Spirit of the Blood Rock

"Don't hurt him." Aspasia yelled as he charged us.

I placed myself in his way with my buckler infused with my Osgar aura. Even with my earth motes keeping me sturdy, I was pushed back as his axe hit me. Looking down I saw a dent in my buckler.

"How strong is he?" I called out.

"He's an expert in basic aura." Dagfinnr said.

"I'm not sure that's true right now." I dodged the next attack. "He's closer to a Master in terms of pure strength."

I transferred most of my mana into my Speed spell. The more mana put into a spell the stronger it became but there was a threshold where the amount of mana to increase the spells effect would start to double. With my current maximum mana output I could increase my Speed spell by half but wouldn't be able to cast any other spell.

With that I was able to dodge most of his attacks. The ones that did hit me, I had to angle my buckler to make it a glancing blow or I was sent flying. What helped was that Wigand didn't seem to be thinking strategically. He was just mindlessly coming at me swing after swing.

Keeping him away from the others was easy. All I had to do was be the closest target and he'd come towards me. The problem was that only Lariss was trying to help me. She shot an arrow in the ground right next to him and a vine burst out and wrapped around his legs. It stopped him for a moment before turning sickly red and falling apart.

"Stop staring and do something to help." Lariss scolded the others.

"We can't hurt him, he doesn't know what's going on." Aspasia said.

"Then do something to restrain him." I said.

Dagfinnr pulled out his bow and hesitated before firing a shot at Wigand's leg. It pierced through and sprayed bright red blood. Wigand didn't react. When he stepped forward on that leg and flexed his muscles, the arrow snapped. Part of it had to still be in the flesh.

"Dagfinnr don't listen to them. We can't hurt him." Aspasia ran forward and tried to talk to him. "We're guild mates Wigand. You have to stop."

Now that she was the closest target he swung his axe down on her. I was on the other side of him and didn't have enough time to intercept the attack. All I could do was throw myself into him; it was like jumping into a wall. It was just enough to throw his swing off from cutting her down the middle but it didn't miss completely.

Blood sprayed from her left shoulder as golden light flashed from her. As Wigand raised his axe again, I placed myself between them. My Osgar aura was circulated to my max but I didn't have time to switch my spells to take the impact.

My buckler cracked and pain radiated through my my arm. Once again Wigand raised his axe. With Aspasia behind me I couldn't get out of the way without her dying when a flash of light came from behind me. Wigand staggered and I was able to force his axe to the side with my sword.

Lariss pulled Aspasia back as I attacked. Using the flat side of my sword I hit the back of his knees with the full force of my Lydos aura. He cried out in pain and fell to his knees. I quickly pulled out two spinneret sacks and tossed them on the back of his legs. With a Moonlight slash I cut them open and the web fluid poured out. As Wigand tried to stand the webbing began to dry, keeping him from being able to stand.

"What do we do now?" I asked.

"I think this is one of the great spirits of the forest." Lariss pointed to the Blood Rock. "It must have fallen to the corruption and has a hold on Wigand."

"Aspasia, can you perform a cleansing?" I asked.

"If I was at full strength it would be easy, but in my present state I don't know how long it will take even if I can." She held her hand over her wound as a bright light enveloped her shoulder.

Wigand was currently struggling in the webbing but it wouldn't last long.

"Head over to the far side of the rock. Lariss and I will keep him distracted." I said.

She didn't look like she wanted to obey but in the end Dagfinnr helped her to her feet and they headed away.

"Do you have anything that might help us?" I asked.

"If we could get Vegaror's potion down his throat he might be able to come to his senses for a moment. But I doubt he'll let us do that." Lariss said.

"With only one hand the center of balance of the axe will be off. Just focus your arrows at the top of his axe when it's at its highest point." I said.

"Gotcha." She replied.

When he was about to break free I charged him from behind and whacked him with my buckler in the back of the head. It delayed him only a few seconds but we were going for every delayed second we could get. I had thought about trying to grapple him but even without being empowered by the Blood Rock, he'd be much stronger than me with his stage of aura.

After he rose again the three of us began a repetitive dance. He'd raise his axe, an arrow would hit it head, and I'd add to the momentum with my own sword parry. With him being thrown off balance and my speed, it wasn't too hard to keep him busy. The problem we had now was time. My silver core gave me a decent amount of mana but my Speed spell was using it at an alarming rate.

As time dragged on I scaled back my Speed spell and relied on my Osgar aura and broken buckler, yet Wigand didn't seem to be slowing down at all. His determination and speed were the same as when he started. He must be getting constant power from the Blood Rock. Aspasia was working on getting the Blood Rock cleansed but was there a way to break the power flow.

I tried guiding him further away from the Blood Rock to see if that would lessen the effects but that turned out to be a bad idea. Once we got to a certain distance he stopped caring about me and turned towards Lariss. She distanced herself as well but before I could get his attention he noticed Aspasia and Dagfinnr.

Pushing my Speed to its limits, I was able to intercept him but that left me with almost no mana left. Relying fully on my Osgar aura and Lariss' arrows I was just able to resist Wigand's power. Following Lariss' direction, Dagfinnr started to shoot his arrows to throw off his swings as well. Though he tended to miss.

As we were nearing our limit, Aspasia raised her hands into the sky and a beam of light fell upon the Blood Rock. Wigand let out a scream and fell to the ground. As the light hit, the red began to boil off the surface of the rock, falling to the ground as sludge. The longer it lasted the more the strain of the cleansing showed on Aspasia. Her eyes were becoming bloodshot and sweat poured down her face.

When the last of the red corruption fell off, the golden color of the rock underneath began to glow. Aspasia fell forward and was caught by Dagfinnr. The light from the sky ended but the light from the rock took over. I was blinded from it but felt no pain or discomfort. I could feel my wounds begin to heal, my mana recover, and my aura replenish.

'Thank You.' A voice within my head said.

When the light dimmed Lariss walked to the rock and placed her hand on its surface. She breathed a sigh of relief.

"It worked. The great spirit has entered a deep slumber. As long as it's asleep it shouldn't fall back into corruption." She said.

"Aspasia, Dagfinnr. What's going on?" Wigand said.

"It'll take a while to explain." Aspasia said.

"Holy shit, what happened to my arm." He exclaimed. "And who the hell are they?"

Aspasia went over and pulled the massive man into a hug.

As the three of them started to explain to each other what had happened since they split up, Lariss and I began to look through the monster corpses that were still around. There were several good finds and unique organs since they were all abominations. I found a total of ten monster cores.

When we were done we rejoined the others. I handed over three of the monster cores along with some of the parts that would be useful to Aspasia. I had thought about keeping everything but decided against it. They had helped take care of the threat after all. Besides, having them on our good side could prove useful in the future. That was one lesson I had learned from being a politician back on Earth, only make enemies when you have to.

"In the morning we're going to head out of the forest." Aspasia said.

"Are you up to making it out?" I asked.

"The Spirit Stone has restored much of our strength." She said. "And my mind is clear again. We didn't intend to come this far into the forest and weren't prepared. If you intend to go further into the forest we'd only be a hindrance."

We spent the night around the Spirit Stone. The cleansing spell and the Stone's power had changed the area around it. The corruption had been removed from the area and created an oasis of peace in the forest. When morning came we bid them farewell and started to make our way towards the heart of the forest.