Chapter 22 – End of the Long Night

Despite his utmost effort he is still a novice with regards in how to use mana, there was a limit of how much he could do it alone, yet he didn’t give up.

Lucca cut through, time and time again. The silver blade he got from the dead adventurer from earlier has cracks all over its body and is just a matter of time before being completely destroyed.

“Ah… ah… ah… Finally it was destroyed?”

With the last swing to intercept an incoming attack, the blade finally gave up and was completely broken. Lucca couldn’t help but show a wry smile while he took the dagger given by his beloved Ann who didn’t have a scratch on its surface.

Bang, an attack comes. If he dodges the whip will come again, so he has to disturb their movement or cut out their vines once for all.

Therefore, cut, slash and rip! That was the only way Lucca could make it through.

He was tired, he already had slayed a few dozens of monsters alone, but when he lost the support of the magicians from Windser due to the lack of mana, he had to take the brunt of the attack alone.

If he took of his clothes, they could all that purple marks and blood flowing because of the attacks, yet he didn’t had any choice but to accept the attack.

A big mouth comes and tries to bite away Lucca, he has no other option but dodge, while in the air, the vines thrust again. He is bombarded one more time by their combined offensive.

“Ah… Ah… This is bad…” – Muttered while spitting out the blood in his mouth.

Lucca moved his eyes and saw the scene on his surroundings. On his back there were countless bodies, on his side there was Windser et al fighting the huge flytraps and in his front a huge amount of floras preparing their offensive yet again – “Ah… Ah… Ah… But the number of enemies certainly decreased.”

(Their numbers decreased, but they are still two times the amount we originally had… I can’t keep up fighting like this, my body is already at its limit…)

Breathing slowly Lucca accessed the situation of his tired body and understood he couldn’t keep this reckless way of fighting, the plants certainly didn’t give him a major wound yet, but it was just a matter of time before his body slowed enough for him to be eaten by huge carnivorous plants or being whipped to death by the floras.

“Ah… Ah… Angel… I don’t know why you gave me this power, but I will use it to make it through this night” – He flashed a smile while raised his dagger – “So… My body, don’t give up on me…”

While saying those words, as if they were a blessing to keep fighting, he started circulating what’s left of his mana on his whole body. Earlier he understood that he didn’t needed to force his body to the maximum to kill those plant monsters, but it became a battle of attrition he didn’t have any other choice but to go full power and kill as many as he can.

Golden light started shining brightly in the middle of the night. The plant monsters weren’t intelligent, but their instinct made they hesitate, for the light was their natural enemy together with fire.

The golden clad boy moved towards the monsters, his speed now was a level faster than before he started battling, the vines that came in his direction were easily dodged, if before he had to attack them to not suffer the next attack, now he was already in the face of the floras while stabbing her with his weapon.

The flora didn’t give up and swung the tentacle one last time to stop the boy onslaught, but with his other hand he easily stopped the attack.

“RIIIIIIIIIIIIII”

What seemed to be the screams of pain of the floras that was being burned by the golden light could be heard louder than any sound on this battlefield, yet the boy didn’t flinched and once more stabbed the monster.

It died, the boy clearly knew as he sensed some little amount of energy flowing through his body when he delivered the last blow. Since the start of the battle, whenever he felled an enemy, he felt this sensation of confirming he indeed had slayed them.

Nevertheless he did not have the time to ponder about what was that feeling, as another attacks made its way to him.

The boy kept moving while easily dodging those attacks, then a big mouth make his way towards him, he easily sidestepped avoiding the danger, but in the next moment he was greeted by another carnivorous plant ready to eat him.

“…”

The silent boy seeing he didn’t any other choice, swung his left fist. His golden clad punch dived into the ‘flesh’ of the carnivorous plant and made a huge hole, his other arm, that wasn’t shining, moved.

The mana from his arm was focused on the blade of the dagger as if becoming a sword made out of Holy Mana and he stabbed it through the plant open mouth.

Forcing as the weight of his normal arm he skewed the plant brain and could feel the energy flowing through his body, the mark of the slay.

Taking out his arm, now already clad golden again, he moved once more and intercepted the first carnivorous plant.

If before he couldn’t figure out the energy before, now bathed in holy mana, he could sense that the carnivorous plants were stronger than the floras, each swing of them could kill a man if they were unprepared. Therefore he decided to focus on those big monsters rather than the annoying floras.

He kept battling, yet after killing the 15th huge carnivorous plant he felt his mana decreasing, even though there was little amount of energy being gain with every slay, it was a minor quantity compared to his full throttle.

At that moment suddenly the forest started to feel the rise of the temperature, seconds later the red color started to rise. Flames, upon flames surged going towards the sky.

Lucca et al could only watch, yet despite them not paying attention to the battlefield, the attacks stopped, as if the monsters too couldn’t help but watch the wall of flames that climbed towards the skies.

As they reached a size bigger than everything Lucca ever saw before, they started to fall. The flames, that seemed to consume anything, fell from the skies and when they finally touched the ground, a wave to heat surged in all directions.

“Amazing…”

Lucca couldn’t help but mutter as just the wave of the aftermath made him felt such heat, he couldn’t possible fathom what felt like inside the world of fire.

As if the messenger of the day, the flames simply vanished and the sun started rising in the east.

At that moment Lucca finally recovered his senses, and remembered the battlefield, but the monsters still didn’t attack. Wondering why they suddenly stopped he looked towards them and saw that the floras became extreme sluggish and the carnivorous plants seemed to shorten and didn’t move as much.

Finally the long night of fighting was over. The plants empowered by the moon were easily dealt in the light of the sun.

When the shout of Captain Windser roared, everybody knew, the battle was over.

In that moment a beautiful girl with red hair with the same color of the castle of flames and serene blue eyes showed up in the top of what used to be waterfall, but now was just a dried nascent.

She beamed her usual style and with a jump she appeared in front of Lucca.

“You worked hard tonight, boy”

She moved her hand in a speed Lucca’s eyes simple couldn’t follow and tapped his forehead. At this moment Lucca felt the exhaustion of the night in full brunt and finally let his body rest.

“Who would have thought that he could have done that much?” – Muttered Cecil while looking the wake of the battlefield, the boy was alone in the middle of innumerous corpses.

“I can see why he already got the blessing… Still to use conduit like this…”

Cecil said while looking his fainted body, blood gushing everywhere and his flesh swollen purple all over. It was clear he wouldn’t be able to move for a long time.

“Hahh… How reckless for a brat…

But I will give a little service this time, since I don’t want to carry you.”

Cecil waved her hand and her mana turned golden blue color and slowly permeated the tired body of the boy, regenerating him and moments later his pained breath was returned to normal together with his whole body that seemed perfectly fine, with the exception of his ragged clothes.