The very first thing Asher did after the demon finally died was try not to panic. To his surprise, the fact that his lower half was no longer attached to his body didn’t seem to freak him out nearly as much as he would have expected. Of course, having had more than a little training in first aid, he fully understood why that was the case.

  I’m going into shock, he thought clinically, watching the blood pour from his torso. I suppose I should do something about that before I die.

  Eternal Regeneration’s second tier skill clearly stated he’d heal through even death, provided his body was mostly intact. Asher had a bad feeling about just how intact the skill would quantify his current predicament. There was always a chance just his torso and head were enough for him to come back from, but he wasn’t all that keen on testing that theory if he didn’t have to.

  Shaking harder than he ever had before, he first dropped his Spatial Lock and Astral Dip, returning their slice of the material realm back to where it belonged. Every second spent within drained more of his energy, and now was not really the best time to pass out. Once he was back, he summoned the entire box of Lesser Restoration potions he’d purchased from Polly. He knew they wouldn’t be nearly strong enough to restore his missing lower half, but reattaching it? Combined with his own Eternal Regeneration, it just might be enough.

  Thank God Complete Resilience works against blood loss, he thought, gritting his teeth as he downed the first of the six bottles. Even with his skills, the world was already beginning to swim, and the edges of his vision were going black as he fought to stay conscious. Reaching out with shaky fingers and a rough application of Distortion, he grabbed the lower half of his body and pulled it toward him, hissing in pain as he did his best to line up his hips with his torso. With his background, he knew better than anyone that there wasn’t a chance in hell of him putting his two halves back together and walking this off. The demon had to have absolutely eviscerated critical bones, organs, and arteries in its attack, and he was one hundred percent still going to die, regardless of whatever magical healing he had on hand.

  That was fine.

  Death, he could handle.

  Come on, he thought, groaning in pain as he firmly yanked his two halves together as best he could. Once they were in the relatively correct position, something that required more than a little guesswork in his current state, he grabbed two more of Polly’s potions and dumped their entire contents all over their connecting spot. That done, he brought another potion to his mouth and chugged that one as well, already feeling the healing try to get to work.

  He could practically sense the magical energy swirling around inside him, before taking one look at the damage he was asking it to repair and turning to look at him like he was crazy. Not even a potion of Restoration would have been enough on its own to save him in his current state, let alone Lesser Restoration. Even so, that was alright.

  I don’t need to survive, I just need you to reattach me, he demanded, using one hand to keep his two halves pulled together as he downed yet another potion, and then grabbing the last of his six potions and dumping that one on the point between his two halves as well. He knew potions were most effective when ingested, but their efficacy dropped with each one drunk. After the first two, the third would barely do anything, and one was basically just wasting potions by the fourth.

  Guess I’ll need to swing by Polly’s shop again and grab some new potions sometime, he thought warily as the world began wavering all the harder and he realized he didn’t have the strength to continue trying to pull himself together. Maybe she’ll let me make a bulk purchase the next time…

  Trying to think suddenly seemed like far more effort than it was worth, and Asher let his head rest against the hard earth of the training ground, content to rest for a little while and let his Eternal Regeneration do what it did best. Part of him screamed that resting was the last thing he should be doing right now, but he was way too tired to care about the rest of the demons attacking the town, or the fact that Samantha was still busy fighting.

  They’ll all be there when you get back… he thought, agreeing with himself as his eyes flickered closed and his heart finally gave up the losing battle of trying to circulate blood that simply wasn’t there. With one last small, shuddering breath, Asher relaxed, letting the calm, soothing darkness take him.

  Pure nothingness, the absence of all matter and energy surrounded him as he drifted, disembodied and separated to his mortal form by all but a thread. Despite the lack of anything resembling eyes, Asher felt the attention of something on him. Something far larger than anything he ever thought possible. The entity that felt as though it dwarfed planets and had existed since long before time itself gazed upon him, and while it couldn’t speak, Asher could clearly sense one singular, powerful emotion radiating off of it somehow.

  Curiosity.

  With a gasp, Asher jolted awake, sweat pouring down his face as the sensation of being observed by that vast nothingness clung to his body. Unable to move or breathe or even close his eyes that hadn’t existed, he’d been purely at the mercy of that strange entity right up until his skill had snapped him back to his body. Shuddering, he instinctively tried to pull his legs toward him and curl up into the fetal position, before a wave of pain unlike anything he’d ever felt before broke him out of his horrified trance.

  Stolen story; please report.

  The pain was so bad Asher couldn’t even scream, and he simply lay there twitching with his mouth open, struggling to draw breath. Once the pain had abated to a more tolerable level where it only felt as though he was dipping his lower half into a vat of acid, he carefully propped up his head and glanced down at himself.

  It was hard to tell how well his desperate attempt at reconnecting his severed half had gone with how much blood was everywhere, both his and the demon's, but seeing as he was alive once more, he must have done a decent enough job. If he had to guess, he’d assume the magic had focused on restoring the most critical of systems first for his survival. Things like his arteries and ruptured organs. That meant the far less important things like his bones and nerves were probably still shot to hell and ever so slowly healing, which would explain the excruciating pain.

  “So this is what victory feels like…” he muttered, letting his head fall back to the ground and staring up at the night sky. It was still pitch-black out, so either he’d been lying dead on the ground for an entire day and nobody had bothered to move him, or he’d only been out for a few hours at most. Though with how damaged his body still was, he had a feeling he hadn’t actually been dead for all that long this time around.

  Burning through my entire stock of Lesser Restoration potions probably helped with that…

  While he tried to gather his thoughts, he strained to hear if any noise was coming from the nearby town. Yet despite his best efforts, he couldn’t make out anything. Not the sounds of screaming as demons tore through people, nor the sounds of excited cheering as the forces from the academy killed off the last of the attacking forces. He wanted nothing more than to get up and run over there, to find Samantha and make sure everything was okay, but he wasn’t really in a position to do so.

  Samantha!

  With a start, Asher’s foggy mind cleared up a bit more, and he quickly focused on her Eternal Mark. There was a split second before he received the readings, and he let out a sigh of relief when his mark confirmed she was still alive and okay. She’d taken on a few superficial cuts here and there and some minor bruising, but other than that, she was totally fine.

  Oh yeah, Brian’s still in my Personal Rift…

  Knowing how much he disliked it in there, Asher focused his skill and pulled him out. It wasn’t until he saw the boy blink at the sudden change and desperately look around for his sister that the thought occurred to him it may have been wise to keep him in there just a little bit longer.

  “Asher?!” Brian all but shouted, finally spotting him lying on the ground, covered in what honestly was an impressive amount of blood. “Oh, God, are you dying?!”

  “Kinda the opposite,” he laughed weakly, his face screwing up in the pain doing so caused him. “Don’t worry, Samantha’s okay, I just checked on her with my mark. I can’t hear any distant sounds, so I think the worst of the battle is over.”

  “Are we in the academy?” Brian asked, looking around and finally spotting the fallen corpse of the greater demon. His eyes bugged out at the sheer size of the fallen foe, and he took a step back unconsciously, despite the fact that it was clearly dead. “What… what is that?!”

  “That would be the reason I’m lying here on the ground, instead of running off to check on Samantha,” Asher said, realizing the sight of the greater demon might raise questions he didn’t want to answer if anyone else saw it. Reaching out a hand with Distortion, Asher touched the greater demon’s corpse and pulled it into his rift.

  Recalling how a certain alchemist had reacted to the blood of a simple imp back in the lich’s tower, he had a good feeling he might be able to get a decent number of shards from the greater demon’s corpse once they reached the capital.

  “Where is everyone?” Brian finally asked after the demon’s body vanished as he picked up Asher’s daggers and placed them carefully beside his prone form. “The place looks empty.”

  “My guess? I figured they have drills for this sort of thing,” Asher said, shaking his head slightly. “Not for a demon attack specifically, but for a raid, I mean. Seeing as the students are primarily kids without so much as their origin element, I’d bet they’re trained to hide deep within the fort, with their instructors standing guard. There were at least six warriors out here, but the demon took them out before I got here.”

  It was only then that Asher remembered the old man, and he gasped.

  “Brian, do you see an older-looking man off by the wall? With a white beard and missing an arm?”

  “…There’s a guy missing an arm who is half buried under a portion of a collapsed wall. Do you mean him?”

  “Yeah, that’s probably him,” Asher admitted with a grimace. Trying to catch the man would have been unwise, but he still felt a tad responsible for just letting the already severely wounded man ragdoll through him. “Can you check and see if he’s okay?”

  “Okay, I’ll be right back,” Brian nodded, running out of his view. Asher couldn’t see what he was doing, but a few minutes later, Brian returned, looking a bit flushed and out of breath. “He’s still alive. Bloody, but okay.”

  “Well that’s one thing I guess,” Asher said, letting out a sigh of relief. I guess the potion closed up the wound from his missing arm. Lucky guy.

  “So… what now?” Brian asked, standing there with his hands at his side, looking like he wanted to be doing something. “What’s the plan?”

  “Currently? I’m going to lie here until I can move my toes without crying,” Asher said, earning a surprised look from Brian. “Yeah, I got hurt in a bad way. But you know me, I’ll be good as new in no time. I know you want to check on your sister, but she’s tough. She’ll probably come get us before long. I don’t know if there are any more lesser demons or imps running around outside the academy walls, so you should stay here with me for now.”

  “Alright,” Brian said slowly, thankfully seeing the reason in his words. “Can you keep watching Sam through your mark?”

  “Don’t worry, if something happens, I’ll Recall over there the moment it does,” Asher said, giving him a reassuring smile. “I may be stuck on the ground, but that doesn’t mean I can’t stab stuff while I’m down here.”

  “Really?” Brian asked, giving him that same look he used anytime Asher told him certain things about his world, like how they drove wagons not drawn by animals or how anyone could talk to anyone else with the push of a button.

  “Yes, really,” Asher chuckled, immediately regretting the action as pain wracked him yet again. “But don’t worry, I don’t think that will be necessary. I’m pretty certain the battle is already over.”

  very good chance that greater demon corpse is going to fetch a literal fortune in shards once he finds the right buyer haha.

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