Living Another Day

At the entrance of the cave, Jeffrey was about to enter when once again a powerful aura covered the area, this time his worries vanished, he recognized this aura.

-"Greeting to Grand Uncle." Jeffrey spoke respectfully and bowed in the direction of the aura.

-" Great, you're safe." The space suddenly tore next to Jeffrey and from there an old man appeared. " I didn't expect that the Heigong would be so daring." he was looking at a mountain at the distance.

-" I fought Dale, he joined the Heigong, It's likely that cultivator only moved to save him." Jeffrey looked troubled as he continued. "While I didn't manage to kill him, I cut his arm and obtained some of his things."

Jeffrey showed his uncle the spear and the ring that was in one of the fingers from Dale arm. The old man's gaze turned dark as he saw the spear, he noticed how Jeffrey was exhausted and hurt.

He sighed and said. -" Things been hard, your father will be proud, don't think too much about his escape, his judgment will come."

Jeffrey nodded and looked at the cave, his uncle noticed the worry in his eyes and gestured him to move. When the old man entered the cave he suddenly frowned, he could feel a weird and esoteric magical energy from the fire in the deeper parts of the cave. He looked at Jeffrey but he just shook his head.

The duo hurried but soon they meet a big crowd of disheveled villagers, Jeffrey instantly felt relieved that the villagers were safe, but he didn't find Cyl with the crowd so he continued running deeper into the cave.

As they reached the last room the cave Luckas group was just exiting the room, Jeffrey saw Cyl standing there holding back the fire.

Cyl was having an easier time now, when Luckas and his group exited the room the phenomenon suddenly died down, the power of the fire severely decline after the phenomenon.

He was gazing at Byrth with a serious look, he was the only cultivator in the room and Cyl thought that he was the one who triggered the phenomenon.

As Jeffrey uncle reached the room he waved his hand and all of the fire instantly gathered in his hand, he looked at the fire with a pensive gaze for a few moments. He wanted to ask Cyl what happened but after seeing his state he decided to enquire later.

When the fire was taken care of Cyl slumped down, he was too exhausted to keep standing, after seeing the old man coming to him he clasped his hand and greeted him.

-" Greeting to General Philips." He tried to stand up to greet him accordingly but the old man just waved and looked around.

-" You two did a great job today, go and tend to your injuries I will take care of the rest here." The situation here was direr than he thought, nobody would imagine that the Heigong was courageous enough to invade the Duke territory to carry such a plan.

Philips sighed and looked at the fire in his hand, some traces of the primordial awakening was still there, he was shocked, the level of primal energy in this flame was astonishing. Even the thought of losing someone with such elemental affinity hurt Philips.

He stored the fire in a crystal vial and started to organize the escort party, he decided to go to the closest city, while he was traveling he paid attention to Byrth, he didn't escape his senses and Philips too thought that he was the one that caused the flame to awaken.

Luckas woke up just before they started to travel to the city, he felt weak and pathetic but even thinking about the burning room again made him shudder. He caught up with the group after resting for a bit.

-" Oh Luckas you're finally woke, thank god, I should be thanking you." Ballam was the first one to talk to Luckas."If not for you we all would be dead right now."

Ballam was emotional as he talked, he was genuinely thankful at Luckas. Soon the rest of the group came to him, they all thanked him too.

-" Hey, I'm sorry for what I did back in the village, it's just that circumstances were too dire and i couldn't think straight back then."

-" Don't worry, to be fair a strange person appearing in your village and suddenly you were under attack would make anyone suspicious." Luckas smiled as he dismissed Byrth worries.

He was feellign happy, after all he barely escaped tragedy, he remembered that Byrth was the one that carried him to the exit.

-" Besides that, you saved me back there too, I was too terrified of the flames to do anything." Luckas felt a little shame when the thought back at his state when the fire broke out.

-" I just carried you, it's nothing worth thanking me for, you were the hero there, if you didn't open the cells I doubt that the cultivator would decide to escape so easily." Byrth was serious as he said that, emotions filled his eyes, he still remembered how useless he felt through the whole ordeal.

Luckas smiled and shook his head. -" If you guys didn't stall him, i wouldn't have a chance to do anything, we all did our part."

-"Hahahaha, what a good young lad." Ballam patted Luckas on his shoulder the old man was just too happy of escaping alive. "Byrth, Luckas is right we all did our part, we're all heroes!."

Jothyr felt speechless seeing the shamefulness of his friend. -" What do you mean we all did our part? You just hide away while Byrth and the others fought the cultivator, fuck, even young Jonathan tried to hit him."

-" Hey did you forget I was the bait while Luckas opened our cell? And says you, what you did while your nephew fought with a cultivator?" Ballam felt attacked that his friend was trying to steal his glory away, he was old, and even as a peddler he didn't have too many interesting stories to tell, but now he finally got his glorious adventure, how could he let someone tarnish it?

Seeing the old duo bickering, Luckas laughed, he felt a lot better now, Byrth, Maria, and Jonathan smiled with him, the joyful mood around his group attracted the attention of the people around them, the villagers around them joined in, most of them recognized Luckas and Byrth the two who contributed the most to the escape.

Countless villagers came forward to thank them, some of them already were familiar with Byrth as he lived in the surrounding area, but to them, Luckas was a new face, this only made the villagers feel even more curious about him. Some of the old ladies even came asking if was engaged hoping to rope him into their villagers.