more herself than Clay.

Looking at Clay, she asked, “Did I do something wrong? Do you know why my brother never came back?” She began to cry again, her voice breaking, “First mom and dad, then the nice old man and now my brother. Just what did I do wrong?!”

Not being able to listen any longer, Clay grabbed her by the shoulders. “Nothing!” Startled by his sudden outburst, grew Mia quiet, while Clay looked sternly into her eyes. “You did nothing wrong! You were also not abandoned, not by your parents, friends, brother or anyone else. It’s just that the world changed…”

Clay stopped for a moment, “...not many survived. But I’m here with you and I won’t leave your side no matter what. I promised Jim that I would care for you.”

Hearing the name of her brother, he eyes visibly widened, while new hope welled up in her. “You know my brother? He sent you? Were is he? What happened? Why didn’t he come personally?Wh–”

“Calm down Mia, I will explain everything, it’s just a little… complicated,” expressed Clay while looking to the side. Should he tell the truth or lie? No he couldn’t lie, this new world was too hard to hide all the death she has already seen and will continue to see in the future. She had to know the whole truth if she was supposed to have a chance on surviving on her own one day. He just had to be careful with his words.

Kneeling down, he grabbed both hands of Mia, looking her into the eyes, “Mia, do you know what happened to your parents?”

She looked to the side, saying, “Yes… they are gone… dead.” Nodding, Clay felt relief, she knew that they were dead, that was good. She was a lot stronger than he initially gave her credit for, so he could be a little more honest.

“Mia, your brother, helped a lot of people when the world changed, saved many lives. Besides all that, he never forgot about you. He was always looking for a way to cure you, but there was a sudden threat one bigger than anyone we had faced ever before, we were able to stop it, but at a great cost…

“Your brother sacrificed in the end his own life to safe my own. I was prepared to leave this world behind, but that didn’t prevent him from giving his own to safe mine. To somehow make this up to him, I promised to care and protect you in his stead. We both lost everything, our family, friends and are all alone here far from civilization, but we will survive you and me together all right?”

Clay wasn’t able to see her face as she looked to the ground, was it too much? Jim was the last person she had contact with, the last person she relied on, the last person she put all of her faith in.

Eventually, she asked, “Was he happy when it all ended?”

“Yes, he died with a big smile,” replied Clay, tears welling up on their own, stupid emotions. He didn’t even know him for that long…

When Mia finally looked up, her cheeks were stained by tears, but also formed into a bright smile, “Our parents always told us to never regret our decisions. If he was able to smile, then so can I.”

Witnessing the smile, couldn’t help Clay himself from smiling himself. If a girl of such tender age could be so strong, then so could he, not matter the hardship and pain he had to face. Before, he worried about caring for a child, but all of these worries just vanished in an instant, like a leaf in the wind. He wanted to protect this smile no matter what.

Grabbing to his belt, he presented Mia with Jim’s obsidian dagger. “Your brother used this dagger, and I think he would have wished for you to have it. See it as a remembrance of him, so that he is always with you no matter where you go. It’s also something you will need very soon.”

Grabbing the dagger, she slowly unwrapped the cloth before watching the gracefully snipped away edges forming a beautiful blade, that shimmered when hold against the sun. She stared at it for a while before suddenly cutting her thump, whining a little before holding the dagger in Clay’s direction.

Taking it, he was visibly confused. “What do you want to do?”

Holding her thumb, she said, “An blood oath, I don’t trust normal promises anymore. We will do it with blood.”

Frowning at where, Mia picked that idea up, he just shook his head. If that is what she wanted, then so be it. He was already determined to protect her, with or without blood oath. Cutting his own thump, he pressed it against hers. “I Clay Raymond declare by my blood that I will protect and care for you without leaving your side. Satisfied?”

“Promise not to die.” Mia added with utter seriousness, which looked rather funny on her small face.

Smiling, Clay said, “I vow to never leave your side, to not die before you have seen the world and all the splendors it holds.”

Nodding satisfied, Mia spoke, “I Mia Hawk declare by my blood that I shall follow and listen to you and be a good sister.”

“Sister?” Clay asked bemused. This remembered him of his older sister. He never had a younger one.

“Of course! We are now bonded by blood, so we are family now!” Mia declared with a tone that didn’t permit rebuking.

Smiling he nodded, standing up still holding Mia’s hand, “Very well do you want to eat something my little sister?”

Rising with the help of Clay she smiled, “Of course, lead the way brother. What’s on the menu?”

“Canned food,” replied Clay with a mischievous smile.

“What!?” Mia asked in an outrage. “Don’t tell me there is only canned food, for the rest of my days!?”

Hearing this, Clay broke into a hearty laugh, one he hadn’t in a very long time.