Chương 82: Chapter 79

Recovery was possible. Jason had lost too much muscle to walk on his feet right now, so the wheelchair would still be on the menu. But there was a clear way out. The physical therapy Jason would be doing wasn't coordination or trying to restore his nervous system to a half-working condition. It was all pure muscle training. That afternoon had been magical for him. Wade remembered watching how his best friend kept wiggling his feet, making them move through the rest of that afternoon.

The smile each time, relief and joy. How he kept trying not to tear up, or give excuses that his nose was stuffing up. True happiness really is the end of pain. It made Wade feel real grateful he still had his legs. A simple limp was getting off lucky in comparison. Speaking of - he now realized, technically, he had a level 44 Discount Holy Healer on his team, and debated having Eri try and heal his ass next.

But with his mana bar showing a little closer to the total 125 than he felt comfortable with, Wade decided to try and let it heal back up to the maximum, and later in the night right before it was time to jump into the next world, he'd have Eri do a max-level healing and see how far they could go before things got dangerous. Time, on the other hand, waited for no man. And Zin had his grenades prepared for him at a warehouse.

There wasn't any doordashing to his pad without the demon finding more things to call a favor for, which meant Wade needed to get a car ride there or walk. He didn't have a car. But Leon did. And it just so happened he'd be arriving soon. His time with Jason had been hours, spent chatting, talking and slowly testing the new range of mobility he had. After the one minute of straight healing the skeleton had performed, they knew they couldn't do any more to help out for today.

Jason needed to rest and let his body filter out the mana poisoning from his system. Even in a world with no mana, on a body that had never once needed to evolve around it, life was still an amazing resilient thing. If Wade's body could already adapt and begin flushing out the toxic nature of mana naturally, it meant all life was ready to handle the advent of mana in this world. Catherine was still on shift, she wouldn't get back till much later. Long after Wade was gone.

He wouldn't get to see her reaction to all this, but he could imagine it. For once, he felt like he had paid back some of his debt to that little family of two that had taken him and his sister in two years prior, no questions asked. Catherine was as much his and Ann's mom as she was Jason's. Wade needed to make sure he survived now for the rest of them all. He took a breath, it was time to focus on the followup.

So he sent a few text messages, packed it up, and returned home with Eri to spend whatever time was left preparing with tests. Which ended with Wade back in his bathroom, drying his bare feet. His jeans were soaked through, but the follow-up tests with his half-schemed store-bought ideas had actually worked. That Water Mastery boon was going to pay rent. He was almost prepared for the next round. Almost. His eye turned to the notification on his System interface psyching himself up for what's coming.

The quest he'd paid an entire coin for. Locate the Alchemy Lab - Among the demons of the floating city of Dalrithi, locate the abandoned lab ruins of the notorious Alchemist, Xan'Phane. Rewards: Unlock Potion Crafting. System Alchemy Recipe (Rare). Further quests offered in this line. That was going to be their goal. It might be a little tough since Selena hadn't heard anything about what Dalritith was, nor who the hell Xan'Phane is. The demons on the fishing boat might have the answer however.

That's the plan they were doing. Assuming he actually managed to get out of the mithril sea and back onto the boat. If he fell down through the sea, that'd be... a problem. And speaking of problems, there was another notification on his questlogs that worried him. It had been there since he'd left Play's storefront. Waiting. One coin Challenge Mode selected. Reward: Gain five coins for surviving until the end of this round. The reward was great, but he had no idea what kind of challenge the System would send him.

What he could do was take a guess - it was likely forcefully lower his chances of surviving until the end of the round in some way. Otherwise, the win condition wouldn't be much of a challenge. If he did die, it wouldn't be that great of a loss. Water Mastery had some excellent synergy with his dodge boon, specifically when it came to stamina. But it wasn't some perfect high quality boon either. If he failed to lock this one in, it wouldn't be the end of the world.

"Information is just as valuable." He muttered. His phone rang. It wasn't Play, the NEETess was probably too occupied watching anime or playing a video game right now. But it was someone Wade had been expecting.

"All right, sure, we'll be right out." He said to the phone, then hung up, and grabbed his satchel of mana potions.

"Eri, we're going!" The skeleton sat cross-legged on the living room floor, methodically arranging Wade's collection of takeout coupons by color. Calories per dollar was an important metric to Wade, and sometimes fast-food actually offered a better deal than his usual ramen, lentils, beans, rice and eggs could. The inkblot mask turned toward him. Plan?

"Leon's pulling up on the curb outside, and he's giving us a lift straight to… straight to... goddamn it, even with you it stops me?" Wade sighed.

"We're going straight to ' an acquaintance' of mine. Grab your coat and hat. Not the metal one, the normal one please." Might look odd in the heat out here, but Eri was quite literally immune to any of that now. As for the colander, it had been swiped from Jason's house. And given the healing offered, Jason was more than happy to let the skeleton loot whatever hat he wanted. Wade's phone buzzed again. Five minutes out. Leon's text read.

They made their way down the apartment stairs and out the door again for a third time. They didn't have to walk out to the busy street for long however. A beige 2001 Toyota Corolla with Nevada plates pulled up to the curb, looking dated compared to all the brand new cars running around. The passenger window rolled down manually, and he leaned across the center console.

"What a drive. LA very different place to drive. Is like battlefield out here."

"Also takes goddamn forever just to drive seven miles anywhere, and using blinkers is seen as a sign of weakness for some reason." Wade said, "Trust me, I have opinions about this place. I miss having a car but also really don't miss having a car. Glad you made it here in one piece though." The door creaked as Leon climbed out, and Wade noticed the longsword laying right over the passenger seat.

"That's really conspicuous." Wade said. Leon stretched, joints popping after the long drive.

"Says man hiding skeleton in a trenchcoat." The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident. Eri clicked his jaws a few times, laughing. Leon looked exactly as built and big as he had in Azdrial. Except this time he was wearing normal clothing instead of just his boxers. It felt like seeing a soldier in civilian clothing, given Wade's experience with him. Odd feeling.

"All right, fair point, but in my defense Eri looks like he's going to comic con, happens a lot around here." Wade glanced up and down the street. Nobody even seemed to care or look their way. Los Angeles had seen stranger, and they'd only pay attention if the group was in their way. Eri was basically wearing urban camouflage.

"You good to keep driving for another twenty minutes?" Leon shrugged, reaching for the longsword off the passenger seat and putting into the trunk as he stretched his legs out.

"Long distance trips fine with me, I enjoy driving Vera." He patted the car affectionately.

"She looks rough on outside, but very nice on inside. She take great care of me back." Eri clapped his hands with excitement. He'd seen these cars mosh around everywhere, and now he was getting to go inside one. He was already sitting on the backseat before Wade could even explain how to open the doors. Smart skeleton. Wade climbed in the front expecting to find a small ecosystem of abandoned snack wrappers and maybe some new species of mold in the back seat next to Eri's feet.

Instead, he found working air conditioning and clean seats. It was unnatural. Nineteen year-old cars like this one were supposed to have a cracked windshield, at least three different kinds of mystery sauces permanently etched into the seats, and a single french fry inside the glove box. But this? This was like stepping into a car commercial where everyone was suspiciously happy about their insurance rates.

The lack of food stains made him suspect Leon followed a healthy lifestyle and didn't eat cereal straight from the box. The mortal enemy of racoon-kin like Wade. Or worse: A vegan. He decided to silently put his differences aside for now and opened up the GPS, destination set to Zin's warehouse. And the car sped off with a quiet healthy sounding vroom. As they chatted during the drive, Wade discovered that Leon wasn't vegetarian or vegan as he'd feared, but he did mostly eat healthy home-cooked meals.

Wade decided he would give that a pass for now, in the spirit of cooperation. On Eri's part, he sat behind, head glued to the window, watching the city pass by. Riding inside a car was basically an amusement park ride for him, and the speed Leon went up to made the skeleton giddy. For all of five minutes before they hit traffic, of course.

It ended up taking forty-five minutes, with the GPS personally committed to leading them down the worst possible routes, including one intersection without a dedicated left-turn signal. Leon spent five minutes locked in LA's traditional blood sport of automotive chicken before they got past that. But they rolled into an old industrial complex in one piece, the tires slowly crunching through the gravel as Leon steered his car into shade.

Warehouses stretched across the lot, every window caked with enough tan grime to block any view inside. A chain-link fence surrounded the property, topped with razor wire, but the way into the lot had been wide open for Leon to pass through.

"You certain this is place?" The Russian killed the engine, and the two stayed in the now silent car.

"Is looking like location from horror movie. You know, one where retail worker die first."

"This is LA," Wade said, carefully scanning the streets and the parking lot.

"There isn't a monster waiting to attack us, don't be silly Leon. We'll just get mugged instead. And I don't mean someone mugging us. I mean a hidden no-parking sign somewhere, for exactly today and right now." There had been one such sign earlier on the road, but Wade needed to do some mental calculations on whether that applied to this private parking lot through some convoluted legal loophole that parking enforcement knew like the back of their hand, or if this lot followed its own Murphy's Law rules.

The GPS confirmed they'd arrived at the right address, though the satellite view hadn't prepared him for how abandoned everything looked. Eri climbed out, having figured by himself how the car doors worked from the inside now. He straightened his hat and marched toward the entrance without hesitation. Wade and Leon looked at each other, then both scrambled out of the car, running after the dead-set skeleton marching to the building ahead. The closer they got, the more details they saw, which was... mostly useless.

Like the rest of the warehouses, every single glass panels was so filthy it might as well have been painted brown. Could have been construction equipment blowing dust off the gravel in the general area, or something more innocent. But Wade had a feeling this was very much intentional in some way.

"My friend, this very much looks like trap." Leon said.

"Or at minimum, place where bodies get dumped."

"Don't I know it." Wade muttered, watching Eri take the door handle ahead of them.

"I'm just really hoping this isn't some convoluted long-term betrayal scheme. Hold on Eri, let me scout a bit." For all Wade knew, the grenades were planned for him as advertised, just not in the way he was hoping for, with more immediate explosions. Zin hated Play, and was looking to get free from under her boot. Or bunny slippers. Whatever the NEETess was using. Wade got up nearby, then tried his usual methods of sussing things out.

"Identify." Warehouse door (Low Quality) No shit. He got a little closer, trying to see health bars, and those did appear. Level 31 Human - 100% Level 31 Human - 100% Level 31 Human - 100% Level 86 Greater Infernal Essence - 100%"What the actual fuck?" Wade hissed. That would be Zin all right. But the real problem were the three mega-leveled humans. Illy had told him a goddamn SAS commando wasn't this high up in levels, so who were these guys that could beat a commando? And why were they all exactly the same level?

He looked over to Leon and Eri to let them know and found something else. Level 6 Player - 100% Level 37 Skeletal Champion - 95%"Motherfucker." Wade breathed out.

"The system lowered Eri's level from 44 down." This was bullshit. This was an outrage! He hadn't done jack squat to get his minion's level lowered, the System was stealing his XP! Leon turned to the skeleton, frowning.

"Hmmm, I see it too. What changed? And when?"

"Nothing changed! Other than handing him clothing, he's got nothing else on him that could have lowered his level! What the actual fuck, I want my levels back!" Eri clicked his jaw. He didn't know what was going on, but he felt appalled.

"Wait," Wade stopped halfway, head clicking on.

"You think maybe since he used up some of his mana to heal Jason, he went down levels for it?" Leon shook his head.

"Is five percent health, barely tickle. Is likely not that. Likely." He turned to look over to his old car.

"But, do have idea we might be trying."

"What's the idea?"

"Eri leveling up when given greatsword, da?"

"…You think it's a lack of equipment?"

"Why think anything when we can test?" He turned and walked back to the car, opening the trunk and took out his longsword. Ah. He'd give that over to Eri and they'd see if his levels would come back or not. He drew the blade out of the sheathe, tossed the scabbard back in the trunk, turned and made his way back to the shadow of the warehouse.

"If it work like I think, maybe he g—" Leon's voice cut out. Because as he lifted the sword and extended the hilt to Eri, he held it still. Ending his movement with that blade. After he'd unsheathed it from the car and kept moving around with it on the walk over. A sphere of air slashes ripped half a foot around him outwards in all directions. Before he could so much as blink, a small dozen of those air slices struck Wade like waves. his hands belatedly raised up to shield his face but it was too late.

The slices passed by him, the ones impacting him delivering their full force. It felt… like a bunch of papers had been thrown his way. Eri was completely unaffected on the other hand, the air slashes looking far more cosmetic, none of them managing to cut through his clothing, and especially not his worn trench coat. Leon realized what was going on almost at the same moment it started to happen, and he immediately moved again, not letting himself stay still for a moment longer.

Because that would increase the damage he'd just dealt. The air slices advanced past Eri and Wade, and faded out of existence. All three stood still, looking at what happened.

"Oiii blyyaat," Leon whistled.

"Is... uh, very twitchy for a boon. Sorry."

"Think my luck stat must have triggered, because if that strike of yours was just a flat amount of damage instead of based on how you swung that sword, we'd be in deep shit." Leon's 'attack' had been to slowly hand it off to Eri. Which if it had landed as a hit on anything, probably wouldn't have cut even paper. So the damage it dealt to Wade and Eri had been just as negligible. Eri's clothing had outright blocked all the damage.

"Every bit of extra info is good info," Wade said, brushing some of the dust blown into him. His face and hands still had some aftershock feeling, but more like Leon had tapped him with the sword edge without any real speed. Which he technically had in a way.

"Does mean you'll want to end your swing on the fastest possible attack you got when you actually use that skill. Maybe overhand attack while dropping down, slam it in the ground to keep it still right after?" The falling speed would combine with Leon's downwards swing. Would be super effective. Leon nodded.

"Is good plan. I like it."

"Should also figure out how much out of the sheathe you need to pull the sword for it to have the effects." If this really was full weeb, then just pulling the sword two inches up out of the scabbard and holding still would trigger the effects. But would pulling it again also count as a new unsheathing?

"Focus Wade." Leon said, waving a hand at him.

"We testing with Eri first."

"Ah, right. Sorry, got sidetracked. That boon has a lot of potential." Eri reached a hand out and grabbed the longsword handle. The moment he did, Wade saw the System update in real time. Level 42 Skeletal Longsword Champion - 95% Two less than when he had a greatsword. Wade figured immediately that's because Eri was more used to greatswords than he would a longsword. All the golem hunters used giant weapons to fight. And come to think of it, when Eri hadn't had a single weapon on him, he'd been level 37.

His original level.

"Eri." Wade said slowly.

"Do you remember having a tiny knife on you before you died?" The skeleton clicked his jaw. Yep.

"That dagger wasn't made for combat, was it?" Two jaw clicks. Nope, not for a second.

"And if you were, let's say, completely feral - would you have used that knife to fight with?" Another two jaw clicks.

"Son of a bitch." Wade said, more shocked.

"I think I know how it works now."