Chapter 118 - Quick End.

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[Adam C. POV]

"His curse has blinded you long enough, master, so let me be your eyes..."

As those words left my familiar, I felt a sudden change in his energy, his energy colliding with mine in a chaotic display, and then... nothing, nothing but the darkness itself embracing me, giving me sight.

It was strange.

One moment, I was blind to what was happening, and the next, I could see it all, from thousands of perspectives. 

That's the only way I could describe what I had felt the moment my familiar arrived. Memories I didn't recall having, now felt as if they had always been there.

Yet, despite this new feeling of understanding, I still felt... incomplete, at least in a sense.

My memories felt as if they were constantly changing, and vanishing, only for a backup to stop me from forgetting, it was an odd sensation.

"Forget ME!" 

I blinked, with my only working eye at the moment, staring at the pale man, who now simply had a frightened expression on his face.

He was afraid of me.

No...

He was afraid of the change in me.

"Stay aWay!" 

He took a step back, his knife trembling in his hands as he tried to will himself to take another step, then another, only for his feet to remain rooted in the same spot. 

The darkness of my familiar that had enveloped me moments earlier had been replaced with an almost ethereal light, one that seemed to vibrate with my own power.

I wasn't any stronger than I was before.

I was simply... unaffected by his ability now, at least to a degree and that was more than enough.

My smile widened, as I tilted my head to the side, feeling the warmth of my blood draining down my face from the eye he had stabbed with a piece of glass.

"Leave me ALONE!" The pale man screeched, stumbling back.

I snorted, "Fuck off," and with a single flash step, viciously pulled my blade across his neck in a single movement. Then, as I sheathed my blade behind him, there was an echoing thud as his head rolled off his shoulders and tumbled to the ground, leaving behind a fountain of blood that spilled from his corpse.

"Good riddance," I sighed, wondering how I would explain my injuries to Cana, it would take me... weeks, maybe more to heal my eye back. 

Suddenly, a guttural, cacophonous voice echoed throughout the area, bouncing off the trees, a voice that was both simultaneously a whisper and a deafening roar.

"His death...was too...quick."

Who was... oh right, I have a seemingly demonic Raven as my familiar.

"Demonic?! Ha! They wished they could be as radiant as moi!" 

Oh right, we are still connected. 

Taking a deep breath, I pushed my familiar out of my body and into the air with a burst of energy. "That was... uncomfortable."

"It was... an experimental endeavor," My raven coughed awkwardly, puffing his feathers a bit.

I sighed.

To think I almost lost to someone far weaker than me, because I couldn't remember them, or perceive them. This was a glaring weakness I hadn't anticipated.

This encounter had shed some light into a few things I never put any thought into.

I was ill-prepared to face enemies that countered me in any form of shape. Mostly on a psychic level.

If his curse had been but a bit different, he could have altered my memories, making me an enemy of the guild or something far worse.

And that was an outcome I could simply not allow. 

My familiar had helped today, but what if he wasn't there the next time, or he wasn't equipped to deal with the next threat? 

"Find Lilia, and tell her to bring some medical supplies," I said with a tired sigh. 

There would be time to figure out my predicament later, right now, I needed to tend to my wounds, meaning it would be a long night.

"Right away!" With that said, my familiar took off into the distance at full speed, his quest to bring Lilia to me. 

I sighed once again, closing my remaining eye, focusing on using all of my power to fuel my healing Kido. I had been lucky the bastard hadn't complete fucked up my eye, a little bit deeper and I would've lost it.

It hurt like fucking hell. 

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Ten minutes later, Lilia and my familiar arrived at my location, with Lilia carrying the equivalent of an entire clinic on her back.

"It didn't occur to you... that you could've maybe been exaggerating with all of that?" I asked, deadpanning at her with my only working eye. 

"Don't be silly, Adam-sama, I only brought the essentials!" Lilia defended with a smile.

"Why would I need an MRI machine?" I retorted.

"For MRI purposes?" Lilia offered with a weak smile.

You know what, I don't have time for this shit. "Just give me some water, and some soap."

"If you don't mind me asking, was your opponent strong?" Lilia asked, giving me the items I had requested while tilting her head in curiosity.

"Not exactly," I replied, taking a small pause. "He was... difficult to deal with, that's all."

I didn't feel like elaborating right now. 

"Oh," Lilia muttered. "Well, in that case, let me take a look at your wounds."

Hm, that might actually be of help.

"Sure, knock yourself out," I nodded.

As I settled onto a stool my familiar pushed close to me, Lilia went to the back of her medical supplies and returned with a tray full of various stuff. 

As she walked towards me, the smell of antiseptic and lavender began to fill the air. 

"Let's see what we're dealing with here," Lilia said in a fully focused tone, though despite that, I could still detect a hint of concern. 

Nodding, I removed my clothes down to my underwear, revealing the cuts and stab wounds that littered my arms, legs, and torso.

Lilia gasped. "How in the world are you so calm with wounds like these?"

I shrugged. "You know better than most that I've had worse."

I wasn't exaggerating. 

I had been in my fair share of fights and scraps, but so far, nothing I couldn't handle. These wounds were painful, sure, but they didn't bother as much as others might imagine. 

Lilia, however, despite having seen me in worse states, looked like she was about to have a heart attack.

She carefully began cleaning the wounds with a wet cloth, and every now and then, I'd catch her shaking her head or muttering under her breath. I tried to make light of the situation to ease her concern.

"Remember Deliora?" I asked with a chuckle.

"How could I not?" Lilia replied with a dejected tone, as she continued with her work.

I sighed. 

"It will take a hell of a lot more than this to take me down, Lilia," I said, winking at her with my eye.

"Don't do that," Lilia muttered.

"Do what?" I replied, with a hint of a frown. 

"Pretend this is okay," Lilia said, as she placed a bandage on one of my cuts. "Because it's not, no matter how strong you are, it's not. It will never be."

"I understand your concern, but it's honestly not a big deal," I said, trying to soothe her worries.

"It is a big deal!" Lilia exclaimed, her eyes flashing with anger. "You can't be this damn casual and calm about getting stabbed and having your blood all over the place! You're missing an eye!"

"Yeah, I know," I replied.

"You're too calm about this whole situation, and that scares me. Why? Why are you so calm?" Lilia muttered, her eyes piercing mine. 

"Because I have to be," I replied.

It wasn't that I didn't care about my wounds.

It was that I cared more about avoiding them in the future, than whatever it was I was going through at the moment. 

Perhaps she was right though, and I was simply wrong by not worrying about this kind of stuff, who knows?