Chapter 115: Haze

  Moira fondly gazed at the hot springs as she got up, ready to leave. Potentially, this was one of her last few water runs. In a few hours, the third trial was about to start in earnest. Once it did, they couldn’t afford to sit here in the relative safety of this defanged trap. They’d need to move forward. Well, first, they needed to obtain proper supplies, then eat some proper food, and relax for a while before going full steam ahead.

  She stored the water inside her container. It still needed to be filtered, then desaturated from mana later. But this was enough for now. They already had enough water back at their base.

  The week and a half spent inside this place had gone way better than she had initially expected. Back at the icebergs, she thought that it was almost game over.

  Both her teammates were out for the count, and the day and a half that she spent dragging them around felt like hell. She was constantly drained of mana, spending it all moving them, healing them, and fighting off some stragglers. Thankfully, there wasn’t a swarm or a larger monster.

  It all boiled down to the stupidity of these voyagers. If not for their insanity, none of this would have happened. She was thankful that they got what they deserved.

  Their settlement wasn’t all that far away from the hot springs. So she slowly floated towards it, unhurried, basking in the wind. As an aviatrix, flying was her life. And she hated that she couldn’t fly full speed, competing over here. Here, it was all about survival. Fly to avoid monsters, fly to avoid fights, or go towards fights, or move to the next level of the dungeon. It was always something stressful.

  Hopefully, once everything was said and done, she could explore the Tavan scene. The fairies had their own aerial games over here, so she wanted to compete. But for that, she had to defeat the dungeon and be rid of its curse.

  As she neared the settlement, a sudden rumbling noise caught her attention. She turned to the side to see a very familiar monster running through the barren field.

  It was a quadruped, covered in deep red scales. All four of its legs were muscular and had sharp claws. It had two horns, and from the top of its head to the tip of its tail, a straight line along the spine, and spiky fins jutted out. It was a wingless dragon, a drake. And the way it was running straight at her, she had a feeling that this was the same drake that they had faced before.

  She stayed airborne, well out of the immediate range of its lava spit. And wasn’t that a horrible ability in itself? A monster that regurgitated lava. Was simple fire breath too basic for it? But thankfully, that helped Moira more than anything because lava was heavy. It wasn’t as easily propelled as fire. So this thing’s breath attacks wouldn’t really reach her if she kept her wits about her.

  It stopped to a halt in front of her. Still out of range. But from this distance she could clearly see it. The right side of its face was a bit singed. The scales were blackened in that area, and there was definitely some scarring over there. This was absolutely the same drake that had given them chase when they’d been resting in that valley.

  The beast had tracked them somehow. It took this long because it must have gone on a wild goose chase. To the volcano first, then a bit of meandering, then these hot springs.

  Its plight was funny. Yet, it was chilling at the same time. It was tenacious, and it had seen them as prey. It wouldn’t leave them alone until it ate them. It couldn’t be allowed to chase them any further.

  She was about to engage the drake in combat when another noise demanded her attention. Both she and the monster turned in unison towards the sound.

  From that direction, a blazing reddish-orange meteor hurtled through the air, flying towards them. They’d only heard the sound because it was already upon them.

  Moira would recognize those flames anywhere. Parth was awake, and he was here.

  The next second, Parth reached them, skating midair, a wreath of flames covering him.

  With him, he brought a strong gust of heated wind. It blasted away all the lingering steam in the area. The heat didn’t really affect Moira. Either due to her mana’s protection, or due to Parth’s control over the heat he was releasing. It was most likely the latter. But that didn’t mean that the heat wasn’t there.

  The air around him shimmered in a haze, distorting and rising. He’d learnt to make an entrance, for sure.

  The drake completely ignored Moira and locked in on him, its orange eyes narrowed in rage. It roared in anger, its fins bristling, and its maw glowing with a mouthful of lava. Apparently, it had a bone to settle with him for the injury.

  Parth didn’t look all that bothered. His face was instead a picture of bored indifference. He turned towards her and spoke, “You mind if I take this one? Wanna just stretch my legs a bit. Feel too cooped up.”

  “Go ahead. It’s all yours,” she said, as she began floating away, clearing some space for him. At the same time, she didn’t deactivate her artefacts. Not that he’d need help. But by this point, she’d learnt to be vigilant of opportunistic rats butting in on fights.

  The fact that he was here, though, meant that his training had ended successfully. There had been no backlash. In fact, she wondered why he hadn’t been awakened when she was there. Was Vyasadatta so confident with his progress that he thought Moira’s healing wouldn’t be needed?

  Honestly, she hadn’t expected Parth to tough it out. That whole crazy meditation gambit was something she didn’t have any trust in. But it looked like it worked. Due to her healing cards and whatever the hell that extreme technique was doing to him, his body didn’t look worse for wear. He hadn’t lost any muscles, and he didn’t look like someone who starved himself for upwards of a week.

  But the passage of time was still visible in other ways. For the first time since they’d all met Parth, he was sporting a scruffy beard. He always liked to keep himself clean-shaven. This was bound to happen, given that they were cut off from Tava for three weeks. And there was no time for self-care, either. All their efforts in the first week were focused on beating the second trial. Then the next two weeks, on surviving this layer. The hot springs were a good touch, but Parth hadn’t partaken in them much, as he was stuck in a spot, meditating the whole time, trying to detach himself from his flesh.

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  Path dove towards the drake, and it spat a large glob of lava towards him in response. He didn’t make any attempt to dodge it. Instead, he held his left palm forward and pulled his right hand backwards, preparing for a punch. As it was about to hit him, his flaming aura surged, propelling him even faster. He touched the lava with his gauntlet-clad palm. On contact, there was a minor explosion, and the lava was blown away, raining chunks of it down on the drake instead.

  The draconic beast tried to move and avoid it, but it didn’t get the opportunity. His fist, which was already pulled back for a punch, rammed down on the beast’s forehead. It grunted as it crashed on the ground, but it immediately twisted and got up on its four legs.

  Once again, it didn’t get to do anything, as Parth was already within striking range once again. This time, both of his fists were swirling with blue flames. He unleashed a vicious cross, and at the moment of impact, the compressed flames detonated. There was a sickening crunch, and the drake’s neck snapped back in an unnatural direction.

  The beast fell to the ground, twitching uncontrollably. Parth didn’t let it suffer much as his other fist rammed down on his skull, killing it instantly.

  As Moira flew down towards him, she noticed that blue sparks of flames were still swirling around his gauntlets. But it was not the uncontrolled bursts that she had seen so far from the blue flames. The sparks were swaying in a pattern, moving to a silent rhythm. A rhythm dictated by Parth.

  “So stretched your wings enough?” she asked.

  He didn’t reply for a few seconds. Instead, he was intently looking at the blobs of lava burning on the sand.

  “I honestly thought that this fight would be harder,” he then said, turning back towards her.

  “Yeah, I didn’t expect it to end so quickly. You were supposed to be fasting for a week, man. Even with mana and healing, that’s too much. I thought you wouldn’t be in the shape to move around for a while. And wasn’t your mana supposed to be used up to compensate for the lack of sustenance?”

  “My mana was consumed. I have maybe about thirty percent remaining,” after a beat, he corrected it. “A bit more than that”

  “Thirty percent after this fight or thirty percent when you woke up?”

  “Both?” He said hesitantly, unsure of his own answer.

  “What the hell do you mean by that?” she exclaimed.

  “I mean, this fight didn’t take much mana at all.”

  Moira was shocked at that. Sure, Parth had monstrous reserves. And sure, flying from the settlement to here wasn’t that much of a hassle because the distance was very short. But she thought that the flaming punches would have taken a lot of mana, given the result. Draconic species had notoriously thick scales, and their bones were very sturdy. When Parth faced the lindwyrm, he said that he almost spent his entire reserves on that fight.

  She agreed that this fight was not that spectacular. It wasn’t drawn out, and visually, there was not much magic being thrown around. It did end in three punches after all. But she thought that at least those blue punches would have consumed a lot of mana, given the internal damage he’d inflicted.

  This only meant that his control and efficiency over his mana had gotten fine-tuned to a ridiculous level. If what he said was true, then there was practically no wastage.

  “What sort of bullshit is that? Did you attain enlightenment or something?”

  “Ha, I wish,” he snorted. The blue sparks disappeared abruptly, and his normal flames surrounded him once more. He lifted off the ground a couple of inches, gesturing towards their camp.

  “No, wait,” Moira said, eying the dead drake. The only damage on its body was on its face. The rest of it was intact.

  “Let’s take this with us,” she said.

  “Why?”

  “Spoils of war. We normally don’t have the time or luxury to bother with trophies. But we do have a safe zone this time,” she said. Her mind was already running a mile a minute, trying to settle on what to do with the drake.

  “Fair enough,” He said as ropes of flame erupted from his hand, moving towards the drake.

  “Don’t damage the scales,” Moira said urgently.

  “Yeah, don’t worry,” Parth said as the ropes wrapped around the drake. She got closer and examined the point of contact with a hawk’s eye. And he was right, his control was indeed back, stronger than ever. She couldn’t even see any singes as the flaming ropes tightened.

  Moira and Parth lifted off, heading towards their settlement, dead drake in tow.

  “How did you know to intercept the fight at that moment? Or were you just going towards the hot springs to take a bath and interrupt the standoff?”

  “Nah, I was out in the town square, basking in the fake sun. Then I sensed this thing entering my range,” he said.

  “I thought your heatmap’s range was only a few hundred meters.”

  “Not anymore,” Parth said with a smirk.

  “No shot. This is some bullshit. Oh well, at least you’re in our team, and we don’t have to go up against such nonsense,” she grumbled.

  Parth just chuckled, before he remembered something. “Speaking of the heatmap, did you have any luck finding that strand of mana?”

  Moira shook her head aggressively. “Nope. We tried what you said. But we couldn’t pinpoint the flow of mana inside our brains with such accuracy. Not that we’d know what would happen if we followed the same method as you. Even teach was doubtful about it. He said that if it were that easy to do, everyone would have found some sort of sensory ability or the other. Even he didn’t use such a method to do his mana sensing. It was most likely only possible for you because someone who’d worked his ass off for that ability had practically gift-wrapped the muscle memory for you. That’s a lot of bullshit that you’ve pulled in a short time frame, Parth.”

  “Damn, that’s a shame. I thought we all could use some sort of sensory abilities if we followed that instruction,” Parth said.

  “It’s never too late. So we can keep trying. But I don’t know how it’ll even manifest for us, if at all. Our artefacts don’t have any expressions that could lead to that. Maybe Kwame’s could. I don’t know.”

  Parth just hummed in response. They had been floating slowly, so as not to spoil their spoils of war. Despite the snail’s pace, they were already at the village’s outer farmlands due to the short distance.

  “What’s up with the blue flames? It seems you have control over it now,” Moira enquired.

  “Something like that. They do cost a bit more effort to create, but it’s all a matter of efficiency, I guess. I still spend the same amount of mana. So it’s not taxing on my reserves.”

  “Wow... that is one hell of an upgrade, alongside everything else. What did teach make you do? You say you didn’t gain enlightenment, but then you pull off shit like this. What did you see beyond the physical realm and all that jazz?”

  “I don’t know. It was an out-of-body experience, and definitely not something I could repeat without his guidance. It felt as if I wasn’t present in my own body. As if I were floating in a vast sea of nothingness. It honestly felt like a fever dream. Usually, you don’t remember what you dreamed, right? It felt something similar to that. I haven’t yet wrapped my head around what I experienced during this harebrained scheme. All my focus, I guess, was spent on maintaining that state. I only woke up because dear old teach shook me awake with a pulse of mana.”

  “But was torture worth the tradeoff?”

  “Can’t really say now. I mean, my body’s still feeling the aftereffects. Oh, I’m sorry, but I already ate the remaining rations after I woke up. And I’m still hungry. Can’t wait for the others to come here with the supplies...” he said with a sheepish look on his face.

  “Yeah, yeah, not like there was much left anyway. We were saving that for you, so no harm, no foul. We are fine as long as we get the supplies from our teammates. We’ll just have to wait for three hours. Do you need a healing card by any chance?”

  “A very low heart card wouldn’t hurt.”

  Wordlessly, Moira riffled through her deck and reached the three of hearts. She primed it and threw it at him the moment they landed on the town square.

  “So, back to what I was saying. Maybe it was worth it. But only because of your healing and teach’s guidance. The fight was a surprise to me. I didn’t expect my control to be that good, and I didn’t expect the efficiency to have gone up so much. I mean, I am at thirty percent of my reserves, but it still feels like I could do as well as I used to do with a full tank.”

  “And on top of that, you’re gonna be using the faux core.”

  “Not right now. I completely spent it while I was meditating. And forming a new core is not really the right move currently. We don’t have the time. I’ve already made excellent progress as it is. I’m fatigued, you know. Looking forward to eating more food and having some proper sleep. I haven’t slept all this while I was in meditation after all.”

  “Hmm. I get it. The plan’s still the same, right? That hasn’t changed?”

  “No, it hasn’t. We are still gonna do the same thing that we planned. Everyone else is gonna be in for a nasty surprise.”