Link complete

The baby mammoth struggled to stand up after the link was formed.

"You will follow me from now on. Stay close to me," Aru communicated silently to the calf.

The system translated his intent to the baby mammoth. 

The calf was too small to think or be cautious. Aru was the second entity it felt close to, following its mother. Without hesitation, it began to follow him, its fear and sadness easing knowing someone was there to help.

As Aru started to walk, the calf stumbled to keep up with him, unwilling to be separated from him even for a moment.

The warriors who saw what Aru had done looked at him with amazement. 

Das expected the baby mammoth to flee in fear when Aru approached. That's why he made Aru promise to let it leave if it intended to.

Contrary to his expectations, the baby mammoth began to follow Aru like a chick, shocking Das.

"How can someone tame a spirit beast, even if it is just a child, by simply rubbing its head twice?" Das wondered aloud. "Aru, why is it following you?"

"I think it likes me," Aru replied with a smile.

"Oh!"

"How can someone not like Aru?" Nom chimed in from the side while dragging along the four corpses of the demonic wind wolves. Although he looked like a brute, his heart was not made of stone. 

He placed them nearby, grabbed some snow, and rubbed it along his arms to clean the blood stains.

"Just to make sure, should we dig out the demons?" Nom asked.

"What are you saying, Nom? Can something be more dead?" Moru retorted.

*THUMP*

Nom struck the spine of a demonic wind wolf with his gigantic hammer.

"It can."

Meanwhile, Aru began to observe the corpses of the demonic wind wolves. Above their heads, he could see system text displayed, asking him if he wanted to absorb the spirit energy.

'Yes, I want to. But…' Aru hesitated.

…But he didn't understand why the text was appearing even when he wasn't the one who killed them.

The same was true for the rewarded links.

He knew that his links steadily increased when the others killed the demons. 

'The only thing I did was watch the demons die personally. Is that enough to gain benefits from the system? If so, that's too cool,' Aru mused.

'Anway, confirm absorption.'

[Rank 3 wind wolf(parasitised) <spririt 30 energy>]

[Rank 3 wind wolf(parasitised) <spririt 38 energy>]

[Rank 3 wind wolf(parasitised) <spririt 45 energy>]

[Rank 3 wind wolf(parasitised) <spririt 15 energy>]

The total spirit energy within the corpse was about 130 units.

'That's thirteen units of spirit energy.'

A torrent of spirit energy unlike anything he had experienced before began to flow towards his body. Initially, the flow felt warm and cosy, but shortly after, it began to feel a little uncomfortable.

Perhaps it was due to his limited physique, but the flow of spirit energy started to become turbulent inside his body. A slight pain enveloped him as the spirit energy continued to flow into him, causing his body to heat up and a light blush to form on his face.

6.4

7.4

8.4

…

10.4

The spirit energy continued to grow, surpassing ten units and promoting him to a rank 1 warrior. However, it didn't stop there.

…

15.4

16.4 

Aru began to feel real pain. His breath quickened, and his entire body trembled. Naturally, his condition didn't go unnoticed by the warriors.

"Aru, are you okay?" Das asked.

"Hmmm!" Aru nodded, though he didn't look okay at all.

17.4

An intense pain assaulted him. Aru almost screamed out. 

There were 20 units of spirit still in the corpse. That's 2 more units of raising his maximum spirit energy. Aru was sure that his body wouldn't be handle that for the time being.

He knew that if he wished, he could stop the flow of oncoming energy. But he didn't want to waste it.

Suddenly, the mammoth calf nearby patted him with its tiny trunk sensing his discomfort.

17.5

Seeing the baby mammoth, an idea sprouted in Aru's mind

He began to transfer energy from his body into the baby mammoth. After all, it was his link, and he could share spirit energy with it.

17.5

The spirit energy stopped growing immediately, and the pain he felt diminished and disappeared.

The remaining 18 units of spirit energy began to flow into the baby mammoth through Aru, who acted as a conduit.

[Rank 1 Stone mammoth <Spirit energy 5.9>]

6.9

7.9

The calf was exhausted and low on spirit energy. So, instead of increasing the maximum limit, the energy was used to replenish its body.

[Rank 1 Stone mammoth <Spirit 15 energy>]

Soon, it hit the maximum spirit energy the calf can accept. Then, something similar to what Aru had experienced happened to the mammoth calf. 

[Rank 1 Stone mammoth <Spirit energy 15.1>]

The spirit energy limit of the calf began to increase.

[Rank 1 Stone mammoth <Spirit energy 15.9>]

And it soon stopped once it reached 15.9 units.

All the spirit energy from the corpse was exhausted.

Aru, who witnessed the phenomenon from the side was thrilled. His assumption was true. He proved that he could increase the limit of the spirit energy of his links by using energy from corpses of nemesis creatures. 

At the same time, he realised that there were certain limits on his physique to grow with the spirit energy from the corpses.

Although it dampened his mood a little, he was pretty satisfied with how it turned out.

"Aru, come here. Your cheeks are flushed. Let big sister check if you have a fever," Tia approached Aru while he was immersed in his thoughts.

She crouched down to touch him.

"Scoff! Big sister? He should call you aunt." Moru commented.

"Ahaha ha." Nom laughed.

Tia was twenty-eight years old, this year. Still, she looked youthful. So, she was not at all pleased by the comment. 

"You unmarried geezer that stepped into the thirties have no right to judge me." 

She ignored them and touched Aru's ears, neck and forehead. 

Aru wanted to jump away from her prying hands, but he was not able to. So, he waited patiently. 

"You are certainly a little warm. But it's not a fever. However, if you feel sick, be sure to let us know," Tia said, releasing him.