Chapter 25

Even on my feet, I could feel that I was fading in and out of consciousness, luckily I hadn't used any spells today, so my mana reservoir is still full.

"Healing. Healing." Casting two sets of the second tier spell, I was practically at full strength, my bones were mended, all extra shards were expelled from my body, cutting through my muscles and dropping to the ground full of blood.

It would seem that during my nonconsensual flight, I lost my grip on my weapon leading it to be ejected, and hidden somewhere amongst the grass. I guess I'll just have to make due with my backup weapon.

Suddenly in mid air, a blackened spear appeared, summoned from my storage ring, the same one I had once used to deal a critical blow to the first monster we slew together as a party.

It was made of a single material, formed as if sculpted and not smelted, so dark that no light could escape it. Nowadays, I use it whenever it is inconvenient to use my primary, or in this case when I don't have access to it.

I hear the sounds of battle continue, and I reapplied all the necessary buffs I previously had on, but were removed due to me blacking out momentarily.

I quickly dashed up to the monster, arriving before his side in an instant, the dragon had Wrai pinned beneath one of his claws, crushing him into the ground, and the others were doing everything they could to remove him from pulverizing him into bloody mush.

But, despite the relentless barrage of spells and projectiles that bombarded him, he held on, enduring all of the pain that was being inflicted upon him, absolutely determined to eliminate us one by one.

However, he made another mistake, he thought me to be incapacitated, and under ordinary circumstances that maybe would have been true. But I had the clerical ability to heal myself, and I hadn't shown a single hint of me being a cleric since the beginning of our confrontation.

So, I descended upon him, piercing into his side like a shooting star, penetrating him with the entirety of my lance, it dug into him till there wasn't even enough room for me to hold on to.

He roared in complete agony, as he let go of the arm that was crushing my fellow adventure, and started thrashing about, he clawed and teared at the source of the pain, but the wound was too deep.

The sound of his wretched suffering was like music to my ears, though as it continued to slam into my eardrums, it was starting to cause me pain. Throughout all of this I was holding onto his side, most likely where his rib cage was situated, right where I had planted my spear.

Then heat started pervading his body, superheating his scales as it began to burn me and flames grew along his frame, creating a fiery aura of infernal temperatures.

Yet, I still clung on, relying on the fire resistance spell that had been cast on my earlier by Verica, then I reached over and touched pommel of my weapon still sticking out of him, and said clearly aloud -

"Devastate Wound."

The injury exploded, everything around the spear was sent scattered about. Sending bits and pieces of flesh and sinew flying about, creating a crater of missing matter upon him, an entire chunk of him destroyed.

Grabbing the lance, I leaped back, avoiding a swipe of his claws that seemed to blur in my vision, he was still as fast as ever.

Landing upon the earth, I pulled my arm back, holding onto the spear with one hand, and looked into his eyes. They were wide open in alert, bloodshot from the pain, and were clouded by an emotion that, perhaps, he felt for the first time.

Pure, unadulterated -

Fear.

And I heaved. 

A shockwave of pure pressure burst forth from the strength I put into my throw, clearing away all of the particles that had hung in the air around me.

It shot forth, straight as an arrow, with blinding speed. And in an instant lodged itself through its eye, burying itself deep within his skull.

I let out a breath, coming out as steam from the sheer difference in temperature between my internal heat, and the outside. Still hot from the flames of the dragon.

From activating the spell to piercing his head with my thrown weapon.

All of this happened in a mere two seconds.

I looked to my shaking hand, the sheer amount of power put into it being a little too much, and thought about how far I've come, and still how far I've got to go. Because if this much is enough to cause me this much trouble, I could barely fease the heights I will need to reach.

I would have died without them, without people supporting me.

Not that it was a new idea, I would have perished plenty of times throughout all of our journeys, if it wasn't for them. It just got reestablished within my mind.

"Hey, mind giving me a little healing here?" The voice of Wrai snapped me out of my daze, making me remember that he was gravely injured as well, most likely more so than me.

"Yeah. Sorry.

Healing. Healing. Healing. Healing." I casted the spell four times before I deemed that he was sufficiently healthy, at least enough so that he wouldn't die from just walking around.

He just needed some rest now.

"Huh, I always forget how ineffective your healing spells are on people other than yourself." Commented Verica, who somehow appeared beside me when I was stuck in my head, as she inspected Wrai's state.

"It's strange, I've seen many other priests and clerics, but all of their spells were just as effective on themselves as on others."

It was a little quirk of my class. During the five years, my Cleric class somehow evolved into a form I had never heard of. War Cleric. It boosted all supporting spells cast on oneself but made all of those same spells weaker on others.

It is quite the bizarre phenomena, not exactly suited for team combat, but I have a theory that it was my own unconventional way of worship that caused this event, though how true that idea is I just don't know yet.

Hearing a questioning hum coming from Wrai, I turned towards him -

"Well, I think it's pretty cool. 

I mean, it just shows how much you love yourself."