I Shall Pervert the Heavens

Blood spurted out of the Black Saber and over the elf as it whimpered and collapsed on the ground.

[Black Saber <Lv. 5> killed!

+ 8 exp]

Zach received his 10 percent cut from the experience due to a monster being killed in the dungeon, while Amy received the other 90 percent.

Feeling a little more confident, she cautiously moved toward the next Black Saber, which couldn't move at all, and thrust the sword through the side of its head. It was stopped by the skull, though, and she had to attack again, this time through the throat while noting its weak point.

[Black Saber <Lv. 6> killed!

+ 10 exp]

The final three Black Sabers weren't about to just accept their deaths. They growled and tried to fight back, one even biting Amy on the leg but wasn't able to pierce through the leather shin guard. She unhesitatingly killed them one after another.

[Black Saber <Lv. 5> killed! + 8 exp]

[Black Saber <Lv. 4> killed! + 6 exp]

[Black Saber <Lv. 5> killed! + 8 exp]

"Don't get comfortable yet. There are five more, uninjured too, trapped in the pitfall traps. I will open the pitfall traps, and you must stop them escaping while the shroom gnome kills them."

Saying so, Zach ordered the gnome, which didn't have a crippled arm, to stand in front of one of the pitfall traps with a stone spear ready. A miner stood next to it, along with Amy and another miner on the other side of the trap, all to prevent the Black Sabers from escaping.

Zach gave Amy a countdown in her head, and upon reaching 'zero,' dropped the trapdoor lid open, revealing the trapped Black Sabers.

The Black Saber, upon seeing the exit open, immediately tried to jump out but was met with a stone spear stabbing it in the shoulder. It growled aggressively and dropped back to the bottom of the trap before attempting to jump out again, this time away from the gnome with a spear.

Amy met the Black Saber with a swing of the sword, glancing across its face and cutting open its nose. The miner also stabbed at the Black Saber, leaving a large cut across its waist.

The Black Saber knew that staying in the trap would be the death of it, so it didn't hesitate to keep trying to escape and each time failed woefully while losing too much blood until it slumped down weakly, letting out its final breath.

[Black Saber <Lv. 6> killed!

+ 10 exp]

Observing its mana veins, Zach noted that its energy in its mana paths began draining just like other animals he had observed. What puzzled him, though, was that it wasn't draining out of the veins, not that he could observe at least. There was clearly a draining effect, yet no outlet. He searched and searched but came up with no answers, making him wonder if it had returned to its basic form, which for a low-level being like him couldn't observe.

The final four wolves fell in similar ways, with him netting another 38 exp and the gnome increasing to <Lv. 2> and even nearly <Lv. 3> from the large amount of exp.

With the battle over and several injuries, Zach didn't know if he should call this improvement or not, but still, he was happy at least his skills were getting better with each fight.

He had Amy return to her room and strip her shirt so he could inspect her wound better and what was happening with her mana veins.

Once her shirt was off, he spared a few stares at her bare breasts but soon focused on her bloody shoulder, which had several puncture wounds from the Black Saber's teeth.

"You will need to disinfect that part. Do you have alcohol?"

"No wine."

"Not the kind of alcohol I meant, but I just hope soap and water will hopefully do enough. How does your shoulder feel?"

"Hurts, bone broken, maybe."

"It is understandable that you feel like that. Are you regretting battling those Black Sabers?" Zach asked.

"Unhappy, yes. Regret, no."

Tsk, stubborn girl!

Zach clicked his imaginary tongue as he inspected inside the wound as he had her remove the dried blood with a clean cloth. The wound was clotting, but he was unsure how her mana veins played a role in the recovery, whether the leak in her mana veins was her body's way of increasing her natural recovery speed, which it was struggling with due to it being reinforced by him, or whether the wound allowed her energy to uncontrollably flow out.

Zach had her lie down so he could spend time inspecting her. He extended his tendrils into her mana veins and felt around near her shoulder where the leak was. He wanted to know what was happening after it leaked out, so he truly focused on the escaping mana and tried to allow his tendrils to follow it.

It took several attempts, but he managed to force the hole in her veins open wider and had one of his mana tendrils push out from it.

Along with the hole widening, it meant the outflow of her energy was also faster.

Thankfully, it was nothing concerning like a true leak of energy, but the point where the injury was allowed her energy to leave the veins and infuse itself into her wounds. None of it was leaking from her body, except for maybe some trace elements, and appeared to be helping her wound heal faster.

"Amy, can you feel your energy in your mana veins?"

"My what?"

"Your mana veins, where your mana, lifeforce, and everything else flows, all based off a base energy."

"I don't know what that is. No," Amy replied in broken English, making Zach feel frustrated and confused at the same time.

"Sigh, how does this feel?"

He artificially stirred up her energy and increased the outflow speed of it into her wound.

"Shoulder, sting."

"Not the pain in your shoulder, the flow of energy entering it."

"No, can't feel."

"Sigh, we will have to work on that. It is helping, or maybe even the driving force, of your shoulder healing. Due to your strengthened veins, it is having a hard time doing it by itself, so I am giving it a boost. If this happens in the future, it will be best if you can do it yourself. But you need to be able to feel it to even think of manipulating it."

"Understood."

Zach continued his work on her shoulder. He increased the speed even more, which caused the young elf woman to complain about feeling woozy and her mana draining, which was understandable.

At the same time, though, he could see the wounds on her shoulder closing at a visible speed, but it would still take a while before they were 100 percent.

"Elf, your technique is horrible," he said to Amy, causing her to clench her fist in frustration. "But I look after my things. I will make you strong."

"I leveled up," she bit her teeth and said.

"Good, but that isn't what I meant. Don't get dependent on levels more than your skills and ability. I have a training method for your sword technique first. Also…"

"What… also?"

"I told you to constantly keep Concealment active. Why isn't it right now?"

Amy was dumbfounded at what he said and hastily activated her Concealment skill, causing her presence to dim and seemingly blend in with the stone bed.

She naturally couldn't escape the eye of the dungeon while he had his mana inside of her, though, but he was fascinated by how activating Concealment caused her entire mana veins to slow down slightly, even refracting themselves to seem a little bit transparent.