CH1013

Head regrown but now fully down a leg, Ben tried to sit up but was forced down the moment he was, Thera kissing him and not caring about what the group he’d been guarding saw.

“You asshole,” she told him as soon as she moved away. “If your soul was still there then you should have told me.”

“… I’m sorry. I didn’t know what to say.”

It was the complete truth. Despite putting the full force of his thoughts towards it, that was an injury he hadn’t thought he’d be walking away from. Even if he didn’t think with his brain, it was still an organ that helped control numerous functions of his body and without it he’d been trapped, only able to keep using his magic to defend the dryads and sirens and watch silently as his girlfriend suffered, not having any words that could have made her feel better despite the totality of his mind being at its maximum speed as he tried to find something that could have given her some peace about it.

She seemed to understand the problem he’d had too, looking at him for a moment before ultimately shaking her head. “Okay, well for now, let’s focus on getting you a new leg and then we can walk them all back to town. Start making food for yourself so I can try to grow it.”

“Town first,” he told her, materializing a new prosthetic since the one he’d made earlier would no longer fit. “I can manage, and it looks like we have too much else to deal with right now. Speaking of.”

He nodded behind her and made her turn, catching sight of the same person he had, standing just outside of the range of Ben’s soul.

“Mora,” Thera called out, the sight of the boy hidden in the woods boosting her stress all over again. “What are you doing here? I told you to stay in town.”

“I’m sorry,” he told her, looking like he was about to cry while Ben rubbed his forehead in stress, not sure how much the boy had seen from all of that but knew that any amount wasn’t good. While they treated the boy like he was roughly ten, in reality Mora was only a few months old, and he might have been near enough to see as Ben was beheaded. If not the exact moment, then he’d definitely witnessed as he was lying on the ground, presumably about to die. While the boy would have seen his soul still there, that was surely something that must have felt like only a matter of time, a horrifying experience when it was happening to one who by all accounts was acting as one of his parents.

And Delair definitely saw my beheading too. Yeah, that’s not going to be great for either of them.

“It’s alright, kiddo,” Ben called out, beckoning him over. “For now, let’s head back. Thera, can you look at everyone here for injuries? I’m not the only one missing a limb, but the other would be easier for you to treat on the way.”

“Alright, but if you’re struggling, then let me know. I can carry you.”

“Don’t worry, I can make prosthetics better than any flesh and blood by this point, I’ll be fine for now,” he told her, standing up and doing a quick spin on his fake leg to prove the point as Mora made his way over before Ben scooped him up in one arm and went to carry Delair in the other, whispering to them as he did. “And there’s nothing for either of you to worry about either, alright? I’m okay.”

He felt Delair try to look at the remains of his original head when he said it but he was faster, pulling them beneath the earth so she couldn’t linger on it and left the child to instead see what looked like untouched land as they all started making their way back, Thera picking up the ground beneath them to fly everyone faster than they could have walked. The fear she’d exuded may have scared off the surrounding demons, but they didn’t know how many were still in town. Better to get there faster to help, even with one concern still on Ben’s mind.

We didn’t get the space demon.

Considering the way the portals all closed when touched by Thera’s fear, it felt safe to say that the demon who’d just come the closest to successfully killing him had been on the other side and was likely still running away in terror from the effect Thera had given off but that meant that particular contender had escaped yet again, off and able to do more damage to the world once its mind eventually cleared.

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But nothing we can do about that now, he told himself. Some army off in the world can try to hunt it down. I’ve got other things to worry about.

When they got back to the dryads village, they could see it was cleared; nobody still there, either adventurers or demons, and it left Ben and Thera exchanging a look before they landed and ferried everyone through the mini-gate to Stonewall on its other side where everyone had gone, their minds leaving Ben to whisper in Thera’s own.

So, it looks like the fear effect you gave off was able to reach all the way to the village.

A result that left her to grimace as she immediately began trying to help clear it in those around her while Ben helped, calming the minds of everyone he could reach as Sachel ran over, barely looking at him to instead focus on those he’d brought before collapsing in relief.