Repercussions Part-2

Inspect {Human}

Status…

[

Name: Mariah

Race: Human

Class: Hearth keeper lv. 72, Commoner lv. 1

Level: 73

Age: 36

Title: None

Stats:

Health: 410/ 830

Mana: 105/ 410

Constitution: 83 Spirit: 41

Strength: 32 Agility: 30

Int: 20 

Skills: Cooking Lv. 38, DustAway Lv. 22, Warmth of home Lv. 68, Gentle Glow Lv. 26

Status: Soul Injury lv. 1, Mental trauma lv. 3, Mental corruption lv.5

]

Peter's heartbeat stilled in horror as he looked at her status. He couldn't believe what he was looking at. Eyes wide with disbelief, face wet with newly shed tears.

'This can't be… what was her fault? How did this happen? How!?' he wept in anguish, shouting at the ceiling. 'What is this injustice? Is this his punishment?' Clutching Mariah's head to his chest, Peter wailed. In response to his decreasing mental stability, his defensive skills surged, creating a mental ward to keep negative emotions away.

Eternal Ward safeguarded his mental faculties, and Spirit of Fortitude resisted mental breakdown. While Undying Vitality nourished his sanity. Once he was capable of thinking again, it didn't take Peter long to realise who had harmed her. It was him. He was responsible for her current state. Knowingly or Unknowingly. This was the result of his actions.

A single glance at her face felt like a knife plunging deep into his heart, twisting slowly, tearing him apart from within. Shame. Hurt. Regret. They crashed down on him all at once. Grief spilt from his eyes, despite the constant reinforcement from his defensive skills. Mariah stayed rooted with a blank expression adorning her beautiful face, her body fully relaxed in his embrace.

….

Narrator P.O.V.

DeathKnell glided across the forest floor, melting into the shadows, after the running kobolds.

'Kill! Kill! Kill!' Deathknell thought. That's all it ever thought. It only knew slaughter. Foolish mutts kept running, not realising that they were leading it straight to their nest.

The Walking Calamity had been clear when he gave the order — kill them all. And from the emotions shared through their contract bond, DeathKnell knew he didn't just want them dead. He wanted them to suffer.

DeathKnell could have killed them long ago. There was no need to trail them like this, but then it would have had to hunt down the others on itself. So it waited, hidden among his domain, trailing after kobolds without their knowledge.

Now and then, one of the kobolds would collapse, too exhausted to run any further. Kobolds were too terrified to care about exhausted brethren. They were never too loyal to each other. The tribe could give birth to more, even if some died while escaping.

DeathKnell pulled abandoned ones with a flicker of shadow manipulation into oblivion, once the kobold left their brethren too far behind. Nothing extravagant, just tendrils made up of shadows.

At last, they arrived at the camp, soon to be their graves, along with their executioner. It was a growing community, right in the middle of the forest. Plenty of kobolds were scattered about, coming out of crude tents made of animal hides and bones or tree branches. A rough, newly erected wall of logs served as security for the camp.

When a dozen kobolds staggered into the camp, terror pheromones leaking from them in waves, it grabbed everyone's attention. Everyone stopped their tasks and grew vigilant. The whole camp grew still, silent as they surveyed their surroundings for the incoming threat.

They looked past the exhausted survivors, eyes scanning the forest, trying to see what had driven them here in such a state. They saw nothing. They were helpless. Finding an eldritch creature that moved within the shadows, with a lack of scent on it, was close to impossible for them. It didn't make sense to the kobolds. These fellow kobolds were coming from the direction of the village the scouts had found. From the same village, where their chief had sent two-thirds of her tribe to conquer.

'Where are the others?' They wondered. Before they could spend enough time thinking about it, Deathknell decided to act. In that moment, shadows moved as one, long spikes erupting to impale hundreds of kobolds in batches. Any that were impaled either died outright or were consumed alive as the spikes grew teeth that bit them into pieces. It was gruesome, grotesque, and remorseless.

Deathknell massacred them all — even the young pups, barely a few days old. Wherever the tide of shadows went, it left a pool of blood in its wake. This was Deathknell's purpose. Killing was the only thing it knew.

Deathknell kept killing until it had consumed the corpses of every last kobold. Once it was done, it moved toward the cave. It could feel a rich mana presence emanating from within the entrance, and it remembered what Walking Calamity had told it.

'Leave none alive. What if some were inside the cave?' Without hesitation, Deathknell moved along the long path, killing any kobolds it encountered along the way.

In the end, the path opened into a chamber. With a ceiling rising five meters high and ten meters between each wall, it was spacious. Inside stood a total of eight kobolds, carrying crude weapons, clad in rusted iron armour. Based on the aura of their mana stones, each of them stood at the peak of Tier One in strength. It didn't matter to Deathknell. Its only instinct was to kill.

These kobolds died just like the rest of their weaker kin, slaughtered without resistance. Helpless against the mass of shadows controlled by the Eldritch Spirit, more than twice as powerful as the kobolds.

Drawn toward the rich mana presence radiating from the far side of the chamber, Deathknell extended a tentacle, smashed through the wall, and moved inside to investigate. There it was. The dungeon core. Defenceless, it could do nothing as Deathknell moved to consume it.

…

Peter slowly made Mariah sit on the bed before helping her lie down. Looking at her face, he recalled his class description. 'Jack of all trades but master of none,' it was mockingly fitting and painfully true. He sat down on the floor beside the bed. Clutching her left palm, he averted his face to avoid looking into her eyes. He gritted his jaw in deep regret. 

'I had been so naïve. Heh. Forgetting the present and dreaming of the future,' he thought, in hindsight, while lamenting his choices. 'Foolishly preparing myself to fight shadowy forces in power,' Peter laughed mockingly, 'What good did it do? I couldn't even protect one person properly. Why did I assume my childhood to be peaceful? Just why?'

'In my arrogance, I had spread myself too thin,' Peter looked at his skills. Weapon Mastery. 'I could wield any weapon, but not well enough to protect the village from an attack.' His eyes fell on his trio of defensive skills, 'heh. I could defend myself, but couldn't offer that same protection to others.' A tear fell from his eye onto Mariah's palm, 'I could heal myself, but… not heal you, mother. Forgive this foolish son of yours, if you can.'

'Your son can do many things, but none are good enough to matter.' Peter buried his face into her palm and whispered apologies. Once he was done blaming himself, fantasising about different outcomes, he sighed. Sitting straight, he examined her condition. She hadn't uttered a single coherent word. A husk of her past self, she could barely function as a human without help.

Peter sniffled before muttering, "Just wait, Mom. I will do everything in my power to heal you." Watching her sleep with a peaceful expression, Peter decided to act fast. They could not stay here for long. Peter had no idea how he would explain to the knights, who were sure to come, how both he and Mariah had survived the attack.

Creating a healing skill capable of healing her would take time. Peter couldn't still until then. His guilt would not allow that. He would have to find someone. Someone who could heal her properly. He didn't know the consequences of keeping her in this state for too long, and he didn't want to find out.

With his priorities straight, Peter finally allowed himself a moment of much-needed respite. He needed sleep - real sleep, and rest. He could delay it with Undying Vitality, but that would defeat the purpose. He needed to assimilate his newly added stats, and sleep would accelerate the process.

Resting his body against the wall, with his head on the bed beside his mother's hand, Peter closed his eyes and drifted into sleep.

…

When Peter woke up, he woke to Mariah caressing his hair with her palm while sitting on the bed. Pushing his front up, he studied her face, "Mom?", a relieved smile on his face. Seconds passed with him hoping that she recovered by some divine miracle. His smile slowly withered away. No, she was just acting on instinct - instincts ingrained deep in her mind.

Standing up from the floor, Peter noted the presence of DeathKnell in his shadow, lying dormant, awaiting his command.

As his summon, Peter shared a soul bond with the eldritch creature. It may have seemed in control, but knowing its nature, Peter didn't trust it much. Now that it was back, though, it likely meant it had annihilated all the kobolds.

Taking a sigh of relief, Peter pulled up his status, wanting to read all the system notifications received during his slumber. Based on his natural clock, it had been a few good hours of slumber. The sun was likely up in the sky. Despite not seeing it due to the absence of a window in this room, Peter was sure of that.

Peter felt his stomach grumble, reminding him to put some food inside. While looking at his status screen, he decided to cook something for both of them.

'She must be hungry too,' he thought. Acting swiftly, he stood up and walked to the door. 

"Ahh…" Mariah muttered, her face morphed with distress, once she saw him walk away. It poked a needle in Peter's heart. He stared back with a reassuring smile. "I'm just going to prepare food, Mom," he said, "Don't worry. I'll be just downstairs for a while. It won't take long."

Mariah quieted down and relaxed, her hollow eyes sparking with a tiny sign of understanding. Peter breathed a sigh of relief. It was a good sign. Based on the signs, her injury might not be too bad, even if not yet recoverable. In case she wanted to follow him, he left the open wide open.

Peter made his way downstairs and frowned at the sight of kobold bodies lying around on the floor. His displeasure was conveyed through his bond to his familiar. His shadow spread outward like black ink, covering every inch of the floor. It rippled and swirled, slowly swallowing all the corpses. Once it was done, it retreated.

Peter surveyed the floor, noting that even the blood had disappeared. Making his way down the newly cleaned hallway, Peter assessed his body. It might take a whole week for him to fully assimilate the new stats, but the effects were already showing. His bones were denser, muscles more compressed. His nervous system was faster, making his thought process and reaction speed a lot sharper.

The raised Perception showed its effects clearly as he felt more attuned to the world around him. Minor details that might've once required deeper focus now came to him easily.

And Dexterity…