Deeper Down

It has been a few days since Magnus had his talk with Louviarch. It was the day that his clothes were going to be delivered to the inn he was staying in.

Waiting expectantly, Magnus watched as a backpack was brought to his door. He took the bag in and looked inside.

On top of all the garments were his original clothes. His jeans and shirt.

They were newly washed and even repaired. Magnus nodded in satisfaction.

As for the clothes he requested, they were neatly sorted out. On the right part of the pack were cotton shirts with the appropriate shape.

On the left were his pants. Those were a mix of cotton and leather, mimicking his original jeans' designs. Although the fabric was different, the colour was more or less accurate, which was a great sight to see.

Magnus was happy with what he got.

At least now he wouldn't look like he did not know hygiene if he ever appeared before the populace again.

He had been quite dirty in his fights, but he luckily grimed up well—he looked good in the dirt. And he knew how to make wounds and dirt look pleasing to the eye.

It was a skill he learned after doing outdoor-related activities for most of his life.

...It just didn't work out if he was way too dirty.

Now that he had his clothes, Magnus decided it was time to leave. The information that he needed had been collected as well.

He was going to meet up with Restiel who had been scouring the forest for goodies to take. His efforts had proven fruitful despite a few trying events when he had to slay a fur ball like Mallow to get the fruits on their fruit tree.

It was a hard fight, especially since this particular fur ball was much stronger than Mallow and Jistill for some reason.

If not for Restiel's ability to fly, Magnus would have called off the operation as it would've meant sure death.

But such a difficulty made sense.

The fruits of the tree seemed to be gleaming with the faint light of blue and were crackling with tingling electricity.

It was special, that was for sure.

Bzzzzzzt!

"Ow!"

Magnus flinched as he was zapped by Restiel's electricity.

"That hurts a lot more than I expected it to hurt," He exclaimed as he commanded Restiel to create a few different movements with the electricity.

Small zaps here and there popped up as arcs of blue. They zapped to the tune Jingle Bells, like a musical tesla coil.

"So eating this fruit gifts my body with the ability to command electricity..." Magnus was puzzled as to why such a fruit appeared in the forest of all places. Spirit Energy and those that use it were very particular about the location.

Lava monsters stayed in lava.

Earth monsters stayed in the earth,

So on and so forth.

Then, what were these fruits doing in a place practically void of lightning?

"I have no clue," Magnus smacked his lips as he dug a tunnel out using Spirit Manipulation.

He was currently headed deep into the earth from the side of a rather familiar volcanic area. He just skirted the edges of the magma as he dug until he made it to a different layer of stones.

"—Oh shit!" Magnus watched as Restiel who had been standing beside him suddenly plummet downwards with no space to spread his wings.

Gravity instantly reversed, and the angel was able to remain floating.

Magnus realised he had dug into some chute. He descended slowly, holding a small ball of flames in his right hand.

"Hm?"

Magnus felt the area around him spread out into a vast chasm. Water could be heard running beneath his feet.

He lobbed a fireball in the direction of the water and discovered a river that was a good several dozen metres wide.

What was eerie though were the skeletal faces that suddenly glanced up in Magnus' direction the moment he did so. They were standing idly by on the banks of the river, doing nothing but being dead.

The fireball was then snuffed out by the waters, and everything returned to darkness.

"...Did I see that right?" Magnus prepared another fireball only to feel something stick into his thigh.

He looked down and realised that an arrow was stuck in it.

"..." Magnus had no words.

Instead, he braced himself for impact as the sound of whistling echoed in his ears. Stones flew over from above him and gave him and Restiel armour hard enough to stop the arrows.

The arrows bounced helplessly from the armour they wore, but Magnus could keenly feel the impact of each strike. It was like a punch every time.

As for the arrow in Magnus' thigh, he didn't know how to deal with it.

"Should I snap the shaft, leave it as is, or pull it out?"

Magnus suddenly noticed that his flesh was absorbing a sickly black colour.

"Well, I'm pulling it out for sure," He raised his brows incredulously as he tugged at the arrow.

Shhhhk!

The sound of tearing flesh sounded out and Magnus frowned heavily.

"Urgh..."

The pain was greater than he imagined. He held the arrow close to his face and saw just why it hurt so much.

"It's barbed... Damn..."

Magnus turned to Restiel as he breathed heavily. He pulled both himself and Restiel back into the chute they had fallen from to stay away from the arrows.

"Purification.... please..."

Restiel wordlessly executed his task. A beautiful white glow surrounded him and began flowing into Magnus' wound as a stream of energy. The contamination was instantly prevented from advancing and eventually extinguished.

"Undead huh," Magnus wiped the sweat off his face as he tried his best to bandage his new, really deep wound.

He also took some fruit and consumed it to hopefully help his wound heal. The feeling of consuming life once again sent a rush into Magnus' brain. The crackling taste of the electric feeling was also a one-of-kind flavour.

He ate another one to guarantee his healing.

It was only when the burning pain died down that Magnus decided to once again head down.

"I have this urge to burn all of these reanimated skeletons..." Magnus controlled several fireballs to spread across the area and give him light.

What he saw were several squads of skeletons wielding either swords, bows, or shields. Some wore armour, while some wielded farming equipment instead of weapons.

"Has that brief experience being in the corpse disposal business influenced me this much?" He laughed to himself as he indeed began bombarding the skeletons with flames.

Fire consumed the area, swallowing several squads at the same time. But the fire was not hot enough. All Magnus could do was singe and blacken their bones.

He lacked the explosions usually seen in generic fantasy fireballs. All he had was an explosion of Spirit Energy that had been set ablaze—which wasn't much, as fire and Spirit Energy was generally intangible.

Thus, Magnus decided to have a go with earth.

The element he was most familiar with.

"I can even do this now," Magnus smiled as boulders were cut out of the ground and brought into the air by the lack of gravity.

"Let's see if you lot can survive death by crushing!" Magnus yelled out.

Boom!

Boom!

Boom!

The boulders all descended like crazy, shattering the skeletons of the archers, and pounding them into dust. Unfortunately, the same could not be said to the ones wielding swords and shields.

For some reason, it was the rock that cracked instead of their bones.

Magnus was stunned for sure.

"...They're stronger than I imagined. Those boulders were larger than a typical car!" He exclaimed.

Then a thought wormed its way into his mind, "What about purification?"

That's how it usually worked in games, right? Holy powers usually dealt extra damage to the undead.

The purification that Restiel could use was basically a taste of Divine Energy. It should work.

So, Magnus put his idea to the test. Restiel held his hand out in a domineering manner with his expressionless face. He began glowing in a holy white light that flowed towards his palm and formed a ball.

The ball, under Restiel's and Magnus' command, flew out and smote one of the skeletons.

It zoomed through the skeletal body like a pillar of light descending from Restiel's hand.

What followed next was instant annihilation.

Magnus watched as the skeleton literally melted under the light of purification.

"It works!" He pumped his fist in joy, "But it costs a lot of Spirit Energy..."

He looked around him and discovered at least a hundred skeletons. More were probably lingering outside his range of vision.

It was then, when the pillar of light disappeared, that Magnus felt a surge of energy flow into Restiel at that moment.

"Hm? Could it be...?" Magnus had a fierce suspicion.

An angel getting a boost of energy from killing an undead being..? That was clearly something out of a book, but reality tended to be stranger than fiction. Magnus could accept such a thing, especially with the name of Restiel's Blessing being Archangel of Divine Judgement.

He had just passed judgement on that skeleton, so what was the problem?

Clearly, this was doing what his Blessing let him do. It made less sense for it to be some random coincidence.

Unfortunately for Magnus,

"The energy absorbed isn't Spirit Energy." He felt the contents of Restiel's body and discovered the differently-natured energy within him. "It's Divine Energy. Only Restiel can use such energy. It actually hurts me if I try touching it."

Another thing to note was that Magnus did not know how to make Restiel use Divine Energy, as the body's memories did not include anything about using Divine Energy. He would have to slowly figure it out as he went.

For now, he was preparing himself to spend a lot of Spirit Energy purifying an area that was filled with skeletons.

Like killing pests, Magnus and Restiel slew the skeletons one-by-one over the course of several hours.

It was just a repetitive kill this, kill that, kill those, kill them, and avoid the occasional arrow. Magnus eventually got bored and decided to try honing his sword skills by fighting them near the ground.

It slowed down his task's progression even further, but Magnus spent a lot less Spirit Energy for complete purifications. Restiel was gaining Divine Energy just by assisting Magnus in killing the skeletons.

The drops in the bucket were slowly filling it up.

When it was dinner time, Magnus flew back up to the chute he came from and munched on a Spirit Fruit, strengthening his body and re-energizing him in the process of satiating his hunger.

Magnus admired the refreshing feeling of dining on such fruit as he let his mind wander.

'If Tyrm becomes known to other factions other than the group of whoever that suspicious salesman was in, then there would surely be a scramble to obtain it.' A thought surfaced in Magnus' mind that he seriously deliberated on.

The chaos that would be caused by leaking such information would surely make things fun for him, but at the same time, it was likely that he would suffer for it more. After all, he was currently the only other party with knowledge of the place.

He was able to monopolize the riches it brought.

His greed for power was fighting against his desire for thrills.