MOVE

My eyes shot open, though the sudden hit of extreme stimulation sent a massive pain through my eyes. I quickly closed them, but even with them closed I felt as though I could see. I was connected to everything, like I was a part of its system.

I slowly opened my eyes, I quickly got used to the light. I suddenly get the urge to look at my status menu. I wanted to see how much my stats have changed since Iris's soul was transferred to me.

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Level 98

Race: ???

Elements:???

Mana:200,000

Stamina: 89x3

Strength: 200x3

Intelligence: 186x3

Charisma: 240

Defence: 81

Agility: 79x3

Luck: 57

Magic Power: 200

Unique Magic: Life Drain

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Though my stats have definitely changed, it was hard to tell how much of it was due to Iris and how much was due to me gaining 36 levels, which I assume I got from killing the Ogre. I had no idea how scaling worked in this world. It was hard to calculate the amount of stats I would gain in 1 level because I have never just gained 1 level at a time. I just have to assume that I do have Iris's stats.

I also noticed that I had Magic Power, which had stayed at 0 until now and even Iris's Unique Magic was listed. I then saw my mana at 200,000 and was shocked, but not even seconds later it started to drop, drastically.

The pain was almost gone, and without realising I was already using both of my hands to look through the status menu, but why was my mana going down so fast and then I realised, it must be because of Life Drain. Though I was healing at an insane rate, my mana would drop at the same rate. If I didn't have such a big mana pool, then I would have probably died. Luckily as I neared my full recovery; the rate at which my mana dropped slowed down, getting to the point of only going down 1 mana every 10 or so seconds, why it didn't stop going down is something I'm not sure about.

I slowly stopped up, the roots attached to my back and arms created some resistance, but I felt brand new, like I was never injured in the first place. Though this spell is incredible, it's not convenient to constantly use this during a fight, my mana was already at 102,000, which means I can't let myself get fatally injured until my mana is fully restored. The biggest thing that I had noticed though, was that I was lighter, a lot lighter as I looked down and fell over due to shock.

My fat was gone, completely gone, but not only my muscle, but it looked like I only had one layer of skin covering my skeleton, with my ribs practically popping out of my skin.

I felt a violent, gut-wrenching grief pierce my heart as I tried finding any place on my body that wasn't macerated…

Nothing but bones and ligaments were visible, almost jutting out of the skin. They became less visible as life drain restored more of my appearance and less of my vital organs, but the daunting nature of this ability still sent shivers. I touched my face only to find my jawbone reduced to an angular shape, losing all semblance of vivaciousness.

"AHHHHGGGGG," I screamed as I fell to my scrawny, yet rejuvenating knees in agony. If something was clear, it was that I never wanted to experience this again. Unbearable, wouldn't even start to describe the pain and chills coming from this. My neck gave out under the weight of my pensive, sorrowful state, leaving me looking at the ground upon which I kneel on, in all my pitifullness.

I felt as though my identity had been ripped off of me and thrown away, as nothing about me looked or felt like… me. I punched the ground, as I felt a burning sensation in my eyes, this couldn't be happening to me.

Though, I felt my body slowly recuperating from this, as layers of muscles and tissue were rebuilding themselves and the pain stopped abruptly throughout this process.

A couple minutes passed, but it felt like centuries as my body was regenerating from this frail stature. The dread silenced my surroundings, but as I started feeling more… Well, less dead, I started focusing less on my mortality and more on trying to figure out what I needed to do.

*BOOM*

The sound of lightning boomed around the forest. Startled, and unsure what it was, I sat completely still and listened. The forest stayed dead quiet, nothing could be heard, no birds chirping, not even the sound of leaves moving in the wind, almost as though they had been listening too.

*BOOM*

A more violent sounding lightning boomed around the forest again. Without even realising I had already started running towards where the sounds seemed to be coming from, I felt faster, a lot faster and nimble as well. I was cruising through the forest and dodging almost every obstacle with such ease, it felt like I was just running through them. I quickly noticed the massive rumbling coming from behind me, the roots attached to me followed as I ran through the forest, breaking and cracking the ground open.

*BOOM*

The lightning struck again. It was so loud and powerful it shook the trees, even breaking some that were closer to the point of its origin, as I got closer I passed more and more broken trees, some looking like they were burnt alive, and spots on the grass where it had been completely burnt off. The forest at this point looked completely black, like someone had painted the trees and the grass black, there was almost no sign of life.

I stopped to look around, I listened for the lightning but there was nothing. I climbed to the top of one of the trees to hopefully find where the lightning was coming from. As I looked over the horizon, I noticed a spot in the forest that had almost no trees surrounding it.

I got a closer look only to see Venus standing completely still, with the only thing close to be the head of somebody. In slight shock, I froze, standing on a tree watching Venus as she continued to stay frozen in place, suddenly lightning struck down where she was standing and the purple glow that once surrounded her had disappeared as she slowly crashed to the ground.

Though it looked like Venus had won, I felt a chill down my spine, one that terrified me to my soul, even reaching the part of my soul that was holding Iris. I looked behind me to check if the roots were still attached to me, they had stretched all the way up the tree, breaking some smaller ones on the way up. This relieved me and gave me a sense that these roots will follow me no matter what stands in my way.

I looked back only to notice that Venus was suddenly being brutalized, I could see her body shaking as she was gasping for air and I could hear the laughter of Tyrus as he slowly killed her.

But my body wouldn't move. I tried too hard to get to her, but I couldn't move. I looked at my hands only to see that they were shaking uncontrollably and I was losing balance to the extreme twitch of my legs.

I was terrified, I didn't want to get hurt again, thought my body had rebuilt most of itself, I didn't feel the same. I felt as though I would shatter as soon as I hit anything, being fast wouldn't be good enough. I didn't want to go back between the Realm of Life and Death.

For a moment, I thought about leaving, forgetting that Venus existed and moving on without her. That way I wouldn't have to risk getting hurt again and I could escape with Lutea back to Harpania, where it was safe.

"MOVE OLIVER, MOVE," I suddenly heard a scream, echoing around my head.

"MOVE YOU DAMN COWARD, MOVE!"

"NO, I DON'T WANT TO," I yelled out loud as I clenched my fist as tight as I could and started to charge a 2000 mana punch.

"SAVE HER OLIVER," as the screeching voice echoed in my head, but my body moved against my will. I leaped off the tree and flew towards Tyrus with extreme speed. The vines connected to me followed me, breaking the tree I was standing and cracking the ground close to where Tyrus and Venus were.

"AHHHHHHHG," I yelled with anger, Tyrus turned around to face me, but was stopped by Venus, giving me enough time to land the punch. As I swung my punch towards his chest, I could see the slight worry on his face as he knew he couldn't block it in time.

"ITS TIME FOR ROUND TWO," I yelled at him as I made contact with his chest, I could hear the massive crack of his bones seconds before he was sent flying hundreds of metres away, breaking everything in this path.

My arm almost instantly shattered, but I couldn't feel it, I couldn't even feel the impact of the punch. I looked at my arm quickly regrow itself, and watched my mana deplete quickly.

"Master!" I heard Venus's weak voice as she grabbed my leg and smiled at me. Her body looked destroyed, her chest looked like it was caving and her hands were shaking intensely. Her once beautiful midnight purple feathers look wilted, like they were decomposing and yet she kept her warm smile on her face as her grip on me loosened.

She was going to die.