Chapter 44: Healing Tank

How in Zeus’s butthole was he going to kill this thing?

Actually, Thomas knew how he could kill the boss. If he could somehow get close without being snapped in half by those very sharp jaws or getting ripped to shreds by its claws, he could simply slap the snapping turtle’s shell, activate his Living Architecture skill, and explode its heart. Simple and done.

And he would receive backlash to his very soul.

Even though killing the boss would possibly save all their lives and most certainly prevent injuries (namely to himself), Thomas knew that killing it using a Healing mana skill was wrong.

He could still do it. Nothing would stop him, and he could heal the burn on his soul pretty much like he had last time. Or maybe spend some time at the local hospital healing people for free. That was nice and wholesome.

But Thomas knew bone deep—no, even deeper, soul deep—that using Living Architecture that way again would be taking a step down a dark path. Yes, he could injure his soul, do some acts of contrition later, and call it good. But there would always be more bosses between him and the exit, more Grimms out there in the world that needed to be put down. Thomas could always find a justification for an instant kill. That was the easy part.

Luckily, Thomas had always been a quick thinker, and half of those thoughts weren’t fully realized. Just fragments of conclusions that made up the whole of his decision.

I am not going to use healing mana to kill.

…What would he use then?

The turtle was still turning ponderously toward the edge of the lily pad, after his friends. So Thomas took out the mace and threw it as hard as he could.

Heh. Some classics never got old.

The mace bonked against the turtle’s rough neck skin, without leaving much of a mark. Though it probably stung a little, because the turtle whipped its wedge-shaped head back toward him and gave another rattling hiss.

He had its attention. Now what was he going to do with it?

That was when Thomas spied the Blood Thirst Sword. It must have been knocked from Jo’s grip when she was struck.

It was unfortunately close to the turtle, well within its striking range, so Thomas sprinted forward as fast as he could. His Combat Foresight warned him that the turtle was going to try to snap down on his head a few moments before it moved. Thomas went into a full baseball slide like he was trying to steal second base. It brought him just under the snapping jaws, and his fingers wrapped around the hilt of the fencer’s sword.

If it had any poison mana in it, he honestly couldn’t tell. But it was sharp, and using it meant he didn’t have to get as close to the turtle as he would with his bear claw.

In an instant, the turtle retracted its neck almost all the way to its shell. That gave Thomas the second he needed to jump back to his feet. Then Thomas’s Combat Foresight warned him of its next move: the claws from the left forepaw were just an instant away from slashing all the way through him.

In that instant, a plan formed. A really dumb plan, probably. But he was only going to get one good shot at this thing. A full step back would have brought him out of range of the claws.

So he took something like a three-quarters step back.

The claws hit him like a truck. But as he’d stepped back, most of the claws scored through his vest and left not even a scratch. Unfortunately, the top claw was longer than the rest and higher. And it slashed right through his throat.

Thomas didn’t have to fake going down. He went down hard, life’s blood gushing everywhere.

Shit, he would have said if he were able to speak or breathe. It had ripped into his jugular.

He slapped a hand over his own throat and activated his healing and Living Architecture to full power. Even then, darkness was starting to gather at the edges of his vision.

He barely had enough sense to remember the plan, which was a good thing because the turtle was doing exactly as he suspected it would. Its MO seemed to be striking a victim down, then going in for the chomp. That’s why it had gone after Jo when she had hit the water.

Now it was sizing him up for the killing blow.

The vital artery and skin was closing with an intense itching, vibrating sensation. Thomas was able to draw in a full breath and see the darkness retract a little when his Combat Foresight helpfully informed him that the snapping turtle’s beak was coming for his midsection.

Thomas rolled toward the turtle, and the beak snapped just where he’d been. He was momentarily under the massive turtle’s throat. So, still holding the sword, Thomas returned the favor and slashed upward.

The Blood Thirst Sword parted wrinkly skin like it was made of an old paper bag. And just for good measure, Thomas half sat up, plunged his curved dagger in, and activated the bear claw, just to rip whatever else he could open.

Honestly, the sword had probably been enough. One of the clawed feet slammed a couple of inches from him as it tried to knock him away, but Thomas had already delivered the fatal blow. Cold reptilian blood gushed over him.

Then the turtle collapsed on top of him.

He wasn’t in danger of suffocating, but this was so, so uncomfortable. He pushed up against the turtle’s wrinkly neck skin and tried to give himself a little space.

“Thomas!” He heard Zach yell.

Then Jo’s voice echoed him. Hers was rougher, like she had swallowed a lot of swamp water. “Thomas!”

Something in him unclenched. They were fine. They were both fine.

“I’m here!” he tried to say, but his throat was not all the way healed.

Frustrated, he tried to push upward and then felt hands grabbing a leg that must have been sticking out from underneath the long neck, and pull.

That helped, and within a few moments he was free… and absolutely drenched in his and the turtle’s blood. Why was dungeon diving so gross sometimes?

He pushed Zach and Jo away and attended to his own injury for a few seconds, coughing and then spitting more blood out. “I’m fine.” The wound fully closed and the dangerous edge of darkness to his vision faded. “I’m fine,” he repeated.

But Jo certainly visibly wasn’t. She and Zach looked like drowned rats, and Jo’s shoulder was cocked downward at an unnatural angle. Even from there he could hear her breathing coming out ragged and bubbly.

“Sit,” he told her. Then spat blood again. “Shoulder?”

“I think it’s… dislocated,” she winced but then said, “It doesn’t hurt. Just feels off.”

“She was fighting a fish with one arm, barehanded,” Zach said, with admiration. “It was pretty gnarly, but we got out. Hey, and it turns out I can boil water.” That explained the burn welts on Zach’s hands. Apparently while he could handle flame, he wasn’t immune to water being boiled around him. Plus, he still had his half-healed injuries.

They were all a mess.

Jo, though, looked stricken. “I lost your katana in the swamp. I’m sorry.”

Thomas shook his head. He did not give a single shit about the katana right now. Instead, he grabbed for his backpack, which had stayed on, though it could definitely use a wash from all the blood.

“What happened?” Jo asked. “How did you kill the snapper?”

“Tanked a hit,” he said, and flashed what he suspected was a very bloody grin. “It got me close enough to stab upward.” Then he pulled out a couple of healing potions and looked to Jo. “I don’t think a healing potion or crystal is going to reset your shoulder, and I don’t want it healing that way.”

“We could leave it. It doesn’t hurt, I just can’t really move my arm.”

He shook his head. “And walk all the way back through the forest like that? Oh, wait.” He dug through his backpack again and pulled out the mundane first aid kit. There was a little info packet inside on how to field-treat basic injuries. Dislocation was one of them. Thomas scanned through the instructions. It seemed simple enough.

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“Okay. Zach, you’re going to have to help me with this best you can. Jo… sorry if this hurts.”

The next couple of minutes were not great for anybody involved, but Jo’s shoulder did pop into place, and Thomas immediately told her to drink down the healing potion. Not only would it heal the joint and retighten the ligaments, it would hopefully purge her of whatever she’d breathed in along with the swamp water.

Then he turned his attention to Zach, whose chest wounds had unfortunately reopened in the struggle with the fish. They weren’t bad, but they were bleeding sluggishly. His face, which Thomas hadn’t had time to really address, was pretty bad, though. His hands, too, were starting to blister.

Zach was looking down at himself in bemusement. If he was in pain, he didn’t show it. “Man, I’m going to have wicked scars. Jo, chicks dig scars, don’t they?”

“Only the wrong kind do. Find yourself a nice girl without any scar fetishes,” Jo suggested.

He couldn’t believe the word “fetishes” had just come out of her mouth. She was so Midwest mom.

“You’re not going to have any scars,” Thomas said. He was already feeling drained as he’d expended a lot of mana, but there was no way he was going to stop until his teammates were as healed as he could make them. “Just stay still and let me work.”

And once again he used his Living Architecture skill.

He found it a little more difficult this time. Not impossible, but… harder than he’d expected. He had half-healed the wound already, so it was like Zach’s body didn’t think it was fresh anymore and wanted to “heal” it by forming scar tissue and just be done with the wound. But Thomas was too stubborn to let that slide. He used his Wellspring mana especially to blast through any resistance, and by the time he was done, Zach wouldn’t have to fend off ladies with a thing for scars.

Thomas still pushed a disgusting-tasting healing mana potion on him. “Drink,” he said heavily. “That should help the burns. Plus, you had open wounds and there’s protozoa and other… stuff in swamp water.” Fuck, he was so tired he could barely think.

Zach raised it in a silent toast of thanks, sat, then downed the potion without complaint. His hands started to clear up almost at once.

And Thomas finally allowed himself to sit down. Or more specifically, he sort of sat down without realizing he was just about to do it.

Ugh. He was covered in blood, and it was starting to dry.

Looking inward, he saw that there was actually a good amount of mana still left in his system. A lot of it had built up his core too. He hadn’t burned it all away. Level 3 mana was potent stuff. He was just probably dealing with some blood loss, considering his throat had been ripped open. The mana in his body was probably taking care of that, but why not give it a boost?

Feeling like his arm weighed 100 pounds, he dug around in his backpack and grabbed another level 3 healing crystal. It almost immediately jellified and washed through his body. The infusion instantly helped. Thomas inhaled, feeling strength and relief flow through him.

Yep. That was the good stuff.