Chaper 72 Rank 1

The poisonous energy was sucked up by the core, but that didn't alleviate all the symptoms, the worst, like respiratory failure, was prevented, but the damage was done. His body was in the worst state it had ever been, the energy was gone, but some of the poison remained in the form of a liquid, it kept spreading throughout his body, infecting every single living cell, slowly turning it into a purplish black.

Lucas had a higher tolerance to pain from all the things he had been through, but even now, he was almost passing out because of it. The infection spread over his entire body, and his hearing stopped functioning, only hearing an extremely high-pitched noise instead. His vision started to become bleaker and bleaker, turning into eternal darkness.

'This was a mistake...'

He could've just let the energy disperse in the outside air, but his greed got the best of him. His life was thrown away for some measly gains he would've reached by himself.

As his body started to degrade he regretted his decision more and more.

'Am I really going to die here?', dark thoughts started to flood the remaining part of his mind. Oily black tears started to stream down his face, his skin started to crack in certain places.

'Am I going to die? No! I don't want to! No! I can't! NO!'

Yet he couldn't do anything, his body couldn't generate energy on its own, the core was still busy dealing with the dark energy and he didn't have anything left. Even using willpower was out of the question, the only thing that remained was the broken parts of his mind that were experiencing all the pain and a vision of pure black. He felt alone.

Lucas couldn't tell how much time had passed, but his pain remained eternal. The only positive thing was that his mind had almost grown accustomed to it. The only thing he had left was the omnipresent darkness. It felt cool to the touch, at least that's what he thought since he couldn't move his body.

The darkness was scary in the beginning, it felt like a monster would pop out at any moment. Yet, it also felt relaxing, bathing in nothingness filled him with a serene feeling. He was back in a familiar place.

A brightly shining sun was greeting him once more, all the pain he felt was gone. There was nothing, he could see again, which tipped Lucas off that his body was still in repair while he was stuck in here now.

The sun was stationary, the only bright warm light in the surrounding abyss. The black spot was still there, as tiny as it was, it stuck to the sun, not wanting to let go.

Lucas stood there looking at the sun. His eyes didn't hurt from the light, he only felt the soothing warmth. He said a few things to the sun and even the dark spot, but nothing happened. Nobody was answering him.

After an unknown amount of time did something happen, and the black spot covered the sun like many times before. Now there was nothing anymore, the bloody fiery eyes didn't appear as Lucas had hoped. There was nothing, only darkness, Lucas couldn't tell if he was standing or floating.

The darkness slowly started to change into scenes of his past, but the strange thing was that he could feel what he felt back then as well. He saw the training of Liam again, the pain the potions brought he felt while watching it happen.

The scenery changed and changed, sometimes a happy memory where his heart could heal for a moment. But most of the times it was a painful or embarrassing one. The surroundings changed once more into the torture that Venion did to him. He couldn't move, attack, or use spells, he was stuck in the past he couldn't change. The face of Venion felt real, it was hidden, but now that Lucas knew how he looked he was somewhat glad.

He felt stuck in purgatory. Memory after painful memory, he had to experience them all again, but he couldn't do anything to change it. Even if he had the power to do so, he was forced to experience it all again.

But everything changed when the surroundings changed once more. He was walking down a dirty and muddy road in the cool light from a beautiful moon. He was immediately filled with dread.

'No, NO, NO, NOT AGAIN! PLEASE!'

He was walking down the streets as he usually would with a slight smile on his face, but that was all fake, a memory that he couldn't change. If he were to think about it he would feel some pain, but he could place it beside him. Now, he didn't have a choice, he would experience the same feelings the memory did, there was no escape.

Replaying scene by scene, his mind started to collapse.

'I'm weak. Always was.'

'I'm a coward. Afraid of the dark, loneliness, loss, and death.'

'That was why I ran away that time.'

'All that was left in my mind was fear.'

'I didn't want to die.'

'I survived, but I could never stop blaming myself for being weak...'

"Life is weird, isn't it? Those who are innocent could meet an unfortunate demise, those who are kind are taken advantage of until they aren't worth toying with. Some may know too much or have seen something they weren't supposed to see and be killed so there wouldn't be any loose ends."

'What do we need to do if we just want to live a peaceful life?'

"This universe holds all kinds of people, some good, most of them bad. If you want to live a peaceful life, are you prepared for the consequences?"

Lucas was back to the neverending darkness that surrounded him. His eyes didn't feel empty, no matter how much he wanted it, there was a burning desire there. He felt his eyelids grow heavy and a call to reality as his core said its goodbye.

His core seemed to slowly activate again. It dealt with most of the corrupt energy, so it started to help the body out. He was back into his body, the pain was still there, although lesser.

Out of nowhere energy started to flood his body, his touch had been replaced with pain, but he could feel the amount decreasing slowly. The energy moved around and cleansed the broken body parts from the poison and healed them. Part by part, the pain went away, it started around his chest and head, moving towards his abdomen and legs. The amount of energy and the level of treatment started to increase, it became better and better.

In combination with his core, the damage to his body was being healed, it took some time, but slowly regaining his sense did make him happy. His hearing returned, letting him know that a familiar voice had been shouting runes of the light element for quite some time. It didn't look like she would ever stop. Every time the energy entered his body a new spell was already being cast.

'She's going to kill herself at this rate.'

'So?'

'That would sadden me, she is a good person.'

The number of spells said were simply too much for any Rank 0 mage, she couldn't hold out for very long.

An unspecified amount of time later, Lucas started to feel all the pain in his physical body disappear.

'Looks like she did it.', his vision was slowly returning, starting with shimmering colors to unclear images. It didn't take long before he was himself again, his eyes always had life in them, but it wasn't vibrant, now that returned, if only a little bit.

The first thing he did was check how his core was doing, it had dealt with the corrupt energy on its own, giving the core a darker hue, even with the bright color decorating it. The image felt impossible, yet it was reality, the bright sun of a core with a speck of dark had gained an aura. Not comparable to the normal type of aura that could be forcefully exuded, no it was something different. The aura felt comparable to when he was in the dark, in despair, but it didn't fill him with disgust, but rather a sense of belonging.

His core and body were healed now, but Lucas wasn't going to stop there, he felt that Rank 1 was waiting for him, it was begging him to go. He let his core know it was time to change, throughout the time he had been in pain, the core had been expanding for some time, reaching a state that not a single Rank 0 mage had ever experienced. It looked bloated, ready to evolve into something else, something different.

Receiving the signal it started to compress itself, the pain it had been experiencing was a combination of the dark energy and the fact that it had to wait. It was on edge to evolve but had to hold back all that energy in a way too small container until Lucas was ready. This forced the core to endure more pain, but it did grow more resistant to the energy. The process didn't take too much time and the pain was negligible compared to before, Lucas didn't even have to flinch or recoil, he let it pass like water under the bridge.

The compression stopped when it reached its previous state, but Lucas felt something was different, the core looked more lucent like it was made from a higher material, and the color shone even brighter. The aura that it had manifested not too long ago was pushed back a bit, yet it still remained firm. Whether lucky or unlucky, the core had benefitted from the dark energy, making the dark speck on his core even deeper darkness, while all the healing from Freya provided the core with pure light elemental energy, causing the light to shine even more brightly. His primary elements were strengthened to a degree not a single fresh Rank 1 mage should have.

The core sent a cleansing feeling across his body, ultimately activating all his functions again, the amount of information that entered his brain was overwhelming. He started to see a lot more details, his hearing was improved to the point he could hear the crickets from further away. His smell improved as well, making him smell like a predator feasting on his prey, and most of all the smell of Freya's sweat. She had overexerted herself in order to save him and Lucas couldn't help but be ecstatic about it.

His story could finally begin.