章 13: 13 - A Moment Alone.

In the dark cave, the only noise present was that of a strange flame burning the corpse of a massive rat as if it were wood. Even if what the flame was burning was meat, it did not prevent the flame from continuing to light and extinguishing everything left over from the monster out of existence as if that monster were the best flammable fuel to feed it.

Even with something strange like this happening in front of them, the Blessed were so mentally exhausted that no one realized it wasn't natural.

The man who could become invisible rose from the floor extremely tired and looked around as if to find something. And he was not disappointed, since in a few moments a portal began to rise from the ground, a large portal made of a black and unknown metal that in the center contained a wall of purple plasma that released some fragments floating in the air before disappearing as if they had never existed.

The man was not at all impressed with the portal, as he had passed through it every time he left a Fortress. As he limped from pain and tiredness, the man silently left the fortress as he crossed through the portal without speaking to anyone.

None of the other humans there cared about the man's action of going out without talking to anyone, since with so many deaths that happened, especially in the teenagers' case, having had several of their friends die gruesomely in front of them, the last thing they wanted now was to exchange some falsely polite words with someone they would hardly ever see again in life. So the man leaving without speaking to anyone was actually viewed positively by them.

The scarred man at that point was no longer breathing. Even though Wendy spent all of her energy using her Blessing to heal him, a newly Blessed woman who didn't even train her own Blessing was not enough to heal the man's injuries who was already in the throes of death.

Seeing that the man died, Harry didn't even look a second time at his corpse and limped across the portal in slow steps.

Only Noah and Wendy remained. The girl was still processing what just happened to her, that she would never see the friends who grew up with her again, that she might have done something better to be able to help them if she were stronger, but now such thoughts were useless. As for the man, he looked at that place riddled full of corpses with a heavy heart.

But also, in Noah's head, as he looked at the large number of corpses from the fight, a different thought came to his mind, 'How much exp will that get me now that the battle is over?' Just imagining how much he would earn by burning all the rats' corpses that they killed during the boss fight already made Noah's heart race and made him want to continue giving 100% of himself in future battles to survive through the end. But now, the previously almost intact corpses, which had had only a few cuts and bruises, were almost unrecognizable. That man's light bomb destroyed most of the corpses of the smaller rats, leaving only a few scattered remains of rats behind, and only a few truly complete corpses.

'Well, if it weren't for that light bomb he used, we might not have been able to get out of here alive. Better to have pieces of several corpses than to leave my corpse in that pile too and not be able to absorb any,' He thought. 'Having greed is good, but not overkill.'

When Noah thought about burning these monster corpses, he heard a noise behind him and turned to see what it was. Apparently he had been so focused on how much he would earn from these corpses that he forgot that there was someone else with him there.

As he saw Wendy coming toward him with a hopeful look, he quickly thought of something and said aloud as he pointed in one direction. "I knew him. Can you give us a moment alone?"

Wendy froze for a moment and followed the direction at which Noah's finger was pointing. When she saw that he was pointing at the corpse of the scarred man, she felt a little guilty about having just connected the dots of how the two communicated during the invasion. It really looked like they had known each other. "I'm sorry I didn't manage to save him."

Before Noah could answer, she turned sheepishly and went through the portal.

When she finally left, Noah blew out a breath and stopped paying her any mind, looking again at the corpses scattered on the floor, the corpses of the rats in this case; the corpse of the people he didn't really care about. It is true that he and the scarred man knew each other, since the two had invaded some fortresses together, but it was not to the point that Noah truly cared about the man. Seeing him die obviously didn't make Noah happy, but it also didn't make him sad, at most there was a feeling of, 'What a pity,' and nothing more.

Noah had witnessed many deaths of many people with whom he came into contact in the strongholds over the years, seeing people die whom he had worked with as partners no longer affected him. If it was someone he had some kind of relationship with, perhaps, but that was not the case here. The man was just an excuse for what Noah would do next.

With a smile on his face, Noah felt that his strength was recharging quickly from the flame devouring the King of Rats. Feeling that it wouldn't hurt to use his flames again now, Noah opened his palms, each pointed in a different direction with his arms outstretched like weapons. He frantically started shooting at the various corpses around him.

Since the King of Rats was still being consumed, Noah took this chance to have a bit of plenty with himself and used the flames of hell without worrying about the energy spent, just worrying about understanding how they worked and what he could do with them to minimize cost and maximize benefit.

After burning all the corpses, Noah knew that he had spent almost a full energy reserve using the flame without restriction, but it was worth it since he had some interesting ideas of what he could do in the future. Besides that, with the consumption of the King of Rats as a secondary fuel source, he still had half of his energy reservoir even though he spent something around 100% of the total he had available.

Concerning the human bodies, Noah hesitated a little before attempting to consume them, but since he had already been forced to kill someone before in another fortress, absorbing an already dead human body, or what was left of that body after the rats gnawed on it, was not a problem for him in general.

He thought that maybe he could receive some special ability, but after each time he attempted to consume a human, a warning message appeared in front of him for some seconds.

[The "Hell Flames" ability doesn't have a high enough level for that]

Curious, Noah thought that maybe in the future the skill could do something about human corpses, but for now the only thing he could do was level up the skill. He had already done a small test, the ability could hurt humans, but for now, absorbing them was impossible.

Looking around and finding nothing but ashes, he gave a smile of satisfaction not even he knew he could make. For some reason, seeing a place that was once completely full of corpses now almost empty, save for some ashes, was a really beautiful sight in Noah's eyes.

'Maybe it's a consequence of the skill? Honestly, I find it hard not to find it beautiful to see such a scene. It is as if I had just put up several objects for sale, and in the place where they were installed now only piles of money remain.' He laughed to himself at his own stupid analogy as he looked at the ashes on the floor and finally turned to the portal.

Feeling the familiar sensation of crossing the portal by a method that mankind still did not understand, Noah blinked and in the next instant he was back at the entrance to the fortress.

On the other side of the portal Noah saw the agent holding a tablet while looking anxiously in his direction, most likely waiting for answers that Noah was not interested in giving at that moment. He knew he would have no choice but to give answers that satisfied the man, but it wouldn't necessarily have to be the truth…

[User: Noah Stern

Level: 01

28/100 exp

HP: 10/10

Strength: 10

Agility: 10

Stamina: 10

Skills:

(Hell Flames Lv 01 Exp 61/100: A technique that involves invoking the flames of hell itself. The flames of hell were no different from normal flames, but after purifying so many sins and so many sinners, it became the most powerful flame, having even burned the flame god himself, making him beg Lucifer to extinguish the flames before he died. To increase the power of the hellfire flames, the user must burn sins or sinners.)]

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