(Arin's POV)
The fog in my eyes had not fully lifted when I witnessed Erika's body collapse.
That final spell, an attack that altered the atomic structure of steel into glass shards, was a masterpiece. I felt a warm surge of pride spreading through my chest, momentarily making me forget the pain wracking my own body.
She had done it. That girl who always doubted herself, who always hid behind my back, had just taken down a tier-three monster single-handedly.
However, that pride quickly turned into choking horror.
Erika's body convulsed violently, then fell with a thud to the ground like a puppet whose strings had been forcibly cut. There was no reflex movement to break her fall. Her skin turned deep red, while thin steam rose from her pores, as if the blood inside her body were boiling.
She was experiencing a mana circuit overheat. Her brain had forced calculations beyond biological limits, burning her delicate nerves with an excessive current of energy.
If I left her there and I passed out here... we would only become a buffet for the other inhabitants of the forest.
"Wake up... damn it..." I growled at myself, my voice sounding wet from the blood pooling in my mouth.
I tried to push myself up with my left hand, but the shoulder missed its hinge, sending a paralyzing jolt of pain down to my fingertips. In this critical moment, my shoulder had suffered an anterior dislocation. The head of my humerus bone had been pushed out of its socket, leaving my left arm hanging uselessly.
Trembling, I leaned my injured shoulder against the cliff wall behind me. I closed my eyes for a moment, took a deep, shuddering breath, and visualized the anatomy of my own shoulder. The position of the displaced humerus head and the empty scapula socket.
One. Two. Three.
CRACK!
"ARGHH!" My scream was stifled, escaping only as a wet growl between lips bitten until they bled.
The world spun violently; black fireflies danced wildly in my vision, threatening to drag me into unconsciousness. However, that painful "click" sensation signaled that the joint had returned to its original position. It still hurt excruciatingly, the ligaments were likely torn and swelling would soon follow, but at least the arm could be moved again.
I dragged my body closer to Erika, ignoring the protests from every muscle fiber. Her pulse was weak and rapid, her body temperature scorching hot like an iron furnace. Her condition was critical, but still stable. She would not die from this, provided no monster tore her apart while she was unconscious.
My gaze shifted to the carcass of the Silver Golem which was now nothing more than a pile of scrap metal. Among the shattered metal debris, there was one object still glowing dimly in the center of its torn mechanical chest. It had to be its Core.
The object was cracked, full of small holes from Erika's Anti-Material attack, but the mana inside still remained. Without thinking, I snatched it with a trembling hand and stuffed it into my pants pocket. Its heat penetrated the fabric, burning the skin of my thigh, but I did not care.
"Come on, Erika..." I whispered hoarsely.
I immediately activated the Minimum Junior Aura. A thin layer of energy wrapped around my body, giving a little extra strength to muscles that were already screaming for rest. I grabbed Erika's collar with my left hand, then began dragging her backward.
Every step was torture. My broken leg felt like it was being sliced by bamboo splinters every time it touched the ground, the cracked bone rubbing against swollen flesh. The distance to the cave was only ten meters, but it felt like running a marathon in hell.
Upon reaching the dark and damp cave, I immediately went to work with what little sanity remained. I tore open the rest of Erika's herbal pouch, scattering Sulphur-Moss powder at the cave entrance. The yellow powder spread a pungent stench, like rotten eggs fermented for a month.
The smell was nauseating, but this was the only way to mask the scent of our blood which was so strong.
Right as I finished scattering the last of the powder, the sound of loud squeaking and panicked footsteps came from outside.
I peeked through a crack in the rocks with bated breath. The Kobold troop had returned. They were not chasing us, but swarming the Silver Golem carcass. With spears and claws, they beat, stabbed, and trampled the metal remains with a madness as if venting a deep-seated grudge.
If they found us, our fate would not be much different from that scrap metal.
My body slid down the cold cave wall. Breathing raggedly, my lungs felt like they were filled with sand. My legs were completely numb, refusing to respond to brain commands anymore. My hands trembled so violently that holding the dagger hilt seemed impossible.
I stared at the dark cave ceiling, where water droplets seeped slowly. Despair crept in, cold and paralyzing, more terrifying than physical pain.
Did any instructor see this distress signal? Brook? Karim? Anyone?
Only the silence of the cave answered my hopes. Only the monotonous sound of dripping water and the savage feast of the Kobolds out there.
The memory suddenly intruded uninvited, dragging my consciousness back to the past. Memories of the stinging smell of sewers, of cold mud coating my skin, of little me curling up trembling under the ruins of a wall, holding my breath until my lungs hurt as monsters passed overhead.
Like a rat.
That was me back then. A weak creature who could only hide, wait for danger to pass, pray to deaf gods, and hope for fate's mercy not to be eaten.
I entered the Academy, trained until I vomited blood, dissected hundreds of monsters, all for one goal: so that I would never have to hide again. So that I could stand tall and destroy anything that threatened me with my own two hands.
Yet, look at me now.
Hiding in a dark and smelly hole. Body severely wounded and helpless. Hoping to wait for the enemy to leave or for the arrival of an uncertain savior.
"Nothing has changed..." I whispered bitterly, my voice breaking. Tears of frustration welled in the corners of my eyes, mixing with the dust and blood on my face. "You are still the same sewer rat, Arin."
My hand groped my pocket, touching the rough surface of the Golem Core, then pulled it out. The dim blue light from the cracked crystal illuminated my dirty face, the only source of light in this darkness.
My mind drifted to the moment of Elena's illness diagnosis in the treatment room. At that time, around her slender neck, hung a Life Magic Stone necklace. An ancient artifact that could give instant vitality to its user, heal fatigue, and grant super strength. However, the artifact worked by cutting the telomeres in cells, forcibly shortening DNA chains. In other words, cutting the user's lifespan for momentary power.
The material... was the same, wasn't it?
My mad scientist eyes began to analyze, pushing aside the sentimental emotions from earlier. This Golem Core was basically a solid mana battery compressed under high pressure. Its chemical structure, if broken down, had a ninety percent similarity to a failed, unstable version of the life magic stone.
I did not have the tools or magic to carve it into an elegant necklace artifact. Besides, I was not an Artificer who could manipulate the shape of objects.
But... I was an Apothecary. I knew how chemical reactions worked.
If I could not wear it outside the body as an accessory... what if I forced it to work from inside my digestive system?
The idea was crazy. It could even be called suicide. This Core contained a concentration of raw mana that was toxic to ordinary humans.
I reached for Erika's medicine bag with stiff movements. There was a bottle of mild acidic solvent, usually used to extract poisons from hard plants, and several high-dose heart stimulant pills.
With trembling hands, I crushed the fragments of the Golem Core using the dagger hilt on a flat stone. The grinding sound rang loud in my ears. The crystal shattered into coarse blue powder that glittered beautifully yet lethally. I poured it into the solvent bottle, then dropped in two stimulant pills as a catalyst.
The liquid in the bottle hissed angrily, frothing, and turned an unnatural neon green color.
I stared at the small bottle in my hand. Its light reflected in my eyes.
This was not a healing potion, but pure poison. This was raw Life-Force forced into liquid form. Drinking this was akin to pouring kerosene directly into a bonfire. My heart could explode from overactivity. Or worse... my remaining lifespan could be slashed by five, ten, or twenty years in a single gulp. I was trading the future for the present.
The fear choked my neck, cold and real.
I was afraid to die.
I was afraid I would never grow up to see the world I wanted to reach.
I was afraid my dream ended here, in this dirty cave, without ever proving anything to the world.
But then I turned to the side. Erika lay pale, her breath growing thinner and more ragged. And out there, the sound of Kobold footsteps began approaching the cave. Their squeaks turned into hungry sniffs. They were bored with the iron Golem carcass and wanted to find fresh meat.
If I did nothing, Erika and I would die in a matter of minutes. Eaten alive by low-level monsters.
"To hell with a long life," I hissed, crushing the glass bottle until my knuckles turned white. "Even if I live a thousand years as a frightened rat, what is the point?"
Without hesitation, I downed the green liquid to the last drop.
It tasted like swallowing molten nails. The liquid did not slide down; rather, it stabbed into every cavity of my throat, burned my esophagus, and landed in my stomach like a napalm bomb.
"GAKKH!"
I clutched my neck, my body convulsing violently on the cold cave floor. My back arched stiffly, the veins in my neck bulging as if about to burst.
Pain! Damn it! IT HURT SO MUCH!!
It did not feel like being healed. It felt like every cell in my body was being forcibly violated to wake from its sleep. My heart battered my ribs at an unnatural speed, thumping madly like an engine pushed to the redline, far past its safe rpm limit.
DUM! DUM! DUM! DUM!
The sound of my own heartbeat deafened my ears.
The capillaries in my eyes burst, turning my vision red. My nose dripped hot fresh blood. My stomach felt torn apart by acid that was now spreading into the bloodstream.
Do not pass out! Do not pass out! If you pass out, you die!
I roared in silence, my mouth opening soundlessly, letting the artificial metabolism burn my body from the inside. It felt as if my blood had been replaced with liquid lava.
However, slowly... the fatigue vanished.
Not because my muscles recovered. My torn muscle fibers did not knit back together. My broken bones did not reconnect. But because my nerves were forced, silenced, and sedated to ignore signals of fatigue and pain. My broken leg was still broken, my wounds still gaped, but my brain was now flooded with artificial dopamine, adrenaline, and endorphins that drowned the pain under waves of aggressive euphoria.
My energy overflowed wildly and brutally. The sensation was intoxicating, as if all my life vitality for the next ten years had been forcibly drawn to be used right this second.
I regulated my breath. Thick white steam escaped my mouth every time I exhaled. My body temperature had risen drastically, turning me into a walking furnace.
I reached for my sword lying on the ground.
The weight was gone. It felt too light, as if I were holding a wooden twig, not a three-kilo iron bar.
I could feel my body cells screaming as the drug forced its way into the digestive system, destroying my natural biological order. Every drop absorbed was a verdict slashing months off my remaining life. I was burning the candle of my life from both ends simultaneously.
Even so, there was no time to lament fate. Regret was a luxury for people who would live tomorrow. I had to finish the fight ahead as quickly as possible, then get out of the forest to save Erika. The faster, the better.
With forced steady steps, ignoring the cracking sound of my shifting leg bones, I walked toward the cave mouth. The shadows of a dozen Kobolds appeared elongating on the cave floor as they approached, sniffing our scent.
I grinned, a wide grin full of blood, revealing red teeth.
Let them come. This rat was dead. What remained now was something far worse, something that no longer cared about pain or death.